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By Rima Najjar

Jewish supremacists in 2000 celebrating Baruch Goldberg’s massacre of 29 Palestinian Muslims in the Ibrahimi mosque in Hebron

The Christchurch shooting and ensuing furor over white supremacy brought to mind a similar massacre of Muslims in a mosque in Palestine perpetrated by a Jewish supremacist several decades ago. Two recent headlines about fascism have coalesced in my mind into mirror images. The more I dwelled on them and on the two terror attacks, the more these mirror images twisted and turned.

The headlines:

• Israel’s right-wing justice minister samples ‘fascism’ perfume in bizarre campaign ad
• Poland insists far-right marchers calling for ‘Islamic holocaust’ just sideshow to ‘great celebration of Poles’

How seriously are we to take these headlines? Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the leader of Poland’s ruling party, says racism and xenophobia are a ‘marginal problem’ in Poland, but it’s clear to most of us that white entitlement is part of the structure of many European societies. European thinkers, in fact, are behind the white-nationalist rallying cry “You Will Not Replace Us”.

Israel’s minister Ayelet Shaked claims the fascism perfume ad is just a sophisticated joke (she is trying to say that her fascist positions really “smell like democracy”), but it’s clear to more and more of us that Israel’s whole raison d’être is racism, xenophobia and Jewish separatism disguised as “Jewish nationalism”. In the words of another Israeli politician — Tzipi Livni: “It’s about the Jewish tradition, it’s about Jewish history. — But we need to keep the nature, the character of the state of Israel as a Jewish state because this is — excuse me for using French — the raison d’etre of the state of Israel.”

And yet, as Lana Tatour says in her excellent review of Ronit Lentin’s book, Traces of racial exception: racializing Israeli settler colonialism, “propositions that Israel is a racial state and that Zionism is a racial movement have always sparked— and continue to spark— outrage in Israel and the West.”

Ever since the violent establishment of Israel as an apartheid Jewish state in Palestine in 1948, the Zionist rallying cry “We [Jews]will replace them [Palestinian Arabs]” has been a central tenet of each and every Israeli ruling government and the only way Jewish nationalism can survive.

During the EU-backed Oslo era, in a frenetic attempt to subvert a Jewish settlement freeze, the World Zionist Organization, through the Jewish Agency and the Jewish National Fund, funneled into Israel not only Anglo-Saxon Jews from the US and UK but also Jews from “lost tribes” such as the Bnei Menashe in India, and even imported Peruvian Indians in 2003 to swell a settlement or two despite the difficulties of converting these people to Judaism.

Israel bestows the automatic right to Israeli citizenship on Jews throughout the world while simultaneously continuing to deny Palestinian Arabs, both Muslim and Christian, their internationally recognized right of return to their towns, villages and property in Israel and the rest of historic Palestine that Israel now occupies/colonizes.

White supremacists in Europe, as well as in Western settler-colonial States such as the U.S., Canada and Australia, are anti-immigrant, with a large percentage of the immigrants being people from the Southern Hemisphere. Europe’s immigrants include Syrians among many others. Same goes for Australia.

White supremacist ideology is meant to protect them from a perceived “threat” to “white culture” or “white civilization”, which they see as superior, as well as from the economic threat caused by the disruptions of globalization. They resent that brown and black people they colonized in the past, and still consider inferior, are now turning the tables around on them through migration to the north.

Jewish supremacists, on the other hand, are pro-immigrant, with the immigrants being Jews of any nationality or culture from around the world. Their ideology is meant to maintain the Zionist invention of a Zionist Jewish national identity. The “Jewishness” of Zionism is not only Judaism (despite its full-blown religious component), and not only a colonial-settler project in Palestine. It revolves around the construct of “the Jewish people”.

This identity, like white supremacy, is rooted in a sense that Jewish culture deserves to be the dominant culture and must remain separate and pure. It is superior to the culture/religion of the Palestinian Arabs. To create itself, Jewish nationalism not only stole Palestinian Arab heritage as its own, it actively erased Palestinian Arab history and culture, in addition to the crimes of ethnic cleansing and land theft.

Besides the task of ingathering Jews from around the world into historic Palestine, Jewish supremacy has the added burden of keeping out the rightful owners of the land they have colonized/occupied — Palestinian Arabs, the natural (indigenous) majority in the geopolitical territory of Palestine.

Many Jews in the United States, secular as well as religious, have no intention of making “aliyah”, but they are wedded to the notion of “the Jewish people” in the same sense that white supremacists are committed to the idea of “white people” — a complete bluff, in both cases, since “they have been mixing races and ethnicities since day one. It is pathetic, how these ‘whites’ are whining about ‘invasion’, themselves being descendants of Turks, Tatars, Persians, Greeks, Arab ancestors, Suomi people, Scythians, Slavs, etc.”

The following tale of two massacres, or “terror attacks”, if you prefer, further illustrates the similarities and differences between white supremacy and Jewish supremacy.

The March 2019 Christchurch massacre at the hands of a white supremacist resulting in the slaying of 50 Muslims as they prayed in a mosque in New Zealand has a direct parallel in the February 1994 massacre at the hands of a Brooklyn-born Jewish supremacist, which resulted in 29 Palestinians killed and some 150 wounded as they prayed in the Ibrahimi Mosque in al-Khalil (Hebron).

The twist in the comparison is that the Brooklyn-born Jewish supremacist (Baruch Goldstein) had immigrated to Israel to join the Israeli army. He was, in essence, helping the Israeli government with a task it has undertaken since before the establishment of the State of Israel (see ‘State of Terror,’ by Thomas Suárez), although today it continues to do so through the falsely legitimatized means of a settler-colonial state. A summary document produced by a UN panel last month reported the deaths of 189 unarmed Palestinians, of whom 183, including 32 children, were killed by Israeli live ammunition at the Gaza “fence”, possibly constituting a war crime.

Prior to mass murdering the “Arabs” in the mosque, the perpetrator of the massacre in Hebron wrote a letter to the editor published by The New York Times in which he stated: “The harsh reality is if Israel is to avert the kinds of problems found in Northern Ireland today, it must act decisively to remove the Arab minority from its borders.” Note: Israel’s borders are unusual, for lack of a better word, in that they have changed several times in living memory.

As far as I know, the perpetrator of the Christchurch massacre (I am avoiding mentioning his name, because he reportedly craves fame in the manner of other sociopaths) did not have such a specific agenda — and, if he did, it surely isn’t explicitly espoused by the Australian or New Zealand governments as state policies.

Israel, on the other hand, continues to find numerous “legitimate” means to effect the goal of Jewish supremacists and the terrorists among them, in violation of international law and with the support of the United States and the European Union.

After the Christchurch massacre, commentary on TV and social media ran through the gamut of blame for the bigotry evident in the Christchurch “terror attack”. Among these, the most baffling to me is this conjecture: “Whether or not history really is dialectical, it can be tempting to think that decades of liberal supremacy in Europe have helped give rise to the antithesis of liberalism.” It was the “antithesis of liberalism” from the beginning, as it is today.

If by “liberal supremacy” the writer means the values of the Enlightenment, we can’t possibly blame Jewish supremacy, as spawned by Israel, on European liberalism as we blame Israel for the European values and fact of Jewish colonialism in Palestine. Zionism’s answer to European modern liberalism was to anchor the sensibility of the neo-medieval Jewish ghetto, including its anti-gentilism, in the State of Israel. In other words, Zionism is anti-liberalism — except when it comes to “the Jewish people” as Zionism defines their identity.

In massacring Palestinians in the mosque, the Jewish supremacist Baruch Goldstein was simply on task, a task expressed by “Chaim Weizmann, Israel’s first president, for whom the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians was ‘a miraculous clearing of the land: the miraculous simplification of Israel’s task.’” It’s a task, many “Militant Jews”, to use the term the BBC used in 2000 to describe them, celebrated. What they are is better described as supremacist Jews.

In the topsy-turvy way characteristic of Israel’s hasbara, the Western world has turned Israel’s acts of violence and Jewish supremacy against Palestinians into a false defensive act, when in fact the Palestinian cry “You will not replace us” is a cry, not of bigotry but of righteousness rooted in the misery resulting from Jewish supremacist ideology and Palestinian dispossession.

Rima Najjar is a Palestinian whose father’s side of the family comes from the forcibly depopulated village of Lifta on the western outskirts of Jerusalem.

21 March 2019

Source: countercurrents.org

The Trump administration has barred International Criminal Court investigators from entering the United States. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Friday that the U.S. will start denying visas to members of the ICC who may be investigating alleged war crimes by the U.S. military in Afghanistan. In September, national security adviser John Bolton threatened U.S. sanctions against ICC judges if they continued to investigate alleged war crimes committed by U.S. troops in Afghanistan. A 2016 ICC report accused the U.S. military of torturing at least 61 prisoners in Afghanistan during the ongoing war. The report also accused the CIA of subjecting at least 27 prisoners to torture, including rape, at CIA prison sites in Afghanistan, Poland, Romania and Lithuania. We speak with Jamil Dakwar, director of the Human Rights Program at the American Civil Liberties Union.

Transcript
This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now! I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: We turn now to the Trump administration’s decision to bar International Criminal Court investigators from entering the U.S. In September, national security adviser John Bolton threatened U.S. sanctions against ICC judges if they continued to investigate alleged war crimes committed by U.S. troops in Afghanistan. A 2016 report by the International Criminal Court accused the U.S. military of torturing at least 61 prisoners in Afghanistan during the ongoing war. The report also accused the CIA of subjecting at least 27 prisoners to torture, including rape, at CIA prison sites in Afghanistan, Poland, Romania and Lithuania. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Friday that the U.S. will start denying visas to members of the ICC who may be investigating alleged war crimes by the U.S. military in Afghanistan.

SECRETARY OF STATE MIKE POMPEO: Since 1998, the United States has declined to join the ICC because of its broad, unaccountable prosecutorial powers and the threat it poses to American national sovereignty. We are determined to protect the American and allied military and civilian personnel from living in fear of unjust prosecution for actions taken to defend our great nation. We feared that the court could eventually pursue politically motivated prosecutions of Americans, and our fears were warranted.

In November of 2017, the ICC prosecutor requested approval to initiate an investigation into, quote, “the situation in Afghanistan,” end of quote, that could illegitimately target American personnel for prosecutions and sentencing. In September of 2018, the Trump administration warned the ICC that if it tried to pursue an investigation of Americans, there would be consequences. I understand that the prosecutors’ request for an investigation remains pending.

Thus, today, persistent to existing legal authority to post visa restrictions on any alien, quote, “whose entry or proposed activities in the United States would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences,” end of quote, I’m announcing a policy of U.S. visa restrictions on those individuals directly responsible for any ICC investigation of U.S. personnel. This includes persons who take or have taken action to request or further such an investigation. These visa restrictions may also be used to deter ICC efforts to pursue allied personnel, including Israelis, without allies’ consent.

AMY GOODMAN: Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

To talk more about the U.S. decision to deny visas to those involved in the International Criminal Court investigation, we’re joined now by Jamil Dakwar, the director of the Human Rights Program at the American Civil Liberties Union.

Welcome back to Democracy Now! It’s great to have you with us. Your response to this announcement?

JAMIL DAKWAR: OK. I think this is unprecedented. This is the first time that the U.S. government is targeting foreign judges and prosecutors, personnel of an international—one of the most respected international judicial bodies in the world, with a travel ban. As far as we look back, there hasn’t been any kind of precedent for such a thing. They’re not only doing that. They’re also saying anyone who assisted the ICC, who worked or will work to push for accountability for investigation before the ICC with regard to the situation of Afghanistan, particularly looking at U.S. involvement in war crimes, will be subject to the same visa restrictions. So this is an act of a country that—similar to authoritarian regime. When you have—when you’re crushing dissent, when you’re going after those who are disagreeing with you, when you’re trying to punish and retaliate and intimidate those who are trying to hold you accountable, you use your powers in order to limit the way that they can do that. And that’s really very outrageous and very concerning to us, that this is reaching to this level.

But it also speaks to what this administration has been doing. I mean, this administration threatened with prosecuting judges and the prosecutors of the ICC for doing their job, and for doing the job that the United States should have done—that is, to investigate, credibly and thoroughly, war crimes and crimes against humanity that were committed in the course of the war in Afghanistan, including the use of black sites, not only in Afghanistan. This is another important aspect of this investigation, or in pending investigation, because it hasn’t been really fully authorized by the pretrial chamber, is that it would cover not just what happened in Afghanistan, but it would cover in three countries that are linked to the conflict in Afghanistan—that is, Poland, Romania and Lithuania—because they are state parties. They joined the ICC in the—since 2002, when the court started to function.

So, we will see—we will see how this will play out. We’re very happy that the responses so far, in just the last few days, from members of the court, particularly European countries, have been very strong in condemning the Trump administration and upholding the independence and legitimacy of the court, and that any actions to deter prosecutors and the judges, that would be not acceptable and will be rejected by U.S. allies, particularly in Europe.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Well, let me ask you. This is reflective of an overall tendency in the Trump administration. Last year, the U.S. withdrew from the United Nations Human Rights Council, as well, and it’s resisted over 20 requests by special rapporteurs of the United Nations looking into particular issues of human rights violations here. But this is a step further. This is not just refusing to cooperate. This is actually punishing people who are trying to get to the facts of what’s happened. In terms of what can be done in response by the international community to what, in essence, is the United States saying, “No one has a right to judge what we do abroad”?

JAMIL DAKWAR: Well, first of all, let’s start with what Secretary Pompeo said. He said it’s an attack on our sovereignty. I don’t think that anyone attacked U.S. sovereignty. It was the Afghanistan sovereignty that has been subject to the jurisdiction, because Afghanistan joined the ICC in May of 2003 and agreed that if there would be war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide—these are the worst crimes that are defined under the ICC statute or their treaty—that they would be jurisdiction for the court. So, it’s not an issue of U.S. sovereignty. It’s not also an issue of protecting the constitutional right of American citizens who could be tried abroad. That’s not something that we see again and again. If you committed a crime abroad—you could be committing it anywhere in the world—you could be held accountable by those countries where you violated their criminal laws. And therefore, there is no such a thing of attacking or undermining American sovereignty.

The second thing is, is that Secretary Pompeo is saying there was no consent of the governments, that being—their nationals being prosecuted or investigated by the ICC in the future. Since when war criminals have to get their consent to a criminal investigation? That’s unheard of. So, the nature of the attacks, as you said, they are punitive, they’re retaliatory. They are trying to go and to send a message, not just to the ICC personnel, in particular. This actually has consequences beyond the United States’ situation, of U.S. government officials who commissioned, ordered or implemented acts of torture in Afghanistan and elsewhere. So it is really a serious threat to the system that we created. The United States was responsible for creating systems after World War II, after the horror of the Holocaust, that would fight impunity, that would combat the worst crimes. And now the U.S. is leading the charge in attacking the judges. And being cheered by what countries? Cheered by Sudan, Burundi, the Philippines.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Philippines, which also just pulled out of the International Criminal Court in the last few days. Could I ask you also, though? This must indicate that there is a real fear here on the part of the U.S. government about this investigation, to take this kind of drastic action. Could you talk about what some of what the preliminary findings of the court are in terms of the war crimes committed here?

JAMIL DAKWAR: So, first, it’s important to highlight that the court, the ICC, is a court of last resort, meaning it doesn’t jump in to investigate a crime just because it violates the crimes defined by the Rome Statute, by the ICC. It actually waits and sees what the countries that joined the court are doing, what have they done, in order to investigate violations of the ICC. And that is an important point, because the ICC people think that the ICC, you know, was—immediately acted, automatically opened investigations. That’s not true.

In the case of the United States, the situation of Afghanistan lasted for over a decade, where it was under a so-called preliminary examination. So, it was based on publicly available information. The ICC prosecutor would not use its investigative powers, but rely on media reports, on U.N. reports, other NGOs’ reports, etc. And, yes, once it comes to the conclusion that there is a reasonable belief that there were crimes that are committed in violation of the ICC, and it has a jurisdiction—and it has to also satisfy other requirements—admissibility and the interest of justice—it will then—because this one was initiated by the prosecutor’s office, it will have to get an authorization from the pretrial chamber, a chamber of three judges of the ICC, that then examine the whole evidence.

The evidence that she has is really relying heavily—well, we don’t have access to that information, but we believe that her evidence is based on the Senate torture report, the well-documented investigation of the CIA involvement in the most brutal and gruesome acts of humiliation and torture against prisoners. And that torture report, what was released in December of 2014, basically made the—it put the United States on notice, that if the United States is not acting in light of the declassified parts of the report—because the report itself, the whole thing, was still classified, so we don’t even have a clue what’s in the details of that report, because the U.S. government, both under the Obama administration and under the Trump administration, resisting declassification. But what is publicly available, there is enough to justify opening an investigation.

So, the prosecutor looked into that information. It looked at what the United States has done in order to hold officials accountable, both at the level of the U.S. military and the level of the CIA officials, the level of all chain of—the chain of command, meaning looking not just at the lower-rank officers and military personnel, but also at the leaders who sanctioned this policy. You have the highest level of the White House, in the Bush administration, that ordered the torture program. So they looked at what the Bush administration, the Obama administration have done in order to investigate, and they reached a conclusion that they were not credible investigations. And that’s why they’re stepping in.

And they’re stepping in because this is an important for the rule of law. It’s important for upholding international principles against impunity. And it’s also providing victims of torture their day in court. And that is where, I think, more than anything, is important and being sidelined by the whole response to Pompeo.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about how psychologists James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen could be implicated in the investigation, who reaped tens of millions of dollars for designing torture techniques for the CIA?

JAMIL DAKWAR: So, these two individuals, who are psychologists in their private practice, were hired by the CIA after the terrorist attacks on 9/11 in order to help implement—design and implement a torture program. They have come up with, really, based on pseudoscience—it was really junk science—a theory of how to break down detainees and how to break down those suspected in involvement in the 9/11 attacks. There has been clear evidence, that we have exposed in our lawsuit, the ACLU lawsuit against the two individuals, that was settled a couple of years ago, that showed that this—that the information that they relied on, the science there was really out of—in line with any scientific—and that its purpose was really to coerce and to lead detainees to say things they may have not done. And, in fact, I think the—again, the Senate torture report has confirmed that the program, the whole program, not only was costly, was not effective, but it was also—was misleading in the way that it presented as if those two individuals—so, these two individuals made over $80 million off this program.

And they, as individuals, who acted on behalf of the U.S. government, may also be subject to the ICC investigation, if it’s authorized. We don’t know who are the individuals who will be authorized, but I think that they should be worried. Other people who were involved in the—particularly in the worst part of the CIA torture program should be worried, I think, in the future. That doesn’t mean that the ICC will, again, rush into prioritizing the investigation and prosecuting of U.S. officials. I think that there are other crimes that are being investigated in the Afghanistan situation, especially the crimes against Afghan nationals and the civilian population by the Taliban, by the Afghan forces there.

Now, the real serious challenge for the ICC is, none of those parties—Afghan government, the Taliban and the United States government—is willing to cooperate with the ICC. So the real challenge is how—if this investigation moves forward, how the ICC will really be able to build cases, based on lack—without any cooperation with—of these, of the countries.

AMY GOODMAN: And, very quickly, Pompeo also named Israel, if the ICC says it’s going to investigate Israel.

JAMIL DAKWAR: Yes. So, the secretary’s announcement didn’t only say that it’s about U.S. officials that will be targeted by a potential investigation by ICC. He also alluded to U.S. allies, and particularly Israeli officials. There is a separate investigation—it’s called the Palestine situation—that was actually not the initiation of the prosecutor. It was a request, a referral, by the Palestine to investigate war crimes and crimes against humanity in the context of the Gaza situation in the war in 2014, also the recent attacks on protesters in the Gaza border, as well as the legality of settlements in the West Bank, to what extent they violate the ICC statute. So there’s also that situation, where it could impact, in our view, human rights defenders, human rights lawyers, who are acting to hold officials—in this case, Israeli officials—accountable before the ICC. They could be subject to visa restrictions.

And so, this is really a serious issue that has to be addressed by the U.S. Congress, particularly the House Foreign Relations Committee. We filed a Freedom of Information Act to ask for the legal basis for this policy. The U.S. government is resisting. And we’re likely to file a lawsuit soon to force this information to be disclosed. Because it’s not really about going after every U.S. citizen who served in the U.S. military. That is not what is going—what we’re talking about here. This is here talking about really shutting down a legitimate investigation into war crimes. It is about deflecting from scrutiny, deflecting from upholding international law, and giving not only U.S. officials the immunity and impunity that they have enjoyed for years, but also giving other countries the same. And that’s what’s emboldening other regimes that we’ve seen over the past several months been happy to withdraw from the ICC, like the Philippines did just a year ago, and it came into effect a couple days ago.

AMY GOODMAN: And, Jamil Dakwar, we want to thank you for being with us, director of the Human Rights Program at the American Civil Liberties Union.

JAMIL DAKWAR: Thank you.

AMY GOODMAN: When we come back, we look at the close relationship between the Trump administration and Boeing, in 30 seconds.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: The legendary Lebanese-American musician Dick Dale, who was known as the “King of the Surf Guitar,” has died at the age of 81. His hit song “Misirlou” was an adaptation of a traditional Arabic folk tune. Dale continued performing live into this year, in part to pay his medical bills from bouts with cancer, renal failure and diabetes. He once said, “I have to perform to save my life.”

Amy Goodman and Juan Gonzalez / Democracy Now! / Multimedia – March 19, 2019

Source: www.democracynow.org

By Chris Hedges

The U.S. government, determined to extradite and try Julian Assange for espionage, must find a way to separate what Assange and WikiLeaks did in publishing classified material leaked to them by Chelsea Manning from what The New York Times and The Washington Post did in publishing the same material. There is no federal law that prohibits the press from publishing government secrets. It is a crime, however, to steal them. The long persecution of Manning, who on March 8 was sent back to jail for refusing to testify before a grand jury, is about this issue.

If Manning, a former Army private, admits she was instructed by WikiLeaks and Assange in how to obtain and pass on the leaked material, which exposed U.S. war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq, the publisher could be tried for the theft of classified documents. The prosecution of government whistleblowers was accelerated during the Obama administration, which under the Espionage Act charged eight people with leaking to the media—Thomas Drake, Shamai Leibowitz, Stephen Kim, Manning, Donald Sachtleben, Jeffrey Sterling, John Kiriakou and Edward Snowden. By the time Donald Trump took office, the vital connection between investigative reporters and sources inside the government had been severed.

Manning, who worked as an Army intelligence analyst in Iraq in 2009, provided WikiLeaks with over 500,000 documents copied from military and government archives, including the “Collateral Murder” video footage of an Army helicopter gunning down a group of unarmed civilians that included two Reuters journalists. She was arrested in 2010 and found guilty in 2013.

The campaign to criminalize whistleblowing has, by default, left the exposure of government lies, fraud and crimes to those who have the skills or access, as Manning and Edward Snowden did, needed to hack into or otherwise obtain government electronic documents. This is why hackers, and those who publish their material such as Assange and WikiLeaks, are being relentlessly persecuted. The goal of the corporate state is to shroud in total secrecy the inner workings of power, especially those activities that violate the law. Movement toward this goal is very far advanced. The failure of news organizations such as The New York Times and The Washington Post to vigorously defend Manning and Assange will soon come back to haunt them. The corporate state hardly intends to stop with Manning and Assange. The target is the press itself.

“If we actually had a functioning judicial system and an independent press, Manning would have been a witness for the prosecution against the war criminals he helped expose,” I wrote after I and Cornel West attended Manning’s sentencing in 2013 at Fort Meade, Md. “He would not have been headed, bound and shackled, to the military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kan. His testimony would have ensured that those who waged illegal war, tortured, lied to the public, monitored our electronic communications and ordered the gunning down of unarmed civilians in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Yemen were sent to Fort Leavenworth’s cells. If we had a functioning judiciary the hundreds of rapes and murders Manning made public would be investigated. The officials and generals who lied to us when they said they did not keep a record of civilian dead would be held to account for the 109,032 ‘violent deaths’ in Iraq, including those of 66,081 civilians. The pilots in the ‘Collateral Murder’ video, which showed the helicopter attack on unarmed civilians in Baghdad that left nine dead, including two Reuters journalists, would be court-martialed.”

Manning has always insisted her leak of the classified documents and videos was prompted solely by her own conscience. She has refused to implicate Assange and WikiLeaks. Earlier this month, although President Barack Obama in 2010 commuted her 35-year sentence after she served seven years, she was jailed again for refusing to answer questions before a secret grand jury investigating Assange and WikiLeaks. While incarcerated previously, Manning endured long periods in solitary confinement and torture. She twice attempted to commit suicide in prison. She knows from painful experience the myriad ways the system can break you psychologically and physically. And yet she has steadfastly refused to give false testimony in court on behalf of the government. Her moral probity and courage are perhaps the last thin line of defense for WikiLeaks and its publisher, whose health is deteriorating in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he has been holed up since 2012.

Manning—who was known as Bradley Manning in the Army—has undergone gender reassignment surgery and needs frequent medical monitoring. Judge Claude M. Hilton, however, dismissed a request by her lawyers for house arrest. Manning was granted immunity by prosecutors of the Eastern District of Virginia, and because she had immunity she was unable to invoke the Fifth Amendment protection against self-incrimination or to have her attorney present. The judge found her in contempt of court and sent her to a federal facility in Alexandria, Va. Hilton, who has long been a handmaiden of the military and intelligence organs, has vowed to hold her there until she agrees to testify or until the grand jury is disbanded, which could mean 18 months or longer behind bars. Manning said any questioning of her by the grand jury is a violation of First, Fourth and Sixth Amendment rights. She said she will not cooperate with the grand jury.

“All of the substantive questions pertained to my disclosures of information to the public in 2010—answers I provided in extensive testimony, during my court-martial in 2013,” she said on March 7, the day before she was jailed.

“I will not comply with this, or any other grand jury,” she said later in a statement issued from jail. “Imprisoning me for my refusal to answer questions only subjects me to additional punishment for my repeatedly-stated ethical objections to the grand jury system.”

“The grand jury’s questions pertained to disclosures from nine years ago and took place six years after an in-depth computer forensics case, in which I testified for almost a full day about these events,” she went on. “I stand by my previous public testimony.”

Manning reiterated that she “will not participate in a secret process that I morally object to, particularly one that has been historically used to entrap and persecute activists for protected political speech.”

The New York Times, Britain’s The Guardian, Spain’s El País, France’s Le Monde and Germany’s Der Spiegel all published the WikiLeaks files provided by Manning. How could they not? WikiLeaks had shamed them into doing their jobs. But once they took the incendiary material from Manning and Assange, these organizations callously abandoned them. No doubt they assume that by joining the lynch mob organized against the two they will be spared. They must not read history. What is taking place is a series of incremental steps designed to strangle the press and cement into place an American version of China’s totalitarian capitalism. President Trump has often proclaimed his deep animus for news outlets such as The New York Times and The Washington Post, referring to them as the “enemy of the people.” Any legal tools given to the administration to shut down these news outlets, or at least hollow them of content, will be used eagerly by the president.

The prosecutions of government whistleblowers under the Espionage Act, warrantless wiretapping, monitoring of the communications of Americans and the persecution of Manning and Assange are parts of an interconnected process of preventing any of us from peering at the machinery of state. The resulting secrecy is vital for totalitarian systems. The global elites, their ruling ideology of neoliberalism exposed as a con, have had enough of us examining and questioning their abuses, pillage and crimes.

“The national security state can try to reduce our activity,” Assange told me during one of our meetings at the embassy in London. “It can close the neck a little tighter. But there are three forces working against it. The first is the massive surveillance required to protect its communication, including the nature of its cryptology. In the military everyone now has an ID card with a little chip on it, so you know who is logged into what. A system this vast is prone to deterioration and breakdown. Secondly, there is widespread knowledge not only of how to leak, but how to leak and not be caught, how to even avoid suspicion that you are leaking. The military and intelligence systems collect a vast amount of information and move it around quickly. This means you can also get it out quickly. There will always be people within the system that have an agenda to defy authority. Yes, there are general deterrents, such as when the DOJ [Department of Justice] prosecutes and indicts someone. They can discourage people from engaging in this behavior. But the opposite is also true. When that behavior is successful it is an example. It encourages others. This is why they want to eliminate all who provide this encouragement.”

“The medium-term perspective is very good,” he said. “The education of young people takes place on the internet. You cannot hire anyone who is skilled in any field without them having been educated on the internet. The military, the CIA, the FBI, all have no choice but to hire from a pool of people that have been educated on the internet. This means they are hiring our moles in vast numbers. And this means that these organizations will see their capacity to control information diminish as more and more people with our values are hired.”

The long term is not so sanguine. Assange, along with three co-authors—Jacob Appelbaum, Andy Müller-Maguhn and Jérémie Zimmermann—wrote a book titled “Cypherpunks: Freedom and the Future of the Internet.” It warns that we are “galloping into a new transnational dystopia.” The internet has become not only a tool to educate, they write, but the mechanism to create a “Postmodern Surveillance Dystopia” that is supranational and dominated by global corporate power. This new system of global control will “merge global humanity into one giant grid of mass surveillance and mass control.”

“All communications will be surveilled, permanently recorded, permanently tracked, each individual in all their interactions permanently identified as that individual to this new Establishment, from birth to death,” Assange says in the book. “I think that can only produce a very controlling atmosphere.”

“How can a normal person be free within that system?” he asks. “[He or she] simply cannot, it’s impossible.”

It is only through encryption that we can protect ourselves, the authors argue, and only by breaking through the digital walls of secrecy erected by the power elite can we expose the abuses of power. But ultimately, they say, as the tools of the state become more sophisticated, even these mechanisms of opposition will be difficult and perhaps impossible to use.

“The internet, our greatest tool of emancipation,” Assange writes, “has been transformed into the most dangerous facilitator of totalitarianism we have ever seen.”

That is where we are headed. A few resist. Assange and Manning are two. Those who stand by passively as they are persecuted will be next.

Chris Hedges writes a regular column for Truthdig.com.

19 March 2019

Source: countercurrents.org

By John Scales Avery

Over 1.5 million young students across all continents took to the streets on Friday March 15th for the first ever global climate strike. Messages in more than 40 languages were loud and clear: world leaders must act now to address the climate crisis and save our future. The school strike was the largest climate action in history. Nevertheless it went almost unmentioned in the media.

Here are some of the statements by the students explaining why they took part in the strikes:

“In India, no one talks about climate change. You don’t see it on the news or in the papers or hear about it from government. We want global leaders to declare a climate emergency. If we don’t act today, then we will have no tomorrow. ” – Vidit Baya, 17, Udaipur, India.

“We face heartbreaking loss due to increasingly extreme weather events. We urge the Taiwanese government to implement mitigation measures and face up to the vulnerability of indigenous people, halt construction projects in the indigenous traditional realm, and recognise the legal status of Plains

Indigenous People, in order to implement environmental protection as a bottom-up approach” – Kaisanan Ahuan, Puli City, Taiwan.

“We have reached a point in history when we have the technical capacities to solve poverty, malnutrition, inequality and of course global warming. The deciding factors for whether we take advantage of our potential will be our activism, our international unity and our ability to develop the art of making the impossible possible. Whether we succeed or not depends on our political will” – Eyal Weintraub, 18, and Bruno Rodriguez, 18, Argentina.

“I want to be certain that our government is committed to investing in a just transition to a more sustainable country, that we will lower carbon emissions and curb climate change. I am joining this strike to demand that decisions are more future-focused and that policy will reflect our environmental rights as written in our constitution” – Dona Van Eeden, 21, Cape Town, South Africa.

“The damage done by multinationals is enormous: the lack of transparency, dubious contracts, the weakening of the soil, the destruction of flora and fauna, the lack of respect for mining codes, the contamination of groundwater. In Mali, the state exercises insufficient control over the practices of the multinationals, and it is us, the citizens, who suffer the consequences. The climate alarm has sounded, and the time has come for us all to realise that there is still time to act locally, in our homes, our villages, our cities” – Mone Fousseny, 22, Mali.

“The governments failed to respond properly to the dramatic challenge of our climate crisis. Our generation, the least responsible for the acts of the polluters, will be the ones to see the most devastating impacts of climate change. World leaders are losing the window to act, but we are not going to stand still watching their inertia.” Greta Thunberg, Sweden

Greta Thunberg has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize

16-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, who started a worldwide children’s climate movement last summer with her lone school strike in front of the Swedish Parliament, is now a leader of the global movement for climate change. Her eloquent and crystal-clear speeches at COP24 in Poland in 2018, at the Davos Economic Forum in Switzerland in 2019, and at the recent European Union’s climate meeting in Belgium, have produced real change. For example, influenced by Greta’s speech, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker stated that “In the next financial period, 2021-2027, every fourth euro spent in the EU budget will go towards climate mitigation actions”. The EU budget is usually 1 percent of its economic output, or 1 trillion euros across seven years.

The three Norwegian parliamentarians who nominated Greta Thunberg for the Nobel Peace Prize cited the connection between climate change, the refugee crisis and threatened wars. Like the global school strikes of March 15, Greta’s nomination receives little mention, not only in mainstream media, but also in alternative media.

Attention has been distracted by the attrocious murders in New Zealand

The almost simultaneous neofacist and racist murders in New Zealand have distracted media attention from the children’s global school strike for climate action. But while combatting racism and neofacism is important, it is much less important than the urgent need for rapid action on the issue of climate change, without which the entire future of human civilization and the biosphere will be lost. We give our children loving care, but it makes no sense to do so and not do everything within our power to give them a future in which they can survive. The media have a duty to help in mobilizing public opinion for the great task that history has given to us – the task of saving the future.

Some discussion of these issues can be found in my new book, entitled “Saving the Future”, which may be downloaded from the following link:

http://eacpe.org/app/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/Saving-the-Future-John-Scales-Avery.pdf

John Scales Avery is a theoretical chemist at the University of Copenhagen.

19 March 2019

Source: countercurrents.org

By Christian Christensen

The sediment of hatred and discrimination directed at Muslims slowly builds up over time and it is not only the most hateful and dark places online or in the world that lay the groundwork for explosions of hatred and violence such as this

The Christchurch terrorists, who earlier today took the lives of nearly 50 people at two mosques, were clearly consumed by both racism and hatred of Muslims. One posted a lengthy “manifesto” on white nationalism before he committed the crime. They spent significant time online, and were perhaps “radicalized” in chat-rooms and via social media.

In other words: we may make ourselves feel better if we think of their lifeworld as being made up of ideologies and spaces far outside of the norm. That their thoughts and ideas were of the type most citizens would never entertain, expressed in places most would never visit. That these thoughts and ideas would eventually be put into action in ways that violate the most basic notions of humanity and decency. Thoughts and acts of barbarity, divorced from civilized society.

Yet, as horrific and inhumane as these violent spaces may be, we see the shadows and ripples of the bigotry and discrimination they contain in far more everyday practices and places. On our regular television channels. In our mainstream newspapers. In our films. In our schools. In our politics.

Muslim refugees seeking to flee war are described in terms reserved for animals (“swarms”) or natural disasters (“floods”). When an act of violence is committed by a member of the Muslim community, the entire community is held to be collectively responsible and asked to condemn that violence…or else be judged complicit. Muslim pieces of clothing become items to ban. Muslim bodies become items to ban, with legislation stopping Muslims from even entering countries. Their ability to “integrate” is questioned, even when most Muslims are hard-working and valuable members of the community. When Muslims are elected to serve the public in political office, even then their allegiance is a topic for “debate.”

It is outlets such as the Daily Mail in the UK and Fox News in the US, together with a band of anti-immigrant and xenophobic websites, that have spearheaded these popular attacks on Muslims, portraying them as less than trustworthy, less than citizens and less than human. They are portrayed as people whose wearing of the hijab is sufficient proof that they are against, for example, the US Constitution.

Then, when acts of extreme violence such as Christchurch are committed against Muslims, these same outlets, their spokespeople, and the politicians whose anti-immigrant rhetoric they so willingly record and relay, throw up their hands in faux confused anguish, wondering with Thoughts-And-Prayers where all of the hate comes from. Of course, once the pain and attention has subsided, the cycle will begin again.

Even here, however, it is all too easy to allow the anti-immigration press, in conjunction with online forums and social media, to become alibis for a much broader process of vilification across all media, including those outlets now self-identifying as part of an anti-Trump resistance.

People may roll their eyes at the mention of the US/UK occupation of Iraq, thinking it was all such a long time ago, but consider the long-term effects of that occupation. How the destruction of the country, and the killing of thousands of innocent civilians, was made possible largely by the fact that those citizens were predominantly Muslim. Would the US so willingly and easily have killed that many Christians? How these thousands of deaths became footnotes for even the “progressive” press, forgotten once the sexiness of the televisual bombing of Baghdad had ended. How, ironically, we failed to ask ourselves as nations about our collective responsibility for these killings, committed in our names and with our tax dollars. And, how Muslim deaths remained footnotes under Obama and now Trump, with regular drone attacks killing scores in Yemen and Pakistan generating little or no coverage. The dead, because of their religion and poverty, just not worth our valuable time. And, if they were not worth it “There,” why would they now be worth it “Here”?

Or, when politics are covered in Europe by the supposedly “quality” press, think about how so-called “integration” is always framed as a one-way street, where the onus is entirely on the new arrivals, and where domestic racism and discrimination apparently play little or no role in how immigrants adapt to their new homes. These are issues often couched in the language of quasi-civility, but it is a quasi-civility that is stifling in its soft violence.

These are all factors that add to the sediment of hatred and discrimination that slowly builds up over time, laying the groundwork for explosions of hatred and violence. One tweet, one TV show, one newspaper article does not lead most people to kill.

As I wrote online earlier today after hearing what had happened: “It is a steady, daily flow of stereotypes, vilification and dehumanization that create an environment where violence is easier. Where a sense that those killed were ‘asking for it’ by their very existence.”

Christian Christensen, American in Sweden, is Professor of Journalism at Stockholm University.

16 March 2019

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr James M Dorsey

Recent Chinese pressure on Myanmar to approve a controversial dam project and the arrest in recent days in Kazakhstan of a human rights activist suggest that China in a seemingly tone-deaf pursuit of its interests is forcing governments to choose between heeding increasingly anti-Chinese public sentiment and pleasing Beijing to ensure continued political and economic support.

Apparent Chinese disregard of public opinion, whether as a matter of policy or because of haphazard insensitivity, is compounded by the powering of anti-Chinese sentiment in several countries as a result of commercial terms of China-funded Belt and Road projects that favour the use of Chinese rather than local labour and materials.

The Chinese approach risks anti-Chinese sentiment meshed with social and economic discontent exploding into popular protests that could prove destabilizing. It potentially could complicate Chinese efforts to ensure that the Muslim world continues to refrain from criticizing China’s crackdown on Turkic Muslims in the strategic but troubled north-western province of Xinjiang.

Chinese pressure on various countries aimed at imposing its will strokes with China’s adoption of a more aggressive diplomatic posture that has seen its diplomats employ blunt, undiplomatic language and repeatedly break with diplomatic protocol.

As a result, increasing Chinese pressure on Myanmar to revive the suspended Myitsone dam project in ethnic Kachin state is putting the government between a rock and a hard place.

The government is being forced to choose between ignoring popular concerns that the dam would disrupt the traditional economy of the Kachin in a region wracked by ethnic insurgency and cost Myanmar control of the Irrawaddy River, its most important waterway, or risk the ire of China on which it depends politically and economically.

China has reportedly offered in return for the dam to support Myanmar that has been condemned by the United Nations, Western countries and some Muslim nations for its repressive campaign against the Rohingya, some 700,000 of which fled to Bangladesh in 2017.

China has invested some US$15 billion in scores of projects in Myanmar

China’s state-controlled Global Times newspaper recently quoted Xiamen University Myanmar expert Fan Hongwei as saying that “the abrupt suspension of such a significant project has blurred political trust between China and Myanmar.”

Former Myanmar President Thein Sein in 2011 suspended the US$3.6 billion dam project in response to a campaign that brought together conservationists, scholars, and political activists including Nobel Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.

Activists assert the dam, if built as previously designed, would flood 600 square kilometres of forestland in northern Kachin state and export 90 % of the power produced to China.

Myanmar is not the only country that has recently experienced Chinese attempts to force it to act in ways that could have unintended consequences.

Kazakh police, despite widespread public criticism of the crackdown in Xinjiang, last weekend raided the office of Atajurt Eriktileri, a group that has reportedly documented more than 10,000 cases of ethnic Kazakhs interned in China and arrested activist Serikzhan Bilash.

Activists suspect that the raid was the result of Chinese pressure aimed at squashing criticism of the crackdown in Xinjiang.

Similarly, Russian leaders are facing mounting public anger in the Lake Baikal region and the country’s Far East at their alleged connivance in perceived Chinese encroachment on the region’s natural resources including water.

A petition by prominent Russian show business personalities opposing Chinese plans to build a water bottling plant on the shores of Lake Baikal attracted more than 800,000 signatures, signalling the depth of popular resentment and pitfalls of the Russian alliance with China.

Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi sought to put a good face on differences with China over his country’s demand that the focus of the China Pakistan Economic Project (CPEC), a US$45 billion plus crown jewel of the Belt and Road, be shifted from infrastructure and energy, to poverty alleviation, job creation and agriculture.

China has acknowledged Pakistan’s demand but suggested that the refocussing would happen in good time.

Mr. Qureishi asserted this week had CPEC had entered its second phase but provided few details. The minister said agreements on the second phase that would involve the creation of four economic zones would be concluded at some unspecified date in the future.

China notably refrained in recent months from contributing to a financial bailout of Pakistan that was achieved instead with the help of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates who have committed some US$30 billion in funding and investments.

Pakistani and Chinese officials have gone out of their way in recent months to deny any dent in what they have described as an all-weather friendship.

“There is no threat to CPEC. Our government considers it a game changer,” M. Qureishi insisted this week.

China’s deputy chief of mission in Islamabad, Lijian Zhao, insisted in an interview last year and in a series of tweets that China “always supported & stood behind @Pakistan, helping #develop it’s #infrastructure & raise #living standards while creating #job.”

Ultimately, the proof will be in the pudding. Indications so far are that China is digging in its heels on the assumption that its political and economic clout will allow it to get its way. Its an approach that ignores potential black swans and does little to garner soft power.

Dr. James M. Dorsey is a senior fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, co-director of the University of Würzburg’s Institute for Fan Culture, and co-host of the New Books in Middle Eastern Studies podcast.

14 March 2019

Source: countercurrents.org

By Dr Ramzy Baroud

More US measures have been taken in recent weeks to further cement the Israeli position and isolate the Palestinian Authority (PA), before the official unveiling of President Donald Trump’s so-called ‘deal of the century’. But while attention is focused on spiteful US actions, little time has been spent discussing the PA’s own responses, options and strategies.

The last of Washington’s punitive measures came on March 3, when the US shut down its Consulate in Jerusalem, thus downgrading the status of its diplomatic mission in Palestine. The Consulate has long served as a de-facto American embassy to the Palestinians. Now, the Consulate’s staff will merge into the US embassy in Israel, which was officially moved to Jerusalem last May – in violation of international consensus regarding the status of the occupied city.

Robert Palladino, US State Department spokesperson, explained the move in a statement, saying that “this decision was driven by our global efforts to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of our diplomatic engagements and operations.”

Diplomatic hogwash aside, ‘efficiency and effectiveness’ have nothing to do with the shutting of the Consulate. The decision is but a continuation of successive US measures aimed at “taking Jerusalem off the table” – as per Trump’s own words – of any future negotiations.

International law, which recognizes East Jerusalem as an occupied Palestinian city, is of no relevance to the Trump administration, which has fully shed any semblance of balance as it is now wholly embracing the Israeli position on Jerusalem.

To bring Palestinians into line, and to force their leadership to accept whatever bizarre version of ‘peace’ Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, has in mind, the US has already taken several steps aimed at intimidating the PA. These steps include the cutting of $200 million in direct aid to Gaza and the West Bank, and the freezing of another $300 million dollars that were provided annually to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA).

That, and the shutting down of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) office in Washington DC, on September 10, were all the signs needed to fully fathom the nature of the US ultimatum to the Palestinian leadership: accept our terms or face the consequences.

It is no secret that various US governments have served as the financial and even political backers of the PA in Ramallah. While the PA has not always seen eye-to-eye with US foreign policy, its survival remained, till recently, a top American priority.

The PA has helped Washington sustain its claim to being an ‘honest peace broker’, thus enjoying a position of political leadership throughout the Middle East region.

Moreover, by agreeing to take part in assisting the Israeli military in policing the Occupied Territories through joint US-funded ‘security coordination’, the PA has proved its trustworthiness to its US benefactors.

While the PA remained committed to that arrangement, Washington reneged.

According to the far-right Israeli government coalition of Benjamin Netanyahu, PA leader, Mahmoud Abbas, is simply not doing enough.

‘Doing enough’, from an Israeli political perspective, is for Palestinians to drop any claims to occupied East Jerusalem as the future capital of Palestine, accept that illegal Jewish settlements in the West Bank would have to remain in place regardless of the nature of the future ‘peace agreement’, and to also drop any legal or moral claims pertaining to Palestinian refugees right of return.

While the PA has demonstrated its political and moral flexibility in the past, there are certain red lines that even Abbas himself cannot cross.

It remains to be seen how the PA position will evolve in the future as far as the soon-to-be announced ‘deal of the century’ is concerned.

Yet, considering that Trump’s blind support for Israel has been made quite clear over the course of the last two years, one is bewildered by the fact that Abbas and his government have done little by way of counteracting Washington’s new aggressive strategy targeting the Palestinians.

Save for a few symbolic ‘victories’ at the United Nations and UN-related bodies, Abbas has done little by way of a concrete and unified Palestinian action.

Frankly, recognizing a Palestinian state on paper is not a strategy, per se. The push for greater recognition has been in the making since the PLO Algiers conference in 1988, when the Palestine National Council declared a Palestinian state to the jubilation of millions around the world. Many countries, especially in the global south, quickly recognized the State of Palestine.

Yet, instead of using such a symbolic declaration as a component of a larger strategy aimed at realizing this independence on the ground, the PA simply saw the act of recognizing Palestine as an end in itself. Now, there are 137 countries that recognize the State of Palestine. Sadly, however, much more Palestinian land has been stolen by Israel to expand on or build new Jewish-only colonies on the land designated to be part of that future state.

It should have been clear, by now, that placing a Palestinian flag on a table at some international conference, or even having a Palestine chair at the G77 UN coalition of developing countries, is not a substitute for a real strategy of national liberation.

The two main Palestinian factions, Abbas’ own Fatah party and Hamas, are still as diverged as ever. In fact, Abbas seems to focus more energy on weakening his political rivals in Palestine than on combating the Israeli Occupation. In recent weeks, Abbas has taken yet more punitive financial measures targeting various sectors of Gaza society. The collective punishment is even reaching families of prisoners and those killed by the Israeli army.

Without a united front, a true strategy or any form of tangible resistance, Abbas is now vulnerable to more US pressure and manipulation. Yet, instead of moving quickly to solidify the Palestinian front, and to reach out to genuine allies in the Middle East and worldwide to counter the bitter US campaign, Abbas has done little.

Instead, the Palestinian leader continues to chase political mirages, taking every opportunity to declare more symbolic victories that he needs to sustain his legitimacy among Palestinians for a while longer.

The painful truth, however, is this: it is not just US bullying that has pushed the PA into this unenviable position, but, sadly, the self-serving nature and political bankruptcy of the Palestinian leadership itself.

Ramzy Baroud is a journalist, author and editor of Palestine Chronicle.

13 March 2019

Source: countercurrents.org

By Alia Sarfraz and Junaid S. Ahmad

If you do not ask, you do not get a seat at the table. As with any abusive relationship, Pakistan needs to be firm in where its stance will be and be the one setting the direction for the future. With Pakistan’s leadership being virtually conferred with a Nobel Peace Prize status, we can only see this as a wake-up call to the world about the reality – versus the mythology – of South Asia. It is important to take stock of what emancipatory lessons we can build upon from the various developments: tracing the past and looking into the future. Where are we headed? How can Pakistan strengthen its moral leadership? What must it ask for?

The Myth vs. Reality

We are, obviously, referring to the situation in which India’s right wing BJP government deemed it legitimate to send its fighter jets well into Pakistani territory, all the way to the northwestern province of KPK, as an ostensible act of retaliation against a bomb attack on Indian occupation soldiers last month. Without any evidence whatsoever, New Delhi regurgitated the tired mantra of ‘cross-border terrorism’ sponsored by Islamabad.

Pakistan asked for evidence, and even in the absence of it, was willing to cooperate with India to jointly investigate the bombing. Instead, what then transpired was a spectacular sequence of self-destructive and foolish actions by the Indian political and military elite. After illegally and dangerously sending its fighter jets to bomb ‘militant strongholds’ in Pakistan, the more accurate term for the mission is now being called the Indian surgical ‘tree strike’ – since no evidence of any militants being killed has been provided (even though India claims around 200-300 were killed!) – and on the other hand, Pakistan has clearly shown the evidence of a beautiful forest receiving the brunt of the Indian attack with several trees destroyed.

It was clear that Pakistani fighter jets chased the Indian planes back to their side of the territory fairly quickly. And if the main message that India’s hawks wanted to send was that India will not restrain itself in waging all-out war against Pakistan despite the latter’s nuclear deterrence, the Pakistanis gave little time for the Indians to celebrate their moment of joy: Islamabad immediately sent its fighter jets to repeat the same across the border in Indian territory, but was far more eco-friendly – they didn’t lay to waste any trees!

The Goal of Setting Peace is not so Filmy and Bollywood needs to stay out of it

The rest of the story is to be seen in the renewed mythology that is now said to be coming out soon in a Bollywood blockbuster hit. The film is supposed to salvage even a miniscule of Indian military ‘pride,’ even if they have to concoct a fictional account to restore ‘lost honor’ of the nation that’s seven times the size of its neighbor that it loves to bully. Having regional hegemon’s actors and actresses be involved in such blatant cinematic political posturing does not have good optics at all, and will certainly cost Bollywood with boycotts and scorn.

However, for those that didn’t not follow the ensuing developments the high-risk saga unleashed by New Dehli warmongerers, what then transpired were a series of Indian ‘missteps’ (to put it mildly) and dignified Pakistani political behavior that effectively produced the most dramatic and sudden loss of Indian ‘soft power’ since at least the end of the Cold War.

Winning in a dog fight against Indian fighter jets, the Pakistani military were able to protect and care for a downed, captured Indian pilot in their territory – treated so well to his own astonishment. And throughout this affair, the singular, dignified role of the prime minister of Pakistan, Imran Khan, proved to be the cornerstone of Pakistan’s honorable fortitude and stellar performance. Prime Minister Imran Khan’s sober and impressive appeal to sanity on both sides, to halt the militaristic madness and to resume the diplomacy he’s advocated for since he stepped into office – all stood in such stark contrast to both the politicians and the armed forces in India, who seemed pathologically bloodthirsty.

Where is Gandhi now that Pakistan has its Jinnah on the way?

Now, isn’t that a role reversal of how we’ve been told to see the two countries? Weren’t we told that India is the largest and greatest democracy on earth, where generals know their place, with good, peaceful, ‘Gandhian’ religion and ‘shining’ with prosperity, whereas Pakistan is the evil ‘illegitimate child’ from partition, or the mischievous step-brother, which has ‘bad’ (violent) religion, and nefarious generals and their dreaded intelligence services mouthing and undertaking venality left, right, and center?

That picture certainly didn’t stand up to scrutiny over the past two weeks, that’s for sure.

Within two days of the Indian pilot’s capture, Prime Minister Imran Khan, as an unprecedented gesture of goodwill, handed the pilot back over to India. His behavior compared to his counterpart in India, Narendra Modi, is not even a comparison to speak of: the latter has exposed himself and his coterie of politicians and military men to be state criminals eyeing for war and militarism.

All of this has not gone unnoticed. It is a remarkable change for media organs, intellectuals, policymakers, and politicians in the West to speak very candidly about India’s culpability and unjustified belligerence in the scenario of the past few weeks. Most importantly, we are witnessing a sea change in commentary that speaks bluntly of Indian criminality and atrocities in Kashmir, where its occupation soldiers rule and brutalize with impunity. And finally, there is an undeniable recognition from these circles that Pakistan, and specifically Imran Khan, has played an extraordinary role in defusing a potentially catastrophic situation.

In addition, what was equally surprising and remarkable was that the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC) had for the first time ever invited India to its meeting, only to finish the convention with a strong denunciation of New Delhi for its overall senseless bellicosity and its specific crimes in Kashmir. This was astounding considering that many of the Gulf countries and Iran have very close economic relations with India. But those were put aside, and the message was clear: we are on the side of Pakistan and Kashmiris on this one, and there should be no doubt about that.

This is why, to once again repeat what we mentioned above, the past few weeks have represented the most dramatic loss of Indian soft power since the end of the Cold War.

And since India’s arrogance as the ‘big power’ in South Asia has effectively made it play the role of a ‘sub-imperialist’ regional hegemon, or just candidly, the bully in town, this type of matter is always a ‘zero-sum’ game for New Delhi. That is, India is not interested in genuine ‘win-win’ cooperation with its neighbors; rather, it wants total victory for its elites, and everyone else be damned. Hence, according to this Manichean logic by India’s rulers, this loss for New Dehli has benefitted Pakistan only in the sense that the insane and wild stereotypes of the latter being this ‘pariah,’ ‘rogue,’ and ‘failed’ state can no longer be sustained – as much as of course some Pakistan-o-phobes still try.

It is in this light that we believe that moral leadership in Pakistan, in civil society and in government, use this rare opportunity in which long overdue respect has been accorded to the positive role Pakistan can play as a nation advancing peace, prosperity, and justice throughout the region and beyond, to raise some very specific issues that can be immediately addressed.

The Demands Pakistan Needs to Make

Pakistan’s position is sufficiently strong and morally unassailable at this moment to assert for the rights it deserves, and to position it to effectively argue for the cogency of its views internationally. Urgent agenda items that Pakistan has to advocate for in order to set the standards higher for a well-deserved moral high ground include: a) insistence on the UN Resolution affirming the right of self-determination of Kashmiris in the brutal Indian occupation of Kashmir, b) the freeing of Dr. Aafia Siddiqui from the barbaric, inhumane American capture and imprisonment, c) compellingly conveying to Pakistan’s all-weather ally, China, that the worsening situation of the Uighur Muslim population must be urgently addressed; and d) informing the generals in Myanmar that the atrocities and ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya Muslims should halt immediately.

These would be a great start to Pakistan finally playing an exemplary ‘ummahtic’ role, but giving moral leadership and support to all initiatives that de-center Western hegemony and re-center the lives, experiences, cultures, histories, and faith traditions of the rest of eighty percent of the world’s planet.

Much of Pakistan’s history has been beset by internal and external problems of corruption and authoritarianism combined with slavish subordination to Washington, London, or the Gulf petro-monarchies. But it’s important to remember: we are the first nation-state defined explicitly by its Muslim-ness in the modern world, and are capable of setting the example as leaders of where the world needs to drastically level up in its treatment of the planet’s social majorities.

After assuming office, PM Imran Khan made the poignant observation that a nation should be judged not by the state of its rich, but by the condition of its impoverished and marginalized. On those grounds, the world fares very poorly. Pakistan, set that bar high. We can do this.

12 March 2019

Alia Sarfraz is an attorney from Australia who has worked for the Australian government and blogged for the Center for African Affairs and Global Peace (CAAGLOP) as a UN Volunteer. She serves as Legal Advisor at Kashmir Council of Australia and is part of the Free Aafia Siddiqui Movement. She currently lives in Chicago and is a Blogger and Community Affairs Activist with the Dorothy Brown Coalition and Women’s Committee at Rainbow PUSH.

Junaid S. Ahmad is a PhD candidate in Islam and Decolonial thought at the School of Sociology and Social Policy, University of Leeds; a Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA-Istanbul); and the Director of the Center for Global Studies at the School of Advanced Studies, University of Management and Technology (UMT), Lahore, Pakistan.

By Tony Cartalucci

4 Mar 2019 – The OPCW (Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons) has presented its final report regarding an alleged chemical weapons attack on Douma, Syria on April 7, 2018. Despite attempts by the Western media to hail it as “proof” that the Syrian government used chemical weapons in Douma – the report says nothing of the sort.

In fact, the report fails to link any of the alleged 43 deaths to apparent chlorine found at the scene of the alleged attack.

Claims of the attack were made by US-backed militants on the eve of their defeat – with the Syrian military retaking Douma the following day. Initial reports claimed sarin or chlorine chemical weapons were deployed through the use of two yellow gas canisters modified as bombs.

No sarin of any kind was found by OPCW inspectors.

While the report suggests two modified yellow gas canisters were used in the attack and that they appeared to have been dropped onto two buildings (locations 2 and 4), the report also mentions that OPCW inspectors found a nearly identical canister in a workshop used by militants to construct weapons.

The alleged “chemical weapons” attack prompted the United States, UK, and France to launch missiles strikes against Syrian military targets on April 14, 2018, long before the first OPCW inspectors even arrived at the sites of the alleged attack on April 21.

No Link between Chlorine and Casualties

The OPCW report would note video and photographic evidence of alleged victims of chemical exposure could not be linked to any specific chemical including traces of chlorine OPCW inspectors found. The report would specifically claim (emphasis added):

Many of the signs and symptoms reported by the medical personnel, witnesses and casualties (as well as those seen in multiple videos provided by witnesses), their rapid onset, and the large number of those reportedly affected, indicate exposure to an inhalational irritant or toxic substance. However, based on the information reviewed and with the absence of biomedical samples from the dead bodies or any autopsy records, it is not currently possible to precisely link the cause of the signs and symptoms to a specific chemical.

In other instances, the OPCW report would cite witnesses – including medical staff who allegedly treated victims of the supposed attack – who expressed doubts of the presence of any chemicals at all.

The report would state (emphasis added):

A number of the interviewed medical staff who were purportedly present in the emergency department on 7 April emphasised that the presentation of the casualties was not consistent with that expected from a chemical attack. They also reported not having experience in the treatment of casualties of chemical weapons. Some interviewees stated that no odour emanated from the patients, while other witnesses declared that they perceived a smell of smoke on the patients’ clothes.

Other accounts reviewed by the OPCW suggest a large number of casualties were owed to smoke and dust inhalation from conventional bombardment.

The report would specifically state (emphasis added):

Some witnesses stated that many people died in the hospital on 7 April as result of the heavy shelling and/or suffocation due to inhalation of smoke and dust. As many as 50 bodies were lying on the floor of the emergency department awaiting burial. Others stated that there were no fatalities in Douma Hospital on 7 April and that no bodies were brought to the hospital that day.

The conflicting witness reports, the lack of any evidence linking chlorine to even a single death on April 7, and other inconsistencies and contradictions make it impossible to use the report’s conclusions as “proof” that the Syrian government carried out a deadly chemical attack on the eve of its victory in Douma.

Similar Canisters Found in Militant Workshop

While the Western media has focused on the report’s conclusion that chlorine was present and possibly emanated from the two canisters that appear to have been dropped onto two buildings in the area, another crucial finding has been predictably glossed over.

A militant-run weapons workshop investigated by OPCW inspectors revealed a large number of resources for working with chemicals to make explosives. Among an array of chemicals and equipment associated with making explosives, a yellow gas canister was found.

The report would admit:

Although the team confirmed the presence of a yellow cylinder in the warehouse, reported in Note Verbale of the Syrian Arab Republic (Annex 10, point 2) as a chlorine cylinder, due to safety reasons (risk involved in manipulating the valve of the cylinder, see Figure A.8.2) it was not feasible to verify or sample the contents. There were differences in this cylinder compared to those witnessed at Locations 2 and 4. It should be noted that the cylinder was present in its original state and had not been altered.

The lack of interest by the OPCW in the canister despite the obvious implications of its presence in a weapons workshop controlled by militants calls into question the inspectors’ diligence and agenda.

The canister’s “differences” are owed to the fact that those at locations 2 and 4 were modified to appear as bombs, while – admittedly – the canister in the militant workshop remained unaltered.

The obvious implications of a nearly identical canister turning up in a militant workshop making weapons is that the militants may likely have also made the two converted canisters found at locations 2 and 4. OPCW inspectors found other improvised ordnance in the workshop including, “a number of 20-litre metallic drums, some fitted with crude cord-type fuses, which appeared to have been filled with plastic explosives to serve as improvised explosive devices.”

Western media organizations have tried to dismiss the presence of the canister at the workshop by suggesting it was a “setup” orchestrated by the Syrian Arab Army. Huffington Post UK senior editor Chris York would go as far as referring to the workshop as:

…the rebel explosives lab that had been captured by the SAA days before and which they were desperately trying to make look like a chemical weapons lab.

In reality, the OPCW itself would suggest nothing of the sort, and noted that all of the equipment present was consistent with a weapons workshop. Nowhere does the OPCW suggest anything was altered – including the canister – which the OPCW specifically noted “had not been altered.”

The presence of a canister nearly identical to those found at locations 2 and 4 in a militant weapons workshop provides at least as much evidence that militants staged the supposed chemical attack as the Western media claims the canisters at locations 2 and 4 suggest it was the Syrian government.

In the absence of definitive evidence regarding who created and deployed the canisters found at locations 2 and 4, or how they truly ended up there, a better question to ask is “why” they would have ended up there.

Chemical Weapon Attack in Douma… Cui Bono?

Why would the Syrian government – in the middle of a major military offensive it was on the literal eve of concluding in complete victory, drop only 2 canisters filled with a limited amount chemicals to kill – at most – 43 people? A simple artillery barrage could kill just as many people – or very likely – many more.

The use of chemical weapons even on a large scale have historically proven less effective than conventional military weapons – and the use of chlorine on such a small scale as claimed in Douma serves no conceivable purpose at all – at least not for the Syrian military.

Despite claims otherwise, the Syrian government has derived no benefit whatsoever had it been behind any of the chemical attacks it has been accused of by militants and their Western sponsors over the course of the Syrian conflict.

The Douma attack – were it the Syrian military – would have served no tactical, strategic, or political purpose.
Conversely, it would serve as one of the very few actions the Syrian government could take to jeopardize its victory by justifying a large scale Western-led military attack on Syrian forces.

In fact, just one week after the alleged attack, the US, UK, and France would indeed launch as many as 100 missiles into Syria in retaliation, the Guardian would report.

On the other hand, militants who had been occupying Douma had every reason to stage the attack.

By staging the attack on the eve of their defeat and producing graphic scenes of human suffering – particularly among children – the militants would have a propaganda tool readily able to invoke global public concern, sympathy, and outcry in defense of their cause – a propaganda tool their Western sponsors eagerly amplified through their global-spanning media platforms.

With the United States having previously launched entire wars based on false accusations of merely possessing chemical weapons, the militants correctly assumed the US would use the staged attack as a pretext for further direct military aggression against the Syrian state – possibly saving them.

The US still to this day cites “chemical weapons” and the Douma incident on April 7, 2018 specifically – as part of its pretext to maintain its illegal occupation of Syrian territory and its continued support of militants attempting to overthrow the Syrian government.

The alleged us of “chemical weapons” by the Syrian government also regularly serves as a primary talking point used by the Western media when attacking anti-war politicians, pundits, and commentators.

The OPCW report’s conclusions are too ambiguous to draw a conclusion one way or the other. The presence of a nearly identical canister in a militant workshop raises serious questions and associated implications suggesting the attack was staged – questions that must be adequately investigated and answered.

That the Syrian government gained nothing from the attack and was only further jeopardized politically and strategically by it – raises questions about motivations that likewise need to be answered before drawing conclusions.

But as the Western media has proven many times before – it is fully capable of producing entirely irrational lies based on tenuous evidence or no evidence at all – and even repeating those lies after being blatantly caught telling them previously.

That the Western media is still attempting to sell WMD lies regarding Syria after being caught fabricating them to justify war in neighboring Iraq should be at the forefront of the global public’s mind when considering their “interpretations” of this latest OPCW report regarding Douma, Syria.

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The Land Destroyer Report is maintained by Tony Cartalucci, an American geopolitical analyst based in Bangkok, Thailand.

11 March 2019

Source: www.transcend.org

By Robert Inlakesh

The commission found serious human rights violations that may constitute crimes against humanity and called on Israel to “Lift the blockade on Gaza with immediate effect.”

8 Mar 2019 – The United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council have released a powerful report, on the Gaza ‘Great Return March’ demonstrations, stating that they have grounds to believe Israel committed International War Crimes against demonstrators during “large-scale civilian protests”.

The 22-page document has been condemned by the Israeli government, as there is talk of Israel being brought to the International Court of Justice and tried for war crimes and violations of International Law against demonstrations that “were civilian in nature”.

“The commission conducted 325 interviews and meetings with victims, witnesses, government officials and members of civil society, from all sides, and gathered more than 8,000 documents, including affidavits, medical reports, open source reports, social media content, written submissions and expert legal opinions, video and drone footage, and photographs.”

Here are the most important points concluded in the report:

• The commission found in the killings of 189 demonstrators between 30 March and 31 December 2018, 183 were killed with live ammunition, including 35 children, 3 health workers and 2 members of the Press. Only 29 of those killed were members of Palestinian armed groups.
• Only 4 Israeli snipers were lightly injured, none were killed by demonstrators.
• 23,313 Palestinian demonstrators were injured during the 2018 demonstrations, 6106 with live ammunition, “contributing to the highest toll of injuries recorded in the Occupied Palestinian Territory since 2005.
• On the killing of child demonstrators, the commission found “reasonable grounds to believe that Israeli snipers shot them intentionally, knowing that they were children”.
• On the killing of health workers, “the commission found reasonable grounds to believe that Israeli snipers intentionally shot health workers, despite seeing that they were clearly marked as such”.
• On the killings of journalists, “the commission found reasonable grounds to believe that Israeli snipers shot journalists intentionally, despite seeing that they were clearly marked as such”.
• The commission found that both male and female protestors were shot in the groin. The female victims told the commission they are now “unlikely to be able to have children”.
• The policy of the Israeli Minister of Defense, was to deny passage to any person injured during demonstrations, causing unnecessary deaths and life changing injuries.
• According to the commission, except in two possible cases, “the use of live ammunition by Israeli security forces against demonstrators was unlawful”.
• Israel used a “disproportionate use of force”.
• The “demonstrators were shot in violation of their right to life or of the principle of distinction under international humanitarian law”.
• The commission found “reasonable grounds to believe that the excessive use of force by Israeli security forces violated the rights” of thousands of demonstrators who were peaceful.
• The commission found “reasonable grounds” to believe that Israel violated “The Convention on the Rights of the Child”.
• “Violations of international law, such as those committed by Israeli security forces and set out in this report, give rise to State responsibility…”.

The commission found serious human rights violations that may constitute crimes against humanity and called on Israel to “Lift the blockade on Gaza with immediate effect.

The often repeated Israeli claims of the protests being inspired and organized by “Hamas terrorists”, were also addressed in the report, which stated that the demonstrations were inspired by the internet posts of 34-year-old Palestinian poet and journalist, Ahmed Abu Artema, with the demonstrations being organized by “A higher national committee and 12 subcommittees.”

The report went on to say, that “while the members of the committee held diverse political views, they stated that their unifying element was the principle that the march was to be “fully peaceful from beginning to end” and demonstrators would be unarmed”.

Activities such as the use of incendiary kites, cutting barbed wire or tire burning were organized by “self-declared” units. The report further states “the commission found no evidence to suggest that they were directed or coordinated by armed groups”.

The commission interviewed what it called an international journalist who said, “I have covered wars in Syria, Yemen, Libya. I have never seen anything like this. The slow methodical shooting. It was just shocking…”

The commission also noted that Israel refused to assist with the UN investigation and did not “cooperate or provide information.”

The following is a sample of the cases investigated by the commission.

March 30 demonstrations

Injury of 17 Mohammed Ajouri (17 years old)

“Israeli forces shot Mohammad, a student-athlete, in the back of his right leg as he gave onions to demonstrators to relieve tear-gas symptoms, approximately 300 m from the fence. His leg had to be amputated.”

The murder of Abdel Fatah Nabi (18 years old)

“Israeli forces killed Abed, from Beit Lahia, when they shot him in the back of the head as he ran, carrying a tyre, away from and about 400 m from the separation fence.”

The murder of Bader Sabagh (19 years old)

“Bader, from Jabaliya, was killed by Israeli forces when they shot him in the head as he stood smoking a cigarette 300 m from the separation fence.”

Injury and murder of schoolgirl (13 years old) and Marwan Qudieh (45 years old)

“Israeli forces injured a schoolgirl with bullet fragmentation. As she lay on the ground, four men attempted to evacuate her. The forces shot three of them, killing Marwan Qudieh (45) from Khuzaa village and injuring a potato seller and another man in the legs. One of the rescuers had to have a leg amputated.”

Injury of Alaa Dali (21 years old)

“Alaa, a member of the Palestinian cycling team, was shot by Israeli forces in the leg as he stood holding his bicycle, wearing his cycling kit, watching the demonstrations, approximately 300 m from the separation fence. His right leg had to be amputated, ending his cycling career.”

May 14 demonstration, seven children killed

“On 14 May, Israeli security forces shot and killed seven children: a girl, Wisal Khalil (14), and six boys: Izzedine al-Samak (13); Said al-Kheir (15); Ahmad al-Sha’ar (15); Talal Matar (15); Saadi Abu Salah (16); and Ibrahim al-Zarqa (17).”

The murder of Mohammad Najar (33 years old)

“Israeli forces shot Mohammad, a naval police officer, in the chest, killing him, as he sat on a hill with a friend, around 500 m from the separation fence.”

The murder of Yasser Abu Naja (11 years old)

“On 29 June, Israeli forces killed Yasser from Khan Younis with a shot to the head as he was hiding with two friends behind a bin, approximately 200 m from the separation fence. The children had been chanting national slogans at Israeli forces.”

The murder of Nasser Mosabeh (11 years old)

“Nasser was from Khan Younis. On 28 September, Israeli forces shot him in the back of the head as he stood 250 m from the separation fence. He died the same day.”

The murder of Razan Al-Najar (20 years old)

“On 1 June, an Israeli sniper bullet hit Razan, of the Palestinian Medical Relief Society and who at the time was wearing a white paramedic vest and standing with other volunteer paramedics approximately 110 m from the separation fence, in the chest at the Khuzaa site, east of Khan Younis. She died in hospital.”

The murder of Yasser Murtaja (30 years old)

“On 6 April, Yasser, a journalist from Gaza City, was shot in the lower abdomen by Israeli forces at the Khan Younis site while he was filming the demonstrations for a documentary. He was wearing a blue helmet and a dark blue bulletproof vest clearly marked “Press”. He died the following day.”

Amputation of Abed Nofal (11 years old)

“On 17 April, Abed, a schoolboy from the Bureij refugee camp, was shot by Israeli forces while he was playing football near the separation fence. His leg had to be amputated.”

The extended version of the report is set to be released on March 18, 2019. The commission recommended that UN members consider imposing individual sanctions, such as travel bans or an asset freezes on those responsible.

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Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, political analyst and human rights activist who specializes in delivering insight into the geopolitical scene of the Middle East, specializing in the political and humanitarian situation in Palestine.

11 March 2019

Source: www.transcend.org