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By Kit Klarenberg And Wyatt Reed

Leaked docs reveal that prior to the toppling of Bangladeshi PM Sheikh Hasina, the US govt-funded International Republican Institute trained an army of activists including rappers and “LGBTQI people,” even hosting “transgender dance performances,” to achieve a national “power shift.” Institute staff said the activists “would cooperate with IRI to destabilize Bangladesh’s politics.”

On August 5, months of violent street protests finally toppled Bangladesh’s elected Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina. When the military seized power and announced the imposition of a so-called “interim administration,” video footage showed Hasina fleeing to India aboard a helicopter. As vast swarms of student protesters overran the presidential palace, Western media outlets and many of their progressive-leaning consumers cheered the rebellion, framing it as a decisive defeat of fascism and the restoration of democratic rule.

Hasina’s replacement, Muhammad Yunus, is a longtime Clinton Global Initiative fellow granted a Nobel Prize for pioneering the dubious practice of micro-lending. While Yunus has hailed the “meticulously-designed” protest movement that thrust him into power, Hasina personally accused Washington of working to remove her from power over her alleged refusal to allow a US military base on Bangladeshi territory. The State Department has dismissed allegations of US meddling as “laughable,” with spokesman Vedant Patel telling reporters that “any implication that the United States was involved in Sheikh Hasina’s resignation is absolutely false.”

But now, leaked documents reviewed by The Grayzone confirm the State Department was informed of efforts by the International Republican Institute (IRI) to advance an explicitly stated mission to “destabilize Bangladesh’s politics.” The documents are marked as “confidential and/or privileged.”

IRI is a Republican Party-run subsidiary of the National Endowment for Democracy, which has fueled an array of regime change operations across the globe since it was conceived in the office of CIA Director William Casey over forty years ago.

The newly-uncovered files reveal how IRI spent millions in the lead-up to Hasina’s overthrow covertly coaching opposition parties and establishing a regime change network concentrated among the country’s urban youth. Among the GOP-run Institute’s front line foot soldiers were rappers, ethnic minority leaders, LGBT activists hosting “transgender dance performances” in the presence of US embassy officials – all groomed to facilitate what the US intelligence cutout called a “power shift” in Bangladesh.

[https://twitter.com/ChiefAdviserGoB/status/1838659469523525943]

IRI offers Bangladeshi youth “the knowledge and skills to wield online… tools for change”

The origins of the protests which toppled Hasina can be traced back to 2018. That summer, thousands of young people took the streets of Dhaka to demand safer roads and stricter traffic laws after an unlicensed bus driver killed two high school students. The demonstrations grew despite heavy repression, eventually prompting the Hasina administration to impose more stringent laws on negligent driving.

Since their victory, scores of Bangladeshi students have honed their protest tactics, shutting down transit points in response to what sometimes seemed like trivial abuses. Against a backdrop of intensifying crackdowns, the opposition Bangladeshi Nationalist Party (BNP) held an escalating series of street protests, which often morphed into riots. The simmering war between student protesters and Hasina’s government reached a boiling point this August 4, when the military stepped in and seized power.

Following the coup, pundits have pointed to the role of social media in whipping up anti-government sentiment and driving havoc in the streets of Dhaka. Not coincidentally, the recently-leaked IRI files emphasize the importance of online training and message discipline in affecting political change.

IRI seeks ‘power shift’ in Bangladesh

IRI has operated in Dhaka since 2003, ostensibly “to help political parties, government officials, civil society, and marginalized groups in their advocacy for greater rights and representation.”

In reality, as the documents make abundantly clear, IRI has funded and trained a wide-ranging shadow political structure, comprising NGOs, activist groups, politicians, and even musical and visual artists, which can be deployed to stir up unrest if Bangladesh’s government refuses to act as required.

The student protests of 2018, and the overwhelming electoral victory by Hasina’s Awami League in December of that same year, appear to have inspired the IRI’s regime change aspirations. In 2019, the Institute began conducting research to inform its “baseline assessment” of the country, which consisted of “48 group interviews and 13 individual interviews with 304 key informants.” In the end, “IRI staff… identified over 170 democratic activists who would cooperate with IRI to destabilize Bangladesh’s politics,” according to an IRI report which was submitted to the State Department.

The report, which documented the IRI’s activities in the country between March 2019 and December 2020, shows the US government’s regime change campaign ramped up significantly after Hasina’s “lopsided victory.” Her administration, they declared, had become “entrenched,” and their “political position” had “solidified.”

Meanwhile, the IRI concluded that the BNP opposition had “failed to successfully mobilize” its supporters. The party’s attempts to “foment street movements” had floundered, and it remained “marginal,” leaving the Awami League’s “power… undiminished.” Nonetheless, IRI considered BNP to be “still the most possible party to drive a power shift in the future.”

The idea that this political change might be achieved via the ballot box, however, didn’t appear to be up for consideration. With BNP apparently too “violent, insular, rigid, and hierarchical” to win an election, IRI instead proposed a “broad-based social empowerment project that fostered and expanded citizen-centered, local and non-traditional forums for political engagement.” In other words, street mobilizations.

Much of the IRI’s fascination with street protests and online communication is spelled out in a separate internal report titled, “Social Media, Protest, and Reform in Bangladesh’s Digital Era,” which declared that Bangladeshi students “have again led the country’s most vibrant protest movements, with the help of a tool their predecessors didn’t have: the internet.”

“Moving forward, IRI intends to expand its work with college students across the country,” the report declared.

The document explains that Bangladeshi protesters successfully used social media to promote videos and “short documentaries” of their actions, and compel local and international media to cover the upheaval. For example, Facebook-streamed live videos of police breaking up protests “went viral and helped spread knowledge of the protests across the country.”

One of the most powerful viral moments arrived in the form of a protest anthem by Kureghor, which the IRI called “the biggest internet-based Bangladeshi music band.” IRI staff noted they actively worked “to ensure Bangladesh’s young people have the knowledge and skills to wield online and off-line tools for change,” which helped them “to extract concessions” from elected officials.

“LGBTI people” as US regime change shock troops 

The IRI also supported a variety of “socially conscious artists,” which it called “an underutilized actor” for regime change purposes. “While traditional [civil society organizations] face constant pressure, individual artists and activists are harder to suppress and can often reach a wider audience with their democratic and reformational messages,” the Institute pointed out.

But Washington’s propaganda efforts weren’t just left to individual artists. The IRI also wrote that it had identified three “marginalized communities” to serve as shock troops on wedge issues – “Biharis, plainland ethnic groups and LGBTI people.”

In total, between 2019 and 2020, “IRI issued 11 advocacy grants to artists, musicians, performers or organizations that created 225 art products addressing political and social issues,” which it claimed were “viewed nearly 400,000 times.” Additionally, the Institute bragged that it “supported three civil society organizations (CSOs) from LGBTI, Bihari and ethnic communities to train 77 activists and engage 326 citizens to develop 43 specific policy demands,” which were apparently “proposed before 65 government officials.”

Between October and December of 2020, the IRI hosted three separate “transgender dance performances” across the country. Per the report, “the goal of the performance was to build self-esteem in the transgender community and raise awareness on transgender issues among the local community and government officials.” At the final performance, in Dhaka City, the US Embassy sent its “deputy consul general and deputy director of the Office for Democracy, Rights and Governance” to participate.

Finally, the IRI also carried out “community-specific quantitative and qualitative research,” which included “three focus group reports” and what it called “the largest published survey of LGBTI people in Bangladesh.”

In sum: “IRI’s program raised public awareness on social and political issues in Bangladesh and supported the public to challenge the status quo, which ultimately aims for power shift [sic] inside Bangladesh.”

In the US, Republican Party politicians have traditionally scorned government support for visual artists, transgender dancers, and rappers. But when an opportunity to install a more US-friendly government arose, the GOP’s in-house regime change organ eagerly transformed its domestic cultural enemies into political foot soldiers.

Bangladeshi rappers on the US intelligence payroll

This July, Bangladeshi media celebrated a barrister and Bangla rap artist named Toufique Ahmed as an influential face and voice of the protest movement to topple Hasina, touting his offer of free legal support to protesters arrested during the demonstrations.

IRI documents reveal that Ahmed’s music has been directly subsidized by the US government. According to the Institute’s files, Ahmed “released the first of two music videos under IRI’s small grants program, “Tui Parish” (You Can Do It),” in 2020.

Tui Parish | Towfique | Bangla Rap

The song explicitly targeted “youth with a message of perseverance in difficult times,” while encouraging “those who are committed to strengthen democracy in Bangladesh in every possible way, including protests and street movements.” The lyrics of his second IRI-funded music video addressed “a variety of social issues in Bangladesh including rape, poverty and workers’ rights.” It was explicitly “designed to reveal social issues in Bangladesh and build up disappointment and even dissent to [the] government so as to call for social and political reforms.”

IRI was particularly proud of the fact that its Bangladesh “art program… contributed to American cultural diplomacy in Bangladesh.” By funding local hip-hop artists, “IRI promoted a uniquely American art form,” the group noted. The US has a long history of weaponizing music for soft power purposes, stretching from the CIA’s co-optation of jazz in the 1950s to USAID’s deployment of anti-communist rappers as agents against Cuba’s present-day government.

During one of the IRI’s televised cultural programs, the host “introduced rapper Towfique Ahmed’s music video with a description of rap’s origin in the US.” The Institute boasted that “this message reached over 79,000 households” across the country.

Elsewhere, IRI noted approvingly that in interviews with Bangladeshis “who attended public exhibits or watched IRI’s programs on television,” it was clear that “public consumers of the media products understood the messages of the art.” These responses were said to demonstrate that IRI had moved close to its goal “to drive [a] power shift in Bangladesh through social and political reforms” that year. Effusive praise was heaped on the “non-traditional civic actors” it had trained in the country:

“They are neither solely an artist nor solely an activist; instead, they are functioning as a hybrid agent of change [emphasis added]. While cultural activism in Bangladesh may not directly influence policy change and improve institutional behavior alone, it can certainly shape the political debate, advance social dialogue and raise more public awareness on key issues.”

IRI documents expose the BNP as unpopular, directionless

IRI’s internal documents make clear that the opposition BNP’s lack of popularity necessitated the US government’s infiltration of Bangladesh’s civil society. One IRI report suggested that without a multi-million dollar cash injection from the US regime change apparatus, the BNP would remain trapped in a cycle of “vacillation between violence, boycott and participation,” and near-total rejection by voters.

The IRI’s 2020 final report is even more explicit, noting the BNP “has also failed to successfully mobilize opposition. Since the 2018 election, the BNP political strategy has shifted between boycotting and joining elections while trying to foment street movements against the government. None of these tactics have worked. The BNP remains marginal, and the AL’s power is undiminished. However, the BNP is still the most possible party to drive [a] power shift in the future.”

The Institute wasn’t the only DC-based player involved in efforts to oust the Awami League. An IRI writeup of a September 2019 meeting with BNP leadership notes the participation of a Senior Director for Blue Star Strategies, the controversial lobbying outfit which Hunter Biden helped convince to work on behalf of now-dissolved Ukrainian energy conglomerate Burisma. “The BNP has contracted with Blue Star Strategies,” the report notes, “to manage their communications and advocacy work with US-based policymakers and other key stakeholders.”

US officials have charged that Hasina’s Awami League relied on autocratic methods like vote rigging to compensate for its lack of public support. However, one leaked file related to a secret meeting between IRI and the BNP noted that the opposition party is “a persistent critic of IRI’s public opinion research,” as the figures “consistently” show “high approval ratings for the Awami League and negative ratings for the BNP.”

Elsewhere, a document outlining IRI’s “Bangladesh Strategy 2021-22” acknowledges the BNP “faces external pressure, internal disarray, and declining popularity.” A party activist was quoted as saying BNP members and supporters were “in confusion about who is leading the party,” as it was “missing leadership.”

IRI went on to lament that the BNP “appears to be losing popularity” within an already dwindling base, and that even before COVID-19, its public rallies “were sparsely attended.” Perhaps this is why “political party strengthening” was listed first under a section of an IRI document entitled, “Priority Areas of Work for IRI.”

IRI’s Bangladesh wing would “emphasize the need for support in advance of the next general elections,” while “[steering] away from traditional pre-election activities.” More music videos and art gallery shows were on the way, apparently.

Without any sense of irony, the IRI report concluded by warning of foreign interference in Bangladesh’s internal politics: “predictably, the [Awami League] and Sheikh Hasina would seek re-election by all means under the support of India.” As if to justify its own meddling in Bangladesh, the IRI insisted it was “necessary to counterbalance interference from regional powers” in the vote, which went ahead in January 2024.

The Awami League wound up winning the election in a landslide, while the BNP boycotted the vote, despite overt State Department attempts to compel their participation.

The IRI has not responded to a request from The Grayzone for comment about its activities in Bangladesh.

Pro-US micro-loan maven, Clinton acolyte takes charge in Dhaka

Before the August 2024 coup, Hasina had complained for years about US demands to construct military facilities in the country as part of Washington’s broader Indo-Pacific Strategy of “containing” China.

Refusing to acquiesce to Washington’s pressure, Hasina remained close with India. In May 2024, just days after meeting with Donald Liu, the Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia and Central Asia, Hasina warned that a “country of white-skinned people” had demanded she allow the installation of a military base in the Bay of Bengal. She apparently declined, telling legislators: “I do not want to come to power by leasing out parts of the country or handing it over to someone else.”

Similar obstinance led to the undoing of Imran Khan, the former Prime Minister of neighboring Pakistan, who was removed from power in an April 2022 military coup backed by the US. As economist Jeffrey Sachs noted, “the very strong evidence of the US role in toppling the government of Imran Khan raises the likelihood that something similar may have occurred in Bangladesh.”

With the pesky Hasina government and her Awami League now out of the picture, Washington’s preferred political leaders have taken on the task of dividing up the country and punishing dissidents – like the 150 journalists who’ve been charged since August 4. As Dhaka descends into chaos, with roving BNP gangs engaging in street battles for control of territory, a so-called “interim government” has emerged. It has already granted sweeping police powers to the military, and while it initially claimed to seek power for just a handful of months, one report in The Guardian estimates the unelected new regime could maintain control of the country for “up to five or six years.”

[https://twitter.com/Kanthan2030/status/1840823265121677569]

Leading the new government is Muhammad Yunus. A close associate of Bill and Hillary Clinton, Yunus received a Nobel Prize in 2006 for pioneering the concept of “microlending,” a piratical form of legalized loansharking that has impoverished and immiserated swaths of the Indian subcontinent ever since.

During Hillary Clinton’s tenure as Secretary of State under Obama, Yunus was shielded from prosecution in Bangladesh for corrupt business dealings, and simultaneously showered with millions in US government contracts. Clinton also threatened Hasina’s son with an IRS audit unless the Bangladeshi leader dropped an official probe into Grameen Bank, a microlender Yunus founded. US diplomatic cables released by WikiLeaks confirm multiple covert contacts between Yunus and US officials over the years, and reveal a favorable view of the predatory lender prevailed in American halls of power.

Standing alongside Clinton at the Clinton Global Initiative this September, Yunus boasted that the seemingly spontaneous “revolution” that toppled Hasina had actually been “meticulously-designed.”

“It’s not just [that it] suddenly came, it’s not like that.” Instead, it was “very well designed, even the leadership – people don’t know who the leaders are, so you can’t catch one and say, ‘it’s over.’ It’s not over.”

Yunus is not the only new Bangladeshi leader with clear ties to Washington. In 2021, his new foreign minister, Touhid Hossain, served as a “featured guest presenter” at a USAID workshop which trained Bangladeshi reporters on “countering misinformation.”

Within hours of Hasina’s flight from the country, Bangladesh’s new leaders ordered the release of BNP leader Khaleda Zia, who was serving a 17-year prison sentence for corruption. If Yunus ultimately does decide to cede power, the BNP now appears poised to inherit leadership. That’s because, with the Awami League practically banished from Bangladeshi politics, the once-flailing BNP has become the only possible alternative.

Even establishment analysts have begun to acknowledge that the return of the BNP now appears all but inevitable. As the Crisis Group stated days after Hasina’s ouster, “If an election were to occur tomorrow, the BNP… would probably emerge victorious.”

Now, the stage is set for Dhaka’s return to the US orbit. At a September 26 business luncheon in an upscale New York hotel, Yunus signaled that the country is once again open for business, assuring the assembled foreign investors: “As the US looks for its supply-chain diversification under its Indo-China Policy, Bangladesh is strategically positioned to become a significant partner in fulfilling that goal.”

30 September 2024

Source: thegrayzone.com

By samidoun

“I assure all of you: to the enemy, to the friend, to the whole world: You cannot eliminate Hezbollah, nor will you be able to eliminate the honourable resistance movements in Palestine. You will never be able to do so, because the resistance is not a conventional army, and because the resistance is, first and foremost, the people. A people who possess faith, willpower, confidence in victory, who love martyrdom, and who reject humiliation and disgrace. This is a people that no one can defeat. You may kill its men, women, children and elderly. You may destroy their buildings and homes over their heads. But you cannot defeat them. And with us as well, I assure, the resistance will not break. And the resistance will not be defeated.” – Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah

Samidoun Palestinian Prisoner Solidarity Network mourns with the deepest respect and salutes with the highest honour the great Arab, Islamic and international leader, the lifelong struggler, the brilliant revolutionary strategist, the anti-imperialist, anti-colonial icon, the beloved of the oppressed, the military and political commander, the tireless and victorious mujahid on the road to al-Quds and the liberation of Palestine, His Eminence, the Secretary-General of Hezbollah, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah.

We extend our condolences and congratulations to the Lebanese people, the Palestinian people, Hezbollah and its leadership, members and supporters, the resistance fighters on the front lines, all of the forces of resistance in the region, the revolutionary movements of the world, and his family and loved ones on the martyrdom of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, assassinated by the Zionist regime in a murderous attack on the southern suburbs of Beirut, on Friday, 27 September 2024. At the moment of his martyrdom, as he did throughout his life, he was deeply engaged and devoted to the liberation of Palestine, loyal in all circumstances, continuing to fight and advance for Palestine and Lebanon, confronting to the end the Zionist entity, its U.S. imperialist directors and all of their agents in the region.

Continuous building for liberation

In 2000 and 2006 and continually until this moment, Sayyed Nasrallah and the revolutionary movement he dedicated his life to building and leading struck blow after blow against Zionism and imperialism, as the Lebanese Resistance, led by Hezbollah, liberated the south of Lebanon from Zionist occupation after nearly 20 years of struggle and victoriously confronted the Zionist assault once again in 2006. Sayyed Nasrallah was the architect of a historic liberation that ushered in a new era of Palestinian, Arab, Islamic and international struggle and broke the back of Zionism, exposing its pretenses of military superiority and eternal domination over the region. He was renowned always for his wisdom, honesty and precision, with a clear vision of the enemy’s capacities, exposing its lies and manipulations, and planning for a strategic victory.

Sayyed Nasrallah’s leadership and struggle was also directly connected to the prisoners’ movement and the liberation of the prisoners of the Zionist regime. From the liberation of Khiam prison by the victorious Lebanese resistance in 2000, liberating the torture dens of the occupiers and their collaborators and turning it into a museum of honour for those who struggled and sacrificed there, to the repeated prisoner exchanges achieved by Hezbollah, the Lebanese Resistance, including the 2004 prisoner exchange, which liberated 400 Palestinian prisoners as well as 23 Lebanese, five Syrians, three Moroccans, three Sudanese, one Libyan and one German-British prisoner jailed by the Zionist regime. These exchanges, in which Sayyed Nasrallah himself played a major role, illustrated once again that the only viable mechanism available to liberate the prisoners in occupation jails is to liberate the land and to achieve an exchange.

Anti-imperialist vision targeted by a US/Zionist aggression

He always led, spoke and analyzed with the highest clarity about the forces of the enemy faced by the Lebanese and Palestinian people, recognizing and exposing the alliance between Zionism and US imperialism, saying: “America itself is the decision maker. In America, you have the major corporations; you have a trinity of the oil corporations, the weapons manufacturers and the so-called ‘Christian Zionism.’ The decision making is in the hands of this alliance. ‘Israel’ used to be a tool in the hands of the British, and now it is a tool in the hands of America.” In April of 2024, he reiterated this statement, affirming: “The claim that the Americans cannot force Israel to do something is nonsense. According to some theories, Israel controls America. No sir. It is America that controls Israel.” He did not hesitate to confront Arab and Islamic reactionary forces working as agents and allies of imperialism and Zionism, working tirelessly instead to build a revolutionary resistance alliance and deepen even further the unbreakable bonds of blood, commitment and struggle between Lebanon and Palestine.

We must be clear: this assassination attack was also a genocidal assault on the Lebanese people, particularly the people of al-Dahiyeh, the popular cradle of the resistance. The Zionist regime dropped 83 one-ton U.S.-made bombs on residential buildings in the southern suburbs of the Lebanese capital, Beirut, in the aggression. However, this was not simply an attack using U.S. weaponry. It is clear that the U.S. and its fellow imperialist powers, including Germany, France, Canada, Britain, Australia, and Italy, are full partners in the ongoing genocide in Gaza and throughout occupied Palestine and in the ongoing brutal Zionist aggression against Lebanon, including the assassination of Sayyed Nasrallah.

Indeed, US president, war criminal and genocidaire Joe Biden praised the assassination of Sayyed Nasrallah, calling it a “measure of justice for a…reign of terror.” Of course, it was Sayyed Nasrallah, his comrades in Hezbollah, in the Palestinian Resistance, in all of the resistance forces of the region who were responsible for bringing down the reign of terror of Zionism and imperialism in Lebanon and confronting it everywhere in the region. Biden further confirmed that the assassination, and indeed, the entire aggression on Lebanon, were meant to break the unshakeable alliance with the Palestinian people and their resistance, saying that “Nasrallah…made the fateful decision to join hands with Hamas and open what he called a ‘northern front’ against Israel.” As Sayyed Nasrallah affirmed in his last speech, he met these demands with defiance and unshakeable commitment: “We will never abandon Palestine.”

Lebanon and Palestine: The Unbreakable Alliance

Indeed, Hezbollah and the Lebanese people and their Resistance joined hands with Hamas and all of the forces of the Resistance, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, and all of the resistance factions and the Palestinian people as a whole, to create a major support front in the battle of Al-Aqsa Flood. And they have consistently fought to decolonize the north of Palestine, emptying it of its settlers and soldiers, in order to defend Gaza and demand an end to the genocide. It is Hezbollah, alongside the people, armed forces, and AnsarAllah movement of Yemen, and their fellow resistance forces in the regional resistance alliance, who have taken their responsibilities to prevent genocide seriously, while the imperialist powers arm, fund and indeed direct the genocidal warplanes of the Zionist entity. Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah refused to allow the alliance of the support fronts to be broken, committed deeply to the liberation of al-Quds and all of Palestine, from the river to the sea, knowing that his martyrdom was possible and even likely, as was that of his son, Hadi, in the battle to liberate Lebanon in 1997.

The imperialist powers, led by the United States, continue to list Hezbollah on their so-called lists of “terrorist organizations” or “terrorist entities,” despite the fact that Hezbollah is a mass movement and political party in Lebanon, the force that achieved the liberation of Lebanese land from Zionist colonization and terror. This listing is used in an attempt to isolate, sanction and besiege the resistance, as well as to legitimize the assassination and imprisonment of its leaders and members. Listing Hezbollah and the Palestinian Resistance organizations on “terror lists” and under anti-terror laws runs entirely in contradiction with international law and the rights of people to liberate themselves from colonialism and occupation. While this has failed, of course, to crush the resistance or to isolate it from its popular cradle in Lebanon and Palestine, it continues to serve as a mechanism of repression and targeting, much like the sanctions and coercive economic measures targeting nations and states that resist U.S. imperialist domination. In fact, time and time again, the great resistance leaders targeted for assassination by the Zionist regime using US weaponry and intelligence – for example, the martyrs Ibrahim Aqil, Fouad Shukr, Saleh al-Arouri, and Ismail Haniyeh – all appear as “specially designated global terrorists” or even “most wanted” by the United States.

They Can Never Assassinate Resistance

The assassination campaign is nothing new, and it has failed miserably in an attempt to destroy the resistance. The deep faith and commitment of the resistance’s leadership has prepared them for martyrdom, and Sayyed Nasrallah, alongside every fighter for Palestine and Lebanon, carried with him the deepest willingness to sacrifice and struggle despite any price extracted. He said: “We will continue to walk this path, even if we are all killed, even if we are all martyred, even if our homes are destroyed over our heads, we will not abandon the option of Islamic resistance.”

Sayyed Nasrallah himself was elected as the General Secretary of Hezbollah in 1992, following the Zionist assassination of Sayyed Abbas al-Musawi. The assassination of al-Musawi failed, despite the predictions of the day, to destroy Hezbollah and the Lebanese resistance; on the contrary, the resistance rose to greater strength and power, ridding the land of Lebanon of the colonial zionist forces occupying the South since 1982.

From Ibrahim Aqil to Fouad Shukr to Abbas al-Musawi, from Ismail Haniyeh to Saleh al-Arouri to  Fathi Shiqaqi, Abu Ali Mustafa, Abdel-Aziz Rantisi, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, Imad Mughniyyeh, Yahya Ayyash, Abu Jihad, Kamal ‘Udwan, Mohammed al-Najjar, Basil al-Kubaisi, Kamal Nasser, Wadie Haddad, Ghassan Kanafani, Mohammed Boudia, Basil al-Araj, Tariq Izzedine to Samir Kuntar; the Zionist regime relies on the assassination weapon against the liberation movement. However, despite these assassinations, the forces of resistance are stronger than they have ever been and the Zionist regime continues to crumble. Assassinations have little effect on the capabilities of the Resistance, for they cannot kill the ideology of resistance as it is not embodied in individual men but in the popular consciousness of the broad masses.

As Tareq Izzedine said, “Whenever a leader ascends, ten will emerge to replace them. When a martyr ascends, 100 martyrs will emerge to replace them. The march continues, and it does not stop until the defeat of the occupation.” And as Saleh al-Arouri said, “We are martyred like our people, we are arrested as they are arrested, our homes are demolished and we are being chased and pursued. We fight because we must.”

On the road to Al-Quds, on the road to victory and liberation

The pain of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah’s assassination is felt in the heart of every free human who cherishes liberation, justice and a future of dignity for all. His revolutionary honesty and clarity, brilliant strategic wisdom,  and deep commitment is cherished everywhere, from the villages, cities and refugee camps of Palestine, where spontaneous marches burst into the streets at the news of his martyrdom, to the popular cradle of south Lebanon and among the Lebanese people as a whole, to those who march for Palestine and against the genocide in the centre of Johannesburg, South Africa, to a commune in Venezuela working to build popular solidarity and confront U.S. imperialism, to even the streets and campuses of the imperial core, where mass movements confront genocide, imperialism and Zionism. He represents not only himself, but the true promise of the resistance, for victory, return and liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea, for the defeat of Zionism, imperialism and their reactionary agents and partners. Committed always to uplifting the oppressed, Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah lived his life as a mujahid on the road to al-Quds, and a true international revolutionary leader of our time.

The Zionist and imperialist forces seek to declare an illusory “victory” or “achievement” over the Resistance through the assassination of Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and the mass targeting of the Lebanese and Palestinian people. However, despite their genocidal campaigns of aerial bombing, they have been utterly unable to uproot or destroy the Resistance and its deep commitment among the people. Al-Aqsa Flood has exposed before the world the true nature of Zionism and imperialism and has made it clear that a liberated Palestine and indeed, a liberated Arab nation and a liberated region are fully possible and achievable. Despite their genocidal attempts to erase the revolution and the resistance in a sea of blood, they will never kill the resistance nor the Palestinian, Arab, Islamic and international revolution against Zionism and imperialism. 

We hold the deepest confidence that the unified Resistance will ensure that the occupation is held accountable for its genocidal aggression and its cowardly assassinations. For those of us in the imperial core, this is a moment to escalate our struggle, to organize more actively, to take direct action, to fill the streets, and to make it impossible for imperialist business as usual to continue. 

As the martyr Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said in his last speech, “The end of this battle will be a historic victory.” Our collective movement must, with full confidence and commitment, do everything in our power to ensure the correctness and inevitability of this statement.  

This great crime will only inspire even more resistance and struggle along the path set out and exemplified by Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, the great leader and the great martyr, until the defeat of the Zionist regime and its imperialist partners and sponsors, until victory:  the liberation of Palestine from the river to the sea, and the liberation of the Arab people and the region from Zionism, imperialism and their agents and collaborators.

28 September 2024

Source: samidoun.net

By Gerald A. Perreira

“And do not say about those who are killed in the way of Allah ‘They are dead.’
Rather, they are alive, but you perceive it not.”
Quran, Surah al-Baqarah

“So long as there is imperialism in the world, a permanent peace is
impossible.”
Hassan Nasrallah

Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the fearless and enduring Lebanese resistance movement, Hezbollah, embraced martyrdom on September 27, 2024, at the hands of the racist and fascist settler-colonial outpost known as Israel, with the full complicity of its US and Western backers.

Oppressed peoples worldwide mourned his death and commemorated his extraordinary life and achievements. Liberation movements throughout South America and the Caribbean saluted him, situating him in his rightful place, amongst the great freedom fighters of our time.

A State within a State, as many have described Hezbollah, Nasrallah successfully built the new within the confines of the old. He will be remembered for leading many successful battles, amongst them Hezbollah’s stunning defeat of the invading Zionist forces in Lebanon in 2006, and the decisive role Hezbollah played in defeating the pseudo-Islamists in Syria. His most recent heroic stance, confronting Israel head on as it conducts its campaign of genocide in Gaza on behalf of the Collective West, will be forever remembered.

For all those who perpetuate the Western big lie that Nasrallah was a ‘terrorist’ know this: long after you are gone and forgotten, Hassan Nasrallah will be remembered in the annals of history as someone who had the courage to stand up to the fourth largest military power on earth, and history will most definitely absolve him.

International pariah and mass murderer, Benjamin Netanyahu, and his fascist cohorts in the Knesset, Biden administration, the Democratic and Republican parties, and the US intelligence agencies, believe that the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah and other high-level leaders will break the resistance and tilt the scale in favour of a Zionist victory. These enemies of the poor, oppressed, and downtrodden masses of humanity have no understanding of the world and human civilization beyond the material realm. They operate and function purely at the level of their base animal instincts, failing to comprehend the metaphysical realm. For the faith-driven freedom fighters of Hezbollah, the spiritual element is the link to a higher level of purpose and action. The primary contradiction is between truth and falsehood – between The Party of God and the Party of the Devil.

Hezbollah is a Lebanese liberation movement that was formed as a response to the 1982 Israeli invasion of their country. However, in its broader context, all those who have fought against genocide, past and present, the enslavement of captured Africans, all those who stand in defence of human dignity and a world free of colonialism, racism, fascism and Zionism, are members of the Party of God. On the other hand, individuals, organizations, movements, and governments that perpetrate these evils are members of the Party of Shaitan.

At this time, we must reject the enemy’s propaganda to divide us, to make us lose confidence in the Resistance, and especially reject all forms of cynicism and despair promoted by the corporate media and corporate social media. The assassination of Hassan Nasrallah and other leading figures from Hamas and Hezbollah is of course a blow and is painful, however it does not alter the trajectory. If anything, it will motivate and energize all of us to intensify our efforts in the struggle in whatever capacity we can. There is no turning back. Imperialism and Zionism must be defeated. Victory is inevitable.

Rene Guenon, the French metaphysician who reverted to Islam, in his book titled, The Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times stated: “There is no cause for despair, and, even were there no hope of achieving any visible result before the modern world collapses under some catastrophe, this would still be no valid reason for not undertaking a work whose scope extends far beyond the present time. Those who might be tempted to give way to despair should realize that nothing accomplished in this spiritual order can ever be lost, that confusion, error and darkness can win the day only apparently and in a purely ephemeral way, that nothing can ultimately prevail against the power of truth.”

Rest in Power Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah – yours was a life well lived. You live on in the hearts and minds of all those throughout this world who fight for a new dawn.
May Allah be pleased with you.

1 October 2024

Gerald A. Perreira
On behalf of the National Directorate,
Organization for the Victory of the People (OVP)
Georgetown, Guyana
https://www.ovpguyana.org/

By Dr. Ramzy Baroud

The official Israeli army version of why it has targeted civilian areas during the intense and deadly bombardment of September 20 in south Lebanon is that the Lebanese are hiding long-range missile launchers in their own homes.

This official explanation by the Israeli military was meant to justify the killing of 492 people and the wounding of 1,645 in a single day of Israeli strikes.

This ready-to-serve explanation shall accompany us throughout the Israeli war in Lebanon, however long it takes. Israeli media is now heavily citing these claims and, by extension, US and western media are following suit.

Keep this in mind as you reflect on earlier statements made by Israeli President Isaac Herzog on October 13 when he argued that there are no civilians in Gaza and “there is an entire nation out there that is responsible”.

Israel does this in every war it launches against any Palestinian or Arab nation. Instead of removing civilians and civilian infrastructures from its bank of targets, it immediately turns the civilian population into the main targets of its war.

A quick glance at the number of civilians killed in the ongoing war and genocide in Gaza should be enough to demonstrate that Israel targets ordinary people as a matter of course.

According to the Palestinian Health Ministry in Gaza, children and women constitute the largest percentage of the war’s victims at 69 percent. If we factor in the number of adult males who have been killed – a number that includes doctors, medics, civil defense workers and numerous other categories – it will become obvious that the vast majority of all of Gaza’s victims are civilians.

Only Israeli media, and their allies in the west, continue to find justifications of why Palestinian civilians, and now Lebanese, are being killed in large numbers.

Compare the following two statements, which received much attention in the media, by Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari, regarding both Gaza and Lebanon.

“Hamas systematically uses hospitals to wage war and consistently uses the people of Gaza as human shields,” Hagari said on March 25.

Then, “Hezbollah’s terror headquarters was intentionally built under residential buildings in the heart of Beirut, as part of Hezbollah’s strategy of using human shields,” he said on September 27.

For those who are giving Hagari the benefit of the doubt, just review what has taken place in Gaza in the last year.

For example, Israel claimed that the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital massacre was not of its doing, and that it was a Palestinian rocket that killed the nearly 500 displaced refugees and wounded hundreds more on October 17.

All evidence, including investigations by well-respected rights groups, concluded the opposite. Still, however, the false Israeli claims received much coverage in the media.

The Baptist Hospital episode was repeated numerous times. In fact, the lies started on October 7, not October 17, when Israel made claims about decapitated babies and mass rape. Even though much of that has been conclusively proven to be wrong, some in the media, and pro-Israel officials, continue to speak of it as a proven fact.

And though no Hamas headquarters were ever found under Al-Shifa Hospital, the unsubstantiated Israeli claims continue to be repeated as if they were the full truth.

The same logic is now being applied to Lebanon, where Israel claims that it does not target civilians and, when civilians are killed, it is the Lebanese themselves who should be blamed for supposedly using civilians as human shields.

The Gaza playbook is now the Lebanon playbook. Of course, many are playing along, not because they are irrational or unable to reach proper conclusions based on the obvious evidence. They do so because they are part of the Israeli narrative, not neutral storytellers or honest reporters.

Even the likes of the BBC are part of that narrative, as they use Israeli claims as the starting point of any conversation on Palestine or Lebanon. For example, “Israel has said it carried out a wave of pre-emptive strikes across southern Lebanon to thwart a large-scale rocket and drone attack by Hezbollah,” the BBC reported on August 26.

Israel gets away with its lies pertaining to the mass killings in Gaza, and now sadly in Lebanon, because Israeli propaganda is welcomed, in fact, embraced by western officials and journalists.

Thus when US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan described the September 20 airstrikes on Lebanon as “justice served”, he was indicating to mainstream media that its coverage should remain committed to that official assessment.

Imagine the outrage if the tables were turned, as in thousands of Israeli civilians were slaughtered in their own homes by Lebanese bombs. There would be no need to elaborate on the reactions of the US or western media as this should be obvious to anyone who is paying attention.

Lebanon is a sovereign Arab state. Gaza is an occupied territory, and its people are protected under the Fourth Geneva Conventions. Neither Lebanese nor Palestinian lives are without worth, and their mass murder should not be allowed to take place for any reason, especially based on utter lies communicated by an Israeli military spokesman.

Perpetuating Israeli lies is dangerous, not only because truth-telling is a virtue but also because words kill, and dishonest reporting can, in fact, succeed in justifying genocide.

Dr. Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle.

3 October 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies

On October 1, Iran fired about 180 missiles at Israel in response to Israel’s recent assassinations of leaders of its Revolutionary Guard (IRGC), Hezbollah and Hamas. There are conflicting reports about how many of the missiles struck their targets and if there were any deaths. But Israel is now considering a counterattack that could propel it into an all-out war with Iran, with the U.S. in tow.

For years, Iran has been trying to avoid such a war. That is why it signed the 2015 JCPOA nuclear agreement with the United States, the U.K., France, Germany, Russia, China and the European Union. Donald Trump unilaterally pulled the U.S. out of the JCPOA in 2018, and despite Joe Biden’s much-touted differences with Trump, he failed to restore U.S. compliance. Instead, he tried to use Trump’s violation of the treaty as leverage to demand further concessions from Iran. This only served to further aggravate the schism between the United States and Iran, which have had no diplomatic relations since 1980.

Now, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sees his long-awaited chance to draw the United States into war with Iran. By killing Iranian military leaders and Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh on Iranian soil, as well as attacking Iran’s allies in Lebanon and Yemen, Netanyahu provoked a military response from Iran that has given him an excuse to widen the conflict even further. Tragically, there are warmongering U.S. officials who would welcome a war on Iran, and many more who would blindly go along with it.

Iran’s newly elected president, Masoud Pezeshkian, campaigned on a platform of reconciling with the West. When he came to New York to speak at the UN General Assembly on September 25, he was accompanied by three members of Iran’s JCPOA negotiating team: former foreign minister Javad Zarif; current foreign minister Abbas Araghchi; and deputy foreign minister Majid Ravanchi.

President Pezeshkian’s message in New York was conciliatory. With Zarif and Araghchi at his side at a press conference on September 23, he talked of peace, and of reviving the dormant nuclear agreement. “Vis-a-vis the JCPOA, we said 100 times we are willing to live up to our agreements,” he said. “We do hope we can sit at the table and hold discussions.”

On the crisis in the Middle East, Pezeshkian said that Iran wanted peace and had exercised restraint in the face of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, its assassinations of resistance leaders and Iranian officials, and its war on its neighbors.

“Let’s create a situation where we can co-exist,” said Pezeshkian. “Let’s try to resolve tensions through dialogue…We are willing to put all of our weapons aside so long as Israel will do the same.” He added that Iran is a signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, while Israel is not, and that Israel’s nuclear arsenal is a serious threat to Iran.

Pezeshkian reiterated Iran’s desire for peace in his speech at the UN General Assembly.

“I am the president of a country that has endured threats, war, occupation, and sanctions throughout its modern history,” he said. “Others have neither come to our assistance nor respected our declared neutrality. Global powers have even sided with aggressors. We have learned that we can only rely on our own people and our own indigenous capabilities. The Islamic Republic of Iran seeks to safeguard its own security, not to create insecurity for others. We want peace for all and seek no war or quarrel with anyone.”

The U.S. response to Iran’s restraint throughout this crisis has been to keep sending destructive weapons to Israel, with which it has devastated Gaza, killed tens of thousands of women and children, bombed neighboring capitals, and beefed up the forces it would need to attack Iran.

That includes a new order for 50 F-15EX long-range bombers, with 750 gallon fuel tanks for the long journey to Iran. That arms deal still has to pass the Senate, where Senator Bernie Sanders is leading the opposition.

On the diplomatic front, the U.S. vetoed successive cease-fire resolutions in the UN Security Council and hijacked Qatar and Egypt’s cease-fire negotiations to provide diplomatic cover for unrestricted genocide.

Military leaders in the United States and Israel appear to be arguing against war on Iran, as they have in the past. Even George W. Bush and Dick Cheney balked at launching another catastrophic war based on lies against Iran, after the CIA publicly admitted in its 2006 National Intelligence Estimate that Iran was not developing nuclear weapons.

When Trump threatened to attack Iran, Tulsi Gabbard warned him that a U.S. war on Iran would be so catastrophic that it would finally, retroactively, make the war on Iraq look like the “cakewalk” the neocons had promised it would be.

But neither U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin nor Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant can control their countries’ war policies, which are in the hands of political leaders with political agendas. Netanyahu has spent many years trying to draw the United States into a war with Iran, and has kept escalating the Gaza crisis for a year, at the cost of tens of thousands of innocent lives, with that goal clearly in mind.

Biden has been out of his depth throughout this crisis, relying on political instincts from an era when acting tough and blindly supporting Israel were politically safe positions for American politicians. Secretary of State Antony Blinken rose to power through the National Security Council and as a Senate staffer, not as a diplomat, riding Biden’s coat-tails into a senior position where he is as out of his depth as his boss.

Meanwhile, pro-Iran militia groups in Iraq warn that, if the U.S. joins in strikes on Iran, they will target U.S. bases in Iraq and the region.

So we are careening toward a catastrophic war with Iran, with no U.S. diplomatic leadership and only Trump and Harris waiting in the wings. As Trita Parsi wrote in Responsible Statecraft, “If U.S. service members find themselves in the line of fire in an expanding Iran-Israel conflict, it will be a direct result of this administration’s failure to use U.S. leverage to pursue America’s most core security interest here — avoiding war.”

Medea Benjamin and Nicolas J. S. Davies are the authors of War in Ukraine: Making Sense of a Senseless Conflict, published by OR Books in November 2022.

3 October 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Andre Damon

US and Israeli officials openly endorsed a large-scale attack on Iran Tuesday, following a strike by Tehran on Israel with 185 ballistic missiles the same day.

Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett called for strikes on Iran’s nuclear program, a move that has been planned by Israel and the US for decades.

“We must act *now* to destroy Iran’s nuclear program, its central energy facilities, and to fatally cripple this terrorist regime,” Bennett declared, demanding that Israel must “strike the head of the octopus of terror.”

He was joined by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, who said, “I would urge the Biden administration to coordinate an overwhelming response with Israel, starting with Iran’s ability to refine oil,” implying a damaging US attack on Iran’s energy infrastructure.

He was joined by Republican Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, who declared, “I urge the reimposition of a maximum pressure campaign against Iran and fully support Israel’s right to respond disproportionately to stop this threat.”

The warmongering comments were bipartisan. Democratic Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania said in a statement, “My voice and vote follow Israel to ensure they have whatever resources they need—whether that’s military, financial, or intelligence—to prevail over terror.”

Nearly one year after the October 7 attacks on Israel by Hamas, which were facilitated by a deliberate stand-down of the Israeli military and intelligence services and the beginning of the genocide in Gaza, it has become clear that the United States and Israel have seized upon the events of that day as a pretext to carry out a long-planned regional war throughout the Middle East, with Iran as the central target.

Iran’s missile strike on Israel took place just one day after Israel launched a ground offensive in Lebanon, following days of escalating air bombardments that left thousands of people dead.

On Saturday, Israel assassinated Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, using 85 massive bombs that completely leveled high-rise residential buildings, killing hundreds.

Iran’s foreign minister released a statement saying the attack was a response to “the assassination of the head of Hamas’ political office in Tehran, who was an official guest of the Iranian government, as well as the assassination of the Secretary-General of Hezbollah in Lebanon and General Nilforoushan, a senior Iranian military advisor, in Beirut.”

Both the US and UK’s military forces participated in efforts to shoot down missiles used in the strike, which was larger, more sophisticated and less telegraphed than an earlier strike on Israel by Iran in April. US and Israeli officials sought to present the strike as having no impact, despite widespread footage on social media showing missiles impacting Israeli military bases.

Iran’s top military official, Mohammad Bagheri, stated on state TV that the missiles fired at Israel were aimed at three military bases—Nevatim, Hatzerim and Tel Nof—as well as the headquarters of Mossad, Israel’s intelligence agency. He emphasized that civilian areas and infrastructure were intentionally not targeted.

All sections of the US political establishment restated their support for Israel’s actions in Gaza and its broader attack throughout the Middle East. “Make no mistake, the United States is fully, fully, fully supportive of Israel,” said US President Joe Biden. He added, “The attack appears to have been defeated and ineffective, which is a testament to Israeli military capability and the US military.”

Responding to Iran’s missile strike, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared, “Israel, with the active support of the United States and other partners, effectively defeated this attack,” adding, “We demonstrated, once again, our commitment to Israel’s defense.”

US Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democrats’ candidate for president in the November election, added that the US would “never hesitate to take whatever action is necessary to defend US forces and interests against Iran and Iran-backed terrorists.” She added, “I’m clear-eyed. … Iran is a destabilizing, dangerous force in the Middle East, and today’s attack on Israel only further demonstrates that fact.”

Democratic Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said, “The United States will continue to stand by our ally Israel in support of Israel’s right to defend itself. … Iran and its proxies must be held accountable.”

Meanwhile, Israel’s bombardment and ground invasion of Lebanon continued, with at least five Israeli airstrikes attacking the southern suburbs of Beirut on Wednesday. The number of people killed by Israel in Lebanon in the past 12 months is approaching 2,000, compared to the 1,200 people killed in Israel’s 2006 invasion of Lebanon.

And in Gaza—where the official death toll since last October has surpassed 41,000 but is likely over 186,000—at least 37 people were killed in two separate Israeli’s airstrikes on the Nuseirat refugee camp and a school in Gaza City, where displaced families were sheltering.

The escalating calls for massive strikes on Lebanon came amid a report by Politico that US officials authorized Israel’s ground offensive on Lebanon.

Politico reported, “Senior White House figures privately told Israel that the US would support its decision to ramp up military pressure against Hezbollah—even as the Biden administration publicly urged the Israeli government in recent weeks to curtail its strikes.”

The report continued, “Presidential adviser Amos Hochstein and Brett McGurk, the White House coordinator for the Middle East, told top Israeli officials in recent weeks that the US agreed with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s broad strategy to shift Israel’s military focus to the north against Hezbollah. … Behind the scenes, Hochstein, McGurk, and other top US national security officials are describing Israel’s Lebanon operations as a history-defining moment—one that will reshape the Middle East for the better for years to come.”

2 October 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Laura Tiernan

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange delivered a powerful speech Tuesday in Strasbourg, France during a 90-minute session of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). He described 14 years of extra-judicial persecution, lawfare and imprisonment against him by the United States and Britain and its chilling effects on media freedom worldwide.

Assange travelled from Australia to appear before PACE in person. He was seated alongside his wife Stella and WikiLeaks editor-in-chief Kristinn Hrafnsson. It was Assange’s first public speech since his release from Belmarsh prison four months ago after a plea deal with the US Department of Justice.

Assange said of the deal, in which he pleaded guilty to conspiring with US Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to obtain and disclose classified documents: “I eventually chose freedom over unrealizable justice after being detained for years and facing a 175-year sentence with no effective remedy.” He emphasised, “I am not free today because the system worked, I am free today after years of incarceration because I pled guilty to journalism.”

He said that without an unprecedented global campaign for his freedom, waged by activists, citizens, legal and medical professionals and political representatives, “I never would have seen the light of day.”

Assange was appearing at a specially convened parliamentary session on his detention and conviction. It was introduced by Icelandic representative Thórhildur Sunna Ævarsdóttir, general rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders for the Council of Europe and member of the Pirate Party. On Wednesday, PACE will debate her report, “The detention and conviction of Julian Assange and their chilling effects on human rights.”

The personal toll on Assange wreaked by the US-led vendetta against WikiLeaks was evident. Assange told PACE:

The experience of isolation for years in a small cell is difficult to convey. It strips away one’s sense of self, leaving only the raw essence of existence. I am yet not fully equipped to speak about what I have endured, the relentless struggle to stay alive both physically and mentally. Nor can I speak yet about the death by hanging, murder and medical neglect of my fellow prisoners.

He continued:

Isolation has taken its toll, which I am trying to unwind, and expressing myself in this setting is a challenge. However, the gravity of this occasion and the weight of the issues at hand compel me to set aside my reservations and speak to you directly.

Assange used his appearance to warn of the far-reaching implications of his prosecution under the Espionage Act, which had criminalised journalism and ushered in a regime of “transnational repression.” His conviction meant that any journalist anywhere in the world could be charged, extradited and imprisoned for exposing war crimes and other human rights abuses by the US government.

After 14 years’ incarceration in Britain, under house arrest, inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and then prison, Assange described emerging from “the dungeon of Belmarsh” and finding “how much ground has been lost during that time … how expressing the truth has been undermined, attacked, weakened and diminished. I see more impunity, more secrecy, more retaliation for telling the truth and more self-censorship.

“It is hard not to draw a line from the US government’s prosecution of me, it’s crossing the Rubicon by internationally criminalizing journalism, to the chilled climate for freedom of expression that exists now.”

Assange said WikiLeaks had “obtained and published the truth about tens of thousands of hidden casualties of war and other unseen horrors, about programs of assassination, rendition, torture and mass surveillance. We revealed not just when and where these things happened, but frequently the policies, the agreements and the structures behind them.”

He recalled how WikiLeaks’ Collateral Murder video published in 2010—showing US Apache helicopter crew “eagerly blowing to pieces Iraqi journalists and their rescuers”—had exposed the reality of modern warfare and “shocked the world.”

Assange described the persecution that followed, including covert actions by the CIA:

It is now a matter of public record that under [CIA Director Mike] Pompeo’s explicit direction, the CIA drew up plans to kidnap and to assassinate me within the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and authorized going after my European colleagues, subjecting us to theft, hacking attacks and the planting of false information.

My wife and my infant son were also targeted. A CIA asset was permanently assigned to track my wife, and instructions were given to obtain DNA from my six-month-old son’s nappy. This is the testimony of more than 30 current and former US intelligence officials.

He concluded:

The CIA’s targeting of myself, my family and my associates through aggressive extra-judicial and extra-territorial means provides a rare insight into how powerful intelligence organizations engage in transnational repression.

In the Q&A period that followed, Assange responded to a question about his plans for the future. He spoke of the transformed political climate facing WikiLeaks:

Where we once released important war crimes videos that stirred public debate, now every day there are livestreamed horrors from the wars in Ukraine and the war in Gaza. Hundreds of journalists have been killed in Gaza and Ukraine combined. The impunity seems to mount, and it is still uncertain what we can do about it.

Asked whether he had known at the start how few legal protections were available to WikiLeaks in Europe, Assange said he had expected legal harassment and was prepared to fight. But he added:

My naivete was believing in the law. When push comes to shove, laws are just pieces of paper, and they can be reinterpreted for political expediency. They are the rules made by the ruling class more broadly, and if those rules don’t suit what it wants to do, it reinterprets them.

Another PACE representative asked whether, in retrospect, Assange would have done anything differently. He replied: “Once I was trapped in the United Kingdom, it took me time to understand what UK society was about—who you could trust, who you couldn’t trust, the different types of manoeuvres that are made in that society. There are different media partners that perhaps we could have chosen differently.”

Assange’s then media partners, led by the Guardian newspaper and the New York Times, published WikiLeaks’ explosive revelations before promptly breaking relations with Assange. They conspired with the Pentagon, CIA and the British state in a decade-long slander campaign aimed at destroying Assange and contributing directly to the “chilling environment” of state terrorism and precision-guided assassination of journalists in Gaza and beyond, armed, financed and directed by the imperialist powers of Europe, the United States and Australia.

2 October 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Hiren Gohain

Now that the top leadership of the Hezbullah headed by Hasan Nasrallah have been liquidated in one fell swoop and Netanyuhu is chortling that such will be the end of all enemies of ‘the free world’ ,it is  clear that the fateful occurrence had not been just a happy accident for him and his backers,but the outcome of an elaborate and meticulously planned and executed campaign.One only awaits the apparently episodic and haphazard expansion of the war to Iran,with rulers of major Arab states watching complacently from a ‘safe’ distance.Not realizing that it is also going to pinion them to the American strategy and squeeze them to an insignificant role in the middle east.

While the American war machine seemed to sweep all before it Hezbullah had emerged in the aftermath of the second Gulf War in Iraq as a major force of resistance to American hegemony.The organization was not simply a small fighting group aiming at inflicting injuries on the apparently invincible American forces.It received popular support,clearly had precise well-defined goals and caused much headache to the Americans.Its leader emerged as one of the most effective leaders of serious popular and military resistance to American goals.They have been on his trail since then.Now Israel has acted as a star sniper for Americans.That is why Netanyuhu has been invited to speak to the US Congress twice and  applauded.Pentagon seems to have been complicit in not only the determination of the military goals,but also the actual planning of the campaign.

In the meanwhile the advent of new electronic devices in the shadow war of intelligence had radically altered the nature of the larger war.The capacity for gathering vital intelligence on location and movements of targeted people whether from mobile watchtowers in space or from snoopers below on earth has qualitatively altered the balance of power in favour of America and its most favoured ally.The allies on the other side have been caught napping.The dividends that technological advance in war preparations received from lavish expenditure on electronic and weapons research by the West had been neglected by them as they sat snugly in their triumph about their temporary local successes.It is a war to the death, not  a struggle for pockets of influence.The power and success of Israel in inflicting  serious damage deep inside enemy territory with the help of advanced gadgetry and powerful American weapons must not from now on to be discounted.For the Hezbullah is not going to disband itself and go into monastic retreat.

The rising clamour for ceasefire and the hypocritical ambiguously worded American advocacy for such a settlement is hardly a cure for the infected wound.It will settle nothing but will give Israel time to consolidate its gains and prepare for the next assault.Every Palestinian attempt to regain advantage may be turned into an opportunity to widen the war and further weaken the enemies of Israel.The next target is likely to be Iran.

The idea is not in my view a total victory over a dangerous enemy but an expansion of area under control in an unending war.Keeping the issue alive brings more political dividends than a conclusive victory or settlement.Only a rabid jingoistic and insatiable blood-thirsty  government in Israel will serve this purpose.This might not ensure some sort of monopoly control of the world’s petroleum reserves(recent discoveries the world over no longer support such a view),but it will certainly ensure control of the world’s major trade route. Besides it will keep at bay such unsettling alien initiatives as the Chinese moves for peace and reduction of conflict among countries of the region.Thousands of people,including children,women and the elderly, might be incinerated every year.But in the accounts of the managers of this war such collateral damage is considered unavoidable.Crooked politicians who had raised such a hue and cry about the ‘acts of terror’ by Hamas a year ago have not even raised an eyebrow at the flagrant terrorist attack on Hezbolla planting miniature  explosive devices in electronic gadgets like mobiles and walki-talkies which did not confine its  toll to combatants.

Now what does it signify for the targeted nations and countries?They must have in use and in store effective electronic devices to offset the current advantage of Israel and its senior partner.Such pinpointed accuracy of successful attacks not only indicate systematic and effective surveillance from space but also a humming network of collaborators on the ground to relay precise and instantaneous information.To locate and disarm such an elaborate and efficient network highly effective jamming devices must be put to work.The vacancy on the ground where enemy agents can perform at will is a major disadvantage for the target nations or armies.

Facial and physical recognition technologies as well as the capacity to relay such information second by second must have helped the enemy to score such spectacular successes.Old methods of direct contact and conflict are perhaps no longer so vital.Or perhaps these can no longer serve as an all-purpose approach.

The backwardness of science education and research against such a background in the countries concerned must be admitted as a disadvantage.The major and senior partner in this alliance against American hegemony and Israeli brutality,Iran has turned half of its population against itself with its blind religious dogmatism.The religious control over education is unlikely to ensure advances in science, research and technology.

The people are certainly a mighty force in themselves.But had they been armed with science they could have performed much much better.Besides the iron-fisted attitude to those not inclined to orthodoxy is bound to breed disgruntled infomers. Now that a charismatic popular leader with a clear mind and broad outlook as well as an incomparable strategic grasp,as well as his immediate successors, have been martyred, the next generation of leadership must address such fundamental problems creatively and energetically. The technological gap must be narrowed.

Israel is hard at work trying to throw its opponents off its  scent by declaring that thanks to double agents in the ranks of Hamas or Hezbullah it has had the prompt and precise information that enabled it to hunt down the enemy commanders.While the chaos of insecurity and confusion lasting years on the ground might have bred the odd traitor or two,the main loophole appears to be the edge in technological or electronic advance as well as the reliance on accurate intelligence that helped elimination of key figures in the command of the enemy forces.

Nor must it be taken for granted that there  cannot be any native innovative skill to outwit sophisticated Israeli and American electronic warfare.Vietnam made up for lack of radar with big funnel-shaped cavities on the ground with prostrate  individuals with keen ears could hear the drone of aircraft from a distance way ahead of its actual appearance in the skies of a particular area. Israel has to be fought to a standstill and America robbed of its power to terrorise the world.

Hiren Gohain is a political commentator

2 October 2024

Source: countercurrents.org

By Jordan Shilton

The Israeli military launched its ground incursion into southern Lebanon early Tuesday morning. While Israeli officials claimed that ground operations would be limited in scope, scale and duration, the claims are no more believable in the case of Lebanon than in Gaza.

Underscoring the central involvement of American imperialism in the escalating region-wide war, State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said Washington is in “continuous conversation” with the Israeli military about its invasion, while public broadcaster Kan referred to “intensive coordination” between Israel and the US on how to deal with an Iranian attack.

Reuters reported late Monday that Lebanese army units were seen leaving positions on the Lebanon-Israel border and were retreating 5 kilometres inside Lebanese territory. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) announced a “closed military zone” encompassing several northern communities along the border, emphasising that entering the area was forbidden. An official told the Times of Israel that one goal of the operation would be to eliminate Hezbollah positions along the border. A meeting of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s security cabinet later Monday decided to proceed with the operation.

Heavy shelling and air strikes targeted several locations along the border. The IDF ordered residents in Dahiyeh, the southern suburb of Beirut and a traditional Hezbollah stronghold, to leave their homes. Shortly afterwards, major explosions were heard as at least eight strikes occurred shortly after midnight Tuesday morning, according to Lebanese news agency NNA, destroying several residential buildings.

The invasion of southern Lebanon follows a weekend of unrestrained violence by the Zionist regime, including the massacring of hundreds of civilians in air strikes across the country. The targeted assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah Friday claimed some 300 civilian lives, as six multi-story buildings were flattened in Beirut’s southern suburbs. In the 24 hours to Monday, 136 people were reportedly killed by Israeli strikes. The intensive bombing, which included the first strike on central Beirut Sunday night, has forced some 100,000 people to flee to neighbouring Syria, where a fratricidal conflict stoked by US imperialism for over a decade is ongoing.

Israel also struck the ports of Hodeidah and Ras Issa in Yemen, some 2,000 kilometres from its border, Sunday. The strikes, which targeted power plants and facilities used by the Houthis to import oil, killed six people and injured 57.

While Hezbollah has continued to fire rockets into northern Israel, the sustained attacks of the past two weeks appear to have seriously undermined its capabilities. Brussels-based military analyst Elijah Magnier told Al Jazeera that Israel has struck at least 3,000 to 3,500 Hezbollah missile units. “There are thousands of Hezbollah operatives who’ve lost their hands or their eyesight, and they’ve been evacuated to hospitals in Syria and Iran. Therefore, these fighters are out of the equation and can no longer participate in any potential war,” he added, referring to the consequences of Israel’s terrorist attack on September 17, when hundreds of communication devices exploded. In addition to Nasrallah, dozens of top Hezbollah commanders have been murdered.

In an indication of the indiscriminate character of the onslaught, akin to the ongoing slaughter of the Palestinians in Gaza, 14 Lebanese paramedics were killed in two days of bombing up to Sunday. On Monday, the health ministry reported the deaths of a further six paramedics in renewed air strikes.

Asked at a press briefing about the reports of a ground invasion, Miller confirmed US imperialism’s intimate involvement in the major escalation of the war. “They have informed us about a number of operations,” said Miller, referring to Israel. “They have at this time, told us that those are limited operations focused on Hezbollah infrastructure near the border, but we’re in continuous conversations about it.” With breathtaking cynicism, he added, “Military pressure can at times enable diplomacy.”

Earlier in the day, Secretary of State Antony Blinken became the latest US official to revel in the mass slaughter, hailing the assassination of Nasrallah. The Hezbollah leader was a “brutal terrorist” and “the region, the world are safer without him.”

Behind the bogus public statements about a “limited” operation, Israel’s far-right regime is clearly launching a massive offensive to revenge the setback it suffered during the month-long 2006 war on Lebanon, when Hezbollah mobilised broad popular support against an IDF invasion. The United Nations confirmed that its 10,000-strong UN Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL), which was tasked with monitoring the ceasefire agreement that brought the 2006 war to an end, was no longer in a position to carry out patrols due to the intensity of fighting.

Speaking to troops in northern Israel, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant, who infamously labelled Gaza residents as “human animals” as Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians began, declared, “the elimination of Nasrallah is a very important step, but it is not everything.

“We will use all the capabilities we have. If someone on the other side did not understand what the capabilities mean, it is all capabilities, and you are part of this effort.”

Netanyahu’s far-right regime intends to annex parts of Lebanon, alongside Gaza and the West Bank, as part of its US-backed drive to restructure the entire Middle East. Netanyahu and other leading officials have bluntly laid out this agenda, including in speeches to the US Congress in July and UN General Assembly last week.

Israel’s aggressive expansion of the conflict, which is rapidly assuming the dimensions of a Middle East-wide war, is made possible by the unflinching support it enjoys from US imperialism. As the World Socialist Web Site explained within days of Israel launching its destruction of Gaza, Washington endorsed the genocide because it viewed it as a critical component of the preparations for a region-wide war with Iran. In a October 23, 2023 perspective taking note of the US surging of troops and naval vessels to the region following the commencement of Israel’s assault on Gaza, the WSWS wrote,

The Biden administration is escalating the war in the Middle East and threatening to directly attack Iran as part of what it sees as a globe-spanning conflict for world hegemony, stretching from Eastern Europe to the Middle East and the Pacific. American imperialism, confronted with the economic rise of China and the global decline of the US economy, sees war as the means to assert world domination.

Over the past year, Washington has supplied billions of dollars in weaponry to Israel, including the 2,000-pound bombs that have turned Gaza into a wasteland and are now devastating Beirut and southern and eastern Lebanon.

The Pentagon announced Monday that Washington will send “a few thousand” more US troops to the region, increasing the number of US soldiers in the Middle East to 43,000, according to the AP. The bulk of the new forces consist of squadrons of fighter jets and attack aircraft. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin stated Sunday that he had extended the deployment by a month of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier strike group to the Middle East. A second aircraft carrier strike group, the USS Harry Truman, recently departed from Virginia and is expected to arrive in the region in a week.

With their repeated escalatory actions, Israel and its US paymaster are attempting to goad Iran into some sort of response, which can then be used to launch a vicious attack on Tehran. Already this year, Israel assassinated seven Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps members in Damascus and humiliated Iran’s bourgeois-clerical regime by killing Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh while he was visiting Tehran as a guest at the inauguration of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. For their part, the Iranian regime and its bourgeois-nationalist allies throughout the region have nothing to offer in the face of this imperialist-led onslaught, other than vain pleas for an accommodation with the imperialist powers.

The only social force capable of preventing the plunging of the entire Middle East into a bloodbath with incalculable consequences for its long-suffering population is the international working class mobilised in struggle against imperialist war. Rejecting reactionary Zionism and bankrupt bourgeois nationalism, the workers of the Middle East, whether Arab, Persian, or Jewish, must unite on the basis of the fight for socialism in alliance with their class brothers and sisters in the imperialist centres to put an end to the capitalist profit system and war.

1 October 2024

Source: countercurrents.org