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Dissident Voice

Dissident Voice
24 Apr 2024 | 6:53 am

1. Nicaragua: The Good Shepherd


Yesterday I attended mass. Instead of a priest, the mass was celebrated by Nicaraguan children – 10 fourth and fifth grade students. The kids led the congregation in prayers, passing of the peace, read the gospel and shared a homily. They invited congregants to share reflections on the reading – the Good Shepherd – and they blessed wine and soda crackers and served communion.

As I watched, I thought, "This is the way it should always be, we should be following the children, not the other way around." Why listen to old white men who stand behind so many pulpits the world over when the children can teach us so much more?

These kids have already learned all of life's important lessons. They already love each other, they already recognize the divine in each other, they already respect each other. These kids won't preach hate or war. In their homily, they tell us that their good shepherds are their parents and teachers; but I believe our good shepherds are these children.

I am struck by the hope that this model of the children leading the congregation is a reflection of a larger global shift. Worldwide, we have begun to see countries from the global south preaching from the pulpit, so to speak: South Africa taking Israel to the World Court for the genocide of the Palestinian people. Nicaragua taking Germany to the International Court of Justice for aiding and abetting Israel's genocide of the Palestinian people. Namibia arguing before the ICJ that because it has suffered occupation and colonialism Namibia "considers it a moral duty and sacred responsibility to appear before this court on the question of the indefensible occupation of Palestine by Israel."

Just as these children shepherded us in a mass that was every bit as dignified as any mass ever said by a priest, so is Nicaragua shepherding the world. Nicaragua is a small country from the global south that is modeling consistency and dignity – and choosing peace every step of the way. Just in recent days, Nicaragua has:

  • Broken diplomatic ties with Ecuador following its flagrant violation of international law and diplomatic norms when police raided the Mexican Embassy in Quito and forcibly removed former Vice President Jorge Glas, who had been granted political asylum by Mexico. In its statement, Nicaragua expressed "forceful, emphatic and irrevocable repulsion, in light of which we take our Sovereign Decision to break all diplomatic relations with the Ecuadoran Government, at the same time we express, once again, our warm and consistent consideration to the beloved Ecuadoran people, who are living through times of inconceivable brutality, and we ratify, once again, our adherence to International Law and the Conventions that govern civilized relations between the States and Governments of the World."
  • Reminded the UN that the U.S. still owes Nicaragua reparations and requested that these now be paid. In 1986, Nicaragua won a case against the United States wherein the International Court of Justice ruled that the U.S. repeatedly violated international law by training, arming, equipping, financing, and supplying the Contra paramilitaries in Nicaragua; attacking Nicaraguan infrastructure; putting mines in Nicaragua's ports; imposing an embargo on Nicaragua; and encouraging the Contras to commit atrocities that violate international humanitarian law. In 1988, the ICJ ordered the U.S. to pay $12 billion in reparations, which would be at least $31 billion
  • Brought Germany to the ICJ for aiding and abetting Israel's genocide of the Palestinian people. Given its experience in the court successfully arguing the above case against the U.S. as well as many other cases in the intervening years, Nicaragua wanted to use its experience at the ICJ to benefit of the Palestinian people in an attempt to stop the genocide being perpetrated against them.
  • Summed up its consistent and dignified approach in its message at the Economic and Social Council Forum on monitoring financing for development at the UN: "We reaffirm Nicaragua's commitment…to reducing poverty and inequality; to multilateralism, international law, and the assertion, exercise and defense of our sovereignty; and to the relationships of equality based on friendship, mutual respect, cooperation and solidarity."

With Nicaragua leading and the global south now lending its voice, it seems clear that the world will pivot on Palestine. While the U.S. and Europe continue to facilitate genocide by arming Israel; the global south calls for ceasefire and stands in solidarity with Palestine. As the children conclude mass with hugs and high fives all around, it seems especially fitting to me that the trajectory of the world be determined by our response to the genocide in Palestine. After all, Jesus was a Palestinian living under occupation, and he taught us that, "Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me."

2024-04-21 Mass CEB San Pablo Apostle Managua (Photo Credit:  Becca Mohally Renk)

2024-04-21 Mass CEB San Pablo Apostle Managua 2 (Photo Credit:  Becca Mohally Renk)

The post Nicaragua: The Good Shepherd first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
24 Apr 2024 | 4:52 am

2. Warring Against Encryption: Australia is Coming for Your Communications


On April 16, Australia's eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, issued with authoritarian glee legal notices to X Corp and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, to remove material within 24 hours depicting what her office declared to be "gratuitous or offensive violence with a high degree of impact and detail".  The relevant material featured a livestreamed video of a stabbing attack by a 16-year-old youth at Sydney's Assyrian Orthodox Christ the Good Shepherd Church the previous day.  Two churchmen, Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel and Rev. Isaac Royel, were injured.

Those at X, and its executive, Elon Musk, begged to differ, choosing to restrict general access to the graphic details of the video in Australia alone.  Those outside Australia, and those with a virtual private network (VPN), would be able to access the video unimpeded.  Ruffled and irritated by this, Grant rushed to the Australian Federal Court to secure an interim injunction requiring X to hide the posts from global users with a hygiene notice of warning pending final determination of the issue.  While his feet and mind are rarely grounded, Musk was far from insensible in calling Grant a "censorship commissar" in "demanding *global* content bans".  In court, the company will argue that Grant's office has no authority to dictate what the online platform posts for global users.

This war of grinding, nannying censorship – which is what it is – was the prelude for other agents of information control and paranoia to join the fray.  The Labour Albanese government, for instance, with support from the conservative opposition, have rounded on Musk, blurring issues of expression with matters of personality.  "This is an egotist," fumed Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, "someone who's totally out of touch with the values that Australian families have, and this is causing great distress."

The values game, always suspicious and meretricious, is also being played by law enforcement authorities.  It is precisely their newfound presence in this debate that should get members of the general public worried.  You are to be lectured to, deemed immature and incapable of exercising your rights or abide by your obligations as citizens of Australian society.

We have the spluttering worries of Australian Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw in claiming that children (always handy to throw them in) and vulnerable groups (again, a convenient reference) are "being bewitched online by a cauldron of extremist poison on the open and dark web".  These muddled words in his address to the National Press Club in Canberra are shots across the bow.  "The very nature of social media allows that extremist poison to spray across the globe almost instantaneously."

Importantly, Kershaw's April 24 address has all the worrying signs of a heavy assault, not just on the content to be consumed on the internet, but on the way communications are shared.  And what better way to do so by using children as a policy crutch?  "We used to warn our children about stranger danger, but now we need to teach our kids about the digital-world deceivers."  A matronly, slightly unhinged tone is unmistakable.  "We need to constantly reinforce that people are not always who they claim to be online; and that also applies to images and information."  True, but the same goes for government officials and front-line politicians who make mendacity their stock and trade.

Another sign of gathering storm clouds against the free sharing of information on technology platforms is the appearance of Australia's domestic espionage agency, ASIO.  Alongside Kershaw at the National Press Club, the agency's chief, Mike Burgess, is also full of grave words about the dangerous imperium of encrypted chatter.  There are a number of Australians, warns Burgess, who are using chat platforms "to communicate with offshore extremists, sharing vile propaganda, posting tips about homemade weapons and discussing how to provoke a race war".

The inevitable lament about obstacles and restrictions – the sorts of things to guard the general citizenry against encroachments of the police state – follows.  "ASIO's ability to investigate is seriously compromised.  Obviously, we and our partners will do everything we can to prevent terrorism and sabotage, so we are expending significant resources to monitor the Australians involved."  You may count yourselves amongst them, dear reader.

Kershaw is likewise not a fan of the encrypted platform.  In the timeless language of paternal policing, anything that enables messages to be communicated in a public sense must first receive the state's approval.  "We recognise the role that technologies like end-to-end encryption play in protecting personal data, privacy and cyber-security, but there is no absolute right to privacy."

To make that very point, Burgess declares that "having lawful and targeted access to extremist communications" would make matters so much easier for the intelligence and security community.  Naturally, it will be up to the government to designate what it deems to be extremist and appropriate, a task it is often ill-suited for.  Once the encryption key is broken, all communications will be fair game.

When it comes to governments, authoritarian regimes do not have a monopoly on suspicion and the fixation on keeping populations in check.  In an idyll of ignorance, peace can reign among the docile, the unquestioning, the cerebrally inactive.  The Australian approach to censorship and control, stemming from its origins as a tortured penal outpost of the British Empire, is drearily lengthy.  Its attitude to the Internet has been one of suspicion, concern, and complexes.

Government ministers in the antipodes see a world, not of mature participants searching for information, but inspired terrorists, active paedophiles and noisy extremists carousing in shadows and catching the unsuspecting.  Such officialdom is represented by such figures as former Labor Communications Minister Stephen Conroy, who thankfully failed to introduce a mandatory internet filter when in office, or such nasty products of regulatory intrusion as the Commonwealth Online Safety Act of 2021, zealously overseen by Commissar Grant and the subject of Musk's ire.

The age of the internet and the world wide web is something to admire and loathe.  Surveillance capitalism is very much of the loathsome, sinister variety.  But ASIO, the Australian Federal Police, and the Australian government and other agencies do not give a fig about that.  The tech giants have actually corroded privacy in commodifying data but many still retain stubborn residual reminders of liberty in the form of encrypted communications and platforms for discussion.  To have access to these means of public endeavour remains the holy grail of law enforcement officers, government bureaucrats and fearful politicians the world over.

The post Warring Against Encryption: Australia is Coming for Your Communications first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
24 Apr 2024 | 4:35 am

3. Divide and Conquer: The Government’s Propaganda of Fear and Fake News


"Nothing is real," observed John Lennon, and that's especially true of politics.

Much like the fabricated universe in Peter Weir's 1998 film The Truman Show, in which a man's life is the basis for an elaborately staged television show aimed at selling products and procuring ratings, the political scene in the United States has devolved over the years into a carefully calibrated exercise in how to manipulate, polarize, propagandize and control a population.

Take the media circus that is the Donald Trump hush money trial, which panders to the public's voracious appetite for titillating, soap opera drama, keeping the citizenry distracted, diverted and divided.

This is the magic of the reality TV programming that passes for politics today.

Everything becomes entertainment fodder.

As long as we are distracted, entertained, occasionally outraged, always polarized but largely uninvolved and content to remain in the viewer's seat, we'll never manage to present a unified front against tyranny (or government corruption and ineptitude) in any form.

Studies suggest that the more reality TV people watch—and I would posit that it's all reality TV, entertainment news included—the more difficult it becomes to distinguish between what is real and what is carefully crafted farce.

"We the people" are watching a lot of TV.

On average, Americans spend five hours a day watching television. By the time we reach age 65, we're watching more than 50 hours of television a week, and that number increases as we get older. And reality TV programming consistently captures the largest percentage of TV watchers every season by an almost 2-1 ratio.

This doesn't bode well for a citizenry able to sift through masterfully-produced propaganda in order to think critically about the issues of the day.

Yet look behind the spectacles, the reality TV theatrics, the sleight-of-hand distractions and diversions, and the stomach-churning, nail-biting drama that is politics today, and you will find there is a method to the madness.

We have become guinea pigs in a ruthlessly calculated, carefully orchestrated, chillingly cold-blooded experiment in how to control a population and advance a political agenda without much opposition from the citizenry.

This is how you persuade a populace to voluntarily march in lockstep with a police state and police themselves (and each other): by ratcheting up the fear-factor, meted out one carefully calibrated crisis at a time, and teaching them to distrust any who diverge from the norm through elaborate propaganda campaigns.

Unsurprisingly, one of the biggest propagandists today is the U.S. government.

Add the government's inclination to monitor online activity and police so-called "disinformation," and you have the makings of a restructuring of reality straight out of Orwell's 1984, where the Ministry of Truth polices speech and ensures that facts conform to whatever version of reality the government propagandists embrace.

This "policing of the mind" is exactly the danger author Jim Keith warned about when he predicted that "information and communication sources are gradually being linked together into a single computerized network, providing an opportunity for unheralded control of what will be broadcast, what will be said, and ultimately what will be thought."

You may not hear much about the government's role in producing, planting and peddling propaganda-driven fake news—often with the help of the corporate news media—because the powers-that-be don't want us skeptical of the government's message or its corporate accomplices in the mainstream media.

However, when you have social media giants colluding with the government in order to censor so-called disinformation, all the while the mainstream news media, which is supposed to act as a bulwark against government propaganda, has instead become the mouthpiece of the world's largest corporation (the U.S. government), the Deep State has grown dangerously out-of-control.

This has been in the works for a long time.

Veteran journalist Carl Bernstein, in his expansive 1977 Rolling Stone piece "The CIA and the Media," reported on Operation Mockingbird, a CIA campaign started in the 1950s to plant intelligence reports among reporters at more than 25 major newspapers and wire agencies, who would then regurgitate them for a public oblivious to the fact that they were being fed government propaganda.

In some instances, as Bernstein showed, members of the media also served as extensions of the surveillance state, with reporters actually carrying out assignments for the CIA. Executives with CBS, the New York Times and Time magazine also worked closely with the CIA to vet the news.

If it was happening then, you can bet it's still happening today, only this collusion has been reclassified, renamed and hidden behind layers of government secrecy, obfuscation and spin.

In its article, "How the American government is trying to control what you think," the Washington Post points out "Government agencies historically have made a habit of crossing the blurry line between informing the public and propagandizing."

This is mind-control in its most sinister form.

The end goal of these mind-control campaigns—packaged in the guise of the greater good—is to see how far the American people will allow the government to go in re-shaping the country in the image of a totalitarian police state.

The government's fear-mongering is a key element in its mind-control programming.

It's a simple enough formula. National crises, global pandemics, reported terrorist attacks, and sporadic shootings leave us in a constant state of fear. The emotional panic that accompanies fear actually shuts down the prefrontal cortex or the rational thinking part of our brains. In other words, when we are consumed by fear, we stop thinking.

A populace that stops thinking for themselves is a populace that is easily led, easily manipulated and easily controlled whether through propaganda, brainwashing, mind control, or just plain fear-mongering.

This unseen mechanism of society that manipulates us through fear into compliance is what American theorist Edward L. Bernays referred to as "an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country."

To this invisible government of rulers who operate behind the scenes—the architects of the Deep State—we are mere puppets on a string, to be brainwashed, manipulated and controlled.

Yet as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, it's time to change the channel, tune out the reality TV show, and push back against the real menace of the police state.

If not, if we continue to sit back and lose ourselves in political programming, we will remain a captive audience to a farce that grows more absurd by the minute.

The post Divide and Conquer: The Government's Propaganda of Fear and Fake News first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
24 Apr 2024 | 12:05 am

4. Last Nation Standing ─ Iran


By not responding to decades of Israel's provocations with an attack on Israeli soil, Iran displayed patience. The Islamic Republic rulers realized the provocations were becoming harsher, more damaging, and without stopping; it was time to respond. Their response was notable; a mild rebuke that showed power and unwillingness to harm civilians, unlike the offensive attacks by Israel's military and intelligence that have killed Iranian civilians and military personnel.

Israel's worldwide propaganda mechanism omits the tens of previous illegal and damaging attacks inflicted upon Iran and charges Iran with cruel and threatening behavior that requires a strong reply. Already, members of England's parliament (MP) obeyed the Zionist call for action with outrageous pleas to assist Israel against "Iran's genocidal actions," and "attempt to interrupt the peace."

One person is injured and that is genocide. Tens of thousands of Gazans killed and no reference to genocide. Mayhem in the Middle East since the first Zionist set foot in Palestine and one relatively harmless attack disturbed the peace. Are these MPs real people or artificial intelligence? How can they run for office and be elected?

A common thread exists in US actions of aggressive behavior toward nations that have not threatened the security of the United States, such as 21st-century Iraq and Iran. The common thread weaves nations that were or are antagonists of apartheid Israel. All, except Iran, have been subdued by the U.S. What Israel wants, Israel gets, and Israel convinced the United States to eliminate the foes of the Zionist Republic. Americans died and Americans paid for efforts that had scarce benefits to U.S. citizens. Iran is now the last nation standing and Israel is coercing the U.S. to perform its usual duty — get rid of Iran. Look at the record.

Sudan

Deposed Sudan leader, Omar al-Bashir, made it clear. "Israel is our enemy, our number one enemy, and we will continue calling Israel our enemy." Israel also made its relationship with Bahir clear by destroying a Sudanese arms factory suspected of producing chemical weapons for Hamas. Times of Israel reports that "Over the years, there have been reports of the Israelis continuing to aid South Sudanese rebels during Sudan's second civil war, which lasted from 1983 to 2005." Israel's assistance to the rebels enabled South Sudan to secede and weaken Bashir. The Times of Israel also reports that "Miniature Israeli flags hang from car windshields and flutter at roadside stalls, and at the Juba souk in the city's downtown, you can buy lapel pins with the Israeli flag alongside its black, red and green South Sudanese counterpart."

Link of a car bomb at the World Trade Center in New York to Osama bin Laden, who resided in Sudan, prompted the US State Department to add Sudan to its list of state sponsors of terrorism. In October 1997, the U.S. imposed economic, trade, and financial sanctions on Sudan. These sanctions occurred despite none of the extremists engaging in terrorist activities while in Sudan. Bashir offered extradition or interviews of arrested al-Qaeda operatives and allowed access to the extensive files of Sudanese intelligence. According to a CIA source, reported in the Guardian, Sept 30, 2001, "This represents the worst single intelligence failure in this whole terrible business. It is the key to the whole thing right now. It is reasonable to say that had we had this data we may have had a better chance of preventing the attacks."

The U.S. Congress heightened the insurrection in Sudan's Darfur province by passing amendment H.Con.Res.467 — 108th Congress (2003-2004), amended 07/22/2004, which "States that Congress declares that the atrocities unfolding in Darfur, Sudan, are genocide, and urges the Administration to refer to such atrocities as genocide." The amendment gathered world opinion against the Sudanese government. Although the public accepted the figure of 400,000 killings of people in Darfur, this genocide had no verification of the number of killings, no displayed mass graves, and no images of a great number of bodies.

Before he left the U.S. State Department, former US Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick stated on ABC News online, November 9, 2005, "It's a tribal war. And frankly I don't think foreign forces want to get in the middle of a tribal war of Sudanese."

A peace agreement ended the second Sudanese civil war in 2005. On July 9, 2011, South Sudan became independent and reduced Sudan to a pipeline for South Sudan oil. After Sudan became a diminished state, barely able to survive, the United States lifted economic and trade sanctions. Independent South Sudan fared worse — involved in its civil war, human rights violations, and social and economic turmoil. Human Rights Watch (HRW) claimed [South Sudan] "Government security forces and armed groups perpetrated serious human rights abuses, including killings, acts of sexual violence, abductions, detention, torture and other ill-treatment, the recruitment and use of children, and destruction of civilian property." The U.S. government did not criticize the human rights violations of the friend of Israel.

On October 23, 2020, Israel and Sudan agreed to normalize relations
On April 6, 2021, the Sudanese cabinet approved a bill abolishing the 1958 law on boycotting Israel.

The once wealthy Sudan, flowing with minerals and gushing with oil had the possibility of becoming a strong and vibrant African nation. US policies of countering terrorism, assisting South Sudan rebels, and interfering in the Darfur civil war contributed to preventing that outcome and provided Israel with a friendly Sudan that no longer assisted the Palestinians.

Libya

Libya's leader, Mohammar Qadhafi, has been quoted as saying on April 1, 2002, "Thousands of Libyans are ready to defend the Palestinian people." In that speech he called for a Pan-Arab war against the state of Israel's existence and demanded "other Arab leaders open their borders to allow Libyans to march into Palestine, to join the Palestinian uprising." In the speech, Gaddafi claimed he would not recognize Israel as a state.

The United States used Gadhafi's support for radical revolutions as a reason to have strained relations with Libya. Sanctions soon followed. In March 1982, the U.S. Government prohibited imports of Libyan crude oil into the United States and expanded the controls on U.S. originated goods intended for export to Libya. Licenses were required for all transactions, except food and medicine. In April 1985, all Export-Import Bank financing was prohibited.

On April 14, 1986, the United States launched air strikes against Libya in retaliation for "Libyan sponsorship of terrorism against American troops and citizens." Five military targets and "terrorism centers" were hit, including Gadhafi's headquarters.

After Libya halted its nuclear program, renounced terrorism, accepted responsibility for inappropriate actions by its officials, and paid appropriate compensation to the victims' families for the bombing of a US commercial airplane over Lockerbie, Scotland, the United Nations (UN) lifted sanctions, the U.S. terminated the applicability of the Iran and Libya Sanctions Act to Libya, and President Bush signed an Executive Order terminating the national emergency, which ended economic sanctions.  All was going well until 2011.

Despite the lack of clarity of the 2011 rebellion against Gadhafi and specious reasons for NATO and US roles to defend the rebels, the U.S. government cut ties with the Gadhafi regime, sanctioned senior regime members, and, together with several European and Arab nations, managed to convince the UN Security Council to authorize intervention in the conflict. The intervention demolished the Gadhafi regime and enabled the rebels to obtain victory, another fallen nation that was an outspoken antagonist of Israel, and, still, in 2024, an embattled nation.

Egypt

On October 6, 1973, Egypt and Syria launched a surprise attack on Israel to reclaim territories they had lost in the Six-Day War. With Israeli troops seriously outnumbered and facing near-certain defeat at the hands of the Soviet-backed nations, President Nixon ordered an emergency airlift of supplies and materiel. "Send everything that will fly," Nixon told Henry Kissinger. The American airlift enabled Israel to launch a decisive counterattack that pushed the Egyptians back across the Suez Canal.

In a briefing,  Scuttle Diplomacy: Henry Kissinger and Arab-Israeli Peacemaking, by Salim Yaqub, Woodrow Wilson Center, Dr. Yaqub argued that "Kissinger's pivotal role as the intermediary allowed him to feign neutrality while secretly supporting the Israelis, and to turn the peace negotiations into a long series of small confidence building steps which would give the appearance of progress that Egypt required to come to an agreement with Israel, but which would allow Israel to keep most of the Syrian and Palestinian land gained after the 1967 Six-Day War."

Prime Minister of Egypt, Anwar Sadat, signed a peace treaty with Israel, and the U.S. normalized relations with previously combative Egypt. The most populous and leading nation of the Arab world, the principal defender of Arab rights, which had waged several wars with Israel, no longer posed a threat to Israel and became a weakened observer to the hostilities affecting the Middle East.

Syria

Israel and Syria battled from day one of the UN 181 Proclamation that recommended partition of the British Mandate.

The U.S. never favored the Assad regime and cut relations. After the September 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. soil, the Syrian Government tried limited cooperation with the U.S. War on Terror. Syrian intelligence alerted the U.S. of an Al-Qaeda plan to fly a hang glider loaded with explosives into the U.S. Navy's Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain. Syria was also a destination for U.S. captives outside of its borders in its rendition program. According to U.S. officials, as reported by Nicholas Blanford, in a Special to The Christian Science Monitor, May 14, 2002, "Syrian information was instrumental in catching militant Islamists around the world."

Syria's descent into near oblivion started with its civil wars, in which foreign fighters (ISIS and al-Nusra) entered Syria from NATO's Turkey (no retribution to Turkey for allowing ISIS to enter Syria), and a multitude of insurgents fought with and against one another until Assad, with assistance from Russia, Iran, and Hezbollah, overcame the insurgencies. WikiLeaks, in 2011, released diplomatic cables between the U.S. embassy in Damascus and the State Department, which revealed the U.S. had given financial support to political opposition groups and their related projects through September 2010.

ISIS is defeated and a limping Assad government barely survives as a splintered nation. Bombed almost daily by Israeli missiles and planes, the hopelessly weak Syria cannot retaliate. With assistance from the U.S., Syria's threat to Israel has been neutralized.

Iraq

Justifying the U.S. invasion of Iraq with a spurious reason that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and needed to be silenced was so absurd that another reason was sought. Security school scholars argued a joint threat of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction and links to terrorist groups. Hegemony school scholars argued preservation and extension of U.S. hegemony, including the spread of liberal democratic ideals. When in doubt bring in liberal democratic ideals.

The interventionists conveniently forgot that Saddam Hussein was a restraint to Iran and a deterrent to Radical Islamists. With Hussein removed, Iran lost its restraint. Bordering on Iraq and spiritually attached to Iraq's Shi'a population, Iran became involved in the commercial, economic, and political future of Iraq, an event that U.S. strategists should have known.

The invasion of Iraq and disposal of a Saddam Hussein regime, which had prevented al-Qaeda elements from establishing themselves, exposed Iraq's porous borders to Radical Islamic fighters. Founded in October 2004, al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) emerged from a transnational terrorist group created and led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. His cohorts entered through Jordan, while al-Qaeda forced out of Waziristan in Pakistan found a haven in Iraq. Meanwhile, fighters trained in and wandering through the deserts of Saudi Arabia hopped planes to Istanbul and Damascus and worked their way across Syria into Iraq. Disturbed by the U.S. invasion and military tactics, Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim al-Badri al-Samarrai, later known as Al Baghdadi, founder of the Islamic Caliphate, transformed himself from a fun-loving soccer player into a hardened militant and helped found the militant group Jamaat Jaysh Ahl al-Sunnah wa-l-Jamaah (JJASJ), which countered the U.S. military in Iraq.

Spurious reasons and obvious counterproductive results leave doubts that the original explanation and rationales for the invasion were correct. A more valid reason involves the neocons in the Bush administration who were closely identified with Israel in the Pentagon, Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith, and the office of the vice president, Lewis 'Scooter' Libby, who aggressively advanced the case for the invasion. Some backups to that theory,

Haaretz, Apr 03, 2003, "White Man's Burden," Ari Shavit, "The war in Iraq was conceived by 25 neoconservative intellectuals, most of them Jewish (ED: Avid Israel supporters), who were pushing President Bush to change the course of history."

In The Road to Iraq: The Making of a Neoconservative War, Muhammad Idrees Ahmad echoes the case.

The road to Iraq was paved with neoconservative intentions. Other factions of the US foreign policy establishment were eventually brought around to supporting the war, but the neocons were its architects and chief proponents.

Ahmad quotes a remark attributed to British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw. "It's a toss-up whether Libby is working for the Israelis or the Americans on any given day." He also quotes former New Republic editor Andrew Sullivan who contended, "The closer you examine it, the clearer it is that neoconservatism, in large part, is simply about enabling the most irredentist elements in Israel and sustaining a permanent war against anyone or any country who disagrees with the Israeli right."

A 1996 report, Clean Break, A New Strategy for Securing the Realm, prepared by neoconservatives at the Jerusalem-based think tank, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies, many of whom held vital positions in the George W. Bush administration, lends substance to the charge that the invasion of Iraq served Israel's interests.

We must distinguish soberly and clearly friend from foe. We must make sure that our friends across the Middle East never doubt the solidity or value of our friendship….Israel can shape its strategic environment, in cooperation with Turkey and Jordan, by weakening, containing, and even rolling back Syria. This effort can focus on removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq — an important Israeli strategic objective in its own right — as a means of foiling Syria's regional ambitions.

Israel can make a clean break from the past and establish a new vision for the U.S.-Israeli partnership based on self-reliance, maturity and mutuality — not one focused narrowly on territorial disputes. Israel's new strategy — based on a shared philosophy of peace through strength — reflects continuity with Western values by stressing that Israel is self-reliant, does not need U.S. troops in any capacity to defend it, including on the Golan Heights, and can manage its own affairs. Such self-reliance will grant Israel greater freedom of action and remove a significant lever of pressure used against it in the past.

Participants in the Study Group included Richard Perle, American Enterprise Institute, Study Group Leader, James Colbert, Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, Charles Fairbanks, Jr., Johns Hopkins University/SAIS, Douglas Feith, Feith and Zell Associates, Robert Loewenberg, President, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies, Jonathan Torop, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, David Wurmser, Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies, and Meyrav Wurmser, Johns Hopkins University.

Richard Perle, Douglas Feith, and David Wurmser later served in high positions in the George W. Bush administration at the time of the Iraq invasion. The others were allied with organizations that promoted Israel's interests.

Two observations:
(1)    Why were Americans prominent in an Israeli Think Tank and why were they advising a foreign nation?
(2)    Note that the thrust of the report is to advise Israel to have a "clean break from the past and establish a new vision for the U.S.-Israeli partnership based on self-reliance, maturity, and mutuality." This has been the modus operandi of the Netanyahu administrations.

Another ember that warmed the neocon's heartfelt devotion to Israel; The Project for the New American Century urged an invasion of Iraq throughout the Clinton years. "Bombing Iraq Isn't enough. Saddam Hussein must go," William Kristol and Robert Kagan, PNAC neocon directors wrote in the 1998 New York Times.

No "smoking gun" firmly ties the neocons devoted to Israel together with using the United States military to eliminate another Israel antagonist. The argument is based upon it being the best, most factual, and only reason the war could have been wanted.

Iran – Last Nation Standing

The Islamic Republic may not be an exemplary nation, but there is no evidence or reason for the U.S. accusations that Iran is a destabilizing, expansionist nation, or leading sponsor of international terrorism. Why would it be – there are no external resources or land masses that would be helpful to Iran's economy, Iran has not invaded any nation, and its few sea and drone attacks on others are reactions from a perception that others have colluded in harming the Islamic Republic and its allies. Ayatollah Khomeini's vision of expanding his social ideology never got anywhere and died with him. Subsequent leaders have been forced to reach out to defend their interests and those of their friends, but none of these leaders has pursued an expansionist philosophy or wants the burden that accompanies the task — enough problems at home.

No matter what Iran does, the US perceives Iran as an enemy and a threat to not only the Middle East but to world order. All this hostility, despite the facts that (1) the Iranians showed willingness to create a new Afghanistan by pledging $560 million worth of assistance, almost equal to the amount that the United States pledged at the Tokyo donors' conference in January 2002, (2) according to the U.S. envoy to Afghanistan, Richard Dobbins, played a "decisive role in persuading the Northern Alliance delegation to compromise its demands of wanting 60 percent of the portfolios in an interim government," (3) Iran arrested Al-Qaeda agents on its territory and, because Al-Qaeda linked the Shiite Muslims, represented by Iran and Hezbollah, with Crusaders, Zionists, and Jews as its most bitter enemies, had ample reason to combat terrorist organizations, and (4) Iran has no reason for or capability of attacking the U.S .or its western allies.

Being vilified for inadequate reasons is followed by Iran not being praised for significant reasons. President Trump, in his January 8, 2020 speech, argued the U.S. had been responsible for defeating ISIS and the Islamic Republic should realize that it is in their benefit to work with the United States in making sure ISIS remains defeated. Trade the U.S. with Iran and Trump's speech would be correct.

The U.S. spent years and billions of dollars in training an Iraqi army that fled Mosul and left it to a small contingent of ISIS forces. Showing no will and expertise to fight, Iraq's debilitated military permitted ISIS to rapidly expand and conquer Tikrit and other cities. Events energized Iraq's Popular Mobilization Forces, which, with cooperation from Iran and leadership from its Major General Qasem Soleimani, recaptured Tikrit and Ramadi, pushed ISIS out of Fallujah, and played a leading role in ISIS' defeat at Mosul. Iran and Soleimani were key elements in the defeat of ISIS.

What reward did Solemani receive for his efforts? When his convoy left Baghdad airport, a drone strike, perpetrated by U.S. military, assassinated Major General Solemani and nine other innocent people on January 3, 2002. UN's special rapporteur on extrajudicial killings, Agnes Callamard, reported the U.S. had not provided sufficient evidence of an imminent threat to life to justify the attack.

As usual, Israel used the U.S. to satisfy its desires. "Israel was going to do this with us, and it was being planned and working on it for months," President Trump said about the coordination to kill Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of Iran's Quds Force. "We had everything all set to go, and the night before it happened, I got a call that Israel will not be participating in this attack. I'll never forget that Bibi Netanyahu let us down. We were disappointed by that. Very disappointed…But we did the job ourselves, with absolute precision … and then Bibi tried to take credit for it."

Why do these protectors of the realm want Iran destroyed — they fear Iran may act as a deterrent to their future aggression. Iran cannot win a war with a nuclear weapon or any weapons; it can only posture and threaten use of nuclear weapons as a deterrent. Its principal antagonists, Israel, United States, and Saudi Arabia have elements that shield themselves from a nuclear attack by Iran. Israel's small size makes it likely that fallout from a nuclear weapon will endanger the entire region, especially Iran's allies. Any nuclear strike on Israel will be countered with a torrent of nuclear missiles that will completely wipe large Iran off the map and without fallout causing harm to neighboring nations. With little to gain and everything to lose, why would Iran engage in nuclear aggression?

Netanyahu's scenario follows a pattern of using American lives and clout to further Israel's interests and decimate its adversaries. Survey the record — destruction of Iraq, destruction of Sudan, destruction of Libya, destruction of Egypt, destruction of Syria. and now Iran. Only Saudi Arabia and the Gulf countries will be left standing, remaining in that position as long as they show no threat to Israel.

The destructions visited upon the described nations have done little to advance US security and economy. Therefore, the reason for the actions and US support of Israel must be political —politicians coopted by catering to the religious right community and other Israel defenders. US administrations are willing to sacrifice American lives and give exorbitant financial assistance to Israel in trade for electoral support from Israel's backers.

The present confrontations between Iran and Israel have escalated. Those who believe Israel's few drones over Isfahan concluded retaliation for Iran's excessive number of missiles and harmless result in the attack on Israel might be mistaken. The drones may have only tested Iranian defensive capability. More, much more provocations may happen.

Due to US aggressive tactics, the antagonists to Israel have fallen and Iran is the last nation standing.

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Dissident Voice
23 Apr 2024 | 3:58 pm

5. Will the Freedom Flotilla Sail to Gaza?


The flotilla waits to sail from Istanbul.   Photo credit: Medea Benjamin

The non-violence training to join the Freedom Flotilla Coalition's ships to Gaza has been intense. As hundreds of us from 32 countries gathered in Istanbul, we were briefed about what we might encounter on this voyage. "We have to be ready for every possibility," our trainers insisted.

The best scenario, they said, is that our three ships–one carrying 5,500 tons of humanitarian aid and two carrying the passengers–will reach Gaza and accomplish our mission. Another scenario would be that the Turkish government might cave to pressure from Israel, the United States and Germany, and prevent the boats from even leaving Istanbul. This happened in 2011, when the Greek government buckled under pressure and ten boats were stalled in Greece. With our boats docked in Istanbul today, we fear that Turkish President Erdogan, who recently suffered a crushing blow in local elections, is vulnerable to any economic blackmail the Western powers might be threatening.

Another possibility is that the ships take off but the Israelis illegally hijack us in international waters, confiscate our boats and supplies, arrest and imprison us, and eventually deport us.

This happened on several other voyages to Gaza, one of them with deadly consequences. In 2010, a flotilla of six boats was stopped by the Israeli military in international waters. They boarded the biggest boat, the Mavi Marmara. According to a UN report, the Israelis opened fire with live rounds from a helicopter hovering above the ship and from commando boats along the side of the ship. In a horrific display of force, nine passengers were killed, and one more later succumbed to his wounds.

To try to prevent another nightmare like that, potential passengers on this flotilla have to undergo rigorous training. We watched a video of what we might face—from extremely potent tear gas to ear-splitting concussion grenades—and we were  told that the Israeli commandos will  be armed with weapons with live rounds. Then we divided up into small groups to discuss how best to react, non-violently, to such an attack. Do we sit, stand, or lie down? Do we link arms? Do we put our hands up in the air to show we are unarmed?

The most frightening part of the training was a simulation replete with deafening booms of gunfire and exploding percussion grenades and masked soldiers screaming at us, hitting us with simulated  rifles, dragging us across the floor, and arresting us. It was indeed sobering to get a glimpse of what might await us. Equally sobering are Israeli media reports indicating that the Israeli military has begun "security preparations," including preparations for taking over the flotilla.

That's why everyone who has signed up for this mission deserves tremendous credit. The largest group of passengers are from Turkey, and many are affiliated with the humanitarian group, IHH, an enormous Turkish NGO with 82 offices throughout the country. It has consultative status at the UN and does charity work in 115 countries. Through IHH, millions of supporters donated money to buy and stock the ships. Israel, however, has designated this very respected charity as a terrorist group.

The next largest group comes from Malaysia, some of them affiliated with another very large humanitarian group called MyCARE. MyCARE, known for helping out in emergency situations such as floods and other natural disasters, has contributed millions of dollars in emergency aid to Gaza over the years.

From the U.S., there are about 35 participants. Leading the group, and key to the international coalition, is 77-year-old retired U.S. Army colonel and State Department diplomat Ann Wright. After quitting the State Department in protest over the U.S. invasion of Iraq, Wright has put her diplomatic skills to good use in helping to pull together a motley group of internationals. Her co-organizer from the U.S. is Huwaida Arraf, a Palestinian American attorney who is a co-founder of the International Solidarity Movement and who ran for congress in 2022. Arraf  was key to organizing the very first flotillas that started in 2008. So far, there have been about 15 attempts to get to Gaza by boat, only five of them successful.

The incredible breadth of participants is evident in our nightly meetings, where you can hear clusters of groups chatting away in Arabic, Spanish, Portuguese, Malay, French, Italian, and English in diverse accents from Australian to Welsh. The ages range from students in their 20s to an 86-year-old Argentine medical doctor.

What brings us together is our outrage that the world community is allowing this genocide in Gaza to happen, and a burning desire to do more than we have been doing to stop people from being murdered, maimed and starved. The aid we are bringing is enormous–it is the equivalent of over 100 trucks—but that is not the only purpose of this trip. "This is an aid mission to bring food to hungry people," said Huwaida Arraf, "but Palestinians do not want to live on charity. So we are also challenging Israeli policies that make them dependent on aid. We are trying to break the siege."

Israel's vicious attacks on the people of Gaza, its blocking of aid deliveries and its targeting of relief organizations have fueled a massive humanitarian crisis. 
The killing of seven World Central Kitchen workers by Israeli forces on April 1 highlighted the dangerous environment in which relief agencies operate, which has forced many of them to shut down their operations.

The U.S. government is building a temporary port for aid that is supposed to be finished in early May, but this is the same government that provides weapons and diplomatic cover for the Israelis. And while President Biden expresses concern for the suffering Palestinians, he has suspended aid to UNRWA, the main UN agency responsible for helping them, after Israel made unsubstantiated claims that 12 of its 13,000 employees in Gaza participated in the October 7 attacks.

Given the urgency and danger this moment presents, the Freedom Flotilla Coalition is entering rough and uncharted waters. We are calling on countries around the world to pressure Israel to allow us "free and safe passage" to Gaza. In the U.S., we are asking for help from our Congress, but having just approved another $26 billion to Israel, it is doubtful that we can count on their support.

And even if our governments did pressure Israel, would Israel pay attention? Their defiance of international law and world opinion during the past seven months indicates otherwise. But still, we will push forward. The people of Gaza are the wind in our sails. Freedom for Palestine is our North Star. We are determined to reach Gaza with food, medicines and, most of all, our solidarity and love.

The post Will the Freedom Flotilla Sail to Gaza? first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
23 Apr 2024 | 2:40 am

6. Censorship Wars: Elon Musk, Safety Commissioners and Violent Content


The attitudes down under towards social media have turned barmy.  While there is much to take Elon Musk to task for his wrecking ball antics at the platform formerly known as Twitter, not to mention his highly developed sense of sociopathy, the hysteria regarding the refusal to remove images of a man in holy orders being attacked by his assailant in Sydney suggests a lengthy couch session is in order.  But more than that, it suggests that the censoring types are trying, more than ever, to tell users what to see and under what conditions for fear that we will all reach for a weapon and go on the rampage.

It all stems from the April 15 incident that took place at an Assyrian Orthodox service conducted by Bishop Mar Mari Emmanuel and the Rev. Isaac Royel at Christ the Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley, Sydney.  A 16-year-old youth, captured on the livestream of the surface, is shown heading to the bishop before feverishly stabbing him, speaking Arabic about insults to the Prophet Muhammed as he does so.  Rev. Royel also received injuries.

Up to 600 people subsequently gathered around the church.  A number demanded that police surrender the boy.  In the hours of rioting that followed, 51 police officers were injured.  Various Sydney mosques received death threats.

The matter – dramatic, violent, raging – rattled the authorities.  For the sake of appearance, the heavies, including counter-terrorism personnel, New South Wales police and members of the Australian domestic spy agency, ASIO, were brought in.  The pudding was ready for a severe overegging.  On April 16, the NSW Police Commissioner Karen Webb deemed the stabbing a "terrorist incident".  NSW Premier Chris Minns stated that the incident was being investigated as a "terrorist incident" given the "religiously motivated" language used during the alleged attack.

After conducting interviews with the boy while still in his hospital bed on April 18, the decision was made to charge him with the commission of an alleged act of terrorism.  This, despite a behavioural history consistent with, as The Guardian reports, "mental illness or intellectual disability."  For their part, the boy's family noted "anger management and behavioural issues" along with his "short fuse", none of which lent themselves to a conclusion that he had been radicalised.  He did, however, have a past with knife crime.

Assuming the general public to be a hive of incipient terrorism easily stimulated by images of violence, networks and media outlets across the country chose to crop the video stream.  The youth is merely shown approaching the bishop, at which point he raises his hand and is editorially frozen in suspended time.

Taking this approach implied a certain mystification that arises from tampering and redacting material in the name of decency and inoffensiveness; to refuse to reveal such details and edit others, the authorities and information guardians were making their moralistic mark.  They were also, ironically enough, lending themselves to accusations of the very problems they seek to combat: misinformation and its more sinister sibling, disinformation.

Another telling point was the broader omission in most press reporting to detail the general background of the bishop in question.  Emmanuel is an almost comically conservative churchman, a figure excommunicated for his theological differences with orthodoxy.  He has also adopted fire and brimstone views against homosexuality, seeing it as a "crime in the eyes of God", attacked other religions of the book, including Judaism and Islam, and sees global conspiracies behind the transmission of COVID-19.  Hardly, it would seem, the paragon of mild tolerance and calm acceptance in a cosmopolitan society.

On April 16, Australia's eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, got busy, announcing that X Corp and Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, had been issued with legal notices to remove material within 24 hours depicting "gratuitous or offensive violence with a high degree of impact and detail".  The material in question featured the attack at the Good Shepherd Church.

Under the Online Safety Act 2021 (Cth), the commissioner is granted various powers to make sure the sheep do not stray.  Internet service providers can be requested or required to block access to material that promotes abhorrent violent conduct, incites such conduct, instructs in abhorrent violent conduct or depicts abhorrent violent conduct.  Removal of material promoting, instructing, or depicting such "abhorrent violent conduct", including "terrorist acts" can be ordered for removal if it risks going "viral" and causing "significant harm to the Australian community".

X took a different route, preferring to "geoblock" the content.  Those in Australia, in other words, would not be able to access the content except via such alternative means as a virtual private network (VPN).  The measure was regarded as insufficient by the commissioner.  In response, a shirty Musk dubbed Grant Australia's "censorship commissar" who was "demanding *global* content bans".  On April 21, a spokesperson for X stated that the commissioner lacked "the authority to dictate what content X's users can see globally.  We will robustly challenge this unlawful and dangerous approach in court."

In court, the commissioner argued that X's interim measure not to delete the material but "geoblock" it failed to comply with the Online Safety Act.  Siding with her at first instance, the court's interim injunction requires X to hide the posts in question from all users globally.  A warning notice is to cover them. The two-day injunction gives X the opportunity to respond.

There is something risible in all of this.  From the side of the authorities, Grant berates and intrudes, treating the common citizenry as malleable, immature and easily led.  Spare them the graphic images – she and members of her office decide what is "abhorrent" and "offensive" to general sensibilities.

Platforms such as Meta and X engage in their own forms of censorship and information curation, their agenda algorithmically driven towards noise, shock and indignation.  All the time, they continue to indulge in surveillance capitalism, a corporate phenomenon the Australian government shows little interest in battling.  On both sides of this coin, from the bratty, petulant Musk, to the teacherly manners of the eSafety Commissioner, the great public is being mocked and infantilised.

The post Censorship Wars: Elon Musk, Safety Commissioners and Violent Content first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
22 Apr 2024 | 8:59 pm

7. The Empire Owns Us


In today's America there is no need for a contract for millions of my fellow working stiffs. With many states like mine (Florida) having "Right to work laws," unions are few and far between. Duh, like not even 10% of private sector workers are unionized. So, you work for a boss on hourly, weekly, or on commission (as this writer still does for over 40 years) you can be replaced or as the Brits say "redundanized" just like that! And they complain, the Fat Cats who own industry, about slow motion or uncaring employees. Well, like with the guy who put in our laminate floors told me several years ago: "At the place I work, with three of us wood craftsmen, the owner just bought himself, his wife and his two children new BMWs. Yet, never a thought to give us raises or a nice bonus at Christmas."

Let's not just obsess over the shitty work climate for blue and white collar working stiffs. No, check this out: I used my smart TV and found many "Free Channels" meaning no cost to watch. I got into a three season series and was really hooked on the storyline etc. Well, with this channel, TUBI, they have more commercials than I have ever experienced. The way things are set up if you try to leave the show you may lose where you are in it, so I had to sit through the ****. Most of the commercials were geared for young millennials (20s to early 30s) or the Medicare age folks like myself. I could not believe commercials pushing "Up to $500 cash NOW with no hassles." Then you have the ones like Credit Karma whereupon the guy wants to rent this apartment and his credit score is low. So, with Credit Karma you see the guy signing for the "way too costly for my budget" apartment as the For Rent sign is taken down. God bless finance capitalism! How about this one, again geared for that 20 to 30+ age group. It's so easy to buy a new car or sell your old one. With the app in hand this young woman bought the car online… having never test driven it. No bargaining on the price, and who cares, this is modern America! The other young woman is bragging about selling her car online, and how much she got for it. Again, no bargaining. Obviously, those transactions were through some corporation that has the analytics down to a science… for them!

Twelve years ago, I decided to go back to doing stand-up comedy after a hiatus of 40 years. There was a comedy contest at some club in St Augustine, about 50 miles away. I signed up by computer and wrote a nice bit for myself. It was primary election season, so I focused on that and my other major peeve: Dental charges for most Americans with no dental insurance. When I arrived at the club, we contestants met with the MC. He was a regular comic at the place, maybe early 30s. Nice guy. I drew the short stick so I had to go on first. He told me that he would warm the audience up and then introduce me. The rule was to go for 8 minutes. I sat offstage by the bar to observe him. He spent his entire warm up time of 10 minutes with Fart, Tit and Dick jokes. They were laughing hysterically while I was sighing. "I'm dead!" Before he introduced me I did a quick study of the audience. Thirty five people, mostly two tops, a few fours. Their ages varied from mid twenties all the way up to the lady sitting by herself who looked my age.  I started out with the Republican primary contenders. "It's funny folks but if you think about it anyone can kind of look like someone else. Look at the Republicans running for president in 2012. You have Newt Gingrich who looks like a pedophile Bishop." [Only the lady right below me is really laughing.] "Then you have Rick Santorum, Senator from PA, who looks like he belongs under a car changing the oil with Gomer and Goober." [Silence] "Or Sarah Palin, who looks like a very attractive Drag Queen." [Oh boy, tough crowd]. So I changed gears and did my dental bit. "How many of you folks have dental insurance, raise your hands." Two thirds of the audience raised hands… are these people from earth? I went on anyway. "With the way things are nowadays here is how a first visit to a dentist will look like. You're in the chair, he probes your mouth with his assistant taking notes. "OK # 17, $2200- root canal and crown. # 6 and #7 both have cavities, $600 total. # 21 $1100" [The lady below is laughing through it all, while with the other 34 people a silence there's that can kill.] My mouth became as dry as a desert and I prayed the 8 minutes would come… and they did! I walked right out and drove home and never looked back.

During the Vietnam debacle in the 60s and early 70s many of us college students and young working stiffs got out and protested. Even before and after the Bush/Cheney illegal (and immoral) invasion of Iraq, we had many young folks joining us on the street corner. Perhaps not as many as when we had the military draft, but still enough to give us some hope. Well, since that time, where in the hell are the majority of our young Americans? Nowhere to be found, except in the bars and clubs doing what we all did at some time: partying. The difference is that my generation of young Americans who saw through the **** found time to both protest and party. Not anymore. The empire now owns us. As far as those senior citizens like yours truly, well, too many of my fellow baby boomers are more concerned about their next Social Security check, investments, and personal health care. No room for the people of Gaza or the dead-end job workers throughout this nation. No room for the blatant racism, homophobia, etc.

Finally, this Military Industrial Empire actually loves it when working stiffs and retired working stiffs are divided by issues their embedded media and politicos embellish. We have finally become, for certain, the permanent consumer society we always were, especially after WW2. Those commercials reflect just how far down the rabbit hole we landed. When the choices continue to be presented to us of who should rule us, between a Clinton and Bush Sr., a Gore or a Bush Jr., and Obama or a McCain, a Hillary or a Trump, and then (twice, mind you) a Biden or a Trump, we are lost as a culture. And they laugh at the other "Banana Republics".

The post The Empire Owns Us first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
22 Apr 2024 | 6:49 pm

8. Israel Faces Its Detractors


The Israel that many admired through a myopic lens has been brought into improved focus, a ruthless state that has similar characteristics to the Nazi state — virulent nationalist, irredentist, militarist, racist, repressive in occupied territories, ethnic superiority, thought control, and genocidal. One major difference between the Nazi Germany and apartheid Israel is that Nazi Germany had no religious attachment; Israel is emerging as a theocracy. This difference solicits a comparison between Israel as a Jewish theocratic state and the now defunct Islamic Caliphate, known as Islamic State in Iraq and Levant (ISIL).

The need to compare Israel with ISIS comes from Israel's attempt to associate Hamas with ISIS. Israel's worldwide propaganda machine (Hasbara) previously ordered that references to Hamas be preceded by the word terrorist, as if the two words were one word. After decades, the Pavlovian response to the characterization assured that when hearing the word Hamas the adjective terrorist naturally flows to the brain. The terrorism that Israel and its Mossad have inflicted on the Palestinian Lebanese, Syrian, and Iranian people, as well as hundreds of innocents from several nations throughout the world, are never discussed. After the October 6 Hamas attack on southern Israel, which incorporated unnecessary excesses, Hasbara issued a new link for attachment to Hamas, "Hamas is ISIS," declared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. When uttering those words, Netanyahu should have looked in the mirror. A comparison determines that the founding of the Israeli and short-lived ISIS state and securing themselves as unique and dominant authorities have similarities.

Foreigners created the lands

Foreign fighters entered Syria and Iraq and allied with domestic populations to gain territory and incorporate the territory into the Islamic State (IS). Many of the fighters were from the Caucasus and Europe, were not Arab nationals, and sympathized with the ISIL cause.

In 1948, the Israeli forces contained few fighters who were born in the British Mandate; most were immigrants from previous decades and volunteers from Western nations. Foreigners to Palestine engaged in the capture of Palestinian land that enabled the creation of the enlarged Israel and the ethnic cleansing of 750,000 Palestinians.

Uniting the people

The Islamists spoke of uniting the Arab Muslim people and inaugurating another Golden Age of Arab civilization in the Levant. Out of what? Just as the elements that produced the great Hellenist civilizations no longer exist for the Greek people, the elements for reviving an Arab civilization no longer exist for the Arab people. The Mongol onslaught broke the ties that bound the Arab peoples — devotion to the same religion, a House of Wisdom that contained the first university, which translated Greek and Indian texts and became a center for advancements in humanities, sciences, mathematics, astronomy, and medicine, and governance of Muslim Arabs for Muslim Arabs. The modern Muslim Arabs have more in conflict than in solidarity and no longer pursue the uniquely creative efforts of their ancestors. Go through the numbers and we find that ISIL appeals to a small disaffected group who define for others what is Muslim and who is Arab.

The Zionists spoke of uniting world Jewry and recreating a homeland for all Jews in a land they claim was once a home and empire for Jews. Because Judaism is not a religion that governs or attracts those who need strong devotion, religion originally did not play a role in their mission. Nor were the Zionists uniting a people — Jews around the globe did not share a common language, history, or culture and could not be classified as a nation any more than the Mennonites and Jehovah Witnesses can be considered peoples. The Zionists' thrust was one of narrow disaffection, of belief that Jews would never be accepted in any nation. Its appeal, minuscule to Jews at the time of its beginnings, tended to unify Jews by sharing woe, harm, and victimization, a process of uniting psyches by trauma. Present-day Israel still clings to the traumas and uses the Old Testament to give it legitimacy and a focus for all Jews.

Recreating the ancient empire

The previous Golden Age of the Arab world lasted for 600 from 622 AD to 1258 AD, and, as happened to other civilizations, capitulated to superior military forces. The use of the term Caliphate and its designation as an incorporation of the Arab people into a unified body is an exaggeration. Competing dynasties — Umayyad in Damascus and later Iberia, Abbasid in Baghdad, Fatamid in Egypt, and the Turkish Ottoman Empire, Muslim but not Arab — can claim the term Caliphate, but all have disappeared from history and so has the Caliphate. The Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Mongols, and a host of other civilizations had several dynasties, but neither the Italians, Greeks, Egyptians, nor other communities of today are considered heirs or recreations of these previous civilizations. The Golden Age of Arab domination of the Levant is not myth; the modern Caliphate is myth, has no definition in the present, and no return to the past.

History, archaeology, and anthropology dispute the assertion that the Jews of today have a unique relation to the wandering Hebrew tribes and that these tribes secured a foundation as a civilization or an empire. There might be some slight genetic connection but the dispersal of the original tribes and Jews throughout the world, together with conversions, have modified the DNA and a new genetic pool has arisen. There are no significant traces — administration, monuments, buildings, weapons, accepted history, independent writings, tools, implements, or structures — to substantiate that the ancient Hebrews were other than wandering and hilltop tribes, with some communities having periods of urban concentration. No history or records by other civilizations during the time of the Israelites mention the supposed accomplishments of David and Solomon.

History of the ancient Hebrew people rests on the acceptance of the Old Testament as a historical narrative. The Bible resembles literature by a people and not an authentic history of a people — a saga with historical occurrences. Its tone, language and stories are mainly derived from Ugaritic literature of the 12th century B.C. Canaanite city-state of Ugarit and from previous Sumerian, Egyptian, Akkadian, and other ancient texts, stories, and legends. Listen to these other voices and we find echoes of the Old Testament. Several of the Psalms were adapted from Ugaritic sources; the story of the flood has a near mirror image in Ugaritic literature.

Recognized archaeologists (Israel Finkelstein, the director of the Institute of Archaeology at Tel Aviv University, William Dever, professor of Near Eastern archeology and anthropology at the University of Arizona, Ze'ev Herzog of Tel Aviv University, and Margreet Steiner, University of Leiden) have shown that the biblical history of an ancient Israel is mostly myth until the era of Omri in the 9th century B.C., and any attempt to refer to the myth has no definition in the present and no relation to the past.

Descendants of those who owned the land

ISIL claimed they were descendants of those who had close attachment to the lands and cultivated and possessed the soil. For centuries, mainly Arabs occupied the Levant, including historical Palestine, and, except for Israel, they now firmly control all of the Middle East and North Africa. The problem in the Arab nations is that the land and resources are controlled by few and are not properly distributed. Resolving that situation did not need an Islamic state; it needs more democratic states.

Can Jews correctly claim they are descendants of those who had close attachment to the lands, cultivated the soils, and owned them? The biblical twelve tribes of Israel retreat from history is presented as a mystery; described as the "Lost tribes of Israel." Did they fall into a crack? How does this ridiculous description survive normal thought?

By 500 BC, the agrarian and pastoral Hebrew tribes had been absorbed into other empires — Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, and later Greek and Roman. They formed a new group of Jews, who pursued urban trades throughout Mesopotamia and the Roman Empire. In the Persian Parthian and Sasanian Empires (248 B.C. to 641 A.D.), which housed the three great Jewish academies of Surah, Pumbadita, and Nehardea, the legacy and heritage of modern Jews and Judaism are best expressed. These academies codified the oral and written laws and produced the Babylonian Talmud, which became the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the basis for all Jewish law.

Although Jews lived in the Levant and controlled a small portion of the area during the short reigns of the Hasmonean kings, Jewish prominence and physical attachments to the ancient land of Israel and Jerusalem were not great and were mostly spiritual. Some remains of Jewish dwellings, burial grounds, and ritual baths can be found, but few, if any, major Jewish monuments, buildings, or institutions from the Biblical era exist within the "Old City" of today's Jerusalem. The oft-cited Western Wall is the supporting wall for Herod's platform and is not directly related to the Second Temple. No remains of that Temple have been located. This portion of the Western Wall lacks absolute proof of its being close to the "holiest of the holies," and therefore has religious significance by default ─ there is no other apparent religious construction from ancient Hebrew's Jerusalem.

In an attempt to connect ancient Israel to present-day Jerusalem, Israeli authorities apply spurious labels to Holy Basin landmarks.

Neither King David's Tower nor King David's Citadel relate to the time of King David.

Neither the Pools of Solomon nor the Stables of Solomon relate to the time or life of King Solomon.

Absalom's Tomb is an obvious Greek sculptured edifice and therefore cannot be the tomb of David's son.

Securing themselves as the unique and dominant authority

Troubling reports had the Islamic State destroying Christian churches and relics, most prominently those of the Assyrian Church of the East. Other destruction included the Temple of Baalshamin, one of the best-preserved ruins at the Syrian site of Palmyra, Mar Elian Christian Monastery, and The Imam Dur Mausoleum, an example of medieval Islamic architecture and decoration, and ancient sites, museums and libraries in Nineveh, Mosul, Hatra, Mari, and Nimrud.

Israel also consolidated its ethnic appearance.

Meron Rapaport, History Erased, Haaretz, July 5, 2007 reports that "during the 1950s, the nascent state and IDF set about destroying historical sites left behind by other cultures, particularly Muslims. This policy was so indiscriminate that even synagogues were destroyed." Rappaport continues with information from Dr. Meron Benvenisti, Sacred Landscape, The Buried History of the Holy Land. since 1948 that said, "of the 160 mosques in the Palestinian villages incorporated into Israel under the armistice agreements, fewer than 40 remained standing. New Hebrew nomenclature replaced the Arabic names of more than 9,000 natural features, villages, and ruins."

Conclusion

Equating Hamas, an organization that together with Iran has fought ISIS in its territory, has not been well received and is deliberately false. The Financial Times, John Reed in Gaza City JUNE 1 2015, "Hamas seeks to stamp out Isis in Gaza," reports,

Night-time security checkpoints have gone up around Gaza City over the past month — the most visible sign of a crackdown by the ruling Islamist movement Hamas on local followers of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (or ISIS). In recent weeks, supporters of Isis have claimed credit for several bombings and Hamas has rounded up and imprisoned dozens of people, officials and analysts in Gaza say.

The Associated Press, as well as other news sources and institutions, explain why Hamas is not ISIS.

In contrast, Hamas is an exclusively Palestinian movement. Its members are Palestinian and its ideology, albeit violent, is focused on liberating what it says is occupied land through the destruction of Israel. While branded a terrorist group by Israel and its Western allies, its deadly attacks have been focused on Israeli targets.

During its 16 years of rule, Hamas built up a system of government that includes not only its military wing, but also tens of thousands of teachers, civil servants and police. The group also has significant support inside the West Bank and an exiled leadership spread out across the Arab world.

The Islamic State is no longer a caliphate and has little possibility of ever becoming a big "C again!" Examine carefully and focus intensely and soon the apparition becomes clear — if Israel is known as the Jewish state, then ISIL was unknowingly patterning its development (not its behavior) with similar principles to those of the Zionists. The rise of the nation-state under monarchs, which began in the 1500s and developed into nations guided by native people, has entered a new phase ─ get a group together, invade a weak foreign land, provide a false history to authenticate claims, and establish a new nation. The crushing similarity that seals the issue ─ ISIL had no defined borders and neither does Israel.

The post Israel Faces Its Detractors first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
21 Apr 2024 | 8:01 pm

9. Universities for AUKUS: The Social License Confidence Trick


"Can we still see universities as places to learn and produce knowledge that, at the risk of sounding naïve, is for the greater good of humanity, independently transient of geopolitical skirmishes?" Wanning Sun from the University of Technology, Sydney, asks in hope.  "The history of universities during the Cold War era tells us that it is precisely at such times that our government and our universities need to fight tooth and nail to preserve the precarious civil society that has taken millennia to construct."

History can be a useful, if imperfect guide, but as its teary muse, Clio, will tell you, its lessons are almost always ignored. A recent investigative report published in Declassified Australia gives us every reason to be pessimistic about Sun's green pastured hopes for universities untethered from compromise and corruption.  Far from preserving civil society, the Australian university sector is going the way of the US model of linking university research and innovation directly to a gluttonous military industrial complex.  More importantly, these developments are very much on the terms of the US imperium, in whose toxic embrace Australia finds itself.

Over 17 years, the authors of the report found, US defence funding to Australian universities had risen from (A)$1.7 million in 2007 to (A)$60 million annually by 2022".  The funds in question "are backing research in fields of science that enhance US military development and the US national interest."

To justify this effort, deskbound think tankers and money chasing propagandists have been enlisted to sanitise what is, at heart, a debauching enterprise.  Take, for example, the views of the United States Studies Centre (USSC), based at the University of Sydney, where university-military collaboration under the shoddy cover of learning and teaching are being pursued in reverie.  For those lovely types, universities are "drivers of change within society."

The trilateral security pact of AUKUS, an anti-China enterprise comprising Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States, has added succour to the venture, drawing in wide-eyed university administrators, military toffs and consultancy seeking politicians keen to rake in the defence scented cash.

With salivating enthusiasm, a report by members of the USSC and the University of Nottingham from March 2024, noting the findings of a joint University of Sydney and Times Higher Education World Academic Summit, opens with a frank enlisting of the education and research sector "as enablers of operationalising the strategic intent around AUKUS."  No less than a propagandising effort, this will entail "building social license for AUKUS" through "two primary inputs: (1) educating the workforce; and (2) Pillar II advanced capability research."

This open embrace of overt militarisation entails the agreement of universities "across the three countries" to "add value to government through strategic messaging and building social license for AUKUS."  This is no less an attempt to inculcate and normalise what is, at heart, a warring facility in the making.

The authors admit their soiling task is a challenging one.  "Stakeholders agree the challenge of building social license for AUKUS is particularly acute in the Australian context, where government discourse has been constrained by the need to reestablish diplomatic relations with China."  Diplomacy is such a trying business for those in the business of conflict.

The raw note here is that the Australian populace is ignorant of the merits of the belligerent, anti-Beijing bacchanal between Canberra, Washington and London.  They are ignorant of "the nature of strategic competition in the Indo-Pacific and its place in Australian regional strategy for AUKUS".  Concern is expressed about that most sensible of attitudes: a decline of popularity for the proposed and obscenely expensive acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines, costing A$368 billion.  "USSC's own polling, released in late 2023, finds that support for Australia acquiring nuclear-powered submarines has fallen below majority (49 per cent)."

Such terrifying findings – at least from the USSC's barking mad perspective – had also been "corroborated by other major Australian polls, including the Lowy Institute and The Guardian, which find that support has weakened, rather than firmed since the optimal pathway announcement."  The Australian public, it would seem, know something these wonks don't.

When the warmongers worry that their wares are failing to sell, peacemakers should cheer.  It then falls on the warmongers to think up a strategy to reverse the trend.  An imperfect, though tried method is to focus on the use of that most hideous of terms, "social license", to bribe the naysayers and sceptics.

The notion of "social license", framed in fictional, social contract terms, should propel those with a scintilla of integrity and wisdom to take arms and rage.  The official literature and pamphleteering on the subject points to its benign foundations.  The Ethics Centre, for instance, describes it as an informal arrangement whereby an informal license is "granted to a company by various stakeholders who may be affected by the company's activities."  Three requirements must be accordingly satisfied in this weasel-worded effort: legitimacy, by which the organisation "plays by the 'rules of the game'"; credibility, by which the company furnishes "true and clear information to the community"; and trust, where the entity shows "the willingness to be vulnerable to the actions of another."  These terrible fictions, as they come together, enable the veil to be placed over the unspeakable.

When the flimsy faeces encasing such a formulation is scraped away, the term becomes more sinister.  Social licensing is nothing less than a tool of deceit and hoodwinking, a way for the bad to claim they are doing good, for the corrupt to claim they are clean.  Polluting entities excuse what they do by suggesting that the returns for society are, more broadly speaking, weightier than the costs.  Mining industries, even as they continue to pillage the earth's innards, claim legitimacy for their operations as they add an ecologically friendly wash to them.  We all benefit in the harm and harming, so why fuss?

To reverse this trend, a few measures should be enacted with urgent and acceptable zeal.  Purging university vice chancellors and their simpering toadies is a healthy start.  Trimming the universities of the spreadsheeting grafters and the racketeers, percolating through departments, schools and colleges, would be another welcome measure.  All are accomplices in this project to destroy the humane mission of universities, preferring, in their place, brands, diluted syllabi, compliant staff, and morons for students.  All in all, a clear wall of separation between the civic goals of learning and knowledge should be built to shield students and staff from the rapacious, murderous goals of the military industrial complex that continues to draw sustenance from deception, delusion and fear.

The post Universities for AUKUS: The Social License Confidence Trick first appeared on Dissident Voice.
Dissident Voice
20 Apr 2024 | 8:33 pm

10. US Reimposes Illegal and Inhumane Oil Sanctions on Venezuela


A minute after midnight on April 18, the US reimposed coercive economic measures designed to cripple Venezuela's oil industry. Later that day, the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved a new sanctions bill on Nicaragua. Meanwhile, Cuba protested the US's six-decade blockade as talks resumed between the two countries on migration.

At a time of challenged US dollar hegemony and questioning of the neoliberal order, the three countries striving to build socialist societies in the Americas pose a "threat of a good example."

Also on April 18,  Biden announced new sanctions on Iran. Globally, Washington has imposed sanctions on some forty countries. Because these unilateral coercive measures are a form of collective punishment, they are considered illegal under international law.

Even the US Congressional Research Service recognizes sanctions have "failed" to achieve their regime-change goals. Yet the empire's perverse response is to do more of the same rather than reverse course. "Once they are imposed, they become politically impossible to lift without getting something in return," observed The New York Times.

 Times runs cover for US sanctions on Venezuela

The empire's "newspaper of record" bewailed that Uncle Sam had "no choice" but to reign more misery on the people of Venezuela even though sanctions do not achieve their purported purpose.

Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, according to the Times, had "promised to take steps toward holding free elections… with the lifting of some American sanctions as an incentive. But the ink was hardly dry before his government upheld a ban on running for office that had been placed on María Corina Machado."

In fact, the Barbados agreement, negotiated last October, said nothing about Ms. Machado, who had been proscribed from holding public office for fifteen years back in 2015 for financial and treasonous misconduct. There was little chance that the notorious politico would have her conviction reversed by Venezuela's supreme court which, as in the US, is an independent branch of government not under the dictates of the president.

The US knew this when the agreement was signed, but has subsequently used it as an excuse to delegitimize the upcoming Venezuelan presidential election. Why? One reason may be that the US Intelligence Community's Annal Threat Assessment anticipates that Maduro will win the contest on July 28.

The article correctly reports that Machado was the "overwhelming victor" of a primary, but omits that her incredulous 93% margin in a crowded and highly contested field raised doubts about its credibility. Another leading opposition figure in the primary accused the process of being a fraud.

The primary was held privately, not by the official election authority as other primaries were. Machado's own NGO, one that had received funds from the CIA front group, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED), had administered the primary. And after Machado was declared the winner, the ballots were destroyed. This news, apparently, was not "fit to print" in the Times.

 Times laments the downsides of US sanctions…to the US

The article raises a concern dear to the Times, which is that the "immigration crisis," precipitated by the US sanctions, pose "a major political problem for Mr. Biden during an election year." In addition, the Times noted, the sanctions "pushed Venezuela further into the arms of Russia and China."

The article, concluding with a hackneyed observation that "dictators do dictatorship," gripes that "US sanctions can do great harm but rarely delivers the political results that American officials seek."

However, the US didn't completely close the door on Venezuelan oil industry for select corporations in the US and abroad. The new policy, while revoking the general license, will allow companies to seek individual licenses. The change, the Wall Street Journal noted, "is likely to benefit large oil companies with lobbying power in Washington."

More distortions

A second Times editorial on Venezuela appeared the next day, this time masquerading as a news story. "One opposition party was allowed to officially register" in the presidential race, the article reads, inferring that there is only one opposition candidate on the ballot, when Reuters reports there are eleven others.

"Many Venezuelans living abroad," carps the Times, "have been unable to register to vote because of expensive and cumbersome requirements." Unreported is the biggest barrier for Venezuelans living in the US to vote remotely in their country's election. Washington does not recognize the legitimate Venezuelan government, which means no functioning consular services and, therefore, no way to vote.

The Times reporter also complained that deportation of Venezuelan migrants were suspended "without explanation." While the newspaper's articles are protected behind a paywall, one would think that staff would have access to a February Times report that Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez warned that the flights would be discontinued in response to the US's reimposition of sanctions on Venezuelan gold sales.

Times acknowledges the purpose of US sanctions

 The Times at least no longer blames the "economic free fall" of the Venezuelan economy on the socialist government but fully admits the economic sanctions have "crippled the country's crucial oil industry." Further, the Times acknowledges that the Biden administration's action, "could carry significant consequences for the future of Venezuela's democracy, for its economy, and for migration in the region."

In short, the Times reported that US sanctions, "intensified…the single largest peacetime collapse of any country in at least 45 years."

Finally, the Times implicitly acknowledged that the sanctions were never to promote democracy, but were "meant to force the Maduro government from power." An earlier 2019 Times opinion piece included the suggestion that while sanctions "may make the humanitarian crisis worse" they are still desirable as a "source of leverage to remove Maduro."

Venezuela's response

The week before the oil sanctions were reimposed, Venezuelans celebrated the anniversary of the defeat of the 2002 unsuccessful 48-hour US-backed coup. Neither the tactics – the continuing coup attempts – nor the US policy of regime-change have changed.  The Venezuelan president's response: "We are going to keep moving forward with a license or without a license…we are not your colony."

The post US Reimposes Illegal and Inhumane Oil Sanctions on Venezuela first appeared on Dissident Voice.
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