=By=

Rebel fighters from the “First Battalion” training under the Free Syrian Army (Wiki). Apparently distinguishable from ISIS by their tan headgear and white banner with black print.

[dropcap]T[/dropcap]he U.S. government, via its CIA, has financed the “moderate” anti-Syrian mercenaries fighting against the legitimate Syrian government with at least $1 billion a year. The Wahhabi dictatorships in the Middle East have added their own billions to finance al-Qaeda’s efforts against the Syrian people. The U.S. continues to purchase and transport thousands of tons of weapons and ammunition to feed the war against the Syrian people. It also pays the various fighters and opposition groups. The U.S. efforts for regime change in Syria have been running since at least 2006 when the U.S. government started to finance anti-Syrian exile TV stations and held intensive planning talks with various anti-Syrian Islamist elements.

Together with the British government it also runs the current pro-mercenary public relation show to influence the “western” public to support its imperial meddling in Syria.

The Guardian now unveils one of the British government efforts to effectively run the complete “Free Syrian Army” media show:

The British government is waging information warfare in Syria by funding media operations for some rebel fighting groups, …
…
Contractors hired by the Foreign Office but overseen by the Ministry of Defence (MoD) produce videos, photos, military reports, radio broadcasts, print products and social media posts branded with the logos of fighting groups, and effectively run a press office for opposition fighters.Materials are circulated in the Arabic broadcast media and posted online with no indication of British government involvement.
…
Through its Conflict and Stability Fund the government is spending £2.4m on private contractors working from Istanbul to deliver “strategic communications and media operations support to the Syrian moderate armed opposition” (MAO).

The contract is part of a broader propaganda effort focused on Syria, with other elements intended to promote “the moderate values of the revolution” …
…
The documents call for contractors to “select and train a spokesman able to represent all the MAO groups as a single unified voice”, as well as providing media coaching to “influential MAO officials” and running a round-the-clock “MAO central media office” with “media production capacity”. One British source with knowledge of the contracts in action said the government was essentially running a “Free Syrian army press office”.

The British and the U.S. media also run various “civil” groups to further their regime change goals.

The “White Helmets”, known for fake “rescue” videos and their strong cooperation with al-Qaeda (vid), are financed with $23 million by the U.S. government through USAID, with £18.7 million by the U.K. Foreign Office and with several millions more from other governments. But are the “White Helmets” not “moderates” who only want to help people? The U.S. government does not seem to believe that. It just banned the head of the “White Helmets” from entering the United States even though it finances his activities.

Many social media accounts like @raqqa_sl, which are promoted in “western” media, also distribute fake pictures and videos as part of these propaganda efforts.

But even when these media manipulation campaigns and fake “moderates” get exposed their operations continues unabated. The Guardian, after publishing the above, will not for one moment reflect on how its own publishing on Syria was influenced by the government financed fakes. It is, just like other mainstream media, an integrated part of the campaign.

No unveiling of the truth about the “western” attack on the Syrian state and its people seems to any effect on the ongoing media operations. On April 20 the U.S. military spokesperson for the anti-Islamic State coalition told some truth about the role of al-Qaeda in the “rebel” occupied eastern Aleppo city:

That said, it’s primarily al-Nusra who holds Aleppo, and of course, al-Nusra is not part of the cessation of hostilities.

Only two weeks later the NYT propagandist Anna Barnard has the Chutzpah to claim that al-Qaeda only

has a small presence in Aleppo

Lies get repeated even after they have been debunked again and again. The relentlessness of the propaganda onslaught is effective in suppressing any larger opposition to it.

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WITNESS TO HISTORY
CALEB MAUPIN

[dropcap]P[/dropcap]residential Candidate Donald Trump is known for being very crass and rude. However, he also has a way of openly stating what other billionaires are thinking, but are afraid to say out loud.

In one of his earliest interviews, Trump stated a concern that is probably on the mind of many foreign policy analysts.  He said: “You can’t have everybody hating you. The whole world hates us. One of the things that I heard for years and years, never drive Russia and China together, and Obama has done that.”

It’s not only Donald Trump who has this concern. The Council on Foreign Relations, a Wall Street think tank that can otherwise be described as the CIA’s brain, has become obsessed with the issue. The latest issues of the CFR’s publication, Foreign Affairs, speak of the China-Russia alliance at length.

Why Does Wall Street Hate Russia and China?

The Eurasian bloc and its allies have scored key economic victories against the United States and Western Europe on the global market. State-controlled industries in Mainland China, which was considered the impoverished, semi-feudal “sick man of Asia” just 70 years ago, now produces half of all the steel and aluminum on Earth. Russia’s oil and natural gas resources are being sold across Europe, and the Islamic Republic of Iran is starting to move into these markets as well.

The global economic set-up has long functioned like the Roman Empire, where “all roads lead to Rome,” or in this case, to Wall Street and London. But as Eurasia raises its head, bringing South America and parts of the Middle East along with it, the world no longer has to buy its steel, aluminum, and oil from Western corporations. Markets are slipping out of Western fingers. Developing countries no longer have to take out loans from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The “New Silk Road” vision from China, the stabilization of Russia and the Islamic Revolution of Iran, and the Bolivarian movement of Latin America, have all created something western capitalists have never tolerated: competitors.

It is maintenance of monopoly on the global market, not some phony concern about “human rights” or “expansionism” that drives the rising hostility against Russia, China, and any country that dares align with them. Regimes that function as obedient Western clients violate human rights and engage in aggression all the time.

The oil vassals of Kuwait, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia make no pretense honoring human rights.

The leaders of South Korea’s only real electoral opposition, the Unified Progressive Party, all sit in prison simply because of a hypothetical conversation that was audio recorded.

The number of human rights activists and dissidents who have been killed, tortured, or disappeared in US-aligned Latin American countries like Colombia, Guatemala, and Honduras is incalculable. The US backed the autocratic PRI regime in Mexico for many years and is currently supporting the corrupt, drug-infested Narco regime that now runs the country.

The US-aligned Turkish state, which has an ugly history of atrocities against the Kurds, is now rounding up college professors and anyone else who dares question or “insult” President Erdogan. 

The US-backed regime in Ukraine has a Nazi division of its armed forces called the Azvo Battalion. Not only does the US openly align with the anti-Russian, Hitler glorifying fanatics in Kiev as they wage brutal war against their Eastern compatriots, but US military personnel actually provides them with training..The concept of “human rights” has been completely politicized by well-funded foundations that promote the geopolitical goals of Wall Street. Voices in US media raise their “concerns” about human rights almost exclusively against countries that dare assert their economic independence or align with Russia and China.

Many leftists and progressive people in Western countries are easily duped by “human rights” propaganda. They often believe they can gain credibility for their critique of Western society by joining in the demonization of the Pentagon’s latest target.

Like the Southern plantation owners who claimed they were “civilizing” and “bringing Christianity” to those they enslaved, the NATO military machine and its Wall Street paymasters always claim they are overthrowing governments because they have a big heart, and are flowing with compassion for those who are suffering. As the attacks on Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, and now Syria have shown, the “innocent victims”, who become the focus of propaganda campaigns promoting “humanitarian intervention,” usually end up in far-worse circumstances than before.

The Basis of the Eurasian Alliance

The division of the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China was a key factor in the outcome of the Cold War. In 1961, the Chinese Communist Party and the Communist Party of the Soviet Union had incompatible foreign policy strategies. Mao Zedong’s China had become a symbolic epicenter of anti-colonial struggles in the Third World. Khruschev’s Soviet government was desperately trying to engage in diplomacy in the hopes of preventing atomic war. The Soviet Union cut its ties with the People’s Republic of China in 1961, as China denounced Soviet leaders as “revisionists” and “betrayers” of the cause of global revolution.

The division between the two great powers escalated over the course of the following decade. Border disputes erupted. By the early 1970s, the final years of Mao Zedong’s life, the most populous country on earth was no longer telling its allies to oppose Western capitalism, but rather that “Soviet Social Imperialism” was the “main danger” to humanity.

This shift weakened anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist forces significantly. The Chinese invasion of Vietnam, the civil war between leftist factions in oil rich Angola, the re-alignment of Poland, Romania, Albania, and various other European Marxist governments, were all decisive in the eventual defeat of the Soviet Union.

However, since the end of the Cold War, the geopolitical relationship that was broken apart in 1961 with the “Sino-Soviet Split” has gradually re-emerged. As the Russian Federation became more stable and economically prosperous after the disasters of the 1990s, it grew closer to the People’s Republic of China. The two countries, one led by a Communist Party and the other now led by nationalist forces, have formed an economic and political alliance that is once again challenging the monopoly of Western capitalism.

In Russia, the economy is centered on the export of publicly owned oil and natural gas resources. In China, the state controls banking and most major industries. Both Russia and China long ago abandoned the kind of “really existing socialism” pioneered by Stalin with his “Five Year Plans.” However, neither Russia nor China can truly be described as capitalist. In both countries, the decisions of state central planners, not the anarchy of production, dictate the majority of economic activity. The two countries have many billionaires, yet both governments are not afraid to punish capitalists who stray from the state’s overall economic vision. There is plenty of capitalism in China and Russia, but it is a submissive capitalism, functioning under the boot of much more powerful state economic sector.

The Russian and Chinese states are not like the corporatocracies of the West. Their strength comes from highly organized and deeply politicized populations, both committed to a collective nationalist vision. Western liberalism with its glorification of profits and individualism is collapsing in the face of a collectivist alternative. Over the course of the 20th century, the Eurasian societies learned to restrain and control market forces. This has made them stronger than many Western analysts can even imagine.

The Eurasian Bloc now lays the basis for the primary alternative to Western capitalism on the global stage. Brazil and the Islamic Republic of Iran have economies and states that function in almost the same way as Russia and China. The Bolivarian movement in Latin America has unleashed a more traditionally leftist and Marxist version of this economic model, and both Cuba and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea are gradually shifting in this direction.

Strategy for Attack: Oil Price Manipulation and Takfirism

Speaking for the Council on Foreign Relations, Robert Kaplan gleefully predicts “Coming Anarchy” in Eurasia. The article goes on to lament the Chinese slowdown and describe how low oil prices have hurt the Russian state.

The drop in oil prices is no accident. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which sells oil almost exclusively to Wall Street and buys weapons almost exclusively from the Pentagon, has engaged in what looks like an episode of self-mutiliation, dropping prices by exporting huge amounts of oil. Saudi Arabia’s economy is in a state of ruin, as the country takes out more loans in order to expand its oil apparatus.

Negotiations among oil exporting countries continue to fail and the price has not recovered from the dramatic decreases of 2014. This is no accident. Saudi Arabia is intentionally dropping the prices as a part of geopolitical strategy developed by its overlords in Washington DC. The hope is to wreck the economies of Russia, Venezuela, and Iran, all of which are centered around the export of publicly owned oil resources.

Interestingly, a recently published article, also from the Council on Foreign Relations, touts “the use of economic instruments to accomplish geopolitical objectives” as an “American Tradition.”

The oil price drop has created political problems, not just in Russia, but primarily among its allies in South America. The United Socialist Party suffered its first significant electoral defeat in recent history with the US-funded opposition winning at the polls in December. In Brazil, a political crisis has unfolded surrounding the fiscal problems of Petrobas, the state-owned oil company. The once popular, left-wing President Dilma Rousseff, who is very friendly to Russia and China, now faces impeachment.

The economic attack in the form of low oil prices is being followed up by another gem from the CIA’s toolbox, Wahabbism. Religious extremism of the variety found in Saudi Arabia is getting stronger in the Middle East. Violent extremists such as ISIS and the Al-Nusra front are very powerful in sections of Syria and Iraq. CIA training camps in Jordan, the open Turkish-Syrian borders, and the continued flow of weapons into Syria from US-aligned Gulf States, have made the “Jihadist” current stronger than ever.

The CIA has been friendly with Takfiri extremists for a long time. Osama Bin Laden comes from a wealthy Saudi family with a near monopoly construction within the Kingdom. His career as an extremist began in Afghanistan, where he cooperated with the USA and NATO to fight against the People’s Democratic Party and the Soviet Union during the 1980s. The Muslim Brotherhood cooperated with the CIA to work against Arab Nationalist Abdul Nasser in Egypt. US links with the Takfiri “Jundallah” organization that bombs innocent people in Iran were exposed by the New York Times. 

The scourge of Takfirism now threatens China as a wave of stabbings and other terrorist attacks have been unleashed. Chinese Uyghurs, a historically Muslim minority within the People’s Republic, have been fighting in Syria against the government alongside Wahabbi terrorists and extremists. China is openly concerned about what could happen when these forces return home. The Council on Foreign Relations, an entity that works closely with the CIA, now openly predicts the rise of anti-Chinese and anti-Russian religious extremism in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

The strategy employed by the Obama administration to attack the Eurasian Bloc is two-fold. First, create a economic problems by dropping oil prices. Secondly, unleash religious extremists to foment chaos and warfare.

Unlike Bush’s direct military attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq, which resulted in high oil prices and widespread contempt for the United States – even among NATO allies – the Obama-CIA strategy is a long-term plan. It is similar to Brzezinski’s strategies during the “détente” of the Carter administration. It is much better for the United States in terms of public relations, and it is much less risky. But the CIA strategy of economic warfare and the use of proxies to attack Eurasia has a key weakness: it’s not very profitable.

Pragmatic Strategy vs. Market Demand

Oil companies are losing money as prices stay low. Furthermore, military spending has become an essential part of the US economy since the end of the Second World War. The stock market is already starting to feel the pain. If the US economy is to continue functioning as usual, oil prices cannot remain low and military adventurism around the world cannot remain off the table.

While it is seems contrary to basic human decency, the economy of the USA needs high prices at the pump and mass slaughter around the world in order to keep functioning. Drone strikes and the militarization of domestic US police departments are not enough. Eventually, the market forces will demand that oil prices and military spending increase.

However, with the Eurasian bloc stronger than ever, the consequences of direct military attack will be much higher than before.

As is reluctantly pointed out by their greatest enemies, Russia and China have not become weaker in the last decade. They have withstood a campaign of economic sabotage and proxy wars against their closest allies. China faces a huge US military build-up all around it with the so-called “Asian pivot” of the US military. Russia has seen its Syrian allies endure half a decade of civil war, as well as the NATO’s enshrinement of the Ultra-Nationalist, Russia hating Kiev regime, right on its border. Despite persistent hostility and provocations, Russia and China continue to get stronger. Xi Jinxing and Vladimir Putin have become more popular, and the political models they have developed are inspiring a wave of independence and anti-liberalism around the world.

Wall Street is determined to break apart the Eurasian bloc, but this is a task that appears to be almost impossible.

With a US presidential election in the near future, the next few months could render some key surprises. The election of Barack Obama was directly precluded by a financial crash. George W. Bush’s presidency was permanently written into the history books by the Sept. 11th attacks, less than year into his administration.

The rise of the Eurasian bloc, made possible by the Marxist-Leninist social revolutions of the 20th century, along with the computer technological revolution which drastically changed global methods of productions, have forced a dramatic shift on the global stage. The world simply cannot function in the old way any longer. The outdated methods of colonizers and profiteers are being terminated. Profits simply cannot stay in absolute command, and a firm hand from society must force economies to function in a rational way.

History rarely unfolds like a fairy tale. The march of social progress can sometimes be slow and dull, while at other times dramatic and terrifying, but it never stops. Human civilization is now enduring a harsh period of radical adjustment, and everyone should be bracing for the ground to shake.

^{1 “Takfiri” is a derogatory term for Muslims who kill other Muslims over religious differences. It is used by Shia revolutionaries to describe wahhabi jihadists who want to slaughter them.} 

Caleb Maupin

Is an American journalist and political analyst. Tasnim News Agency described him as "a native of Ohio who has campaigned against war and the U.S. financial system." His political activism began while attending Baldwin-Wallace College in Ohio. In 2010, he video recorded a confrontation between Collinwood High School students who walked out to protest teacher layoffs and the police. His video footage resulted in one of the students being acquitted in juvenile court. He was a figure within the Occupy Wall Street protests in New York City. Maupin writes on American foreign policy and other social issues. Maupin is featured as a Distinguished Collaborator with The Greanville Post.  READ MORE ABOUT CALEB MAUPIN HERE.

 Cross-posted with New Eastern Outlook.

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Ramzy Baroud, PhD
Truth’s Advocate

Time marches.

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]t the age of 21, I crossed Gaza into Egypt to pursue a degree in political science. The timing could have not been worse. The Iraq invasion of Kuwait in 1990 had resulted in a US-led international coalition and a major war, which eventually paved the road for the US invasion of Iraq in 2003. I became aware that Palestinians were suddenly ‘hated’ in Egypt because of Yasser Arafat’s stance in support of Iraq at the time. I just did not know the extent of that alleged ‘hate.’  

It was in a cheap hotel in Cairo, where I slowly ran out of the few Egyptian pounds at my disposal, that I met Hajah Zainab, a kindly, old custodian who treated me like a son. She looked unwell, wobbled as she walked, and leaned against walls to catch her breath before carrying on with her endless chores. The once carefully-designed tattoos on her face, became a jumble of wrinkled ink that defaced her skin. Still, the gentleness in her eyes prevailed, and whenever she saw me she hugged me and cried.  

Hajah Zainab wept for two reasons: taking pity on me as I was fighting a deportation order in Cairo – for no other reason than the fact that I was a Palestinian at a time that Arafat endorsed Saddam Hussein while Hosni Mubarak chose to ally with the US. I grew desperate and dreaded the possibility of facing the Israeli intelligence, Shin Bet, who were likely to summon me to their offices once I crossed the border back to Gaza. The other reason is that Hajah Zainab’s only son, Ahmad, had died fighting the Israelis in Sinai.  

Zainab’s generation perceived Egypt’s wars with Israel, that of 1948, 1956 and 1967 as wars in which Palestine was a central cause. No amount of self-serving politics and media conditioning could have changed that. But the war of 1967 was that of unmitigated defeat. With direct, massive support from the US and other western powers, Arab armies were soundly beaten, routed at three different fronts. Gaza, East Jerusalem and the West Bank were lost, along with the Golan Heights, the Jordan Valley and Sinai, as well.  

It was then that some Arab countries’ relations with Palestine began changing. Israel’s victory and the US-West’s unremitting support convinced some Arab governments to downgrade their expectations, and expected the Palestinians to do so, as well. Egypt, once the torch-bearer of Arab nationalism, succumbed to a collective sense of humiliation and, later, redefined its priorities to free its own land from Israeli Occupation. Without the pivotal Egyptian leadership, Arab countries were divided into camps, each government with its own agenda. As Palestine, all of it, was then under Israeli control, Arabs slowly walked away from a cause they once perceived to be the central cause of the Arab nation.  

The 1967 war also brought an end to the dilemma of independent Palestinian action, which was almost entirely hijacked by various Arab countries. Moreover, the war shifted the fcus to the West Bank and Gaza, and allowed the Palestinian faction, Fatah, to fortify its position in light of Arab defeat and subsequent division.  

That division was highlighted most starkly in the August 1967 Khartoum summit, where Arab leaders clashed over priorities and definitions. Should Israel’s territorial gains redefine the status quo? Should Arabs focus on returning to a pre-1967 situation or that of pre-1948, when historic Palestine was first occupied and Palestinians ethnically cleansed? 

The United Nations Security Council adopted resolution 242, on November 22, 1967, reflecting the US Johnson Administration’s wish to capitalize on the new status quo: Israeli withdrawal “from occupied territories” in exchange for normalization with Israel.  The new language of the immediate post-1967 period alarmed Palestinians who realized that any future political settlement was likely to ignore the situation that existed prior to the war.  

Eventually, Egypt fought and celebrated its victory of the 1973 war, which allowed it to consolidate its control over most of its lost territories. A few years later, the Camp David accords in 1979 divided the ranks of the Arabs even more and ended Egypt’s official solidarity with the Palestinians, while granting the most populous Arab state a conditioned control over its own land in Sinai. The negative repercussions of that agreement cannot be overstated. However, the Egyptian people, despite the passing of time, have never truly normalized with Israel.  

In Egypt, a chasm still exists between the government, whose behavior is based on political urgency and self-preservation, and a people who, despite a decided anti-Palestinian campaign in various media, are as ever determined to reject normalization with Israel until Palestine is free. Unlike the well-financed media circus that has demonized Gaza in recent years, the likes of Hajah Zainab have very few platforms where they can openly express their solidarity with the Palestinians. In my case, I was lucky enough to run into the aging custodian who cried for Palestine and her only son all those years ago. 

Nevertheless, that very character, Zainab, was reincarnated in my path of travel, time and again. I met her in Iraq in 1999. She was an old vegetable vendor living in Sadr City. I met her in Jordan in 2003. She was a cabby, with a Palestinian flag hanging from his cracked rearview mirror. She was also a retired Saudi journalist I met in Jeddah in 2010, and a Moroccan student I met at a speaking tour in Paris in 2013. She was in her early twenties. After my talk, she sobbed as she told me that Palestine for her people is like a festering wound. “I pray for a free Palestine every day,” she told me, “as my late parents did with every prayer.”  

Hajah Zainab is also Algeria, all of Algeria. When the Palestinian national football team met their Algerian counterparts last February, a strange, unprecedented phenomenon transpired that left many puzzled. The Algerian fans, some of the most ardent lovers of football anywhere, cheered for the Palestinians, non-stop. And when the Palestinian team scored a goal, it was if the bleachers were lit on fire. The crowded stadium exploded with a trancing chant for Palestine and Palestine alone.  

So, did the Arabs betray Palestine? The question is heard often, and it is often followed with the affirmative, ‘yes, they did.’ The Egyptian media scapegoating of Palestinians in Gaza, the targeting and starving of Palestinians in Yarmouk, Syria, the past civil war in Lebanon, the mistreatment of Palestinians in Kuwait in 1991 and, later, in Iraq in 2003 are often cited as examples. Now some insist that the so-called ‘Arab Spring’ was the last nail in the coffin of Arab solidarity with Palestine.  

I beg to differ. The outcome of the ill-fated ‘Arab Spring’ was a massive letdown, if not betrayal, not just of Palestinians but of most Arabs. The Arab world has turned into a massive ground for dirty politics between old and new rivals. While Palestinians were victimized, Syrians, Egyptians, Libyans, Yemenis and others are being victimized, as well.  

There has to be a clear political demarcation of the word ‘Arabs.’ Arabs can be unelected governments as much as they can be a kindly old woman earning two dollars a day in some dirty Cairo hotel. Arabs are emboldened elites who care only about their own privilege and wealth while neither Palestine nor their own nations matter, but also multitudes of peoples, diverse, unique, empowered, oppressed, who happen at this point in history to be consumed with their own survival and fight for freedom.  

The latter ‘Arabs’ never betrayed Palestine; they willingly fought and died for it when they had the chance.  

Most likely, Hajah Zainab is long dead now. But millions more like her still exist and they, too, long for a free Palestine, as they continue to seek their own freedom and salvation.

Ramzy Baroud, PhD

Has been writing about the Middle East for over 20 years. He is an internationally-syndicated columnist, a media consultant, an author of several books and the founder of PalestineChronicle.com. His books include ‘Searching Jenin’, ‘The Second Palestinian Intifada’ and his latest ‘My Father Was a Freedom Fighter: Gaza’s Untold Story’. His website is: www.ramzybaroud.net.

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Foreign laborers work at the construction site of the al-Wakrah football stadium, one of the Qatar’s 2022 World Cup stadiums, on May 4, 2015. AFP PHOTO / MARWAN NAAMANI / AFP / MARWAN NAAMANI

[dropcap]M[/dropcap]igrant labourers working on Qatar’s 2022 football World Cup projects continue to face abuse including forced labour and poor living conditions despite promises by organisers and the state to improve their conditions, according to the Amnesty International rights group.

In a report published on Thursday, Amnesty recorded a list of abuses, including the withholding of passports, the ongoing practice of interest-bearing ‘recruitment’ loans, deception over pay rates and work undertaken, the denial of rights to travel home, and physical and verbal abuse by managers. This amounts to forced labour under international law, according to Amnesty.

One group of Nepali workers told investigators they were refused permission to return home to help family in the aftermath of the devastating earthquakes last April.

The report was based on interviews between February and May last year with 132 migrant workers rebuilding Khalifa stadium for its use in the 2022 tournament.

Every single worker reported some kind of abuse, the NGO said. At that time, Qatari authorities brought in a new version of its “workers’ welfare standards,” which tackled issues including forced labour, working times, recruitment fees and travel rights.

One Nepali man told Amnesty: “My life here is like a prison. The work is difficult, we worked for many hours in the hot sun. When I complained, the manager said ‘there will be consequences. If you want to stay in Qatar be quiet and keep working’.”

Another worker at the Khalifa stadium told Amnesty he would often wait months to be paid. “At the start of 2014 there was no problem, I was getting my monthly pay and sending back money to my wife to cover my recruitment loan and the rent for our house.

As a consequence of the delays in his pay, the man’s family lost their home. “My family is now homeless and two of my younger children have been taken out of school. Every day I am in tension, I cannot sleep at night. This is a torture for me.”

Amnesty said Qatar’s World Cup supreme committee was “struggling” to enforce standards it had introduced in 2014 after an international outcry over the deaths of scores of construction workers in the country, and reports of poor living conditions.

It said that world footballing body FIFA remained “indifferent” to the conditions of workers, and should be encouraged by sponsors and international groups to push Qatar towards a comprehensive reform plan before World Cup construction peaks in mid-2017.

“Essential steps include removing employers’ power to stop foreign employees from changing jobs or leaving the country, proper investigations into the conditions of workers and stricter penalties for abusive companies,” Amnesty said.

“FIFA itself should carry out, and publish, its own regular independent inspections of labour conditions in Qatar.”

“Hosting the World Cup has helped Qatar promote itself as an elite destination to some of the world’s biggest clubs. But world football cannot turn a blind eye to abuse in the facilities and stadiums where the game is played,” said Amnesty’s secretary general, Salil Shetty.

“If FIFA’s new leadership is serious about turning a page, it cannot allow its showcase global event to take place in stadiums built on the abuse of migrant workers.”

“The abuse of migrant workers is a stain on the conscience of world football. For players and fans, a World Cup stadium is a place of dreams. For some of the workers who spoke to us, it can feel like a living nightmare.”

“Despite five years of promises, FIFA has failed almost completely to stop the World Cup being built on human rights abuses.”

“All workers want are their rights: to be paid on time, leave the country if need be and be treated with dignity and respect.”

Amnesty noted that, on returning to Qatar in February 2016, researchers found that some workers had been moved to better accommodation and their passports returned by companies responding to the group’s findings, but other abuses had not been addressed.

The Khalifa stadium is one of Qatar’s flagship 2022 projects (AFP)

In response to the Amnesty report, FIFA said it was working hard with Qatar’s supreme committee to ensure “continuous improvement” in the treatment of workers on World Cup projects.

Spokesman Federico Addiechi said in a letter: “The workers’ welfare standards in place since February 2014 were described by Amnesty as ‘key protections’. The second version of these standards, finalised in February 2016, have been improved with support of various experts and NGOs.

“One of the many improvements that are part of the second edition is the mandatory requirement for all workers to be in possession of their personal documents, such as their passports, and to have a personal safe for storage.

“While constructive criticism is necessary… it is also important to acknowledge progress and improvements.

“We do not agree with the statement in your letter ‘FIFA took no clear, concrete action to prevent human rights abuses of workers’. FIFA has been integrating human rights components in different aspects of its work, not least through the 2014 and 2108 World Cup sustainability strategies.

“While FIFA cannot and indeed does not have the responsibility to solve all societal problems in a host country, FIFA has taken ‘concrete action’ and is fully committed to do its utmost to ensure human rights are respected on all sites and operations related to the World Cup.”

FIFA said Amnesty’s study was made just as the second version of the directive was coming into force.

Qatar’s ministry of foreign affairs stated that labour reform was a “complex issue,” adding that it was working to restrict summer working hours, ban the withholding of passports by employers (punishable by a 25,000 Qatari riyal ($6,867) fine), and signing bilateral agreements with origin countries to stop the practice of recruitment.

It said Qatar’s emir, Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, last October issued “sweeping” reforms on entry, exit and residency requirements. It noted, however, that they had yet to be enacted.

“Our government takes the issues of labour rights and human rights very seriously and is committed to the ongoing, systematic reform.

“New laws have been enacted – and significant efforts have been made to strengthen the enforcement of these laws,” the ministry said in a letter.

“We believe these reforms demonstrate that Qatar is working hard to improve the lives of its guest workers and that steady progress is being made.

“We are well aware that our efforts are a work in progress, and we appreciate the efforts of Amnesty and other NGOs are making to help us identify areas for further improvement.”

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Nauseated by the
vile corporate media?
Had enough of their lies, escapism,
omissions and relentless manipulation?

Andre Vltchek
Itinerant Philosopher and Journalist

Northern city of Tripoli. [By Andre Vltchek – all rights reserved.

It stands on the frontline, facing ISIS in the east and north, a hostile Israel in the south and the deep blue sea to the west. One and a half (1.5) million (mostly Syrian) refugees are dispersed all over its tiny territory. Its economy is collapsing and infrastructure crumbling. The ISIS is right at the border with Syria, literally next door, or even with one foot inside Lebanon, periodically invading, and setting up countless “dormant cells” in all Lebanese cities and all over its countryside. Hezbollah is fighting ISIS, but the West and Saudi Arabia apparently consider Hezbollah, not ISIS, to be the major menace to their geopolitical interests. The Lebanese army is relatively well-trained but badly armed, and like the entire country, it is notoriously cash-strapped.

These days on the streets of Beirut, one can often hear: “Just a little bit more; one more push, and the entire country will collapse, go up in smoke.”

Is this what the West and its regional allies really want?

Top foreign dignitaries, one after another, are now paying visits to Lebanon: the U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon, World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim and the EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini. All the foreign visitors are predictably and abstractly expressing “deep concern” about the proximity of ISIS, and about the fate of the 1.5 million Syrian refugees now living in the Lebanese territory. “The war in the neighboring Syria is having deep impact on tiny Lebanon”, they all admit.

Who triggered this war is never addressed. And not much gets resolved. Very few concrete promises are being made, and what is promised is not being delivered.

One of my sources that attended the closed-door meeting of Ban Ki-moon, Jim Yong Kim and the heads of the U.N. agencies in Beirut, commented: “almost nothing new, concrete or inspiring was discussed there.”

The so-called “international community” is showing very little desire to rescue Lebanon from its deep and ongoing crises. In fact, several countries and organizations are constantly at Lebanon’s throat, accusing it of ‘human rights violations’ and of having a weak and ineffective government. What seems to irritate them the most though, is that Hezbollah (an organization that is placed by many Western countries and their allies in the Arab world on the “terrorist list”) is at least to some extent allowed to participate in running the country.

Hezbollah appears to be the only military force in that region of Lebanon capable of fighting ISIS. It is also the only organization providing a reliable social safety-net to hundreds of thousands of poor Lebanese citizens. In this nation deeply divided along the sectarian lines, it extends its hand to the ‘others’, forging coalitions with both Muslim and Christian parties and movements.

Why so much fuss over Hezbollah?

It is because it is predominantly Shi’a, and Shi’a Muslims are being antagonized and targeted (and sometimes liquidated) by almost all the West’s allies in the Arab world.  Hezbollah is seen as the right hand of Iran, which is Shi’a. Iran with Russia, China, and much of Latin America Western imperialism, and hence, all are demonized and provoked by the Empire and its ‘client’ states.

Hezbollah is closely allied with both Iran and with the Bashar al-Assad’s government in Syria. It combats Israel whenever Israel invades Lebanon, and it wins most of the battles that it is forced to fight. It is openly hostile towards the expansionist policies of the West, Israel and Saudi Arabia; its leaders are extremely outspoken.

“So what?” many people in the region would ask, including those living in Lebanon.

Angie Tibbs is the owner and senior editor of Dissident Voice who has been closely watching events in the Middle East for a number of years. She believes that a brief comparison between events of 2005 and today is essential for understanding the complexity of the situation:

“In a country where, since the end of civil wars in 1990, outward civility masks a still seething underbelly wherein old wounds, old wrongs, real and imagined, have not been forgotten or forgiven, the military and political success of Hezbollah has been the most stabilizing influence. Back in 2005, following the bomb explosion that killed former Premier Rafic al Hariri and 20 others, the US and Israel proclaimed loudly that “Syria did it” without producing a shred of evidence. The Syrian army, in Lebanon at the request of the Lebanese government, was ordered out by the US, and UN Resolution 1559 stated in part that all Lebanese militias must be disarmed. The plan was clear. With Syrian forces gone, and an unarmed Hezbollah, we had two moves which would leave Lebanon’s southern border completely vulnerable, and then — well, what would prevent Israel from barging in and taking over?”

Ms Tibbs is also convinced that the so-called “international community” is leaving Lebanon defenseless on purpose:

“A similar devious scenario is unfolding today. Hezbollah is busy fighting ISIS in Syria; the Lebanese army, though well trained, is poorly armed. Arms deals are being cancelled, the UN and IMF, and, in fact, the world community of nations are not providing any assistance, and little Lebanon is gasping under the weight of a million plus Syrian refugees. It’s a perfect opportunity for ISIS, the proxy army of Israel and the west, to move in and Lebanon’s sovereignty be damned.”

Indignant, several Lebanese leaders are snapping back. The Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil even refused to meet with Ban Ki-moon during his two-day visit of Beirut and the Bekaa Valley.

One of Lebanon’s major newspapers, the Daily Star, reported on March 26th, 2016:

“Foreign Minister Gebran Bassil Saturday accused the international community of approaching the Syrian refugee crisis with a double standard; hours after U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon departed Beirut following a two-day visit.

“They create war, and then call on others to host refugees in line with human rights treaties,” he said in a televised news conference from his residence in Batroun.”

*

Once lavish, the downtown of Beirut – now ready for war. [By Andre Vltchek – all rights reserved.

Dr. Salim Chahine, Professor of Finance, at the American University of Beirut, is usually at least moderately upbeat about his country. However, developments of recent years, have worn his optimism thin.

“Although the Coincident Indicator issued by the Lebanese Central Bank, BDL, has recently suggested a slight enhancement in economic activity, several officials are sending clear warnings about further deterioration of the situation. The regional geopolitical tensions, the civil conflict in Syria, as well as their implications internally have impacted tourism, trade, and the real estate sectors. According to HSBC, deposits from Lebanon’s largest expatriate population – that usually provide the necessary liquidity for government’s borrowing – may grow at a slower rate in the near future given the worsening conditions in the Gulf. As the country enters in its sixth year of economic slump, HSBC remains skeptical about a short-term recovery. The public deficit is currently rising by around 20% per year, and the GDP growth rate is close to zero.”

Yayoi Segi, an educationalist and the Senior Program Specialist for UNESCO’s Arab Regional Office based in Beirut, works extensively in both Syria and Lebanon. The education sector is, according to her, struggling:

“The public education sector is very small in terms of its coverage in the country, reaching only about 35 percent of the school age population. The state allocation to education is less than 10 percent while the world average or benchmark is 18-20 percent.  The situation is further compounded by the currently ongoing crisis in the region whereby Lebanon has had to accommodate a large influx of refugees. The public provision of education has expanded and continues to expand. However, it is impacting on quality and contributes to an increasing number of vulnerable Lebanese students dropping out of school, while it can only reach 50 percent of Syrian refugee children.” 

Nadine Georges Gholam (not her real name), working for one of the UN agencies, says that lately she feels phlegmatic, even hopeless:

“What has been happening to Lebanon particularly these past five years is really depressing. I used to actively take part in protests to voice my anger and frustration. But now I don’t know if they make any difference or change anything at all.  There is no functioning government in sight.  300,000 tons of unprocessed trash accumulated in just 8 months. There is sectarian infighting. Regional conflicts… What else? Lebanon can’t withstand such pressure, anymore. All is going down the drain, collapsing…”

But worse is yet to come. Recently, Saudi Arabia cancelled a US$4 billion aid package for Lebanon. It was supposed to finance the massive purchase of modern weapons from France, something urgently needed and totally overdue. That is, urgently needed if both the West and the KSA are serious about fighting ISIS.

The KSA “punished” Lebanon for having representatives of Hezbollah in the government, for refusing to support the West’s allies in the Arab League (who define Hezbollah as a terrorist group), and for still holding one of Saudi Arabia’s princes in custody, after he attempted to smuggle 2 tons of narcotics from Rafic Hariri International Airport, outside Beirut.

The story of the Saudi prince is truly grotesque but ‘explosive’. Lebanese authorities found some cocaine on board his private jet – most likely for the personal use of his family and friends. But most importantly there was an industrial quantity of Captagon, which is not just some recreational drug intended for the underground nightclubs of the Gulf in general. Nor is it just for the notorious private orgies in Saudi Arabia in particular. It is, as I was told by several local experts, a “drug that makes one extremely brutal; a drug, which destroys all fear. It is a ‘combat narcotic’, which has been given mainly to the ISIS fighters. It could have been destined for Iraq and the ISIS cells there, but most likely the Saudi Prince was carrying it for the Saudi allies in Yemen. Or both… Or most likely, for both.”

Lebanon obviously “crossed the line”. It refused to play by the script painstakingly prepared by the West and its partners. And now it is being slapped, brutally punished, some even say “sacrificed”.

*

These are of course the most dangerous times for this tiny but proud nation. Syrian forces, with the great help of Russia, are liberating one Syrian city after another from ISIS and other terrorist groups supported by Turkey, KSA, Qatar and other Western allies.

ISIS may try to move into Iraq to join its cohorts there, but the Iraqi government is trying to get its act together, and is now ready to fight. It is also talking to Moscow, after studying the great success Russia is having in Syria.

For ISIS, or al Nusrah, a move to the weak and almost bankrupt Lebanon would be the most logical step. And the West, Saudi Arabia and others, are clearly aware of it. In fact, ISIS is already there. It has infiltrated virtually all cities and towns of Lebanon, as well as its countryside. Whenever it feels like it, it carries out attacks against the Shi’a, military and other targets. Both ISIS and al Nusrah do. And the dream of ISIS is blatant: a caliphate with access to the sea, one that would cover at least the northern part of Lebanon.

If the West and its allies do nothing to prevent these plans, it is because they simply don’t want to.

There are several scenarios how the “fall of Lebanon” could occur. The simplest one is this:

Israel could execute another invasion, or even a “mini-incursion” into Lebanon. It periodically does, anyway. And it keeps threatening, warning that it will again. The Lebanese army is too weak to do anything to defend the country. Hezbollah would throw its forces from the battlefield with the ISIS (in the northeast) down to the south. There they would be tied down for at least several weeks. And that would allow the ISIS to move in, across the border, almost unopposed. Dormant cells – “5th columns” – would be immediately activated. The country could collapse within just a few days.

Now Lebanese leaders should be talking to Teheran and Moscow, immediately, while there is still at least some time left to avert absolute disaster. They should be openly asking for help. There are always wide-open channels with Iran. But instead of hosting a delegation that would try to prevent imminent collapse of Lebanon, Russia had to deal with a recent visit of Saad Hariri, former PM and the leader of “Future Movement”; a man who is openly anti-Hezbollah and, like his (assassinated) father Rafic Hariri, a staunch ally of the KSA, and on top of it, a Saudi Arabian citizen!

‘Coincidentally’, Robert Fisk wrote, sarcastically, about Mr. Hariri, for The Independent on 3 March 2016:

The Sunni Lebanese Future Movement’s leader and former Prime Minister, Saad Hariri, is a Saudi citizen – as was his assassinated ex-prime minister father Rafic – and is now quite taken aback by the willful actions of a nation to which he has always given as much allegiance as he has to Lebanon. The Future Movement, it seems, did not try hard enough to ameliorate Lebanon’s official criticism of Saudi Arabia in the Arab League and should have prevented Hezbollah from destabilizing Yemen and Bahrain – even though there is no physical proof that either Hezbollah or Iran have actually been involved in the Yemeni war or the Shi’a revolt against the Bahraini autarchy, where a Sunni king rules over a Shia majority.

Lebanese army stand ready to defend Tripoli. [By Andre Vltchek – all rights reserved.]

Tiny Lebanon is finding itself in the middle of a whirlwind of a political and military storm that is consuming virtually the entire Middle East and the Gulf.

In the last decades, Lebanon has already suffered immensely. This time, if the West and its allies do not change their minds, it may soon cease to exist altogether. It is becoming obvious that in order to survive it would have to forge much closer ties with the Syrian government, as well as with Iran, Russia and China.

Would it dare to do it? There is no united front inside Lebanon’s leadership. Pro-Western and pro-Saudi fractions would oppose an alliance with those countries that are defying Western interests. But time is running out. Just recently, the Syrian city of Palmyra was liberated from ISIS. Paradoxically, the great Lebanese historic cities of Baalbek and Byblos may fall soon.

Andre Vltchek

Philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He covered wars and conflicts in dozens of countries. His latest books are: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire” and “Fighting Against Western Imperialism”. Discussion with Noam Chomsky: On Western Terrorism. Point of No Return is his critically acclaimed political novel. Oceania – a book on Western imperialism in the South Pacific. His provocative book about Indonesia: “Indonesia – The Archipelago of Fear”. Andre is making films for teleSUR and Press TV. After living for many years in Latin America and Oceania, Vltchek presently resides and works in East Asia and the Middle East. He can be reached through his website or his Twitter.

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