MIKE WHITNEY—The reason Israel continues to kill non-combatants who are in-no-way connected to Hamas, is because it convinces everyone else that the bombing is “indiscriminate” which, in turn, suggests that the perpetrator is a deranged madman driven by irrational hatred. This is how one terrorizes the public into doing whatever is demanded of them. We expect that much of Israel’s current pysops in Gaza was meticulously worked out with a battery of behavioral psychologists long before the first bomb was dropped, perhaps, years before the Hamas attack on October 7.
CULTURE & CRITICISM
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CAITLIN JOHNSTONE—In reality the nature of the US-centralized empire allows it to run a massive, nonstop international propaganda campaign through mass media platforms which are mostly privately owned. The fact that these mass media outlets look independent but function as propaganda organs for the US empire allows its propaganda to fly into people’s minds without triggering any gag reflex of critical thinking or skepticism, which wouldn’t be the case if people knew those outlets were feeding them propaganda. Propaganda only really has persuasive power if you don’t know it’s happening to you.
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T P WILKINSON—One of the principles by which counter-insurgency is waged is by creating outlaws and removing them from the sight or oversight of the regular government and social infrastructure. This has also been done through what is now called “disappearing”. However hostage taking by the counter-insurgency agencies and their operatives has the perfidious effect of creating outlaws in the public perception by staging hostage incidents that appear to be perpetrated by the so-called “terrorists”. Thus the mythic propaganda of the deed is turned against those engaged in struggle- whether or not armed- to elicit the revulsion among the target population commensurate with this violation of the Geneva protocols.
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INDRAJIT–Humans claim supremacy over other animals, but no other animal validates this claim. What do you call a king that crowns himself? That’s just an ordinary Burger King customer. How lame. There’s obviously no objective truth to human supremacy, just ask anyone objective, like a crow or thalagoya. They’ll just flick their tongue or shit on you, as such a stupid question deserves. Humans consider the concept of white supremacy offensive, but supremacy over all living beings is somehow normal. It’s not. It’s deranged.
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EDITOR—Mnar Adley, Mintpress News founding editor hosts today a prominent Houthi official to discuss the blockade and Yemen’s escalating tensions with the United States. The guest is Mohammed al-Bukhaiti, a senior political official and spokesperson for Yemen’s Ansar Allah. His answers to Mnar’s lucid questions are precise, unequivocal, logical and most importantly moral. Nothing he says could be contravened before an impartial audience. Their cause is just.