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By Dr Ramzy Baroud

The Israeli Supreme Court has decided that the Palestinian region of Masafer Yatta, located in the southern hills of Hebron, is to be entirely appropriated by the Israeli military and that a population of over 1,000 Palestinians is to be expelled.

The Israeli Court decision, on May 4, was hardly shocking. Israel’s military occupation does not only consist of soldiers with guns, but elaborate political, military, economic and legal structures, dedicated to the expansion of the illegal Jewish settlements and the slow – and sometimes not-so-slow – expulsion of the Palestinians.

When Palestinians state that the Nakba, or Catastrophe – which led to the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948 and the establishment of the state of Israel on its ruins – is a continuous, unfinished project, they mean exactly that. The ethnic cleansing of Palestinians from East Jerusalem and the endless torment of Palestinian Bedouins in the Naqab and, now in Masafer Yatta, are all testaments to this reality.

However, Masafer Yatta is particularly unique. In the case of occupied East Jerusalem, for example, Israel has made a fallacious, ahistorical claim that Jerusalem is the eternal and undivided capital of the Jewish people. It combined its unsubstantiated narrative with military action on the ground, followed by a systematic process that aimed at increasing the Jewish population and ejecting the original native inhabitants of the city. Such notions as ‘Greater Jerusalem’ and legal and political structures, like that of the Jerusalem Master Plan 2000, have all contribute towards turning the once absolute Palestinian majority in Jerusalem into a shrinking minority.

With the Naqab, Israel’s similar objectives were put into motion as early as 1948, and again in 1951. This process of ethnically cleansing the natives remains in effect to this day.

Though Masafer Yatta is part of the same colonial designs, its uniqueness stems from the fact that it is situated in Area C of the occupied West Bank.

In July 2020, Israel purportedly decided to postpone its plans to annex nearly 40% of the West Bank, perhaps fearing a Palestinian rebellion and unwanted international condemnation. However, the plan continued in practice.

Moreover, a wholesome annexation of West Bank regions would mean that Israel would become responsible for the welfare of entire Palestinian communities. As a settler-colonial state, Israel wants the land, but not the people. In Tel Aviv’s calculation, annexation without the expulsion of the population could lead to a demographic nightmare; thus, Israel’s need to reinvent its annexation plan.

Though Israel has supposedly delayed the de jure annexation, it continued with a de facto form of annexation, one that has generated little international media attention.

The Israeli Court’s decision regarding Masafer Yatta, which is already being carried out with the expulsion of the Najjar family on May 11, is an important step towards the annexation of Area C.  If Israel can evict the residents of twelve villages, with a population of over 1,000 Palestinians, unhindered, more such expulsions are anticipated, not only south of Hebron, but throughout the occupied Palestinian territories.

The Palestinian villagers of Masafer Yatta and their legal representation know very well that no real ‘justice’ can be obtained from the Israeli court system. They continue to fight the legal war, anyway, in the hope that a combination of factors, including solidarity in Palestine and pressure from the outside, can ultimately succeed in compelling Israel to delay its planned destruction and Judaization of the whole region.

However, it seems that Palestinian efforts, which have been underway since 1997, are failing. The Israeli Supreme Court decision is predicated on the erroneous and utterly bizarre notion that the Palestinians of that area could not demonstrate that they belonged there prior to 1980, when the Israeli government decided to turn the area into ‘Firing Zone 918’.

Sadly, the Palestinian defense was partly based on documents from the Jordanian era and official United Nations records that reported on Israeli attacks on several Masafer Yatta villages in 1966. The Jordanian government, which administered the West Bank until 1967, compensated some of the residents for the loss of their ‘stone houses’ – not tents – animals and other properties that were destroyed by the Israeli military. Palestinians tried to use this evidence to show that they have existed, not as nomadic people but as rooted communities. This was unconvincing to the Israeli court, which favored the military’s argument over the rights of the native population.

Israeli firing zones occupy nearly 18 percent of the total size of the West Bank. It is one of several ploys used by the Israeli government to lay a legal claim on Palestinian land and to, eventually, years later, claim legal ownership as well. Many of these firing zones exist in Area C, and are being used as one of the Israeli methods aimed at officially appropriating Palestinian land with the support of the Israeli courts.

Now that the Israeli military has managed to acquire Masafer Yatta – a region spanning 32 to 56 sq km – based on completely flimsy excuses, it will become much easier in ensuring the ethnic cleansing of many similar communities in various parts of occupied Palestine.

While discussions and media coverage of Israel’s annexation scheme in the West Bank and the Jordan Valley have largely subsided, Israel is now preparing for a gradual annexation scheme. Instead of annexing 40% of the West Bank all at once, Israel is now annexing smaller tracts of land and regions, like Masafer Yatta, separately. Tel Aviv will eventually connect all these annexed areas through Jewish-only bypass roads to larger Jewish settlement infrastructures in the West Bank.

Not only does this alternative strategy allow Israel to avoid international criticism, it will also permit Israel to eventually annex Palestinian land while incrementally expelling Palestinians, helping Tel Aviv prevent demographic imbalances before they occur.

What is happening in Masafer Yatta is not only the largest ethnic cleansing scheme to be carried out by Israel since 1967, but the move should be considered a first step in a much larger scheme of illegal land appropriation, ethnic cleansing and official mass annexation.

Israel must not succeed in Masafer Yatta, because if it does, its original, mass annexation scheme will become a reality in no time.

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

3 June 2022

Source: countercurrents.org

By Kristin Christman

PART 3. THE ROOTS OF VIOLENCE: NEEDS FOR POWER AND FREEDOM

Part 3C. The National Endowment for “Democracy”: A Second CIA

We’ve been describing the threats to power and freedom that are driving the current crisis in Ukraine, specifically threats of foreign political interference. In discussing the external conflict between the US and Russia, the earlier essay, Part 3A, focused on the political interference performed by the CIA. But it’s also critical to discuss the behavior of the National Endowment for “Democracy” (NED) and the types of foreign political interference in which it is reportedly routinely engaged.

William Blum, a former Foreign Service Officer who left his post in opposition to the US war in Vietnam, spent a few decades researching US foreign intervention abroad. His intent was to write a magazine article, but the more he uncovered, the more he realized the material was book length. He writes, “My government, I discovered, had easily been the intervention king of all history, a serial intervener. There was scarcely any place in the known world where the CIA, the State Department, and/or the US military had not been doing their dirty work.”

NED was formed in 1983, one year after a proposal by President Reagan for the US “to foster the infrastructure of democracy” abroad. In 1991, one of the founders of NED, Allen Weinstein, stated that much of NED’s work involves doing what the CIA used to do. Some, in fact, refer to NED as the “second CIA.”

NED has four core institutes, the National Democratic Institute (NDI), the International Republican Institute (IRI), the American Center for International Labor Solidarity, and the Center for International Private Enterprise, which it uses to infiltrate foreign political, labor, and business organizations to mastermind “separatist riots, color revolutions, political crises, lies and rumors, and infiltration around the world, with an ever-growing list of evils.”

At the time of NED’s creation, the CIA was in hot political water and under heavy scrutiny, presumably over its violations of congressional law with regard to funding the contras who were trying to overthrow Nicaragua’s left-wing, reform-minded Sandinista government. Officially a non-partisan, not-for-profit organization, NED receives most of its funding from US taxpayers through legislation of the US Congress, it is budgeted for within the US Agency for International Development with the Department of State, and it’s ostensibly subject to congressional overview.

NED almost lost its funding in 1993, and in 2018, it was President Trump who unsuccessfully proposed slashing its funding. Those engaged in the anti-Trump groupthink which criticized every single thing Trump did—especially bizarre and disproportionate given the enormous weaknesses of his predecessors, condemned him once more and his “authoritarian” personality for the reason he opposed such a “good thing” as promoting democracy abroad. Writing in the New Republic, Jeet Heer states, “Unlike every US president since Jimmy Carter, he [Trump] doesn’t believe that it’s in American foreign policy interest to promote democracy and human rights abroad. Instead, his administration is working to undermine the agency tasked with doing so.”

It’s unbelievable that past US presidents are so revered and trusted as to assume that they, in their massively deadly actions in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Guatemala, Panama, Haiti, Venezuela, Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, and beyond, and in their promotion of violence-inducing CIA and NED activities abroad were actually engaged in promoting democracy and human rights abroad. Apparently, in American Orwellian doublespeak, killing more than 800,000 in the Middle East in the US War on Terror was all part of promoting human rights.

It’s certainly possible Trump’s motives were about personal profit. But whether his motives were personal profit or were about saving national money from endless altercations abroad, the argument against his proposal to slash NED’s funding is shallow and false. Heer states, “NED is hated by the very authoritarian regimes with whom Trump is currying favor. For instance, Russia has banned the NED because the Kremlin has deemed it an ‘undesirable’ NGO.” That first line is false. As we shall see, NED is hated by people who are very democratic-minded, and NED’s actions have helped place into power authoritarian leaders, just as the CIA did.

In response to US condemnation of Russia’s alleged interference in the 2016 elections, some have pointed out that the US has interfered in foreign nations to extraordinary degrees. Yet Heer insists that such “moral equivalency is a bit glib” since there’s a big difference between interfering in order to promote democracy and interfering in order to destabilize democracy, which, he claims, is what Russia is doing in the US. In other words, US political interference is considered moral and good because it’s promoting democracy, but Russian political interference is bad and criminal because it’s thwarting democracy.

It’s already a controversial idea to suggest that the morality and legality of violating another nation’s sovereignty varies and depends upon the violators’ purpose. After all, most violators of others’ sovereignty probably presume that their purpose is good. The Allies thought they were great when they violated Iran’s sovereignty and declaration of neutrality during the World Wars to use its railroads. That, supposedly, was somehow also about promoting democracy and freedom. However, in those rare instances where it’s deemed good to violate another nation’s sovereignty, under international law it is only the UN who makes this decision, not simply the US. This helps ensure a more comprehensive, less selfish perspective.

But another hugely shaky point in Heer’s thesis is the idea that US political interference actually is promoting democracy, when abundant evidence suggests that it is not. Equally shaky is the idea that Russian political interference is thwarting democracy or destabilizing US democracy—to the extent that it even exists in the US—when no facts are given to support this statement either. How are we to know that alleged Russian political interference on social media in the US, for instance, wasn’t aimed at trying to thwart the US propaganda machine that steers American minds in undemocratic ways? How do we know that alleged Russian interference in other nations isn’t aimed at thwarting other forms of undemocratic US influence, which seeks to place leaders in power who will grant financial favors to US businessmen? We don’t know either way when only these shallow, unsubstantiated claims are made and no comprehensive analysis is performed. We’re just supposed to stupidly assume that one nation interferes in all the right ways and the other in all the wrong ways.

As we shall see, there’s no clear proof in the material I’ve come across that NED actually is engaged in promoting democracy, or, if it is, there’s no clear proof in that material that its efforts to promote democracy are not offset by its efforts to thwart it. In fact, the evidence I’ve seen supports the idea that NED actually thwarts democracy. American groupthinkers who like to climb on the jeering bandwagon of hating someone, whether it’s Trump or Putin, have to learn that that bandwagon was likely created for manipulative reasons by people who have their own ulterior motives. Just because Trump and Putin didn’t like NED doesn’t mean NED is good. The same goes for NATO.

Many Americans who have already uncovered NED’s worldwide nefarious role from a variety of other sources would wholeheartedly agree with these opening words in a May 7, 2022 report by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China: “The United States has long used democracy as a tool and a weapon to undermine democracy in the name of democracy, to incite division and confrontation, and to meddle in other countries’ international affairs, causing catastrophic consequences.” NED “has subverted lawful governments and cultivated pro-US puppet forces around the world under the pretext of promoting democracy. Its disgraceful record has aroused strong discontent in the international community.” And again, for those with biases, remember: just because China said this doesn’t mean it’s wrong.

NED supposedly promotes democracy, but, according to William Blum in Rogue State, it actually promotes free market economies and US investment abroad—ironically at the expense of both US and foreign democracy—by using US tax dollars to support right-wing groups against left-wing groups and supplying funds, technical expertise, training, educational material, computers, copiers, cars, etc. to right-wing political groups, civic organizations, labor unions, student groups, book publishers, and foreign media. The result of NED’s activities has been the destabilization of nations that in many cases already had free and fair elections.

Certainly, these types of anti-left-wing activities—performed with the goal of toppling and forming foreign governments who will promote the profits of certain US social and business circles at the expense of the local population’s prosperity and well-being, are the activities that have been commonly observed in the CIA, giving credence to NED’s nickname as the “second CIA.”

Therefore, not only does NED promote a certain economic system against the will of the foreign population, but, while I don’t have comprehensive evidence for this, it seems, based upon the results of their work, that their motivation is to promote in particular the ability of US investors and businessmen to have the power they need to make profits off foreign resources, labor, and markets, even if that means that foreigners have less ability to engage in free market economics themselves.

History demonstrates that the US government seeks to stabilize right-wing governments and to destabilize left-wing governments. The entire process is undemocratic, both in trampling the foreign population’s will to choose and benefit from other forms or variations of economic systems and what appears to be the trampling of the general foreign population’s ability to prosper from free market economics to the extent that US businessmen do. In fact, evidence indicates that, aside from a foreign elite that is cultivated, nations go downhill economically after NED or some other pro-capitalist force does its work. If there is evidence to the contrary, of course, it would be important material to bring forward in cooperative dialogue of non-violent conflict resolution. However, be wary of including in the calculations any economic boosts derived from US aid or loans, for these invariably have interest payments that benefit US bank owners as well as over-bearing political, economic, and military strings attached.

In fact, with regard to the economic results of US influence, Blum provides relevant information in his book, Freeing the World to Death: Essays on the American Empire:

In Russia and in the other countries, the “success” of such globalization programs has typically resulted in the mass of the population being left in great want, much worse off than when they were under communism, while a wealthy elite class is created and the country is gradually thrown open to foreign investment and control.

The reduction in the standard of living of the people in the region since 1990 can scarcely be exaggerated. . . . From Bulgaria to Poland, from Slovenia to Lithuania, the citizens have left their homes to become the guest workers, the illegal workers, the migrants, the refugees, and the prostitutes of Western Europe.

However, these countries are now honored members of NATO, proud possessors of a couple of billion dollars worth of useless military hardware they were obliged to buy from multinationals, they have the right to send their youth to the killing fields of Iraq and Afghanistan to support US wars, the American flag flies over American military bases on their lands, globalized free enterprise is king.

When NED appears on the scene, freedom seems to jump ship, because US policymakers want leaders abroad whom they can control. China’s report lists numerous coups and revolutions in which NED was involved with its use of heavy propaganda, character assassination, and the funding and training of opposition groups, including Poland in 1989, the dissolution of the USSR in 1991—which led to the cannibalization of Russia’s resources and the impoverishment of its people, and coups and forced resignations in Serbia (2000), Georgia (2003), Ukraine (2004), Egypt (2011), and Yemen (2011), as well as Jordan, Algeria, Syria, Libya, Belarus, and Bolivia —of the highly popular left-wing Evo Morales, who had done wonders to reduce Bolivian poverty and improve internal ethnic relations. In fact, when Morales had first run for president in 2002, US Assistant Secretary of State Otto Reich warned Bolivia that its aid would be in danger if they chose Morales, who was anti-big business.

According to China’s report, NED, like the CIA, also interfered in several foreign elections, stirred up protests, and funded opposition and media groups, including in Mongolia, Kyrgyzstan, Thailand, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Haiti, and China. Blum also reports in detail on NED’s major interference in Nicaragua, Venezuela, and Haiti. The Alliance for Global Justice states that NED’s first success after its formation was to defeat the left-wing Sandinista government in Nicaragua in 1990, which the US-backed contras had been fighting for years. It then moved on to toppling Haiti’s leader, Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

In his work, America’s Other War: Doug Stokes describes how Venezuela was the victim of a US-supported coup in 2002 when the late President Hugo Chávez was forced from power for 48 hours. And keep in mind that the “support” of a US-supported coup usually means much more than a phone call or handshake. It means money, arms, propaganda, bribes, scheming, payrolls, destabilization operations, economic sabotage, mob instigators, and military back-up.

Stokes explains that NED had funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants to US and Venezuelan opposition groups, including the labor group whose protests ignited the coup. Yet Chávez, who had won the elections of 1998 and 2000 by the largest majority in forty years, was vigorously defended. Millions of Venezuelans protested and defeated the US-backed coup leaders.

To get a glimpse into the disdain some US policymakers actually hold for democracy, note that a Bush Jr. administration spokesman explained that while Chávez had been democratically elected, “‘legitimacy is something that is conferred not just by a majority of the voters.’”  Of course, Bush Jr. should know, since he didn’t win the popular vote against Al Gore but nonetheless was granted legitimacy as the US president.

Eva Golinger, a Venezuelan-American attorney and journalist who strongly supported Chávez, writes that the US Agency for International Development and NED funneled millions annually into political groups who opposed and led to the political downfall of Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa, a highly popular leader who worked hard to reduce poverty and who also refused to renew the lease to allow the US to maintain a military base in Ecuador, thus earning US policymakers’ enmity by breaking the second and fourth of the “Four Commandments” described in the earlier essay, Part 3A, on coups.

Golinger also states that Honduras was the victim of a coup backed by the Obama administration that forced President Manuel Zelaya from power in 2009. Honduras has suffered ever since from the loss of its democracy and the presence of enormous human rights violations.

As Al Jazeera reports, NED also helped anti-Morsi supporters get rid of Mohammed Morsi, Egypt’s first-ever democratically elected president, by paying huge amounts of US taxpayer dollars to opposition parties and wealthy opponents, and by encouraging protests. Now US policymakers support al-Sisi, who led the 2013 anti-Morsi coup, and who’s said to be even worse with regard to human rights than Egypt’s brutal Hosni Mubarak—like Mubarak on steroids. Al-Sisi has had hundreds of Egyptians killed and imprisoned tens of thousands of political prisoners. But you don’t see US headlines hateful towards al-Sisi and calling him a murderer.

Of course, such interference in foreign nations’ internal politics is illegal and violates international law and foreign nations’ laws, if not US law itself. How is it possible that our tax dollars are allowed to fund this? If NED is under congressional oversight, why isn’t Congress acting to enforce law and dismantle NED for criminal behavior?

Blum’s Freeing the World to Death describes NED activities in Eastern Europe:

The standard operating procedure in a particular country has been to send in teams of specialists from US government agencies, non-governmental organization (NGOs), American labor unions, or private organizations funded by American corporations and foundations; leading examples are the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Agency for International Development (AID), and the Open Society organizations of George Soros, American citizen and billionaire. These teams go in with as much financial resources as needed and numerous carrots and sticks to wield; they hold conferences and seminars, hand out tons of papers, manuals and CDs, and fund new NGOs, newspaper and other media, all to educate government employees and other selected portions of the population on the advantages and joys of privatizing and deregulating the economy, teaching them how to run a capitalist society, how to remake the country so that it’s appealing to foreign investors.

Again, notice that these “pro-democracy” institutions aren’t pro-democracy at all. They’re pro-capitalism and specifically, pro-privatization and pro-US investment abroad. They’re confusing an economic system with a political system. Privatization has also been pushed by the World Bank, which grants loans typically on conditions of privatizing. This entire issue led to the “Water Wars” in Cochabamba, Bolivia, when a corporation owned in large part by Bechtel was trying to take over Cochabamba’s public water supply. This was during the brutal dictatorship of US-supported Hugo Bánzer, prior to the leadership of Morales. When the civilians resisted the contract, Bánzer cut off power to the city, banned meetings of more than two people, and instituted martial law. But this forced privatization is what US policymakers call “freedom.”

Once you read about the coups funded and instigated by the CIA and NED in articles and books such as Blum’s Killing Hope and James Cockcroft’s Latin America, you start to see the pattern. In fact, the current crisis has many parallels with the pre-coup stages of CIA and NED operations, particularly the propaganda, the lies, the economic and financial sabotage of Russia, and US businessmen’s acquisitive interests in Russia and Europe. This entire crisis is more than likely another case of the US government fighting to secure control—not only over Ukraine—but over Russia, in order to force them to conform to the Four Commandments.

I’ll include them again here:

First Commandment: Thou shalt not obstruct US businesses’ profit-making abroad.

Second Commandment: Thou shalt not significantly help the poor or give decent amounts of fertile land to the landless.

Third Commandment: Thou shalt not be enemies with our friends, or friends with our enemies.

Fourth Commandment: Thou shalt not reject US military bases and weapons.

Within Russia, the NDI and IRI—two of NED’s core institutes, and George Soros’ International Renaissance Foundation contributed millions to Yeltsin’s presidential campaign and helped create a certain public image that would be as likeable as possible, while ignoring less savory aspects of his personality and plans. Most of all, these US campaign contributors wanted Yeltsin in power because he would play the privatization game, thus opening Russia to the grubby, grasping hands of US investors and businessmen. Harvard University’s Institute for International Development sent over its “shock therapist,” Jeffrey Sachs, to put Russia through a crash immersion into capitalism, a course that resulted in catastrophe for most Russians, but fortunes for foreign investors and Russian oligarchs. While Sachs seems genuinely committed to eradicating poverty, others accused him of being tied a narrow way of thinking that caused the crash into poverty of Russia.

China’s report also writes that NED has been “interfering in Russia’s elections and threatening Russia’s constitutional, defense and national security. According to the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation, between 2013–2014, NED allocated 5.2 million in US dollars to Russian organizations.” By July 2015, NED was declared an “undesirable organization” by Russia. Russian officials reported that NED “participated in work to recognize election results as illegitimate, to organize political action with the goal of influencing government policy, and to discredit Russian army service.” Can you imagine if Russia were involved in discrediting US military service? Even Americans are guilt-tripped into feeling practically criminal if they express disgust with military service rather than the expected holy reverence.

In 2017, NED, apparently in denial of the CIA’s and its own highly manipulative, intrusive, and violence-inducing activities abroad, issued a report “Sharp Power: Rising Authoritarian Influence” in which it demonized China and Russia by alleging that for more than a decade they’ve spent enormous funds on influencing and manipulating target countries and purchasing loyalty. The hypocrisy is unreal. I wonder if NED ever does a self-report on the spending of enormous funds from US tax payer dollars to manipulate target countries and purchase loyalty. I wonder if NED has read Dov Levin’s book which states that in the years 1946–2000, the US has interfered in foreign political elections 81 times, while Russia has interfered 36 times?

Greedy oligarchs who are rivals with Putin, oligarchs who are angered by Putin’s clamping down on the worst cases of corruption and Putin’s re-nationalizing the energy and banking sectors, are oligarchs who’d be happy to accept NED and CIA bribes to commit murder. And there’s no doubt that US policymakers, NED, and NATO, would conveniently but falsely frame a coup against Putin as the result of “dissension within the Kremlin” and “popular unrest” against an “authoritarian, anti-democratic” leader by Russians who “yearn for freedom.”

Putin and Russia have every right to keep NED and its supporters out of their land, unless they want to use the opportunity to try to teach NED members about the true elements of democracy and the fact that democracy need not have a thing to do with capitalism. In my view, it is NED who’s behaving aggressively towards other nations in its illegitimate efforts to take for itself power and freedom meant for others.

However, in the cooperative dialogue of non-violent conflict resolution, it would be important to learn all the facts from all perspectives, and to see if the issue is more complicated than what I have presented here. In what ways do NED members believe they’re promoting democracy or thwarting democracy? Are all NED members equally aware of all NED activities? Might some be in the dark about undemocratic behaviors? Do NED members feel I am misunderstanding some important aspects of their work or misrepresenting what they do? If NED has been accused of so much coup involvement, why doesn’t it admit it?

In the next part of this essay, we’ll talk a bit about the backgrounds of the social and business circles supporting NED, and we’ll carefully scrutinize the assumptions and leaps of logic within statements made by NED leaders with regard to Russia.

Part 3C. Power&Freedom. National Endowment for “Democracy”: A Second CIA

Kristin Christman has been independently researching US foreign policy and peace since 9/11.

30 May 2022

Source: countercurrents.org

By Countercurrents Collective

The war in Ukraine is increasing food prices, which is increasing hunger in Africa.

An AP report from Mogadishu, Somalia cited Ayan Hassan Abdirahman, who is now paying twice as much as she did just a few months ago to buy the wheat flour she uses to make breakfast each day for her 11 children in Somalia’s capital.

Abdirahman has been trying to make do by substituting sorghum, another more readily available grain, in her flatbread. Inflation, though, means the price of the cooking oil she still needs to prepare it has skyrocketed too — a jar that once cost $16 is now selling for $45 in the markets of Mogadishu.

“The cost of living is high nowadays, making it difficult for families even to afford flour and oil,” she says.

The AP report said:

Nearly all the wheat sold in Somalia comes from Ukraine and Russia, which have halted exports through the Black Sea since Feb. 24.

In the Horn of Africa

The report said:

The timing could not be worse: The U.N. has warned that an estimated 13 million people were facing severe hunger in the Horn of Africa region as a result of a persistent drought.

Haji Abdi Dhiblawe, a businessman who imports wheat flour into Somalia, fears the situation will only worsen: There is also a looming shortage of shipping containers to bring food supplies in from elsewhere at the moment.

“Somalis have no place to grow wheat, and we are not even familiar with how to grow it,” he says. “Our main concern now is what will the future hold for us when we currently run out of supplies.”

Sahel

The AP report said:

Another 18 million people are facing severe hunger in the Sahel, the part of Africa just below the Sahara Desert where farmers are enduring their worst agricultural production in more than a decade. The U.N. World Food Program says food shortages could worsen when the lean season arrives in late summer.

“Acute hunger is soaring to unprecedented levels and the global situation just keeps on getting worse. Conflict, the climate crisis, COVID-19 and surging food and fuel costs have created a perfect storm — and now we’ve got the war in Ukraine piling catastrophe on top of catastrophe,” WFP Executive Director David Beasley warned earlier this month.

Even the cost of therapeutic food for malnourished children could rise 16% over the next six months because of the war in Ukraine and disruptions related to the pandemic, UNICEF says.

African countries imported 44% of their wheat from Russia and Ukraine between 2018 and 2020, according to U.N. figures. The African Development Bank is already reporting a 45% increase in wheat prices on the continent, making everything from couscous in Mauritania to the fried donuts sold in Congo more expensive for customers.

“Africa has no control over production or logistics chains and is totally at the mercy of the situation,” said Senegalese President Macky Sall, the African Union chairperson, who has said he will travel to Russia and Ukraine to discuss the price woes.

Moscow Is Ready To Make Significant Contribution

The report said:

Russian President Vladimir Putin pressed the West last week to lift sanctions against Moscow over the war in Ukraine, seeking to shift the blame from Russia to the West for a growing world food crisis that has been worsened by Ukraine’s inability to ship millions of tons of grain and other agricultural products while under attack.

Putin told Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi that Moscow “is ready to make a significant contribution to overcoming the food crisis through the export of grain and fertilizer on the condition that politically motivated restrictions imposed by the West are lifted,” according to the Kremlin.

Western officials have dismissed the Russian claims.

The report added:

In Cameroon, baker Sylvester Ako says he has seen his daily clientele drop from 300 customers a day to only 100 since bread prices jumped 40% because of the lack of wheat imports. He’s already let three of his seven employees go, and worries that he will have to shutter his Yaounde business entirely unless something changes.

“The price of a 50-kilogram bag of wheat now sells at $60 — up from about $30 — and the supply is not regular,” Ako said.

Along with the shortfall in wheat imports, the African Development Bank is also warning of a potential 20% decline in food production on the continent because farmers are having to pay 300% more for their imported fertilizer.

The organization says it plans to address the issues through a $1.5 billion plan that will provide farmers in Africa with certified seeds, fertilizer and other help. Reducing dependence on foreign imports is part of the strategy, but those economic transitions are likely to take years, not months.

Senegal’s president says appetites can pivot more quickly. He is encouraging Africans to consume local grains that were once the staples of their diets.

“We must also change our eating habits,” Sall said. ”We dropped millet and started importing rice from Asia. Now we only know how to eat rice and we do not produce enough. We only know how to eat bread. We do not produce wheat.”

Aid Projects Are Threatened

A Reuters report from Dakar said about a small charity broke ground this year on a clinic in northern Burkina Faso to care for thousands of women and children who have fled Islamist insurgents wreaking havoc along the fringes of the Sahara.

According to the Reuters report, when the Ukraine war began, global supply chains buckled and the cost of building materials, fuel and food spiked in West Africa. The charity’s founder, Boukary Ouedraogo, was forced to make a tough decision: he halted construction of the clinic with only the foundations laid.

Similar calls are being made across sub-Saharan Africa, where aid projects are threatened by the fallout from the war in Ukraine, potentially putting millions of lives at risk.

Ouedraogo’s clinic was desperately needed in Kaya, a town of dirt streets and squat brick buildings surrounded by arid scrubland. Its population has swelled in recent years as thousands of people from surrounding villages flee militant attacks, straining the already basic health care system.

“What happened in Ukraine happened at the same time as the crisis in this country got worse,” said Ouedraogo, who runs the BO Foundation in Burkina Faso.

“We hope all the donors can keep their attention,” he said. “We felt what we were doing was going to reduce the number of deaths and infant mortality.”

Humanitarian agencies already struggling with widespread price increases under the pandemic say the crisis in Europe has made things worse. Even the cost of life-saving therapeutic foods for malnourished children has spiked.

Diverting Aid: From Africa to Europe

Compounding the problem, some donors have diverted state aid from Africa’s worst-hit countries to help support more than six million refugees who have fled the fighting in Ukraine.

Denmark

The report said:

Denmark said in March it was halving its aid to Burkina Faso this year to accommodate Ukrainian refugees. Its budget for Burkina’s neighbor Mali, also in the grips of an Islamist insurgency, has dropped 40%.

Sweden

The Reuters report said:

Sweden has also said it plans to divert $1 billion from its aid budget to help cover the cost of hosting Ukrainian refugees.

Sudan

It is a similar story in Sudan. In a southern area faced with conflict and food shortages, a paediatric clinic run by Senegal-based medical charity Alima faces a $300,000 funding gap due to an increase in costs, including fuel for the clinic’s generator.

At this rate, Alima will have to shut the program down, said its director of operations, Kader Issaley.

Action Against Hunger, a charity with operations across Africa, has seen the cost of foodstuffs such as rice, oil and sugar rise 20% to 30% over the past year.

This will reduce its coverage by the same amount, said Mamadou Diop, a representative from its West Africa office.

“We have to totally rethink our approach,” said Diop. “We must decide, do we reduce supply or reduce the number of beneficiaries?”

Not Only In Africa

The Reuters report said:

The problem is not limited to Africa. The U.N.’s World Food Programme (WFP) feeds 13 million people a month in Yemen, where the economy has been wrecked by years of war, but it has reduced rations for 8 million of them since January.

It may have to make further cuts, after raising only a quarter of the $2 billion it needs for Yemen this year from international donors.

“We are taking food from the poor and feeding the hungry,” said WFP representative to Yemen, Richard Ragan.

“In June we will have to make some tough decisions about possibly even going down to just feeding five million, those who are really most at risk,” he said

Ethiopia, Somalia, DRC

The report said:

Conflict in Ethiopia, Somalia, Democratic Republic of Congo and the Sahel region have forced millions to flee their homes. Nearly half a billion people live in extreme poverty, according to the World Bank.

West Africa alone faces an unprecedented food shortage that threatens nearly 40 million people, driven in part by drought and the impact of the war in Ukraine on food prices and supply.

The impact of higher costs on aid organizations varies, health specialists say.

Smaller non-profits reliant on institutional donors such as governments for yearly budgets may struggle more than a larger charity such as Medecins Sans Frontieres, which raises money through public campaigns.

MSF said it did not foresee cutting back its operations due to the war in Ukraine.

But few are immune. A drop in funding that preceded the Ukraine war has forced WFP to cut rations in seven countries in West and Central Africa.

Nigeria

The Reuters report added:

In Nigeria, the continent’s most populous country, the number of people receiving emergency assistance from WFP has dropped from 1.9 million in September to 650,000.

Like Burkina Faso and Mali, northern Nigeria is also wracked by a prolonged Islamist insurgency.

Health specialists and aid workers said it was too early to assess exactly what the impact on communities will be and it could take months to see how much damage the cutbacks cause.

“Further funding shortfalls will contribute to worsening food security and nutrition in locations where food insecurity is already at emergency levels,” said WFP spokesman for Western Africa, Djaounsede Madjiangar.

The report cited a child from Somalia:

One-year-old Hassan howled in a blue plastic bucket suspended from a scale as a medical technician noted his weight: 5.6 kg.

The report said:

It was an improvement. Hassan weighed only 5.2 kg when he first began receiving treatment for severe acute malnutrition at a clinic run by aid workers in the south of the country three months ago – about half what a boy his age should weigh.

His partial recovery is thanks to a sweet peanut paste called Plumpy’Nut developed by French scientists in the 1990s that has become a crucial weapon in the fight against child malnutrition.

Three small sachets a day for six weeks can be enough to bring a starving child back to full health, according to U.N. children’s charity UNICEF.

“He used to be much worse,” said the boy’s mother, Hasan Habiba Mohammed Nur, patting his bony legs under an oversized T-shirt. “The Plumpy’Nut has really helped him.”

UNICEF says it spends $137 million a year on therapeutic food and the overall market is estimated to be worth up to $400 million.

But aid agencies say it is becoming too expensive.

Over the past year, the cost of Plumpy’Nut has risen 23%, including a 9% increase imposed since the Ukraine crisis began, Plumpy’Nut’s main producer Nutriset, told Reuters.

In a letter to customers in March warning of impending price increases, it said the cost of ingredients such as palm oil, milk powder and whey, and packaging including laminate for the sachets, had risen sharply. Shipping expenses have also rocketed. In all, costs are up 39%, Nutriset said.

“The war in Ukraine is indirectly impacting the price of raw materials, and prices will continue to increase even more in the weeks and months to come,” Nutriset said.

The increases worry UNICEF. It predicts that prices of therapeutic foods will rise 16% in the next six months because of Ukraine and pandemic disruptions. Without further funding, 600,000 more children may miss out on treatment, it said in May.

The effects are already being felt, aid workers say.

Alima’s budget to buy and ship a batch of Plumpy’Nut to a project in an impoverished area in the southeast of Democratic Republic of Congo is about 175,000 euros ($188,000).

But with a rise in fuel costs and the price of Plumpy’Nut, the shipment now costs 230,000 euros, said Hassan Bouziane, who runs logistics at Alima.

He now has to go to donors to get more cash, taking up valuable time.

“The impact on the beneficiaries will be huge,” said Bouziane. “The treatment for a child of five years old is six weeks. When you lose two weeks, that is a third of their treatment.”

2 Of The World’s Top Rice Producers Are discussing Hiking Prices

Two of the world’s top rice producers are in discussions to raise prices together, Reuters reported, citing Thai government spokesperson Thanakorn Wangboonkongchana.

“We aim to raise rice prices, increase farmer income and increase bargaining power in the global market,” Thanakorn said on Friday, per Reuters. “The rice price has been low for more than 20 years while the cost of production has been increasing.”

Thailand and Vietnam are the world’s second- and third-largest rice exporters after India. A price increase in the staple grain would be bad news for billions of people across the world, especially as it comes on top of soaring wheat prices.

Thai Commerce Minister Jurin Laksanawisit told reporters on Friday that the country’s rice exports are getting a boost this year due to a recovery in global demand and as the country’s currency falls to a five-year low against the US dollar, which is used in the trade of commodities internationally, per Bloomberg.

Vietnam’s agriculture ministry did not immediately respond to Insider’s or Reuters’ requests for comments.

Vietnam’s Food Association played down the prospect of measures to boost prices ahead of a June meeting with its Thai counterparts.

“The meeting will focus on measures to cooperate in sustainable food production,” Nguyen Ngoc Nam, the chairman of Vietnam’s Food Association, told Reuters. “It is not reasonable to talk about raising or controlling rice prices at this time when the global food price is on the rise.”

Neither Thailand nor Vietnam are facing a shortage in rice supply this year, according to data from the US Department of Agriculture. However, like in many countries, inflation in both countries has risen sharply in the last year, putting pressure on the government to soften the impact on their populations. About 30% and 40% of the population in Thailand and Vietnam respectively are employed in the agricultural sector, according to the United Nations.

Consumer prices in Thailand are hovering around a 13-year high, having gained 4.71% on-year in April, according to data from the country’s Commerce Ministry. Prices in Vietnam rose 2.86% on-year in May, according to data from the country’s statistics office.

But consumers could turn to other major exporters for rice — like top exporter India — for supplies.

“If Thailand and Vietnam try to jack up the prices, obviously price-sensitive buyers in Africa will shift towards India,” B.V. Krishna Rao, president of the All India Rice Exporters Association, told Reuters. He said neither country has approached India about participating in a rice cartel, Reuters reported.

Benchmark export prices for Thai rice have averaged $420 a metric ton this year — 16% higher than India’s $363 a ton, per Reuters.

Indian trade and government sources told Reuters on Friday that there were no plans to limit rice exports.

The Crisis May Spread To Sugar

Other media reports said:

Sugar prices are expected to soar due to the export restrictions imposed by a number of key producing nations seeking to tame rising domestic food prices.

The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic, which seriously undermined global supply chains, has been dramatically aggravated by the crisis in Ukraine and the subsequent sanctions imposed on Russia. The conflict between the two major grain exporters has disrupted global supplies.

A number of countries have moved to limit exports of other key commodities, putting global food security under threat, while risking further increases in the prices of agricultural products.

Kazakhstan

On Monday, Kazakhstan began a six-month ban on white and cane sugar exports. India is reportedly considering placing restrictions on sugar exports for the first time in six years to prevent a surge in domestic prices. India’s ban is expected to target around 10 million tons of this season’s exports.

Brazil

Last week, Reuters reported that sugar cane mills in Brazil, the world’s biggest producer and exporter of sugar, were canceling sugar export contracts and shifting production to ethanol in an attempt to take advantage of the high energy prices. The estimated cancelations could equate up to 400,000 tons of raw sugar.

Pakistan

Earlier this month, Pakistan imposed a complete ban on sugar exports, citing deep concerns about inflation. In March, Russia banned sugar exports until the end of August.

“For sugar, it’s relatively easy for Brazilian mills to switch production to ethanol production if the economics make sense, and this can push global sugar markets higher,” Darin Friedrichs, founder and market research director at Sitonia Consulting, a Shanghai-based commodities analysis firm, told the South China Morning Post.

“In particular, as both food and energy prices are rising, there is increased focus on the use of food for the production of fuel,” he added.

Earlier this week, the head of the IMF, Kristalina Georgieva, warned that the global economy is facing “its biggest test since the Second World War.” UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres said global hunger levels “are at a new high,” with the number of people facing severe food insecurity doubling in just two years, from 135 million before the pandemic to 276 million today.

However, Dong Xiaoqiang, the commercial head of AB Sugar China, said he does not expect a global shortage of sugar this year despite mounting concerns, adding that India and Thailand, the world’s second largest sugar producer and number two exporter respectively, are expected to increase their sugar output in 2022.

“What has happened recently is more a show of emotional tension over the supply of food including sugar,” Dong told the media. “Most countries that announced export bans are small sugar producers with a tight balance between supply and demand, and not many contracts have been cancelled in Brazil,” he said, while adding that prices are still expected to surge.

30 May 2022

Source: countercurrents.org

By Peter Koenig

On 26 May the 2022 WEF concluded not with a bang, but with a whimper. When mainstream journalists start questioning the usefulness of the WEF, the world should listen.

They asked to what extent WEFs slogan, “Committed to Improving the State of the World”, was relevant.

Improving the State of the World – Really?

What did the WEF and all the illustrious attendants of the Davos meeting do to stop the Ukraine War? Nothing. Zilch.

Professor Schwab, didn’t even offer to mediate for Peace. Instead, he introduced President Zelenskyy of Ukraine on video, who addressed the WEF in his brown t-shirt – a brown that may otherwise and during WWII have been associated with the Nazi-color – coincidence?

In an aggressive tone, Zelenskyy demanded from the West more billions of cash and weapons to kill more Russians. He was very clear that Peace was not an option, but more war against his archenemy, Russia.

Winning that war is indeed not the slightest option, despite all the western propaganda. And Zelenskyy knows it. So, why continue a useless war that kills thousands and thousands of innocent people, more Ukrainians than Russians? Instead of accepting the proposals to talk, to negotiate which had been initiated in Istanbul in late March? What’s the hidden agenda – or perhaps not so hidden, as NATO, not Zelenskyy is calling the shots?

Instead, Zelenskyy got a standing ovation from the WEF crowd, presumably for Zelenskyy’s aggressive, belligerent tone and requests for more fire and killing power from the west. The applause was like enhancing the propagated and truly indoctrinated hatred for Russia within the Forum and around the world. The Forum, consisting of luminaries dubbed the “Davos Man”, for individuals who are bought and sold by “Davos”.

But, Professor Schwab, the founder and eternal CEO of the WEF, the overlord of the world’s good-doers, the one who is “Committed to Improving the State of the World”, did not offer Peace mediation with one world. How would that have been received by the world? Maybe the WEF wants to keep its ambiguous image between “doing good” and “doing right” – or both, or neither?

Can you imagine? Not one word towards Peace, towards seeking a negotiated solution for Peace.

Strangely, Peace and what could be done about it rather than sending more killing material, was hardly mentioned throughout the WEF’s 4-day Forum. Doesn’t that speak for itself and for the WEF’s irrelevance?

Perhaps not. Let’s see.

Of course, there was a multitude of behind close-door sessions taking place. They were secret. Not accessible to the public at large. That’s where the game-making decisions are and were taken. What was playing out in the open Forum was sheer diversion, with a hint of mind-manipulation.

In comes Henry Kissinger, the famous “Realpolitik” statesman, close to 100 years old, (mentor of Klaus Schwab) he who is credited with “opening” China for President Nixon and subsequent US Administrations. He dared suggest, that for Peace, Ukraine may have to cede some territory to Russia.

He was referring to the mostly Russian Donbas area, of about 45,000 sq. km, and 4.1 million people. Compare this to the entire Ukraine, about 604,000 sq. km and roughly 44.1 million people, rapidly declining, though, due to war refugees leaving the country.

This is, of course, “Realpolitik”. Any serious analyst would agree. However, Zelenskyy was furious and aggressively rejecting the idea; Kissinger was verbally insulted with four-letter word by one of Zelenskyy’s aides.

As to the overall gist of the globalist WEF, Kissinger’s attempt to seek a solution didn’t match the globalist’s agenda – another move away from globalization by Henry Kissinger? Is the world listening? Or is it just a farce?

Peace Negotiations?

Shortly after WEF’s closure, President Emmanuel Macron of France and Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, proposed to President Putin to sit down with Zelenskyy for Peace negotiations. It was not clear whether the two were also proposing to moderate these talks.

image: Macron and Scholz at Munich Security Conference, February 2022

Mr. Putin immediately accepted, saying he and Russia’s Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, had proposed such talks on several occasions, but were always rejected.

Will they be accepted this time?

Zelenskyy hasn’t responded yet. Of course, NATO has to be involved and NATO has to give the “green light” …

Logically, NATO knew, or even initiated the idea. Otherwise, the overture by the two leaders (sic) – both scholars of Klaus Schwab’s academy for “Young Global Leaders”, wouldn’t have been possible.

Why are we made to believe something that isn’t?

Are we Being fooled?

Remember, nothing is coincidence, and nothing is what it appears, and you are trained – by media and endless highly sophisticated propaganda – to believe the truth is a lie and vice-versa.

And so, they keep you confused, so that you laugh, when you should scream and vice-versa.

“We’ll know our disinformation program is complete, when everything the American public believes is false.” — William J. Casey, CIA Director (October 2020)

Most surprising, or not, were Ms. Von der Leyen’s remarks, when she praised the Ukraine army for the progress, they made against the Russian Bear (not her words) … and this coming from a former Minister of Defense (Germany). It is surely not naïve, but sheer lie-propaganda – to attract more money from the world’s billionaires, the EU and individual EU countries? Or to fool you once more, into believing that Ukraine really made progress against Russia and may be at the verge of winning this war?

It’s hard to believe by cold logic. But when it comes from her, THE Eminence of the EC, plus as former German Defense Minister, well-versed in war games, it must be true. And this, despite all the reports from independent journalists in the “field”, commenting directly from the war zones.

Independent reports have confirmed that many of the atrocities on the Ukrainian civil society are not perpetrated by the Russian army, but by the Ukrainian Forces, including the Nazi-Azov battalion(s) – yes, there are more than one.

Yes, they are deadly “false flags” inflicted by the very Ukrainian compatriots, and the western news casters know about it, and so does Ms. Von der Leyen.

Why would the journalists lie? They have all to lose by telling the truth. They are doing an independent job, exposing their lives, not only for being at the front line, but also because they are telling the truth.

Is Blatant Lying Necessary?

If blatant lying is necessary at the WEF and that from the – let’s face it, unelected – President of the European Commission (EC), then, the WEF has been sinking very deep – and maybe seriously losing its grip on “globalization” namely Schwab’s dream, of “Global Governance”. Good riddance!

That’s what we hope. But are they really losing out on Globalization? Because one deception chased the next, and we don’t know any more what is real and what is fake.

That’s the purpose. Our brains are getting weaker and weaker.

Eventually we believe whatever the Matrix-commanding authority says, jumping from one belief to the next. At the end we jump from the bridge to our death, if the commander says it’s the best thing we can do for society.

Confusion makes us compliant.

And the world will notice this deglobalizing trend, the intellectual world anyway, even those who have been staunch adherents to the WEF’s annual oligarch get-together.

What was also remarkable and should be noted, in connection with the WEF’s “declining usefulness” – none of the key world leaders were present: Not President Putin (he was most likely not invited), not President Xi (he may have declined either out of solidarity with the Russian leader, or because of “covid” and the zero-covid policy China defends, or both); and not even Joe Biden, the chief globalist himself, was present. Maybe he confused the dates with his trip to Asia.

The absence of the three world leaders clearly shaded the WEF’s luster as well as the pretense of globalization and Global Governance, the ultimate objective of The Great Reset.

Instead, Biden went to South Korea and Japan, to threaten North Korea with additional sanctions which the UN Security Council rejected; and in Japan to gather two-fold support for his aggressive threat on China that the US would go to war to defend Taiwan from an attack of the mainland. Biden’s brain must have forgotten that Taiwan was declared by the UN already in 1971 as an integral part of China, what it historically is.

Maybe this faux pas was also part of the chess game to fool us once more and to plant more confusion.

And, second, to seek Japan’s support for the WHO “Pandemic Treaty” which he, Biden, initiated and proposed, and which is currently being discussed by the ongoing World Health Assembly. If approved, it would transfer WHO into WHT – for World Health Tyranny.

Remember, it is no coincidence that the WEF and the World Health Assembly or the “Pandemic Treaty” take place in parallel. The Pandemic Treaty is an integral part of the WEF’s Great Reset. All is connected.

WHO’s “Pandemic Treaty” on Hold

Here are the good news. At least the first attempt to push this two-fold treaty through seems to be blocked by the African States. That’s a good omen for the world, being rescued by Africa. See this.

According to latest news, WHO withdraws 12 of the 13 Biden proposed ‘sovereignty’ amendments; in other words, of the proposed changes to WHO’s International Health Regulations (IHR). This occurred apparently amid fierce opposition to WHO’s “Pandemic Treaty”, not only from Africa. See this.

However, this doesn’t mean the battle is won, and the world, the people should not become complacent now. The globalists won’t let go easy. Remember, the WEF and especially financial institutions behind the WEF have enormous money power. And if all fails, they may apply other means of pressure – blackmail and worse.

More importantly, people opposing this WHO Pandemic Treaty, must remain on the ball. For example, pressuring their government’s for exiting WHO, and by seeking alternatives to WHO, by creating an alternative international health body, with the purpose of primarily seeking disease prevention, instead of mainly curative means, like high-risk vaccines and other medication, that serve the interests of the WHO controlling elite, as is the case today.

See this: 17,000 doctors launch a plan to break away from the WHO and create a parallel medical universe (this link will give you the Portuguese version. On this link, go to “change language” and switch to English and the English text will appear, however, without changing the website link).

Disapproving the WHO’s amendments to the IHRs and eventually of the “Pandemic Treaty, would be a clear move away from globalization towards individual countries’ sovereignty. Granted, at this stage it would be just winning a battle in what could become a long war of the People against a tyrant health governance of our globe – our humanity; and wars against more tyranny imposed by the globalists.

Further down the road we may be told that Africans have been convinced of the “good” of the “Pandemic Treaty”, for the good of humanity, for preventing future pandemics.

Let’s not be fooled again!

All is possible. Remember, nothing is coincidence, and all is connected – and in this total chaos – what it seems – we are hopelessly lost, and believe what we are told, even if evidence and logic may tell us something different or the contrary. We can’t cope anymore. We just believe what we are told to believe. It’s cognitive dissonance on steroids.

Let me interject here a personal note. We, The People, Shall Win. Not just the battle, but also the war. The sun, the LIGHT, is on our side.

No Snow in Davos. The WEF: “Eternal Globalist Agenda Pusher”

This year, the WEF – the eternal globalist agenda pusher – played out in a pre-summer Davos, no snow, no snow-covered roofs with white-uniformed, hazmat-looking, machine-gun toting face-covered police and military. Much less impressive without snow.

But, all the same, the police and military were everywhere, many hidden, plain-clothed, but all wearing a discrete armband indicating that they were the custodians of WEF-protection.

Ever-so-often they harassed a journalist, who was known to be critical – not mainstream, of course – just for show, and possibly “fear-making” à la “beware of misbehavior, you are in the city of the WEF”. Well, yeah, at least for these 6 days, including the two days of the luminaries’ arrival last weekend.

That the world is rather moving away from the globalization craze, the WEF’s flagship, could be seen on various fronts. Or is it just wishful thinking? Deception in disguise? Nothing is what it seems and nothing is coincidence.

The Money-making “Green Capitalist” Agenda

Other than no Peace suggestion by the WEF, there was of course also Climate Change on the agenda. It’s a must on every world event. There are some thousand or more scientists trained and available to defend this horrifying climate change theory – man-made climate change. A money-making green capitalist agenda, against which very few intellectuals and scientists dare to argue.

How dare you!!!

Now, the Climate Change talk is presented in a new dress. It shifted from man-made CO2 to the Oceans which absorb CO2 and give off CO2 – to keep the world in balance. A perfect system that has worked for millions and millions of years. As if science didn’t know that before. NASA has been studying this phenomenon for over thirty years in both the Atlantic and the Pacific Ocean.

Now the new twist is, because of man’s abuse in producing CO2, perhaps the Ocean’s capacity is no longer sufficient to absorb it all. After all the years of a completely other climate change narrative, we are suddenly presented with this astounding fact – mea culpa – we simple humans, are responsible for releasing and producing so much CO2 and other climate pollution, that the Oceans can no longer absorb it, can no longer keep Mother Earth in balance, what the Oceans have been doing, since Mother Earth exists.

Some two or three decades ago, an Australian scientist said, based on ample studies, that not only does the climate change all the time, nothing is stagnant in the universe but that by far the principal influence on Mother Earth’s climate is the sun, different phases of sun movements.

Man had practically zero influence in the earth’s weather / climate pattern.

There have been long periods of no sun movements that resulted in what is called “Snowball Earth” some 700 million years ago. This is what google has to say:

“These dramatic “Snowball Earth” events occurred in quick succession, somewhere around 700 million years ago, and evidence suggests that the consecutive global ice ages set the stage for the subsequent explosion of complex, multicellular life on Earth.” See this.

“Green Capitalism” cum “Progressive Neoliberalism”

Be it as it may – this scientific evidence doesn’t fit the globalist agenda. It is not even mentioned to be argued about. The Global Warming narrative, that indeed started some three decades ago absorbing everything “environment”, was later converted into “Climate Change”. There was a time, when the entire Environment Department of the World Bank focused only on Climate Change. It was the narrative the world had to believe – and still has to be indoctrinated with it.

Any idea why?

When mankind is presented with its guilt, a guilt that can realistically not be changed, because the guilt is not real, so, whether true or false, we must believe it, to become vulnerable for manipulation and the entire Climate Change panorama offers itself for a new GREEN style of capitalism cum neoliberalism, as those who can still see straight will have observed.

But hardly anybody seems to notice this absurd controversy between the elite’s climate sermon, and their flocking to Davos, in hundreds of private jets, clogging the Zurich airport, then many take a helicopter to get to Davos in 20 minutes instead of the two-hour train ride.

These billionaires or wannabe billionaires, certainly couldn’t give a flying sh*t about CO2 and “man-made climate change”. It’s one of those flying-in-our-face lies, that we so gallantly ignore.

Total Confusion and Scare Mongering

Now that we are totally confused about what’s what and what to believe – and our brains are running crazy, wanting to rest – that’s when the Great Reset comes in, with the whole truth and nothing but the truth. We can’t believe what’s presented, so we laugh and shrug it off as impossible and untrue.

To make the point even stronger, Klaus Schwab hired the Israeli “futurist scientist” Yuval Noah Hariri, apparently Klaus Schwab’s closest advisor, as far as his dream world “The 4th Industrial Revolution” goes, an all-digitized world. Hariri produces videos galore to convince the people that they are mere “hackable” animals, and eventually will be subjected to brain manipulation, either by implanted chips or directly by 5G ultra-short-waves.

It’s part of scare-mongering, but also part of truth-telling about their intention. This dark cult must divulge their intention in whatever convoluted way so that their plans may come through. That’s part of the cult’s rule.

And because our brains are vulnerable and can be chipped or otherwise manipulated, The Reset’s final doctrine, “You own nothing but will be happy” may also be true.

Global Deception. Addicted to Misinformation

This reminds me of a recent article by The Cogent – “Revelation of the Method”. It is a brilliant masterpiece in describing how we are being deceived in plain sight, know it, and still believe in the deception.

We are hopelessly addicted to misinformation to justify our own behavior – there is no escaping, unless we have a shock break-through and jump the fence of the matrix. Within the matrix many of us, totally off-mainstream, believe we are chewing the red pill; in reality we are sucking on the blue pill. Only once we jump the matrix’s fence are we in a position to chew and swallow the red pill.

It will be a big loneliness. Only a drastic jump in consciousness to the level of Fifth Dimension, where the light will be on our side, will make us resistant, red pill-capable.

It is not impossible, but it takes a sea-change in peoples’ thinking and reasoning, especially in the highly educated, a.k.a. indoctrinated, and comfortable western world. But we shall not give up. See this for more details. May I suggest you read this relatively short explanation on the sophisticated psychological war game that, we the People, are being exposed to.

This is my non-conclusive WEF 2022 conclusion. Are they on the winning side, with a well working deceptive program, keeping us confused, and eventually believing in lies, instead of the truth – both of which are presented to Us, The People, simultaneously, and / or sequentially?

Just follow he Climate Change Agenda; the Vaxx Agenda; or the fully orchestrated vaxx propaganda dialogue between Klaus Schwab and Albert Bourla, Pfizer’s CEO – and the Schwab-invited “standing ovations”. See this.

See Video: Conversation between Klaus Schwab and Albert Bourla

In the end, we humanity must and will win this existential war, a war between the dark cult, led by off-humans – and Us, The People.

Our entire Civilization is at stake.

It is as serious as that.

*

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Peter Koenig is a geopolitical analyst and a former Senior Economist at the World Bank and the World Health Organization (WHO), where he worked for over 30 years around the world.

30 May 2022

Source: www.globalresearch.ca

By Kevin Reed

The baby formula crisis that is threatening the lives of infants across the US deepened this week as the out-of-stock rate for baby formula on store shelves surged to 70 percent for the week ending May 22. The shortage rate during the previous week was 45 percent, according to the retail tracking firm Datasembly.

The supply shortage is so severe that there are now reports in some areas of the country of mothers attempting to purchase breast milk online from anonymous and independent sources such as Facebook and Craigslist. Pediatric nutritionists are warning that such measures are potentially very harmful to children.

The crisis of powdered formula supplies, 90 percent of which are produced by four monopolies that dominate the US pediatric nutrition industry, is not a mistake or a product of unforeseen circumstances. It is the outcome of a society run by a ruling elite that, in its singular preoccupation with increasing its wealth, is totally indifferent to the lives and well-being of children.

There has been a combination of criminal negligence, corporate profiteering, stock market manipulation and government complicity that have resulted in the shortage of the essential food needed by infants and toddlers, especially those from poor and working-class families.

The supply shortage began almost immediately following the onset of the coronavirus pandemic in February 2020 when supply chains and transportation were disrupted internationally. During the initial days of the pandemic, families stockpiled the formula and emptied shelves. This was followed by a sharp fall in sales, and manufacturers cut back on production.

Now, with an uptick in births and a dramatic decline in breastfeeding rates among new mothers, demand has shot up again. The inability of the producers to adapt to fluctuations in demand is itself an expression of the anarchistic and unplanned nature of capitalist economics.

The primary cause of the recent surge in the shortage stems from the shutdown in February of the baby formula factory operated by Abbott Labs in Sturgis, Michigan, the largest in the US. The plant is responsible for 25 percent of the US supply and produces the popular brand names Similac, Alimentum and EleCare.

In February, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) forced Abbott Labs to recall products and shut down the Sturgis facility. This action was taken only after it became clear that the conditions in the plant were so unsanitary that the federal government agency, which has a long history of collaboration with the corporations in the food and drug industries, could no longer look the other way.

During congressional testimony Wednesday, FDA Commissioner Dr. Robert Califf said the agency’s inspection of the Sturgis operations that began on January 31 revealed conditions that were “shocking” and “egregiously unsanitary.”

Dr. Califf told the Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations of the House Energy and Commerce Committee that the “totality of evidence” obtained during the inspection caused the FDA to conclude that infant formulas manufactured at this plant “were produced under insanitary conditions.” He added that the formula “may be contaminated” with bacteria that is known to be fatal in infants.

Among the unsanitary conditions uncovered at the Sturgis factory were that multiple swab samples “later tested positive for the bacteria Cronobacter sakazakii,” cracks in the spray dryers used in the manufacturing process are “an issue related to previous foodborne illness outbreak in powdered infant formula” and water leaks and condensation that are known risk factors for deadly bacteria were found “in areas where dry powdered formula was produced.”

Califf also reported leaks in the roof, standing water in the factory and two instances in the past, based on internal company documents, when finished baby formula was known to have “environmental contamination with Cronobacter sakazakii.” The FDA commissioner claimed that these poisoned batches, which were produced by Abbott Labs in 2019 and 2020, had been destroyed by the company.

The FDA inspection was motivated in part by the fact that four infants, who had been fed nutrition products from the Sturgis factory, had been hospitalized between September and December 2021 with Cronobacter infection. Cronobacter sakazakii is a serious foodborne pathogen that can cause “severe, life-threatening infections,” including sepsis and meningitis as well as bowel damage. Two of the children died from their infections.

The agency was also belatedly responding to a report by a whistleblower who disclosed in October 2021 details about the dilapidated conditions at the Michigan factory. The whistleblower also highlighted the retaliatory policy of company management and its firing of employees who objected to the failure to follow FDA requirements, falsification of records, releasing untested products onto retail shelves and failure of antiquated equipment at the Sturgis facility.

Abbott Laboratories is a $200 billion global corporation that produces medical devices and health care products and was founded in 1888. The multinational has profited enormously over the past two years from its pandemic-related COVID testing products while its less profitable pediatric nutritionals operations have been starved of resources.

Meanwhile, the company—whose Executive Chairman Miles D. White earned $27 million and CEO and President Robert Ford earned $25 million in 2021—has rewarded its investors with billions of dollars in quarterly stock buybacks while the bacterial contamination of its baby formula products were well-known. In December 2021, after the FDA had notified Abbott Labs of a planned inspection of its Sturgis facility, the company announced a $5 billion stock repurchase authorization.

Throughout the bacterial contamination crisis, Abbott Labs has claimed there is no proof that its products have caused infants to become sick and die from life-threatening infections. The company has also maintained that the allegations in the 34-page whistleblower report are untrue.

The belligerence of Abbott Labs in the face of facts that it has acted in a criminally negligent manner has been bolstered by the FDA and the US Justice Department which signed a consent decree with the corporation on May 16. This agreement guarantees that Abbott Labs will not be prosecuted or held responsible for the bacterial contamination of its baby formula products, in exchange for restarting its manufacturing operations at the Sturgis plant.

The fact that millions of families are now desperately searching for baby formula on empty store shelves and forced to make life and death decisions to feed their infants is proof that the corporations and the government do not care about what happens to the lives of millions of children. This fact was confirmed in the recent comment by President Biden’s Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg who washed his hands of the crisis, saying, “The government does not make baby formula, nor should it. Companies make formula.”

“Let’s be very clear,” Buttigieg said, “this is a capitalist country.” Precisely. While Buttigieg made this statement to justify a position that the government should do nothing, the entire crisis condemns the social and economic system that the Biden administration and the entire state apparatus defends.

The formula shortage—coming in the midst of a massive surge in prices throughout the world and an ongoing pandemic that has already killed more than one million people in the United States—is another demonstration of the urgent necessity for the socialist reorganization of society.

Baby formula production and distribution—and other essential products and services required to sustain the lives of millions and billions of people on the earth—must be taken out of the hands of the financial parasites who own them. The working class must transform these resources into public property and operate them based on social need and not profit.

Originally published by WSWS.org

28 May 2022

Source: countercurrents.org

Part II

By Michael Welch and Abdul Jabbar

“I feel we are back in 1939; Munich. Czechslovakia has been taken. Will the word community appease a market of 1.2bn or will it stand up for justice and humanity? If a conventional war starts between 2 countries, nuclear countries anything could happen.

“Supposing a country 7 times smaller than its neighbour; faced with a question. Either you surrender, or you fight till the end. I ask myself this question. And my belief is ‘La ilaha illAllah’, there is no God but one. We will FIGHT!”

– Imran Khan, from his speech at the United Nations General Assembly Seventy-fourth session, 9th plenary meeting (September 27, 2019)

LISTEN TO THE SHOW

The Removal Of Imran Khan Part 2: Back to Dismantling Pakistan’s Relationships with China and Russia

A month following the vote of his political rivals to eject him from power, Imran Khan is riding perhaps the biggest waves of popularity that he has ever surfed upon!

And with legions of supporters propping up his stature, he has launched the campaign “Ghulami Na Manzoor,” a call to unseat the “Imported government” of the recently installed Prime Minister Shehbaaz Sharif. Starting after May 20th, less than a week from the time this is written, a new vote of confidence will be launched from the very grassroots population against the individuals who have conspired to remove the leader they put in place nearly four years ago.

The onslaught of the public would enter into Islamabad and hound the Prime Minister everywhere he goes with slogans of “thief and traitor.” Those unable to make the trip would protest locally in their own communities.

That being said, the actual rules of governance would not likely recognize such tactics as anything more than a protest. Power appears to have returned to the old guard leaving U.S. interests in their leading role in the Pakistan stage.

One writer who has taken an interest in the current Pakistan plight, Abdul Jabbar, described the situation in Pakistan as being the latest example of what he calls Indirect Colonialism. HE puts it bluntly:

“In this kind of colonialism, the colonizing power uses local self-seeking, nation-betraying leaders to sacrifice national interests for the sake of self-advancement.

“The colonizer does not have to spend its resources on launching a formal invasion to occupy a country. Local corrupt politicians prostitute national interest to do the colonizer’s bidding.”

On this week’s Global Research News Hour, Jabbar, this week’s feature guest, takes us through just how far back the new government in charge has taken the country already, away from partnership with Russia and China and towards advancing U.S. geopolitical aims. But this interview is preceded by a replay of one of Imran Khan’s most impassioned speeches, the one at the UN General Assembly relating to Islamophobia and the ever contentious Kashmir region. Toward the end of the program, we bring to the attention of listeners the role of a local terrorist army now appearing to attack Chinese in the province of Balochistan.

Imran Khan is the recently removed Prime Minister of Pakistan. He currently commands broad support within the grassroots population of the West Asian country.

Abdul Jabbar is a scholar originally from Pakistan. He has taught interdisciplinary studies (including political science) in the United States for nearly half a century, so he has been following the developments in Pakistan with great interest and concern, both from professional and personal points of view.

(Global Research News Hour Episode 355)

Transcript – Interview with Abdul Jabbar, May 9, 2022

Global Research News Hour: This is Michael Welch for the Global Research News Hour, and the story of the Pakistan coup against Imran Khan is still an ongoing issue. Now one month into the new regime is in power, and Imran is delighting the many hundreds of thousands in the streets.

So we’re going to get a take by a new individual. His name is Abdul Jabbar. He taught English and Interdisciplinary Studies for 36 years on a full-time basis at City College of San Francisco, including visiting professorship at University of California-Berkeley, he’s a recipient of a Fulbright scholarship and two National Endowment for the Humanities Awards, he received his PhD in English from Case Western University in Cleveland Ohio, and has written three books, his latest, The Promise, Reality, and Potential of American Cultural Diversity is in the process of publication. He’s published several articles on literary, political, and similar topics. His video lectures are available on YouTube, and has been following developments in Pakistan with great interest and concern both from professional and personal points of view. Professor Jabbar, welcome to the Global Research News Hour.

Abdul Jabbar: Thank you for having me on the program Michael.

GR: Since Imran Khan was replaced from power one month ago, has there been any fundamental changes in terms of policy that he’s brought forward?

AJ: His policies have been completely turned around. His policy was for independent foreign policy, that was a major concern and that has been completely diluted with the new government because the new government is really [inaudible] in a sham When you have a coup like this, I don’t think we have any idea. For us, it’s just a matter of simple foreign policy decision to bring in someone who will cooperate with our view of the region. We don’t think much more than that. It leads to so many ramifications for the affected country, it’s hard to even imagine.

So right now, what’s happening is that the new prime minister is scrambling all over the world to get funding. He got some funding from Saudi Arabia and requesting the IMF to extend the loan. And you know every new regime that comes in uses the previous regime for causing the problems, but you know time will tell, I am not sure to what extent is it accusations that there was bad governance on the part of Imran Khan’s government. I’m not so sure to what extent I can believe it, but mainly what is of concern is the assassination attempts on Imran Khan. When we make foreign policy decisions to replace someone, I don’t think we really deep down want the person to be eliminated.

But the local people who take power, they have to then guard themselves against reprisal, repercussions, so they just eliminate the person, the opponent. So this time there is a lot of talk of assassinating Imran Khan, and a lot of warnings from the government, and a lot of advice from even the military that he should not call his big meeting where he expects about two million people to show up this month. There’s attempt also to have him arrested, so that’s the situation right now.

GR: So you mean to say that the deals with, the defense deal between Russia and Pakistan is over, that Pakistan is no longer part of the CPEC with China?

AJ: The deal with Russia was close to being completed when Imran Khan was overthrown, so that hasn’t gone through. That was a huge breakthrough for Pakistan’s economy, 30% discount oil, 30% discount on wheat, and Imran was just working for the benefit of the masses who are struggling with this global inflation with COVID thrown in. And that was not completely carried out, and I think it will not happen. The US will dictate terms. The US government will dictate terms with regard to Russia for sure. With China, remember China is the biggest investor in Pakistan’s market. With close to 60 billion dollars of investment in the program called CPEC, which means China-Pakistan Economic Corridor.

And they are, well there are many projects which are going to be very beneficial to Pakistan in China, US has never liked the close relation of Pakistan to China. Because China is a potential threat to US economy, and the US government forgets that in 1971, Pakistan that enabled the first meeting between US and China, it was a secret meeting when Kissinger flew to Islamabad to Pakistan, and then Pakistan government arranged that secret meeting. So they were brought together, the two powers, so Pakistan was instrumental in doing that. So my take is Michael that Pakistan could play a centre role to bring either Russia and the US to clear the tensions. Pakistan believes in, believds under Imran Khan, no bases in Pakistan, no foreign bases.

No participation in foreign and I don’t know what is going to happen now with terrorism in Pakistan. All the Taliban are attacking Pakistan. Pakistan retaliated and there were 47 Taliban killed inside Afghanistan. So this is been happening in the past and now this will escalate…. Terrorism brought under control under Imran Khan because he [inaudible] will have a negotiated settlement with the Taliban is no [inaudible] resolution. He was perfectly right. What we, out of 20 years of war, was to replace the Taliban with Taliban with trillions of dollars of expense and so many debts. So I think that the reversal it has taken place in the foreign policy with the new government.

GR: What can you tell me about the new prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif?

AJ: Shehbaz Sharif has many cases pending against him for corruption and money laundering like his older brother. He has power to have those cases honed in the federal judiciaries. The judiciaries in the system of the whole [inaudible] [inaudible] situations is totally still the same that was there before Imran Khan. The system is the same, he tried to change from one. He failed miserably. Because the system is there and what they do is, like whenever there’s a hearing, the judges will postpone the hearing to the next day, to the next day. So Imran was furious, a few times he said the Judiciary is not doing its job.

So he had a lot of cases. He doesn’t have a clean slate. You can say that he’s almost like on the hill, and so are many of his cabinet members. But he’s a good manager, when he was chief minister of Punjab which is the biggest province in Pakistan. He did some good work and building his home city Lahore, and the area, so he, he’s a good manager, and I believe he will do whatever the US wants him to do, and since he may be able to get Pakistan some benefit in the short run.

But the people are not going to accept it. See millions of people are coming out all over the world. They demand election. In the elections, Imran will have two-thirds of majority that he needs. His problem was, Michael, that he didn’t have an absolute majority when he won elections in 2018. He had to work, compromise, with people with whom he totally disagreed. So it was very difficult. Now if the elections are held, he will have an absolute majority, and even then implement the vision that got postponed, because of the corruption in all these institutions that he inherited.

GR: It sort of brings us to your latest essay, American Style Colonialism and Imperialism with Pakistan the Latest Victim. You lay out how the status as an American conquest is protected by the local puppets who succeed one another. Every once in a while, somebody will actually place the interests of the country ahead of the welfare of US wealth and undue political interests. In Pakistan, before Khan, we had Benazir Bhutto, who was assassinated in 1977. What were the dynamics that played out in that case?

AJ: 2007, think she was assassinated. ‘77 is when Zia-ul-Haq overthrew the democratic government of Bhutto and then he was hanged by Zia-ul-Haq. That is the last clear demonstration of US interference in the internal affairs of Pakistan. It was in 1977, July 5th, to be accurate, I had flown to Pakistan on a visit on July 4th because I know the people there didn’t travel much it was an American plane. So I travelled and I woke up to the news that the country’s government is overthrown and I came to know, I heard some people in the military, some friends, I came to know that the last pieces of the strategy were finalized in the American embassy on [inaudible]. So Zulfikar Ali Bhutto was overthrown. And then a couple of years later he was executed. What happened to the country since then, what did Zia-ul-Haq bring to the country, this is mind-boggling.

He has done the most amount of damage to the country single-handedly. It was a liberal democracy under Bhutto. Bhutto was not perfect. Just talking about the democracy that was in place, and it was a liberal democracy. Zia-ul-Haq brought in the extreme Wahhabi, Saudi Arabian imported version of Islam. And curtailing women’s rights, freedom of speech, and he came for 90 days to have elections but he stayed in power until he was assass– he was killed in an airplane crash. So that also were brought in all kinds of terrorists from over the world.

So they were funded by the US through Pakistan, the US and Saudi Arabia funded them under Zia-ul-Haq to fight the Soviet Union ‘79 invasion of Afghanistan. And so just imagine, those people came from 40 different countries, and they landed in Afghanistan with the help of Pakistan ISI and the US training. So what happened, they destroyed the social fabric of the society. Because once the war was over. they were there. They weren’t leaving. I grew up in Pakistan. I don’t remember any household owning Kalashnikov. And after the Soviet invasion, the US and this [inaudible] for the US, all that changed the country’s society completely.

We could walk in Pakistan at 1 a.m. 2 a.m. freely, but then it was just a matter of being caught for ransom if you go to visit Pakistan. Things changed under Imran Khan simply because he said we should be in negotiated settlement and it is cultural imperialism to command another culture to obey us. And that was why he was respected by the Taliban, then we started calling him Taliban Khan. So really ironic.

GR: The elections in Pakistan are set for 2023. What do you think will take place in the interim to foil Khan’s attempts to return to power? I made you mentioned a possible assassination. Are there other things they could do to finish him off in case he can avoid assassination?

AJ: Just yesterday he said that there are a lot of attempts from all kinds of quarters. He expects some of those, but even if he’s assassinated it will not change the momentum because the youth, which is more aware than ever before, they want the restoration of the government that is representative of their will. And his party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, which means just “his party,” Pakistan Movement for Justice, they will sweep the election. And the current government is trying to postpone the election until as you said 2023. And that, in the interim, many things can happen. You can have… Hopefully the worst scenario is civil war. That is nobody wishes. In Syria, we didn’t think anything would happen when we interfered others interfered, one side was Russia, on the other side was the US, the proxy war. Two and a quarter million people have been killed, so many millions displaced… We don’t know, you see when these things happen, they have their own momentum.

They take the ugliest possible terms, you can’t imagine, so what will happen Michael is anybody’s guess. The worst scenario is civil war. Within my own family there’s a civil war going on. So I can tell you that this, there’s a lot of tension, people and Saudi Arabia there was a spontaneous demonstration against Shehbaz. He had gone to Saudi Arabia and get funding. Here it pretty much is a convention to go to those holy sites in Saudi Arabia to offer prayers. So Shehbaz went there, Shehbaz Sharif and the crowd saw him recognized him and the Pakistan is living in Saudi Arabia they erupted with “Thief! Thief!” And there was a pretty much of a riot. The police came in and then more people joined in and Sharif and his Entourage were attacked and the Saudi Arabian government arrested people from both sides, and they have some draconian punishment for that. Saudi Arabia doesn’t…the government doesn’t want any protest, especially at that time in that place. And as you know they don’t like protest, period. So they’re going to give huge sentences.

The worst part of that incident was to me an FIR registered in a city in Pakistan to implicate to introduce the idea of assassinating Imran on religious grounds that he has done a sacrilege to a holy site because he’s behind the whole riot, that he instigated it. He was in Pakistan of course, there is no legal ability to this and it won’t win in the court. The problem is it instigates, it unleashes a tsunami of hatred and fanaticism.

It was a governor in Pakistan who simply said the blasphemy laws should be used carefully because a Christian woman was being hanged according to sources for blasphemy. And he intervened, he said, blasphemy is a very sensitive legal item, we have to use it very carefully. He was assassinated by a fanatic. Because he thought if he was being too soft on Christian minority and defaming and blaspheming the prophet. So this was the attempt to create a legal basis First Information Report. FIR is a legal document the police registered. And then it unleashes all these currents of hate, totally unfounded. So, you know, that is the worst-case scenario that could happen, that kind of assassination could take place.

Civil war is a possibility, and it’s also possible to be very hopeful, that the current government will continue until the election and the interim will not see any big upheavals other than Imran Khan [inaudible] And he insists on nonviolence. He does not want his followers to do any violence. So, it is possible that probably will be the best-case scenario short of elections.

GR: Well, that’s fascinating reality is playing out. Professor Jabbar I’m afraid we’re out of time now , but you brought us a lot to think about. Thank you for joining us.

AJ: Thank you very much for having me on your program!
______________________________________

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15 May 2022

Source: www.globalresearch.ca

By Mike Whitney

“I can’t believe it’s monkey-pox season already and I haven’t even taken my Ukrainian decorations down.” Robin Monotti

Bill Gates’ prediction that the world would face an unexpected smallpox outbreak is miraculously unfolding. Should we be surprised?

I know I’m not. Here’s the money-quote that was delivered by Gates 6 months before the first case was recorded.

“It’ll take probably about a billion a year for a pandemic Task Force at the WHO level, which is doing the surveillance and actually doing what I call ‘germ games’ where you practice… You say, OK, what if a bioterrorist brought smallpox to 10 airports? You know, how would the world respond to that?” Bill Gates, Sky News, November 6, 2021

One can only marvel at Gates’ extraordinary powers of perception. He’s like some kind of Software Soothsayer able to divine the future from the entrails of animals. Is that it, or does he have a crystal ball tucked-away somewhere in the bowels of his Lake Washington mansion? Whatever it is, it’s trully astonishing. Here’s more from the World Socialist Web Site:

“An unprecedented outbreak of monkeypox virus has officially spread to 10 countries outside of Africa, with 107 confirmed or suspected cases reported as of this writing, in the United Kingdom (9 cases), Portugal (34), Spain (32), France (1), Belgium (2), Sweden (1), Italy (3), Canada (22), the United States (2), and Australia (1).”

Much remains unknown about what is causing the outbreak, which is the most geographically dispersed and rapidly spreading monkeypox outbreak since the virus was first discovered in 1958. In the coming days and weeks, more data and scientific understanding will emerge, but already there is profound concern within the scientific community and among the public, which has found wide expression on social media.” (“Over 100 monkeypox infections detected in 10 countries as unprecedented outbreak spreads globally“, World Socialist Web Site)

Repeat: The most “rapidly spreading monkeypox outbreak since the virus was first discovered in 1958.”

I wonder if that “rapidly spreading” part has something to do with the way that researchers have been tweaking the gain-of-function of these unique pathogens in order to make them more contagious and more lethal? Is that what’s going on?

We’ll probably never know.

And, is it fair to ask whether monkey-pox might be another lab-generated virus that was concocted in the 300-or-so Pentagon-funded secret labs sprinkled around the world that are presently conducting a massive war on humanity to further the ambitions of billionaire elites who are committed to reducing the global population while imposing strict, police state surveillance on every sentient being on planet earth?

We probably won’t get an answer to that one either.

In the interest of fairness, though, we should mention that “reputable” media outlets, like Newsweek magazine, have refuted the claim that Gates made the prediction that we allude to above. Here’s Newsweek’s explanation:

“While Gates has talked about the possibility of bioterrorist smallpox attacks in the past, his comments have been drawn slightly out of context and don’t mention monkeypox.” (Fact Check: Did Bill Gates Predict The Monkeypox Outbreak? Newsweek)

“Slightly out of context?” You mean, Gates did NOT draw attention to a particular infectious disease (smallpox) that magically reemerged from extinction just months later? What “context” is the author talking about? We’d like to know.

Strictly speaking, it doesn’t matter what Newsweek says or doesn’t say, after all, Gates has become the embodiment of everything that’s wrong with today’s Public Health Gestapo, which is why he’s become a magnet for criticism. And, whether he’s been treated fairly or not, a sizable number of people believe quite strongly, that Gates is the mastermind behind a plan to use lab-generated infectious diseases to subjugate the global population in order to establish a tyrannical New Order controlled by voracious elites like himself.

And the WHO’s new sovereignty-eviscerating treaty further underscores this point, in fact, it seems to suggest that Gates and his fellow travelers believe their lifelong ambition to rule the world is now within their grasp. Check it out:

In researching this article, I stumbled across a number of tidbits that readers might find interesting. For example, I discovered that there had been a tabletop exercise simulating a global pandemic involving an unusual strain of #monkeypox” that took place in March 2021. It’s astonishing how many of these ‘preparatory drills’ seem to take place just prior to some particularly horrific event. Can we dismiss them all as mere coincidences? Check out this blurb from the Brownstone Institute:

“… media outlets around the world are on red alert over the world’s first-ever global outbreak of Monkeypox in mid-May 2022—just one year after an international biosecurity conference in Munich held a simulation of a “global pandemic involving an unusual strain of Monkeypox” beginning in mid-May 2022.

Monkeypox was first identified in 1958, but there’s never been a global Monkeypox outbreak outside of Africa until now—in the exact week of the exact month predicted by the biosecurity folks in their pandemic simulation. Take these guys to Vegas!

The global Monkeypox outbreak—occurring on the exact timeline predicted by a biosecurity simulation of a global Monkeypox outbreak a year prior—bears a striking resemblance to the outbreak of COVID-19 just months after Event 201, a simulation of a coronavirus pandemic almost exactly like COVID-19. ” (“Monkeypox Was a Table-Top Simulation Only Last Year”, Brownstone Institute)

And here’s a minute and a half video that helps to explain the excerpt above. (Video) You may notice that the anchor reporting the (simulated) outbreak says, “Scientists have decided that this monkeypox virus was engineered.”

Uh huh. And, further along, one of the analysts offers these prescient words of advice: “We’re seeing far fewer cases where governments’ took early and decisive action”

What do you think that means? Could it mean that we’d better prepare ourselves for another round of experimental clot shots? Is that what it means?

So, here’s your Pandemic Quiz for the Day: What do you think the chances are that an oddball affliction, like Monkeypox, could spontaneously break out in 10 different locations around the world (where it had never appeared before) at the exact same time?

How about “zero” chance? Is that too high?

I’m going to go out-on-a-limb here and say there is zero chance that this new disease occurred “naturally”. The only rational assumption one can make, is that monkey-pox, like Covid, is a lab-generated pathogen spread by covert agents that are prosecuting a bio-war on the global population. But we’ll have to consult Dr Fauci on the matter and see if he agrees. Here’s more from the WSWS:

“In preliminary posts, scientists speculate that the virus, which is endemic in parts of Africa, could have evolved to become more contagious and better suited to human-to-human transmission. In addition, nearly all people under 42 years old have not received a smallpox vaccine (which is 85 percent effective at preventing monkeypox infection) since smallpox was eradicated in 1980. As a result, they have no immunity, and younger adults can be infected as easily as children.”(WSWS)

This simply confirms that another mass vaccination campaign is on the way. Here’s more from the same article:

“The emergence of multiple cases across different countries is deeply problematic….“Given that we have seen now confirmed cases out of Portugal, suspected cases out of Spain, we’re seeing this expansion of confirmed and suspect cases globally, we have a sense that no one has their arms around this to know how large and expansive it might be….

In nearly every public statement by epidemiologists, they have all admitted to being bewildered by how entrenched the virus already is in communities, given that it is normally extremely rare. Tom Inglesby, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, told STAT News, “this is starting off with much more of a foothold, in a much more distributed way, and we don’t understand how it got into those networks.” (“Over 100 monkeypox infections detected in 10 countries as unprecedented outbreak spreads globally“, World Socialist Web Site)

So, it’s everywhere already? Then, what do we do?

The obvious answer is lock-down, mask up and get vaccinated as soon as possible. Otherwise, most of the world’s population could face an agonizing death… just like Covid, remember?. Of course, some people might conclude that we are being deliberately misled again, and that 2 pandemics in 2 years is a statistical impossibility. But why be reasonable when mass-hysteria is the order of the day? Here’s more:

“The number of severe side-effects of the smallpox vaccine makes its use in a mass vaccination campaign problematic. However, due to the long incubation period for monkeypox, the smallpox vaccine can work as a post-exposure prophylaxis in a “ring vaccination” model….” (WSWS)

In other words, don’t be dissuaded by the sky-high rates of heart attacks, strokes, blood clotting or death. Just follow the CDC’s thoughtful recommendations and everything will be just fine. Besides, the government has already purchased 13 million of these new-improved poison-death shots (U.S. Buys 13 Million Doses of Monkeypox Vaccine) so just calm down, take a deep breath and roll up your sleeve. We all know the drill by now.

We do, however, scratch our heads when we read about the suspicious goings-on at the Pentagon’s secret bio-labs that appear to be engaged in all manner of illicit skullduggery including the industrial-scale creation of lethal pathogens that could exterminate billions of people in one fell-swoop. That does keep us up at night. Check out this article in Tass:

“The US researched Ebola and smallpox viruses in Ukraine, says Irina Yarovaya, Co-Chair of the Parliamentary Commission on Investigation of US Biological Laboratories in Ukraine.

“Today, we presented an analysis of which pathogens the US was particularly interested in in Ukraine,” she told reporters Friday. “Aside from the pathogens that are territoriality bound to Ukraine, [the laboratories] researched viruses and pathogens that are endemically very far from Ukraine, such as Ebola and smallpox.”

According to the legislator, the information obtained indicates “aggressive goal-setting that underpins the foundation of these programs, de facto implemented by US Department of Defense on Ukrainian soil.”…

“I would like to underscore that the dialogue that we had with the SVR chief today, combined with the proof obtained by the commission, fully confirms the US-created network of biological intelligence worldwide and the implementation of active military-biological exploitation of the globe, and Ukraine in particular. This essentially poses a serious global threat”….

“But at the same time, [it should] urge the global community to seriously get to the bottom of this secret and dangerous military biological activity, implemented by the US. So that comprehensive measures pertaining to common, equal and indivisible security could be developed. Given the distinction between peaceful and non-peaceful use of bacteriological research and the study of toxins, it must be completely transparent and controlled. And there simply must not be any bacteriological weapons in the world, this is Russia’s principal position.” (“Key Russian lawmaker reveals illicit Ebola, smallpox research at US-run Ukraine biolab”, Tass)

So, what’s going on here? Why does the Pentagon have over 300 bio-labs spread around the world conducting secret gain-of-function research on pathogens that pose a clear threat to all of humanity? And why has the Pentagon partnered with notorious elites whose links to the eugenics, depopulation and climate movements suggest the research may be shaped to a particular strategic agenda that could involve significant casualties?

And what if Monkeypox is not, in fact, a natural occurring virus but merely the next phase of a relentless war on Constitutional government, individual freedom and the basic institutions of modern civilization? Perhaps, we are being prepared for a different civilization altogether, a civilization in which all of our decisions will be made for us by enlightened elders, corporate stakeholders and well-meaning philanthropists. Is that possible?

It’s certainly worth thinking about.

*

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This article was originally published on The Unz Review.

Michael Whitney is a renowned geopolitical and social analyst based in Washington State.

23 May 2022

Source: www.globalresearch.ca

By Gideon Levy

If there is one thing completely missing from the public agenda in Israel, it is the long-term view. Israel does not look ahead, not even by half a generation.

Children are important in Israel, and the time and energy devoted to them may substantially exceed what is typical in most other societies, yet no one talks about what lies ahead for them or for their own future children.

There is not a single Israeli, not one, who knows where his country is headed.

Ask any ordinary Israeli or any politician, any journalist or scientist, from the political centre or the right or the left: where are you going? How will your country look in another 20 years? Or 50? They can’t even describe what 10 years from now might be like. Few Israelis could even say where they would like their country to be going, apart from empty slogans about peace and security and prosperity.
Troubling question

Also very instructive is the one question that does arise about the long term: will Israel still exist in another 20 or 50 years? That is all you will hear queried in Israel about the future. And meanwhile a different question – Will there ever be peace? – which a generation or two ago was omnipresent, is no longer on the agenda and almost never asked.

There are very few places where people ask whether or not their country will exist a few decades hence. People don’t ask that in Germany or Albania, or in Togo or in Chad. This question may not be pertinent for Israel either – a powerfully armed regional power, impressively well-connected, with such technological prowess and such prosperity, the darling of the West.

Yet consider the fact that so many Israelis continue to ask this question, more often lately than ever. Note the incredible efforts Israelis expend to obtain a second passport for themselves and their children – any passport! Let it be Portuguese or Lithuanian, the main thing is to have some option beyond an Israeli passport, as if an Israeli passport is some kind of temporary permit nearing its expiration date, as if it weren’t possible to go on renewing it forever.

All of that suggests that the Israeli habit of burying their heads in the sand about the future of their country disguises a deep-seated, and possibly very realistic, fear about what the future may hold. Israelis are afraid of the future of their country. They brag about their country’s power and ability, a righteous nation, a chosen people, a light unto the nations; they are exceedingly boastful about their army, about their skills, while at the same time a primordial fear gnaws at their innards.

The future of their country is hidden from them, shrouded in mist. They like to talk in religious terms about eternity, “a united Jerusalem for eternity” and “God’s eternal promise to Israel”, while deep down they have no clue what will be happening to their country tomorrow or, at the latest, the day after that.
Self-delusion provides no answer

The name of the game is repression, denial, self-delusion, on a scale unknown in any other society that comes to mind. Just as for most Israelis there is no occupation, and definitely no apartheid, despite the mountains of evidence towering higher all the time – so, for most Israelis, tomorrow is not a thing. Tomorrow is not a thing in terms of the environment or climate change in Israel; tomorrow is not a thing in terms of relations with the other nation living alongside us with our knee on its throat.

Just try asking Israelis what it is going to be like here one day with a Palestinian majority between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, and in the best case you’ll get nothing but a shrug. Where is it all headed? Will we live forever by the sword? Is it worth the price?

What you’ll discover is that – guess what? – Israelis have never asked themselves this question before and no one has ever queried them about it before, either. Their expression will tell you that they’ve never heard such a strange question. In any event, there will be no answer. Israelis have no answer.

This situation is very unhealthy, of course. A society cannot go far with its head buried in the sand, and will certainly be unable to cope with the real challenges confronting it. The occupation, which more than anything else is what defines Israel today, presents more than a few challenges – with which Israel refuses to grapple. What will happen with the occupation? Where will it take the two societies, occupier and occupied, Israeli and Palestinian? Can the occupation go on forever?

Until recently, I was convinced that the occupation cannot last forever. History has taught us that a people fighting to be free generally wins and that rotten regimes, like the military occupation of the Palestinian people by Israel, collapse of their own accord, crumbling internally from the decay that always pervades them. But as the Israeli occupation drags on and its end continually recedes, doubts have riven my once-solid conviction that something will surely happen soon to bring down the occupation, like a tree that looks robust but has rotted from within.

The most frightening case in point is that of America and the Native Americans, a story of a conquest that became permanent, with the conquered herded onto reservations where they have independence and self-determination only in theory and their national rights are ignored.
Indefinite occupation

In other words, there are indeed occupations that go on indefinitely, defying the odds and all the predictions, persisting and persisting until a conquered people stops being a nation and becomes an anthropological curiosity living in its cage on a reservation. This happens when the occupation is particularly powerful and the conquered are especially weak and the world loses interest in their fate. A future like that now looms over the Palestinians. They are at their most perilous hour since the Nakba in 1948.

Divided, isolated, lacking strong leadership, bleeding at the side of the road and slowly losing their most precious asset in terms of the solidarity they aroused all over the world, especially in the global south.

Yasser Arafat was a global icon; there was nowhere on earth that did not know his name. No Palestinian leader today even comes close. Worse yet, their cause is gradually disappearing from the world’s agenda as it pivots to pressing issues like migration, the environment and the war in Ukraine. The world is tired of the Palestinians, the Arab world tired of them long ago and the Israelis were never interested in them. That could still change, but the current trends are deeply disheartening.

Another Nakba on the 1948 model would not seem a realistic option for Israel at the present time; the second Nakba is an ongoing one that creeps along insidiously all the time, but without drama. There are certainly those in Israel who toy with the idea that under the cloak of some future war, Israel could “finish the job” only partially completed in 1948. Threatening voices in that key have sounded louder lately but they remain a minority in Israeli discourse.

Continue with the settlements? Why not. Most Israelis just do not care. They have never been to the settlements, will never go there and couldn’t care less whether Evyatar is evacuated or not.

The struggle has long since moved to the international front. The crucial shift will come only from there, as happened in South Africa. But part of the world has simply lost interest, and the rest clings to the formula of a two-state solution as if it were sanctified by religious edict. Yet, most decision-makers already know that the two-state solution is long dead, if in fact it ever lived and breathed.
Equality is the path

The only exit from this depressing impasse is by creating a new discourse, a discourse of rights and equality. People must stop singing the songs of yesteryear and embrace a new vision. For the international community, this should be obvious; for the Israelis and to a lesser extent the Palestinians, the idea is revolutionary, threatening, and exceedingly painful.

Equality. Equal rights from the river to the sea. One person, one vote. So basic and yet so revolutionary. This path requires a parting of the ways with Zionism and the rejection of Jewish supremacy, and letting go of the entire self-definition of both peoples – but it represents the only ray of hope.

In Israel until just a few years ago this idea was viewed as subversive, treasonous and illegitimate. It is still viewed that way but with somewhat less force. It has become mentionable. It now remains for civil societies in the West and then the politicians to embrace the change. Most of them already know that this is the only solution left, but are afraid to admit it lest they lose the magic formula for a continued Israeli occupation provided by the now dead two-state solution.

The present is deeply discouraging, the future no less so. And yet to persist in thinking that something can still be hoped for, some action can still be taken, is of the utmost importance. The worst thing that could happen in this part of the world would be for everyone to lose interest in what happens here and resign themselves to the current reality. That must not be.

Gideon Levy is a Haaretz columnist and a member of the newspaper’s editorial board. Levy joined Haaretz in 1982, and spent four years as the newspaper’s deputy editor.

23 May 2022

Source: www.middleeasteye.net

By Caitlin Johnstone

19 May 2022 – Oh my God. It happened. I can’t believe it really happened.

During a speech in Dallas at Southern Methodist University’s George W Bush Presidential Center on Wednesday, the man himself, George W Bush, did the best thing ever. I am pretty sure it is the single best thing that has ever happened. I do not believe I am exaggerating when I say that.

While criticizing Russia for having rigged elections and shutting out political opposition (which would already be hilarious coming from any American in general and Bush in particular), the 43rd president made the following comment:

“The result is an absence of checks and balances in Russia, and the decision of one man to launch a wholly unjustified and brutal invasion of Iraq. I mean, of Ukraine.”

And then it got even better. After correcting himself with a nervous chuckle, Bush broke the tension in the empire-loyal crowd with the words, “Iraq too. Anyway.” He then quipped that he is 75 years old, leaning harder on his “Aw shucks gee willikers I’m such a goofball” persona than he ever has in his entire life.

And Bush’s audience laughed. They thought it was great. A president who launched an illegal invasion that killed upwards of a million people (probably way upwards) openly confessing to doing what every news outlet in the western world has spent the last three months shrieking its lungs out about Putin doing was hilarious to them.

There are not enough shoes in the universe to respond to this correctly.

As comedian John Fugelsang put it, “George W. Bush didn’t do a Freudian slip. He did a Freudian Confession.”

One of the many, many interesting things about this occurrence is the likelihood that Bush’s words tumbled out in the way they did because he’s either heard a lot of criticisms of his invasion or has been thinking a lot about them; a familiar neural pathway would explain why his brain chose the exact worst word he could possibly swap out for “Ukraine” in that moment. This would be a small light in the darkness for we ordinary folk who oppose war and love peace, because it suggests that even the worst empire managers cannot fully insulate themselves from our criticisms.

The bullshit doesn’t get any more brightly illuminated than this, folks. All that spin and narrative management they’ve been pouring into the US proxy war in Ukraine, and Bush undoes it all with the Bushism to end all Bushisms.

While the western political/media class constantly rends its garments over “disinformation” about the Ukraine war even as US officials openly admit they’ve been using the media to circulate disinformation about that same war, and even as the Biden administration imprisons and persecutes a journalist for exposing US war crimes, we get a square admission that the US is no better than Russia and that the only thing obscuring this is the fact that we are all swimming in a sea of disinformation and propaganda provided by that same political/media class.

And this admission comes not from any low-level empire lackey, but from the man himself. The guy. The man whose name alone serves as a one-word debunk of every claim made about how uniquely nefarious Vladimir Putin is on the world stage and how uniquely depraved is his invasion of Ukraine.

If you really look at what just happened, really truly ingest it, this one incident just by itself is enough to show you that we are swimming in a sea of lies designed to give us an upside-down and ass-backwards perspective of what’s going on in the world. If Bush himself can’t always tell the difference between the invasion of Iraq and the invasion of Ukraine, then this means our news media and our politicians are lying to us constantly. They lied to us through 2002 and 2003, and they never stopped lying, and they are lying now in the year 2022.

The entire mainstream worldview is a perceptual distortion filter which obscures the public understanding of world events so severely that Bush has been not just forgiven for his crimes but actively rehabilitated in the public eye, while the enemies of the United States are continuously compared to Adolf Hitler and condemned throughout the US-dominated world.

In reality the US is the single most tyrannical and destructive government on this planet, and it is only because the public is fed a nonstop deluge of propaganda that this isn’t universally obvious. Even the worst empire managers know deep down that this is true, and, in their less guarded moments, sometimes the truth slips out.

Caitlin Johnstone is a rogue journalist, poet, and utopia prepper who publishes regularly at Medium.

23 May 2022

Source: www.transcend.org

By Robert Bridge

15 May 2022 – North Americans are being shepherded to the next emoji crusade – the latest being Russia’s special operation in Ukraine – like consumers waiting in line for junk food and Happy Meals. When does the mindless virtue-signaling end?

While some Westerners may find a kindred spirit with McDonald’s and its anti-war posturing against Russia, a little more consistency on the issue of war and peace would be a most welcome development.

The fact is, nothing screams ‘Russophobia’ more than the spectacle of McDonald’s abandoning the Russian market amid Moscow’s conflict with Ukraine, especially when it is remembered that Ronald kept flipping his burgers all the while as George W. Bush and Barack Obama were indulging themselves on a killing spree in numerous ill-fated countries.

Aside from the question of America’s flagrant double standards when dealing with Russia, there lurks an even more mysterious and disturbing riddle: How is it possible to continue triggering Americans into a non-stop virtue-signaling crusade on behalf of various causes? Moreover, if the media was not there to point them to the Next Big Thing, would Americans even know that one existed?

With whiplash swiftness, Americans have gone from taking a knee to Black Lives Matter (even as this group was going on a billion-dollar, 20-state rampage, which entered the record books as America’s most expensive protest ever), to demonizing those wary of new Covid-19 vaccines, to lining up on opposite sides of the Roe v. Wade abortion rights showdown.

Amid these increasingly frequent domestic earthquakes, Russia has always found itself at the epicenter of the action. It’s a bit like the Chris Rock of countries, getting slapped in the face every day without rhyme or reason. There is a whiff of a slick McDonald’s advertising campaign at the heart of America’s perennial obsession with Russia. Just like those wonderfully deceptive TV ads that show a deliriously happy (and mysteriously healthy) family gorging themselves on Big Macs and Happy Meals, a trip to McDonald’s tends to always leave behind a bitter aftertaste, if not outright intestinal issues. In other words, the corporate hype rarely lives up to the reality.

A similar sort of advertising campaign has been aimed directly at Russia for many years, albeit in reverse. Not unlike Edward Bernays, the ‘father of public relations’, and his ability to convince American women in the 1920s that smoking cigarettes was a symbol of feminine empowerment, propagandists today have successfully peddled the fake news to an unsuspecting public that Russia is the root of all evil.

Unless people ditch these carefully crafted stereotypes and physically board an airplane, they will probably never know that Russia’s portrayal by Hollywood and the mainstream media is quite simply the worst form of propaganda. Once an individual experiences the reality of Russia without the second-hand smoke and mirrors – as millions of sports fans did during the 2018 FIFA World Cup, for example, where dozens of football matches were held in 11 Russian cities – they quickly understand that the doom and gloom stories about this part of the world are a wicked pack of lies.

But alas, not everyone in the world can travel to Russia and see the reality for themselves. Unfriendly foreign countries, in cahoots with a venal media, perfectly understand this handicap, which allows them to portray Russia as the ‘evil empire’, something straight out of a Bond flick. And then one day, when Russia finds itself in a situation where it is forced to say ‘enough!’ and resorts to what it considers to be a legitimate act of self-defense – certainly no less legitimate than the military offensives undertaken by the Western hemisphere over the years – a vicious virtue-signaling campaign against Russia and Russians begins in earnest, and to great effect.

The reaction to the events in Ukraine has demonstrated the concentrated power of the US media and government to channel the self-perceived virtuousness of the entire Western world practically at will. The US establishment could just as easily have weaponized a virtuous campaign on behalf of other embattled people, like in Yemen, for example, which has been under relentless siege for seven years by Saudi Arabia, with the assistance from the usual (Western) suspects. According to UNICEF, the humanitarian agency for children, “more than 10,200 children have been killed or injured” since the start of Riyadh’s military blockade, which has led to disease, famine, and death throughout the country.

And what about the long-suffering people of Donbass, the Russian-speaking region of Ukraine that has been under siege by pro-Kiev forces for eight years? How many Americans know that this tragedy can be traced back to a US-led coup that ousted Ukraine’s democratically elected government in 2014? Had the virtue-signaling crusaders shone the spotlight on the plight of these oppressed peoples, asking why the Minsk Protocol for a ceasefire was being regularly violated, there very well could be peace in Ukraine today.

Self-serving companies like McDonald’s and countries like the United States shout from the rooftops that they are the ultimate defenders of the oppressed. The reality, however, is more sobering. The reality is that their virtue-signaling theatrics are of a very selective type that has a strong tendency for aligning with the foreign policy dictates of Washington, as opposed to the actual needs of the downtrodden. Virtuosity should know no political master, otherwise it’s just cheap virtue-signaling on behalf of ulterior motives.

Robert Bridge is a North American writer and journalist.

23 May 2022

Source: www.transcend.org