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By Roger D Harris and John Perry

The National Endowment for Democracy gets its project funding reinstated by the Trump administration

The brief freeze and rapid partial reinstatement of National Endowment for Democracy (NED) funding in early 2025 helped expose it as a US regime-change tool. Created to rebrand CIA covert operations as “democracy promotion,” the NED channels government funds to opposition groups in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba, meddling in their internal affairs.

Regime change on the US agenda

In 2018, Kenneth Wollack bragged to the US Congress that the NED had given political training to 8,000 young Nicaraguans, many of whom were engaged in a failed attempt to overthrow Nicaragua’s Sandinista government. Wollack was praising the “democracy-promotion” work carried out by NED, of which he is now vice-chair. Carl Gershman, then president of the NED and giving evidence, was asked about Nicaragua’s Daniel Ortega, who had been re-elected with an increased majority two years prior. He responded: “Time for him to go.”

Seven years later, Trump took office and it looked as if the NED’s future was endangered. On February 12, the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) under Elon Musk froze disbursement of its congressionally approved funds. Its activities stopped and its website went blank. On February 24, Richard Grenell, special envoy to Venezuela, declared that “Donald Trump is someone who does not want to make regime changes.”

Washington’s global regime-change operations were immediately impacted and over 2,000 paid US collaborating organizations temporarily defunded. A Biden-appointed judge warned of “potentially catastrophic harm” to (not in her words) US efforts to overturn foreign governments. The howl from the corporate press was deafening. The Associated Press cried: “‘Beacon of freedom’ dims as US initiatives that promote democracy abroad wither.”

However, the pause lasted barely a month. On March 10, funding was largely reinstated.  The NED, which “deeply appreciated” the State Department’s volte face, then made public its current program which, in Latin America and the Caribbean alone, includes over 260 projects costing more than $40 million.

US “soft power”

Created in 1983 under President Ronald Reagan following scandals involving the CIA’s covert funding of foreign interventions, the NED was to shift such operations into a more publicly palatable form under the guise of “democracy promotion.” As Allen Weinstein, NED’s first acting president, infamously admitted in 1991: “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.” In short, NED functions as a “soft power arm” of US foreign policy.

The NED disingenuously operates as a 501(c)(3) private nonprofit foundation. However, it is nearly 100% funded by annual appropriations from the US Congress and governed mainly by Washington officials or ex-officials. In reality, it is an instrument of the US state—and, arguably, of the so-called deep state. But its quasi-private status shields it from many of the disclosure requirements that typically apply to taxpayer-funded agencies.

Hence we encounter verbal gymnastics such as those in its “Duty of Care and Public Disclosure Policies.” That document loftily proclaims: “NED holds itself to high standards of transparency and accountability.” Under a discussion of its “legacy” (with no mention of its CIA pedigree), the NGO boasts: “Transparency has always been central to NED’s identity.”

But it continues, “…transparency for oversight differs significantly from transparency for public consumption.” In other words, it is transparent to the State Department but not to the public. The latter are only offered what it euphemistically calls a “curated public listing of grants” – highly redacted and lacking in specific details.

NED enjoys a number of advantages by operating in the nether region between an accountable US government agency and a private foundation. It offers plausible deniability:the US government can use it to support groups doing its bidding abroad without direct attribution, giving Washington a defense from accusations of interference in the internal affairs of other countries. It is also more palatable for foreign institutions to partner with what is ostensibly an NGO, rather than with the US government itself.

The NED can also respond quickly if regime-change initiatives are needed in countries on Washington’s enemy list, circumventing the usual governmental budgeting procedures. And, as illustrated during that congressional presentation in 2018 on Nicaragua, NED’s activities are framed as supporting democracy, human rights, and civil society. It cynically invokes universal liberal values while promoting narrow Yankee geopolitical interests. Thus its programs are sold as altruistic rather than imperial, and earn positive media headlines like the one from the AP cited above.

But a look at NED’s work in Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba suggests very much the opposite.

Venezuela

Venezuela had passed an NGO Oversight Law in 2024. Like the US’s Foreign Agents Registration Act, but somewhat less restrictive, the law requires certification of NGOs. As even the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) – an inside-the-beltway promoter of US imperialism with a liberal gloss –  admits: “Many Venezuelan organizations receiving US support have not been public about being funding recipients.”

The pace of Washington’s efforts in Venezuela temporarily slowed with the funding pause, as US-funded proxies had to focus on their own survival. Venezuelan government officials, cheering the pause, viewed the NED’s interference in their internal affairs as a violation of Venezuelan sovereignty. In contrast, the US-funded leader of the far-right opposition, Maria Corina Machado, begged for international support to make up for the shortfall from Washington.

WOLA bemoaned that the funding freeze allowed the “Maduro government to further delegitimize NGOs” paid by the US. Hundreds of US-funded organizations, they lamented, “now face the grim choice of going underground, relocating abroad, or shutting down operations altogether.”

With the partial reinstatement of funding, now bankrolling at least 39 projects costing $3.4 million, former US senator and present NED board member Mel Martinez praised the NED for its “tremendous presence in Venezuela… supporting the anti-Maduro movement.”

Nicaragua

Leading up to the 2018 coup attempt, the NED had funded 54 projects worth over $4 million. Much of this went to support supposedly “independent” media, in practice little more than propaganda outlets for Nicaragua’s opposition groups. Afterward, the NED-funded online magazine Global Americans revealed that the NED had “laid “the groundwork for insurrection” in Nicaragua.

One of the main beneficiaries, Confidencial, is owned by the Chamorro family, two of whose members later announced intentions to stand in Nicaragua’s 2021 elections. The family received well over $5 million in US government funding, either from the NED or directly from USAID (now absorbed into the State Department). In 2022, Cristiana Chamorro, who handled much of this funding, was found guilty of money laundering. Her eight-year sentence was commuted to house arrest; after a few months she was given asylum in the US.

Of the 22 Nicaragua-related projects which NED has resumed funding, one third sponsor “independent” media. While the recipients’ names are undisclosed, it is almost certain that this funding is either for outlets like Confidencial (now based in Costa Rica), or else is going direct to leading opponents of the Sandinista government to pay for advertisements currently appearing in Twitter and other social media.

Cuba

In Latin America, Cuba is targeted with the highest level of NED spending – $6.6 million covering 46 projects. One stated objective is to create “a more well-informed, critically minded citizenry,” which appears laughable to anyone who has been to Cuba and talked to ordinary people there – generally much better informed about world affairs than a typical US citizen.

Cuba’s Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez criticized the NED’s destabilizing activities, such as financing 54 anti-Cuba organizations since 2017. He advised the US administration to review “how many in that country [the US] have enriched themselves organizing destabilization and terrorism against Cuba with support from that organization.”

Washington not only restored NED funding for attacks on Cuba but, on May 15, added Cuba to the list of countries that “do not fully cooperate with its anti-terrorist efforts.”

The NED: Covert influence in the name of democracy

Anyone with a basic familiarity with the Washington’s workings is likely to be aware of the NED’s covert role. Yet the corporate media – behaving as State Department stenographers and showing no apparent embarrassment – have degenerated to the point where they regularly portray the secretly funded NED outlets as “independent” media serving the targeted countries.

Case in point: Washington Post columnist Max Boot finds it “sickening” that Trump is “trying [to] end US government support for democracy abroad.” He is concerned because astroturf “democracy promotion groups” cannot exist without the flow of US government dollars. He fears the “immense tragedy” of Trump’s executive order to cut off funding (now partially reinstated) for the US Agency for Global Media, the parent agency of the Voice of America, Radio Marti, and other propaganda outlets.

Behind the moralistic appeals to democracy promotion and free press is a defense of the US imperial project to impose itself on countries such as Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba. Those sanctioned countries, targeted for regime change, need free access to food, fuel, medicines and funding for development. They don’t need to hear US propaganda beamed to them or generated locally by phonily “independent” media.

Roger D. Harris is with the Task Force on the Americas, the US Peace Council, and the Venezuela Solidarity Network. Nicaragua based

John Perry is with the Nicaragua Solidarity Coalition and writes for MR Online, the London Review of Books, FAIR and Covert Action, among others.

20 May 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Bharat Dogra

What is happening in Gaza today, unfolding over several months, is unacceptable violation of the most basic right of any people to live and survive in their own land.

In terms of the number of people who have already died as a result of direct and indirect impacts of the violence and aggression against them by Israeli forces for nearly 20 months, seen as a percentage of the total population, this already represents perhaps the highest conflict-related mortality rate of the 21^st century so far. This has taken place without any effective protection steps from either the UNO or the various big powers, some of whom, like the USA and Germany, have been the leading suppliers of the weapons of destruction to Israel.

Apart from such mass murder being inflicted on the people of Gaza, another issue of great concern relates to the various aspects of the aggression making the region increasingly uninhabitable now as well as in the longer-term, threatening he survival base of the people.

For human existence clean water is needed daily for drinking and for numerous other uses. This is being denied as a result of the various direct and indirect impacts of Israeli aggression against people. This denial of water can itself prove life threatening for many people.

Food is another basic necessity. This too has been repeatedly denied to people not just as a result of war but also by deliberate obstruction of relief supplies. Several humanitarian organizations have reported acute famine conditions from time to time. In addition to denying the supply of basic food materials, the conditions needed for cooking food properly are also being denied to people.

Availability of essential medicines and medical care constitute another basic need and a survival need for many people. However the existing hospitals, medical facilities and even medical personnel have been targeted in a big way in the course of the Israeli aggression.

Housing is another basic need. However most houses in Gaza have been destroyed or badly damaged by relentless bombing. Many people have remained buried under rubble, a reality too painful to even imagine. Even shelter camps in which homeless and displaced people seek shelter have not been spared. Even when they are already homeless, people can be ordered any time to shift from one place to another in entirely arbitrary and disruptive ways. The acute distress and difficulties caused by this can be imagined, considering that some family members may be already ill or injured or disabled at the time of shifting.

For people to survive it is necessary to have some means of livelihood. This has been increasingly denied and disrupted, whether in the form of farming or orchards, fishing or safe transport to area of work, availability of regular wage work or proper jobs, disruption of trade and marketing, destruction of educational or medical facilities, for a very extended period.

When livelihoods are disrupted, humanitarian aid and relief supplies provide the most important avenue of meeting the basic needs of people. While the world is quite willing to supplying these, these often cannot reach the people who need these relief supplies the most due to too many restrictions and obstructions placed by the Israeli authorities.

Any community needs relatively safe and clean conditions to live. However increasingly in Gaza the surroundings have unexploded munitions, dangerous materials, air conditions harmful to health and absence of basic sanitation facilities. All this threatens basic survival conditions.

Even in conditions of temporary collapse of survival conditions, people can still manage to live for some time if there are hopes of improving conditions based on assurances by world leaders that corrective steps or remedial actions are being taken very soon. The people of Gaza have been waiting endlessly for such assurances from world leaders. Instead what they sometimes hear only reduces their hopes for effective remedial actions. Some top leaders like President Donald Trump have actually made statements that more or less amount to displacement and shift of people to other areas. In fact the various actions of the forces of aggression and their suppliers or supporters to render the region uninhabitable are likely to be related to the objective of displacing people, whether or not this objective succeeds.

Hence in Gaza what we see is a combination of two factors. Firstly, an unacceptably large number of people are getting killed and seriously injured by bombings and ground level aggression and this is already the highest number in any 21^st century conflict when seen as a percentage of total population (this can be called mass murder). Secondly, there are several forms of aggressions which amount to making a region uninhabitable by destroying the basic conditions of survival. These two conditions can jointly be described as ‘Mass Murder and Making a Region Uninhabitable (MMMARU in short).

What is more, this unacceptably inhuman strategy is being pursued against the people with the most right to this land. Another highly unethical and dangerous aspect of this tragedy is that this is being pursued in an area that is known for highly dense population. The density of population in Gaza in terms of people living per square km is about 250 times more than the world average. In Gaza the population density in 2023 was 15,609 while the world average is about 63 for people living on land.

While the life-sustaining conditions for people of Gaza are being relentlessly destroyed and disrupted, it must be remembered that at the same time life-protecting conditions for various other life-forms, including domesticated animals as well as wild-life are also being destroyed in the form of bombings, presence of toxic and dangerous substances and pollutants in land, water and air, destruction of trees and crops, shortage of water, food and fodder as well as other factors.

It must be said that the conflict and aggression-related, or MMMARU related threats to life exist here on top of the widely prevalent threats of recent times like climate change which too are aggravated by the conflict conditions.

It is clear therefore that the UNO and the international community, including the world’s most senior statesmen and diplomats, must very soon announce a very big initiative for providing immediate safety and relief to the people of Gaza as well as to ensure their longer-term habitation in Gaza in conditions of safety and ability to meet their basic needs in sustainable ways. This should not be delayed any longer. It is already very late, but it is never too late for such urgently needed initiatives.

Bharat Dogra is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now.

20 May 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Gary Smith

How many dead children is it going to take before Israel and its Zionist supporters are satisfied? What is the number that needs to be met before governments in the West intervene? When will the United States and other countries stop selling weapons and funding the genocide of children? This is a serious question.

Because after 19 months of genocide, Israel has reportedly killed 17,492 children. Many more are buried under rubble and presumed dead, but not included in this running total of children killed.

Clearly, 17,492 is not enough dead children, since Israel continues to kill one child in Gaza every 45 minutes, an average of 30 children killed every day.

As of March 2, Israel has cut off all aid to Gaza. Israel has blocked food, water, and medicine from reaching the 2.3 million people in Gaza. “A million children in Gaza depend on humanitarian aid. Their lives are hanging in the balance,” said Juliette Touma, director of communications for the UN Relief and Works Agency.

The United Nations’ emergency relief coordinator said the halting of humanitarian aid amounts to “cruel collective punishment.”

The human beings under siege in Gaza are not starving; they are being deliberately starved. There is a very clear distinction between the two.

But apparently, it’s still not enough dead children. Israel broke the latest ceasefire agreement on March 18. The Gaza Health Ministry says 2,326 people, including 732 children, have been killed since that day when Israel shattered the truce. The overall death toll since the war broke out is at 52,418.

Again, how many dead children are enough?

Zionists answer that they want their hostages back. And yet Israel continues to break ceasefires and fails to agree to further “prisoner”-for-hostage swaps. Does anyone honestly believe that Israel’s intentions are to bring home the hostages? Netanyahu recently admitted that it’s not about the hostages, it’s about eliminating Hamas.

This is ethnic cleansing, pure and simple. The goal is to eliminate Palestinians from both Gaza and the West Bank, as well as Jerusalem, the same goal Israel has had since 1948 during the Nakba, translated as the catastrophe, referring to the displacement of Palestinians during the 1948 Arab-Israeli war. Before the Nakba, Palestine was a multi-ethnic and multicultural society. Between 1947 and 1949, at least 750,000 Palestinians from a 1.9 million population were made refugees beyond the borders of the state. To this day, a large portion of the Palestinian population remain refugees, living in camps.

As a Jew, I am well aware that Israel has been systematically killing children for 77 years. This is not new. What is new is the world is watching children blown to literal pieces, and having limbs torn off by United States missiles, while watching on their smartphones. They are watching schools and mosques being bombed. Hospitals. Bakeries. Journalists. NGOs providing food and aid.

Again, how many dead children is enough?

Gary Smith has contributed essays and columns to Newsweek, Jewish Journal, VegConomist, Moment Magazine, Tricycle Magazine, Jewish Chronicle, Jewish Independent, Mother Nature Network, Elephant Journal, and to several books.

20 May 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Quds News Networ

Gaza (Quds News Network)- At least 60 Palestinians have been killed since midnight in Israeli attacks across the Gaza Strip, as the military has ordered Palestinians in the southern city of Khan Younis to flee ahead of an “unprecedented attack”.

Attacks in northern Gaza on a family home and a school-turned-shelter killed at least 22 people, more than half of them women and children, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

[https://twitter.com/QudsNen/status/1924741112603758728]

A strike in the central city of Deir al-Balah killed 13 people, and another in the nearby Nuseirat refugee camp killed 15, according to Al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital.

Two strikes in the southern city of Khan Younis killed 10 people, according to Nasser Hospital.

On Monday, Israel’s military issued another forced displacement order to residents of Khan Younis, threatening an “unprecedented” assault after launching a wave of deadly strikes on the area and pressing a punishing new ground offensive.

The displacement order, posted on X by the military’s Arabic-language spokesman Avichay Adraee, also applies to the nearby areas of Bani Suhaila and Abasan. It calls on Palestinians to move west towards al-Mawasi.

“From this moment, Khan Younis governorate will be considered a dangerous combat zone,” the post read.

It comes a day after Israel’s military issued a separate displacement order for areas of central Gaza, including the town of al-Qarara, as its expanded offensive
continues.

On Sunday, the military announced it has launched a large-scale ground invasion across Gaza.

According to the military, troops from its Southern Command are now conducting operations on the ground in both northern and southern areas of the enclave, backed by intense aerial bombardment, as part of its “Operation Gideon’s Chariots”.

Under the newly launched air and ground offensive, Israel said it plans to displace hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and secure limited aid distribution inside the territory – something that has been widely criticised by aid groups and the United Nations.

20 May 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization, today called on President Trump to address and renounce an “insane” plan to ethnically-cleanse Gaza and force its population to Libya as reported in national media.

CAIR said that if the news reporting about the plan is true, the ethnic cleansing of Gaza would be a “moral stain on our nation’s history that brings shame for generations to come.”

SEE: Trump administration working on plan to move 1 million Palestinians to Libya – NBC

NBC reports:

“The Trump administration is working on a plan to permanently relocate up to 1 million Palestinians from the Gaza Strip to Libya, five people with knowledge of the effort told NBC News.

“The plan is under serious enough consideration that the administration has discussed it with Libya’s leadership, two people with direct knowledge of the plans and a former U.S. official said.

“In exchange for the resettling of Palestinians, the administration would potentially release to Libya billions of dollars of funds that the U.S. froze more than a decade ago, those three people said.”

In a statement, CAIR National Executive Director Nihad Awad said:

“If this news report that the Trump administration truly is plotting the forced transfer of one million Palestinians from their homeland in Gaza to Libya is true, this plan would represent an unprecedented act of ethnic cleansing unseen in modern history.

“This is morally reprehensible and a historic crime against humanity. It is a slap in the face to all the Arab leaders President Trump just met. Any country or entity that takes part in this war crime would rightly face universal condemnation. 

“No Arab or Muslim nation, and no person of conscience of any background, should entertain this insane idea. Gaza belongs to the Palestinian people who live there.

“The Trump administration should be demanding that the Israeli government end its war of annihilation, not try to find new ways to help Netanyahu finish off the Palestinian people.”

Earlier today, CAIR sent a letter to all members of Congress saying it is “now or never” for elected officials to speak out against Israel’s clear genocidal plan to “flatten and occupy” Gaza and finish the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people.

CAIR also welcomed a Senate resolution signed by 28 senators that calls for the Trump administration to pursue an end to Israel’s blockade on humanitarian aid and the war on Gaza.

Also today, CAIR urged the U.S. House Representatives to cosponsor and support H.Res. 409, a resolution introduced by Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) recognizing the 77th anniversary of the Palestinian Nakba and affirming the rights of Palestinian refugees.

Israel has slaughtered more than 53,000 people in Gaza, mostly women and children.

Yesterday, CAIR condemned the Israeli slaughter of more than 100 Palestinians on the day marking the 77th anniversary of the Nakba (May 15), during which Israeli forces carried out the ethnic cleansing of most of Palestine in 1948.

CAIR’s condemnation comes as Human Rights Watch said today that Israel’s total blockade of Gaza, in place since March 2, has become “a tool of extermination.”

Earlier this week, CAIR condemned the Israeli government’s escalating slaughter of Palestinians in Gaza, including at least 22 children, as a “transparent attempt to sabotage” the Trump administration’s recent push to restart ceasefire negotiations and pursue an end to other regional conflicts.

CAIR also condemned the latest Israeli deadly bombings of Gaza hospitals as indicted war criminal Benjamin Netanyahu says half of Gazans will be ethnically cleansed and there is “no way” Israel will halt its genocide in Gaza, even if a ceasefire is achieved.

Washington, D.C., based CAIR called on the Trump administration to drop U.S.-Israeli efforts to force starving Palestinians in Gaza into de facto concentration camps surrounded by the Israeli military in order to receive food and other humanitarian aid after the release of a report by the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IFSPC) stating that Gaza’s entire population is at imminent risk of famine.

CAIR also condemned the “systematic abuse and torture” that Gaza detainees face in Israeli prisons as outlined in a report released today. The Palestinian Centre for Human Rights (PCHR) report says that abuse is “an integral component of Israel’s genocide against Palestinians.”

CAIR’s mission is to protect civil rights, enhance understanding of Islam, promote justice, and empower American Muslims.

La misión de CAIR es proteger las libertades civiles, mejorar la comprensión del Islam, promover la justicia, y empoderar a los musulmanes en los Estados Unidos.

16 May 2025

Source: cair.com

By Jonathan Cook

Louis Theroux explains in a commentary published by The Guardian recently why the backlash to his recent film about violent, Israeli state-backed settlers misses the point.

His critics say he is unfairly presenting a few marginal “crazies” in Israeli society, who rampage across the West Bank to drive out the native Palestinian population, as significant and influential.

That’s exactly what they are, Theroux responds.

Settler leader Daniella Weiss, who Theroux spent much time following and interviewing, “enjoys enormous clout within the Israeli cabinet and … has the protection of the army in her project of settler expansionism.”

He quotes Haaretz journalist Etan Nechin in noting that the settlers’ “representatives are literally sitting in the government and control everything from the police to treasury.”

Theroux makes a further point about why it is important to focus on the settlers and understand what they really represent.

“A film about extreme West Bank settlers isn’t simply about a region of the Middle East. It’s also about ‘us’,” he writes in The Guardian.

He adds: “The urgency here is that West Bank settlers are a bellwether for where society may be going in countries across the west… Around the same time that the documentary aired, Israel’s national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, who is a settler, was being hosted at [Donald Trump’s] Mar-a-Lago.”

[https://twitter.com/zei_squirrel/status/1917008203402932419]

There has been a backlash to Theroux’s documentary — just as there is continuing support for Israel, even as it commits what the International Court of Justice deems a “plausible genocide” — precisely because those extremists are “us.”

The gun-toting, stone-throwing, orchard-burning, house-torching settlers are from Texas, London and Paris. And so are many of the soldiers — some of them volunteers from Western countries — who are currently slaughtering and enforcing the starvation of children in Gaza.

It is “us” watching this genocide unfold in slow-motion and shrugging our shoulders, or both-sidesing the stream of constant Israeli crimes on our screens.

It is “us” still sending weapons to make the genocide possible.

It is “us” decrying the protesters marching against the genocide, against the starvation of babies, as “anti-Semites,” “haters” and “supporters of terrorism.”

Israel’s crimes didn’t begin 19 months ago. They date back a century or more.

They began with Britain’s sponsorship of an exclusive Jewish enclave imposed on the Middle East — a colonising state-to-be that was always going to require the containment and ultimately the expulsion, or extermination, of the native, Palestinian population.

That process had nothing more to do with “Jewish control” then than it does now. After all, it was an arch anti-semite, Arthur Balfour — Lord Balfour — who wrote the infamous Balfour Declaration in 1917 promising a Jewish state on the Palestinians’ homeland.

He was supported by the entire British Cabinet – apart from Edwin Montagu, the only Jewish government minister, who rightly lamented Britain’s support for a Jewish state in Palestine as evidence of his countrymen’s enduring anti-Semitism.

Why were Balfour and the other government ministers so keen to have “the Jews” in the Middle East?

Religious reasons played a part, to be sure. But more important were all-too practical, foreign policy objectives.

First because, like other governments driven by ethno-nationalist sentiment that was then running riot in European capitals, the British government preferred that “a Jewish state,” dependent on Britain, would project its interests as a British colony in the oil-rich Middle East.

If Britain didn’t seek to promote and harness a European Jewish presence in the region first — to weaponise those Jews against “the natives” — France or Germany might do so instead.

It was a race between European powers for regional control. Though ultimately, of course, they were beaten to the finishing line by the United States, which has been Israel’s main patron since the founding of a “Jewish state” through the mass ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people in 1948.

The crimes Israel carries out today were engineered — made inevitable — by the decisions Western powers took from the early 20th century onwards.

Which is why Theroux is right that we in the West are responsible for Israel’s actions in a way that is entirely untrue of Burma or China or Russia.

Israel’s supporters want us looking away from Israel’s crimes to Burma’s, China’s or Russia’s precisely because Israel is “us.” Its state terrorism is ours.

If the Israel fortress colony falls, so the fear goes, the West’s system of colonial power projection — those 800-plus military bases the U.S. has stationed around the world in its bid for “global full-spectrum dominance” — will begin to unravel with it.

Israel is still secretly viewed by the West — by “us” — as it was by the father of Zionism, Theodor Herzl, 130 years ago: as “a rampart of Europe against Asia, an outpost of civilization as opposed to barbarism.”

Those cheerleading Israel’s genocide, or staying complicity silent, are the ideological inheritors of Lord Balfour and his ugly racism.

Either they wish for “the Jews” to complete the takeover of historic Palestine — exterminating or ethnically cleansing what is left of “the natives” — as a public flexing of “our” muscle, as a demonstration of who controls the world, of what awaits anyone who defies “our” might.

Or they have been so brainwashed by a fear-mongering Western narrative that the world is divided into two — and only the Western half is actually civilised — that the slaughter and maiming of many tens of thousands of Palestinian children and the starvation of a million more seems a reasonable, even moral, response to the state of the world.

[https://twitter.com/Issaamro/status/1918722495273640412]

Yes, the West’s Jewish populations have been more easily sold on this preposterous notion because, given their history of Western persecution, they are more easily persuaded to live in a state of permanent fear, they are more readily convinced by establishment narratives that there are exceptional reasons to support this genocide.

But “our” leaders are no less in thrall to this kind of perverse logic. They gain their positions only after they have been fully initiated into an institutionalised system of power that requires fealty to Western — chiefly U.S. — projection of dominance across the globe.

Whatever U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s personal feelings (assuming he has any), the fact is he is not wrong in proclaiming that his government is in no position to impose a sales ban on the components for F-35 fighter jets, the ones dropping bombs on Gaza’s population to level their homes and shred their children.

As his government implicitly acknowledges, the West’s system of arms production is necessarily so tightly integrated that no one, apart from the central hub of empire headquartered in the U.S., is in a position to change course. The West’s arms industries, just like its financial industries, are simply too big to fail.

Britain is locked in to producing F-35 components not specifically because Israel needs them, but because the West — because the U.S. — needs them for its projection of power, for its continuing control of resources, for its global dominance — or, in the British government’s bogus rhetoric, to safeguard “NATO security” and “international peace.”

Were Starmer to dare to refuse, it would be no different from some local, small-time mafia boss telling the Don in Washington to take a hike. The British prime minister knows his fate would be straight out of a Sopranos script.

This too is the reason why he has been secretly shipping weapons to Israel for use in Gaza — more than 8,500 items — in violation of the promise he made to the British public last year that the shipments had stopped.

While Starmer has to placate those in his party who cannot stomach being complicit in genocide, he also has to keep the Don happy. And the Don is far more dangerous than either Starmer’s party or the British Parliament.

Theroux’s film, The Settlers, is a vanishingly rare example of popular documentary-making showing Israeli society’s dark underbelly. The backlash is not because his thesis is wrong. It is because it tells us far too much about ourselves.

Jonathan Cook is a MintPress contributor. Cook won the Martha Gellhorn Special Prize for Journalism.

16 May 2025

Source: scheerpost.com

By Kim Petersen

From Samori Touré to Thomas Sankara [left], our ancestors chose resistance. Now, we must choose: either we fight for sovereignty, or we remain slaves to neo-colonialism.

— captain Ibrahim Traoré [right], Interview with Radio Omega FM, November 2023

A young, by political standards, military captain, now an acting president has captured widespread admiration in Burkina Faso and across Africa. The legend of captain Ibrahim Traoré appears to be growing by leaps and bounds.

But to understand from whence Inbraim Traoré comes, one should be cognizant of the young revolutionary Marxist leader captain Thomas Sankara who served the people of Burkina Faso (Land of Upright People) before Traoré. Tragically, Sankara was assassinated in a hail of gunfire, betrayed by his close friend Blaise Compaore.

African Hub calls Thomas Sankara the best president in Africa’s history. During Sanakara’s four years as leader he:

Empowered women.

Increased literacy from 13-73% refused aids and made his country self reliant.

Renamed his country to Burkina Faso (meaning Land of the Upright People)

Vaccinated 2M kids.

Reduced all public servants salaries including his.

Built 350 schools, roads, railways without foreign aid

Increased literacy rate by 60%

Banned forced marriages

Gave poor people land

Planted 10 million trees

Appointed females to high governmental positions, encouraged them to work, recruited them into the military, and granted pregnancy leave

Sold off the government fleet of Mercedes cars and made the Renault 5 (the cheapest car sold in Burkina Faso at that time) the official service car of the ministers.

He reduced the salaries of all public servants, including his own, and forbade the use of government chauffeurs and 1st class airline tickets.

As President, he lowered his salary to $450 a month and limited his possessions to a car, four bikes, three guitars, a fridge and a broken freezer.

He opposed foreign aid, saying that “he who feeds you, controls you.”

Drove out French imperialism & withdrew Burkina Faso from the IMF.

He was later killed in a French backed coup in 1987.

Thomas Sankara, the man, was killed, but his ideals live on. Into the fore, another revolutionary has stepped. Ibrahim Traoré is serving the Burkinabé . African Hub calls Traoré, “The youngest and most loved President in the world.”

Russia’s president Vladimir Putin seems to have recognized this appeal and invited Traoré to Moscow. Nigeria’s Igbere Television reported on the dignified transportation accorded to Burkina Faso’s acting president for the 80th Victory Day celebrations in Moscow on 9 May:

Russia didn’t just invite President Ibrahim Traoré to Moscow — they sent a state aircraft to personally pick him up from Burkina Faso. That’s not diplomacy. That’s respect.

That’s symbolism. In a world where African leaders are often summoned like subordinates, this moment flips the script. It tells a new story: of African sovereignty being recognized, of alliances built on mutual interest — not colonial residue.

The security provided for the distinguished guest reportedly included two accompanying Su27 fighter jets.

Given the history of what happened to Sankara and the threats posed by imperialist operatives, the high level of security is understandable, especially given that Traoré is said to have survived 19 assassination attempts.

Traoré himself came to power through a coup against another coup leader Paul-Henri Sandaogo Damiba who fled to Togo. Traoré was disillusioned by Damiba’s failure at handling the “jihadist” insurgency in his country. Armed jihadist groups, purportedly linked to Al Qaeda, are fighting Burkinabè government forces.

*****

Since coming to power in 2022, Traoré has quickly burnished his anti-imperialist and socialist convictions. Burkina Faso is a resource-rich but economically impoverished country. Traoré seeks to overturn that economic contradiction by removing the colonialists who exploited Burkina Faso. Traoré is quoted as saying: “We have been receiving French aid for 63 years, yet our country has not developed, so cutting it off from us now will not kill us, rather it will motivate us to work and rely on ourselves.” (Quoted by Qiraat Africa, published by the South Sahara Research Center, UK)

Yet the West still has strings to pull on. Burkina Faso, Niger, and Mali were suspended from the western-backed Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS). Subsequently, the three countries formed their own anti-imperialist grouping as the Alliance of Sahel States (AES).

It won’t be easy going, as the former French colonies use the CFA franc, an international currency set at a fixed rate against the euro. This renders the African states economically dependent on France which holds a veto over the monetary policies of the CFA franc.

Aware of this currency bind, Africa Reloaded quotes Traoré saying, “Perhaps everything we’ve done has surprised you, hasn’t it? Don’t worry more changes are coming that might still surprise you. We will break every tie that has kept us in slavery.”

In 2023, French troops were ordered to leave Burkina Faso. The French embassy in the capital Ouagadougou is closed and French diplomats have been expelled. Some French passport holders have been detained on suspicion of espionage.

Russian troops have since arrived to help Burkina Faso bolster its security. Nigeria’s Afro Page also reports the “arrival of 1700 Russian commandos, armed, coordinated, and highly trained” in Burkina Faso “not in secret … but boldly in broad daylight…. This is a message from the Kremlin to Washington.” In addition, 700 North Korean troops are said to have arrived in Burkina Faso.

Gaining control over the resources of Burkina Faso is also underway. Burkina Faso has started to nationalize resources, particularly its gold mining sector. Burkina Faso’s prime minister Jean Emmanuel Ouédraogo realizes, “Our gold represents our greatest opportunity for economic resilience during these challenging times.”

Africa Hub quotes Traoré: “We will mine our gold ourselves not for France, but for our people!”

To achieve this, Traoré’s proposal is: “Targeting foreign exploitation, particularly by France, Traore has pushed to nationalize gold mines, like Boungou and Wahgnion, and approved a state-owned gold refinery in 2023 to process 400 kg daily, aiming to retain profits for local development.”

The national transformation planned by Traoré government includes:

1. sweeping reforms redirecting government funds from inflated salaries to crucial development projects
2. launching ambitious industrialization projects
3. unprecedented mechanization of the agricultural sector, including introduction of modern farming techniques and equipment that have significantly increased crop yields and farmer incomes
4. implementing rapid response protocols to counter security threats and dismantle terrorist networks
5. bringing about unprecedented levels of national unity and mobilizing citizens behind a shared vision of progress
6. demonstrating that African nations can chart their own paths to development
7. a deep commitment to public service and national development that focuses on tangible results rather than procedural democracy

Back in 2023, Traoré spoke of the aims of the AES partnership: “We really want to look at other horizons, because we want win-win partnerships.” Security was addressed as a need: “If we can’t afford to buy military equipment in one country, we’ll go to other countries to buy it.”

*****

Meanwhile, the United States stirs the imperialist pot against Burkina Faso. On 3 April, US general Michael Langley, commander of US Africa Command (AFRICOM), accused Traoré of misusing the country’s substantial gold reserves for the military instead of benefiting the nation’s 23 million citizens. If Langley (whose basic pay is estimated by Deepseek at $203,700 per year) had done his homework, instead of making unsubstantiated accusations, he would know that Traoré revealed his net worth at $128,566. He might also know that Traoré refused a presidential salary, continuing instead to receive the same salary he earned as a soldier. Malawi24 was impressed: “Traore’s decision is a stark contrast to the actions of his predecessors, signaling a new era of leadership focused on public service rather than personal enrichment.”

Langley’s comments brought Burkinabé into the streets in support of Traoré and his government.

It is abundantly evident that Traoré has the support of the people, as did Sankara. Despite Traoré having reportedly booted out French and American media from Burkina Faso, even the BCC, a media organ of empire, admits that Traoré “has captured hearts and minds around the world.”

Traoré represents a tangible hope, a hope that is more than an abstraction, it is a hope that, given time and momentum, could ignite a revolution to topple an empire.

Until defeated, empire will not rest. As long as revolutionary men and women are committed, above all, to serving the people, they will pose a threat to empire.

The lives of humans are finite, but the ideals of good people can outlive them and continue to represent a threat to empires until they fall.

Kim Petersen is an independent writer. He can be emailed at: kimohp at gmail.com.

12 May 2025

Source: countercurrents.org

By Mahmoud Darwish

I come from there and I have memories

Born as mortals are, I have a mother

12 May 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Sakai Tanaka

2 May 2025 — The United States and Ukraine signed a resource agreement, on 1 May 2025, that had been postponed since February. It is reported that the agreement is for Ukraine to hand over the rights to underground resources to the United States in return for the United States continuing to provide Ukraine with the US military support. It is also commented that the agreement shows Trump’s greed to devour Ukraine’s interests. （Seven takeaways from Ukraine minerals deal）

2. Trump was pressuring Zelensky to sign the resource agreement or he would not provide Ukraine with the US military support. Zelensky visited the United States in February to sign the agreement, but at the meeting he got into a hard argument with Trump and Vance. Trump, then, canceled the signing and kicked Zelensky out. Trump pressured Zelensky to sign the agreement, but actually Trump himself had no intention of signing it. The agreement seems like a “fake evil operation” to make Trump’s greed appear. (Sneak attack on Zelensky/ゼレンスキーを騙し討ち） [Ukraine signs economic deal with U.S. after pressure from Trump for continued aid]    [JD Vance says war in Ukraine ‘not going to end any time soon,’ hours after US signs minerals deal with Kyiv]
3. The Ukrainian government announced the resource agreement that was signed. Nothing is mentioned on the US military assistance to Ukraine in the text of the agreement. When the ceasefire is over and the country is to be rebuilt, the United States and Ukraine will pool their investment funds to develop Ukraine’s underground resources, from coal and oil to rare earths.  In that context, the United States is not exploiting Ukraine, but rather cooperating with Ukraine’s reconstruction.  In addition, the text mentions nothing about the repayment of the funds that have been provided, even though Trump initially requested.  So, it can be considered that there is no greed in that respect of the agreement either. However, the same agreement sets out the outline only, and the details are vague.  In this regard, the agreement has room for inviting some possible exploitation. （Agreement between….）  [US And Ukraine Sign Landmark Minerals Agreement. Here Are the Key Terms]   [US will no longer ‘fly around the world’ to negotiate an end to the Ukraine war]
4. Half of Ukraine’s underground resources, such as coal, are in Donbas and Crimea, which Russia occupied and annexed. Donbas has long been famous as a coal producing region. Crimea has confirmed the deposits of oil and gas.  Both Donbas and Crimea are considered to remain the Russian territory for the foreseeable future.  In fact, Trump himself has acknowledged that.  For the United States to participate in the resource development of Donbas and Crimea, an agreement with Russia, not with Ukraine, is necessary. Trump is (intentionally) mistaking the person he is pressuring for the agreement.  [In that regard, this agreement can be considered as a farce.]  Besides, the main focus of this agreement is said to be rare earths. There are many rare earth deposits in Ukraine that have not been seized by Russia, but they are hardly profitable.  As the result, many of Ukraine’s rare earths have remained untouched.  （US-Ukraine Minerals Deal: ‘Trojan Horse’ for Creating a  Frozen Conflict?） [Ukraine’s Critical Minerals Stir Global Power Plays-But U.S. Commercial Viability Faces Hard Limits]
5. In order to develop the natural resources, Ukraine needs a ceasefire and peace. Since it is no longer possible for Ukraine to defeat Russia, Ukraine has no choice but to make the concession and reach a ceasefire and peace. However, this resource agreement was signed in return for the United States continuing to provide Ukraine with the US military support.  This is because Zelensky is still willing to continue the War.  Therefore, he needs the US military support.  So in response to Trump’s pressure, Zelensky signed the resource agreement that is premised on the ceasefire.  Unfortunately [for Zelensky who wants to continue the War], the ceasefire is necessary for the resource development…  Therefore, also in that regard, the agreement can be considered as a farce.  （US-Ukraine resources deal: What we know so far）  [Trump’s minerals deal with Ukraine leaves scramble for how to handle Russia]
6. Trump has tried to gain the support of the American people by saying, “We will get the huge amount of aid that the United States has given to Ukraine spending the tax money in the form of resources.” Ukraine is in a state of war, so it is encouraging patriotism.  Besides, they do not want the United States to take away their national wealth, the rights to resources. There must be strong opposition to Zelensky, who is offering up the resources at Trump’s command, but if they do not push that aside and sign the agreement, they will not receive the US military aid from the United States. In February, Zelensky overcame the difficult situation and suppressed the domestic opposition to attend the signing ceremony, but he was picked a fight by the Trump camp, and he was kicked out.  He returned home without signing the agreement.  As such, Trump was taking measures to make fun of Zelensky and Ukraine. （Kremlin Reacts To Minerals Deal Signing: ‘Trump Has Broken The Zelensky Regime’）
7. This time, however, the postponed resource agreement was signed as last, just as the “Victory Day on 9 May”, which is the date on which the ceasefire in Ukraine was scheduled to come into effect after the discussions with Russia at the time of Trump’s inauguration, approached. But what does this actually mean? Let me explain about it as follows:  Zelensky’s Ukraine, by receiving the US military support, is still trying to continue the Ukraine War.   Ukraine refuses to recognize Donbas and Crimea as the Russian territory.   However, Russia and the United States are (ostensibly) strengthening their stance of wanting a ceasefire and peace of Ukraine.  At the end of April, Russia officially expelled the Ukrainian troops from Kursk, which had been the obstacle to the ceasefire and peace.  Russia also acknowledged that the North Korean military had helped it in the battle of Kursk, and praised North Korea. Russia has already incorporated Donbas and Crimea into its own country, achieving one of the purposes of its invasion of Ukraine (i.e. the Special Military Operation or “SMO”). The unity of the non-US sides, whose hidden goal of the Ukraine War has been “to make the world multipolarized“, has also been strengthened.  Meanwhile, Trump’s high tariff policy has also accelerated the decline of the dollar’s key position (i.e. the US economic hegemony).  The occurrence of the US financial [US dollar] collapse is a matter of time.  (Despite that, some Japanese people are still holding NISA without realizing it). [→ See “AI Summary on the relationship between NISA and the potential collapse of the dollar”.]   While Trump’s policy is implemented as such, Russia has almost completed in achieving its goals of the “SMO” in Ukraine.  So, it is about time for Russia to have a ceasefire and peace in Ukraine. （Schiff: The Bounce Is Just A Bear Market Rally） [Does Donald Trump’s trade war mean the end of dollar dominance?]     [Trump took the US economy to the brink of a crisis in just 100 days]    [Why Is The US Dollar Weakening? Trump’s Tariffs Push Dollar Index To 3-Year Low.]    [The U.S. dollar is losing its status as a safe haven thanks to Trump’s tariffs. What does that mean for investors?]    [US exit from IMF would be true dollar shock]
8. Trump also keeps telling, “I want to end this meaningless war in Ukraine as soon as possible.” Unfortunately, the Ukraine War cannot be ended easily.  This is because the UK, France, Germany, the EU, and Canada (i.e. the new Carney administration, which is belligerent and hostile to Trump) want to support Zelensky and continue the War until Russia is defeated. (That is how Trump argues in pretense, however.)  By using the intention of these countries as such, Trump wants to make an excuse that “The US wants to ceasefire and bring about peace to Ukraine, but the UK, France, Germany, the EU, and Canada (i.e. those countries that have been under the umbrella of the British influence) are belligerent and insist that they will fight until Russia is defeated. That is why we cannot have the ceasefire.”   Behind the scenes, on the contrary, Trump is urging the UK, France, Germany, and the EU, telling them, “If you want to prop up Ukraine, do it quickly!  If the UK and France are going to send the troops to Ukraine, do it quickly!  Otherwise, the US and Russia will proceed with the ceasefire!”  (Trump has not quit NATO, because he is urging these countries like that.) （Signs Final Trump-Brokered Minerals Deal, Giving US Preferential Access To Resources） [If Trump abandons Ukraine, can Europe help Kyiv fight on? The clock is ticking to answer that]   [Carney underscores Canada’s commitment to Ukraine]
9. If the UK, France, Germany and the EU seriously enter the Ukraine War, their self-destruction will accelerate ever more. Both Trump and Putin think that it would be better for the UK, France, Germany and the EU to seriously enter the Ukraine War and destroy themselves.  Rather, if it can be more precisely to state it, it may be stated that the UK, France, Germany and the EU will probably not seriously enter the Ukraine War in the end.  If they did, their participation in the War would surely bring about catastrophic consequences to themselves. （Ukraine’s Western backers struggling to muster troops）  [Limitations of Liberalism on Display with Ukraine Crisis]    [If Trump abandons Ukraine, can Europe help Kyiv fight on?]
10. While the leaders of the UK, France, Germany and the EU hesitate to enter the Ukraine War, the peoples of these countries become more averse to the existing militant elites (i.e. totalitarian liberals), causing the elite parties to lose in the elections and putting pro-Russian rightists such as the AfD in Germany and Marine Le Pen in France in power. The British elite rule that has dominated the Western Europe (the US and Europe until last year) will destroy itself militarily or politically. This [rise of such far-right political power] also indicates the self-destruction of Anglo-American hegemony.   This, it can be understood, has been one of the very main purposes of the Ukraine War since the beginning of the War in 2022. (The strategy to make only the UK and Europe view Russia as the enemy/英欧だけに露敵視させる策略）[Europe is being transformed into a new stronghold of liberal totalitarianism]    [The Root of Totalitarian Trends in Liberal Democracy?]    [Strengthening Liberal Totalitarianism]    [Le Pen family]
11. If the liberal elite governments of the UK, France, Germany, and the EU, all of which have been the last power of the Anglo-American hegemony, are overthrown and replaced by the non-British right-wing governments, the on-going process of the multipolarization of the world will be completed. The world order, then, will become multipolarized, and the world itself will become stable.  (By that time, the new Abraham Accords regime will also be established in the Middle East.)   Nonetheless, the reason why the Ukraine War is not ending is because the overthrow of the governments of the UK, France, Germany, and the EU has not progressed.  However, apart from the Ukraine War, the downfall of Europe is triggering by implementing “global warming countermeasures” that promote a super foolish power source conversion based on unfounded anthropogenic theories, for example.  (The COVID-19 city closures also caused Europe to self-destruct.)  Recently, in Spain and Portugal, the super foolish policy of switching to solar and wind power generation has been rushed, resulting in large-scale power outages and major chaos that required a state of emergency declaration.  This implies that “the plan to self-destruct Europe through global warming countermeasures” is progressively and smoothly being implemented. （The Spanish Power Outage: A Catastrophe Created By Political Design & A Warning To The World） [Europe’s Self Destruction]  [Germany’s New Chancellor Merz Vows Continued Support for Ukraine]     [“Global Warming” Is a Really Stupid Issue]    [Europe’s Self-Destruction: Ukraine, Elites, and the Death of Democracy]    [Is Europe Choosing to Self-Destruct?]   [Creative Self-Destruction and the Climate]
12. Putin’s Russia ceased fighting in Ukraine for 2-3 days each on the Easter Sunday, 20 April 2025, and the “Victory Day, 9 May” 2025. [Also see. → “Zelensky threatens Ukraine will strike Putin’s beloved “9 May Victory Day” parade… despite Vlad declaring 3 day ceasefire” and  “Putin humiliated as cities cancel Victory Day events en masse after Ukraine drone attacks”]    That is because the schedule for the Ukraine ceasefire decided by the United States and Russia when Trump took office was (i) to begin the ceasefire negotiations in earnest by the Easter, and (ii) to realize the ceasefire by the Victory Day.  Actually, however, the ceasefire did not progress because it was the plan to force the Western Europe to take the lead in the Ukraine War and cause them to self-destruct.  Putin established this symbolic ceasefire only for 2-3 days each, which was too short for the Ukrainian army to rebuild themselves.  If the ceasefire lasted more than a week, the Ukrainian army would intensify its counterattacks, causing serious damages to the Russian army. So, that explains why the ceasefire was set only for 2-3 days. (Trump embarks on a ceasefire in Ukraine/ウクライナ停戦に乗り出すトランプ） [The US-Russian Strategy for the Ukraine Ceasefire]    [If Ukraine loses war, it will be ‘end of Western hegemony’, warns UK’s Boris Johnson]    [BRICS Overtake G7 According To The IMF: Is It The End Of Western Hegemony?]
13. Trump and Putin are taking measures to make the UK and the EU self-destructed in the Ukraine War, while two of them are promoting measures to stabilize and strengthen the non-US side. Take North Korea, for example.  Trump nowadays has begun to say that he wants to meet with Kim Jong Un again.   Meanwhile, Putin announced and praised the North Korean military’s achievements at Kursk and revealed that Russia was teaching North Korea the latest military technology.  Trump will meet with Kim Jong Un one day in due course.  He will work also with Russia and China to resume the dialogue between South Korea and North Korea.   While Europe is destroying itself, the rest of the world is becoming to be stabilized.    （White House preparing for possible Trump-Kim talks）（First Video Showing Russian Instructors Training North Korean Troops）  [What Russia’s Support Means for North Korea’s Nuclear Modernization]    [Europe’s Path to War and Self-Destruction]     [The End of an Era: America’s Waning Hegemony in a Multipolar World]   [Trump admin reportedly laying groundwork for summit with North Korea]   [How South Korea’s next president can end the impasse with North Korea]    [Russia supports US-North Korea dialogue, envoy says]    [China as a Mediator in North Korea]    [How will South Korea navigate US-China competition in 2025?]

__________________

Notes:

1. The hyperlinks with the parentheses ( ) at the end of some paragraphs were added by the original author. Those hyperlinks in the paragraphs and those with brackets [ ], with the italic letters at the end of some paragraphs were added by the translator for the convenience of the reader. In addition, the numbers, such as (1), (2), (3), (i), (ii), (iii) or (a), (b), (c), and bold and/or italic letters were also used in the translation by the translator for the same reason.
2. The paragraph number was added to the head of each paragraph (except to that of the first paragraph) by the translator for the convenience of the reader.
3. The views and/or opinions in those hyperlinks added by the translator do not necessarily reflect those of his. In addition, it is either impossible or unavailable for the translator to verify the genuineness of the information in those links. He does not take any responsibility for the contents in those relevant links at all.
4. The views and/or opinions expressed in the above-mentioned article are those of Sakai Tanaka, who is the original author. His views and/or opinions do not necessarily reflect those of Transcend Media Service (TMS) or those of the translator. Therefore, the reader is kindly requested to understand, interpret or judge those views and/or opinions at his or her own responsibility.
5. The original article in Japanese was published more than a few days or a few weeks ago. Meanwhile, the situations and/or conditions mentioned in the article might have been changed. This also means that the author’s argument expressed and/or the information provided in the article might have become inadequate or less or least adequate, obsolete, out of date or no longer valid by the time the TMS reader reads the same article in English.

Original author: After graduating from university, Sakai Tanaka started working at the Kyodo News  Agency in 1986. From 1997 he joined Microsoft Network (MSN) and in 1999, due to change of policy at Microsoft, he became an independent journalist. Tanaka has published more than twenty books on international affairs, some translated and published in China, South Korea and Taiwan. He studied at Harvard University from 2000 to 2001 and in 2005 was invited to serve as a senior researcher at the Royal Faisal Institute in Saudi Arabia. Website: tanakanews.com

Satoshi Ashikaga is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment. Having worked as researcher, development program/project officer, legal protection/humanitarian assistance officer, human rights monitor-negotiator, managing-editor, and more, he prefers a peaceful and prudent life.  His previous work experiences, including those in war zones and war-torn zones, constantly remind him of the invaluableness of peace.

12 May 2025

Source: transcend.org

By Roger D. Harris

It’s been over 100 days since Donald Trump’s return to the presidency. Most NGOs to the left of the Heritage Foundation are alarmed about his confrontational international posture and related erosion of the rule of law.

5 May 2025 – Human Rights Watch (HRW), a supposedly liberal organization, is also concerned. But their problem is that the president hasn’t gone far enough – at least in the case of Venezuela. HRW’s latest report on Venezuela calls for intensified illegal measures that cause misery and death, outflanking Trump from the right.

Ignoring the US hybrid war

At issue for HRW is last July’s Venezuelan presidential election that saw Nicolás Maduro declared the winner. Beyond issues with supposed electoral irregularities lies the elephant in the room that is utterly disregarded by HRW. The US hybrid war against Venezuela was the biggest obstacle to free and fair elections. Venezuelans were under economic siege with coercive measures aimed at pressuring them into backing the US-backed opposition.

Also telling is the opposition’s refusal to submit their electoral records to the Venezuelan supreme court, when summoned to do so because they do not recognize the constitutional order in Venezuela. Legally, there was no way for them to claim victory even if they had legitimately won.

Post-election protest demonstrations were predictable. The opposition, which has a long history of anti-democratic street violence, threatened them if it lost. HRW characterizes the riots as mostly peaceful, while accusing the government of responding with a “brutal crackdown.”

Yet the widespread damage of public property such as health clinics, government offices, schools, and transportation facilities – along with murders of government security personnel and party members – were inconvenient facts entirely ignored in HRW’s over 100-page report. Such actions can hardly be called peaceful, nor blamed on the government.

A cure worse than the disease

For argument’s sake, let’s not contest HRW’s claim that the books were cooked in Venezuela’s presidential election in order to examine the NGO’s solution.

On April 29, the US State Department celebrated 100 days of “America first” accomplishments, highlighting the revocation of oil importing licenses and the establishment of potential secondary tariffs on countries that still dare to import Venezuelan oil.

The next day, HRW’s report demanded even harsher punishment. Frustrated that the “Trump administration appears to be prioritizing cooperation” with Venezuela, HRW called for expanding sanctions and deepening pressure. And this is despite Washington’s plans to further maximize its maximum pressure campaign to achieve regime change in Caracas.

Specifically, HRW urged the US and other states to “counter Maduro’s domestic carrot-and-stick incentives that reward abusive authorities and security forces, making them loyal to the government” by imposing even more “targeted sanctions.”

Further compounding the impact of individual targeted sanctions is the reality of overcompliance. Even individual sanctions end up contributing to collective punishment. A 2019 statement by HRW recognized that “despite language excluding transactions to purchase food and medicines, these sanctions could exacerbate the already dire humanitarian situation in Venezuela due to the risk of overcompliance.”

But now the 1,028 existing unilateral coercive measures (the correct term for sanctions) on Venezuela by the US and its allies apparently aren’t enough for these sadists.

HRW admits that these coercive measures have “failed to make a dent” in correcting what they see as bad behavior. Why then persist if ineffective? Perhaps, because they’re very effective in punishing errant states and warning others.

HRW also lobbied for yet more foreign intervention in Venezuela’s internal affairs: “Foreign governments should expand support for Venezuelan civil society groups… a sustained and principled international response is crucial.”

Selective sanctimony on sanctions

HRW criticized the Trump administration’s sanctions targeting the International Criminal Court (ICC) because they might potentially “chill” the tribunal’s ardor to go after Venezuela.

Revealingly, this particular HRW report shows no concern that Trump’s sanctions might stifle the court’s prosecution of the US/Zionist genocide in Palestine. What HRW is instead focused on is having the court “prioritize its investigation” of Venezuela.

HRW never mentions in this report that the US does not accept the ICC’s jurisdiction over itself. In other words, this report fails to criticize Washington’s evading accountability as long as the ICC can be weaponized against Venezuela.

The ICC has, in fact, been blatantly politicized regarding Venezuela. Caracas has requested in vain that the ICC investigate US coercive measures that have caused over 100,000 civilian deaths in Venezuela, constituting a crime against humanity.

The HRW report is sanctimonious about the “brave efforts of [opposition] Venezuelans who risked—and often suffered,” but is callously unsympathetic regarding the devastating effects on the population at large of the very measures it is advocating.

HRW laments the US administration’s cutting funding to astroturf “humanitarian and human rights groups” promoting regime change in Venezuela. But it does not express sympathy for ordinary Venezuelans suffering economic hardship, food insecurity, or lack of medicine due to broader US sanctions. Notably absent from this report is acknowledgement of the humanitarian consequences of Washington’s unilateral coercive measures.

The human rights organization’s primary critique of the enormous humanitarian toll of the unilateral coercive measures is that they have “failed to produce a transition.”

Sanctions kill

The HRW report frames US sanctions as supposedly justified efforts to enforce imperial restrictions on Venezuela and not as part of a regime-change hybrid war.

As Venezuelanalysis reported: “US economic sanctions against Venezuela are a violent and illegal form of coercion, seeking regime change through collective punishment of the civilian population.” Investigations by the UN’s high commissioner for human rights found “sanctions that threaten people’s lives and health need to be halted.”

Even HRW’s own World Report 2022 cited UN findings that sanctions had exacerbated Venezuela’s economic and social crises. Yet HRW apparently considers the burden warranted, which invokes Madeleine Albright’s infamous defense of Iraq sanctions: “we think the price is worth it.”

Follow-the-flag humanitarianism

HRW has long maintained a “revolving door” relationship with the US government personnel. The organization is also significantly associated with George Soros and his Open Society Foundations. UN Independent Expert and human rights scholar Alfred de Zayas describes how HRW and similar NGOs have become part of what he calls the “human rights industry,” instrumentalizing human rights for geopolitical agendas.

Unilateral coercive measures are a major component of the US imperial tool kit. But HRW opportunistically fails to note that such sanctions are illegal under international law. In fact, Article 33 of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibits collective penalties against protected persons.

As Mark Weisbrot with the Center for Economic and Policy Research observes, HRW has “ignored or paid little attention to terrible crimes that are committed in collaboration with the US government in this hemisphere,” while it “has repeatedly and summarily dismissed or ignored sincere and thoroughly documented criticisms of its conflicts of interest.”

HRW recognizes that the coercive measures against Venezuela, which impact the general populace, have not succeeded in imposing an administration subservient to Washington – what they euphemistically call “restoration of democracy.” So why continue advocating more sanctions and support for Venezuela’s far-right opposition? The answer is that Washington’s NGO epigones talk “reform” but aim at fomenting insurrectionary regime change.

________________________________________

Roger D. Harris is a member of the TRANSCEND Network, associate editor at Council on Hemispheric Affairs (COHA), and the immediate past president of the Task Force on the Americas, a 33-year-old human rights organization in solidarity with the social justice movements of Latin America and the Caribbean.

12 May 2025

Source: transcend.org