Western False Flag Disintegrates: Russia brings witnesses of “staged” Douma attack to OPCW briefing

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No attack, no victims, no chem weapons: Douma witnesses speak at OPCW briefing at The Hague (VIDEO)

RT.com dispatch
Published time: 26 Apr, 2018 16:21 
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Witnesses of the alleged chemical attack in Douma, including 11-year-old Hassan Diab and hospital staff, told reporters at The Hague that the White Helmets video used as a pretext for a US-led strike on Syria was, in fact, staged.

“We were at the basement and we heard people shouting that we needed to go to a hospital. We went through a tunnel. At the hospital they started pouring cold water on me,” the boy told the press conference, gathered by Russia’s mission at the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) in The Hague.

Hassan was among the “victims” seen being washed by water hoses in a video released by the controversial White Helmets group on April 7. The boy and his family later spoke to the media and revealed that Hassan was hurried to the scene by men who claimed that a chemical attack had taken place. They started pouring cold water on the boy and others, filming the frightened children.

“There were people unknown to us who were filming the emergency care, they were filming the chaos taking place inside, and were filming people being doused with water. The instruments they used to douse them with water were originally used to clean the floors actually,” Ahmad Kashoi, an administrator of the emergency ward, recalled. “That happened for about an hour, we provided help to them and sent them home. No one has died. No one suffered from chemical exposure.”

[dropcap]H[/dropcap]alil al-Jaish, a resuscitator who tended to people at the Douma hospital that day, told the press conference that some of the patients had indeed experienced respiratory problems. The symptoms, however, were caused by heavy dust, which engulfed the area due to recent airstrikes, and no one showed any signs of chemical warfare poisoning, al-Jaish said.

The hospital received people who suffered from smoke and dust asphyxiation on the day of the alleged attack, Muwaffak Nasrim, a paramedic who was working in emergency care, said. The panic seen in footage provided by the White Helmets was caused mainly by people shouting about the alleged use of chemical weapons, Nasrim, who witnessed the chaotic scenes, added. No patients, however, displayed symptoms of chemical weapons exposure, he said.

Ahmad Saur, an emergency paramedic with the Syrian Red Crescent, said that the ward he was working at did not receive any patients exposed to chemical weapons on the day of the alleged incident or after it. All the patients needed either general medical care or help with injuries, he said. Saur told journalists he came to speak at The Hague independently of the Red Crescent, and that he was testifying freely and without any pressure.

One reporter asked what would happen to the eyewitnesses and whether they would “stay in Europe to testify.”

“We’re going back home, and see no problem with that. The situation is a lot better now. We’re Douma residents, like many others,” Hassan Ayoun, a doctor with the emergency department, said.

Six of the Douma witnesses brought to The Hague have already been interviewed by the OPCW technical experts, Russia’s permanent representative to the OPCW, Aleksandr Shulgin, said.

“The others were ready too, but the experts are sticking to their own guidelines. They’ve picked six people, talked to them, and said they were 'completely satisfied' with their account and did not have any further questions,” Shulgin revealed. He added that the allegations by “certain Western countries” ahead of the briefing that Moscow and Damascus were seeking to “hide” the witnesses from the OPCW experts did not hold water.

The alleged chemical incident was only supported by the White Helmets’ video and social media reports from militant-linked groups, but the US, the UK and France judged they had enough evidence that it actually took place and launched a series of punitive strikes against Syria on April 14. The US and its allies accused Syrian President Bashar Assad of carrying out the “attack,” without providing any proof of their claim. Notably, the strike came hours before the OPCW fact-finding team was set to arrive in Douma to determine whether chemical weapons had been used there.

The truth was obvious to anyone who understands the players in this tragedy and their motives and national cultures. 

Dateline: PressTV April 19 2019

Appendix
Imperialist crime complicity via propaganda

The Atlantic, a pretentious magazine catering to the upper middle class, is dutiful in its poison injection to support Washington's war aims in the Middle East. Most readers are comfortably clueless (or maybe don't care) they are swallowing propaganda offal. All the photos in this Syria war dossier" come from sources clearly favoring the "rebels" fighting to topple Pres. Assad and making Syria into another Libya. Many of the captions accuse the "Assad regime" of bombing his own people, etc., tropes we see constantly in the Western media's mendacious narrative about the war.

One of the shots, guaranteed to tug at or sensitive hearts, portrays a dead child, victim of government bombardment, we are helpfully told:  "The body of a young Syrian child lies wrapped in a shroud on the floor of a makeshift clinic following Syrian government bombardments in Douma on February 22, 2018.
See the whole filthy dossier here:

https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2018/03/photos-seven-years-of-war-in-syria/555377/

And if you have the energy, and we hope you do, fire a note to the shameless editor, who, being sociopathically shameless, will toss it in the wastebasket, or maybe see it, either way, do try. If you irritate these hypocritical bastards even a little, you have accomplished something.

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ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

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Things to ponder

While our media prostitutes, many Hollywood celebs, and politicians and opinion shapers make so much noise about the still to be demonstrated damage done by the Russkies to our nonexistent democracy, this is what the sanctimonious US government has done overseas just since the close of World War 2. And this is what we know about. Many other misdeeds are yet to be revealed or documented.

Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” — acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump — a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report

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How the Guardian newspaper fulfills George Orwell’s prediction of ‘Newspeak’

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Douma victims—an staged event.

On Sunday April 15th, Britain’s Guardian bannered “OPCW inspectors set to investigate site of Douma chemical attack” and pretended that there was no question that a chemical attack in Douma Syria on April 7th had actually occurred, and the article then went further along that same propaganda-line, to accuse Syria’s Government of having perpetrated it. This ‘news’ story opened [and clarificatory comments from me will be added in brackets]:

UN chemical weapons investigators were set on Sunday to begin examining the scene of a chemical attack in the Syrian city of Douma, which had prompted the joint US, French and British strikes against military installations and chemical weapons facilities near the capital, Damascus.

The arrival of the delegation from the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) came as the Syrian military announced that it had “purified” [no source provided, but this — from 7 March 2018 — is the only source that existed prior to the April 14th missiles-invasion of Syria, and its meaning is very different: https://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=https://sana.sy/fr/%3Fp%3D113016&prev=search] the region of eastern Ghouta, of which Douma is a part, after a two-month campaign that killed nearly 2,000 civilians [no source provided as regards either the number, or that all of them were ‘civilians’ and that none of them were jihadists or “terrorists”], following years of siege.

The propaganda-article continued directly:

“Units of our brave armed forces, and auxiliary and allied forces, completed the purification of eastern Ghouta, including all its towns and villages, of armed terrorist organisations,” the general command statement said.

No source was provided for that, but this sentence is a sly mind-manipulation, because here is what the Syrian Government’s General Command had actually said: “Statement of the Army General Command declaring Eastern Ghouta clear of terrorism” as headlined by the Syrian Government itself.

In other words: the Guardian’s ‘journalist’ had substituted the word “clear” by the word “purify” and did this after having already asserted but not documented, that the Government had just completed “a two-month campaign that killed nearly 2,000 civilians.” When the Syrian Government announces that an area has been “cleared of terrorists (or of terrorism),” the U.S.-allied propagandist uses the word “purify,” such as “purified the region of eastern Ghouta” or “the purification of eastern Ghouta, including all its towns and villages, of armed terrorist organisations.” But by the time that the reader gets there to “purification … of armed terrorist organisations,” the reader has already been indoctrinated to believe that Syria’s Government is trying to “purify” land, or perpetrate some type of ethnic-cleansing. That’s professional propaganda-writing; it is not professional journalism.

Later, the article asserts that, “The OPCW mission will arrive in Douma eight days after the chemical attack, and days after the area fell to the control of Russian military and Syrian government forces. That delay, along with the possibility of the tampering of evidence by the forces accused of perpetrating the attack, raises doubts about what the OPCW’s inspectors might be able to discover.” However, a fierce debate is being waged over whether this was not any real “chemical attack” but instead a staged event by the jihadists in order to draw Trump back into invading Syria. In other words: any journalistic reference yet, at this time, to the event as “the chemical attack” instead of as “the alleged chemical attack” is garbage, just as, prior to the guilty-verdict in a murder trial, no journalistic reference may legitimately be made to the defendant as “the murderer,” instead of as “the defendant.” That is lynch-mob ‘journalism’, which Joseph Goebbels championed.

The Joseph-Goebbels-following ‘journalist’ has thus opened by implying that the Russia-allied Syrian Government is trying to crush a democratic revolution, instead of the truth, that the U.S.-allied Governments are trying to overthrow and replace the Russia-allied Syrian Government. It’s a big difference, between the lie, and the truth.

[dropcap]A[/dropcap]nother story in the April 15th Guardian was “Pressure grows on Russia to stop protecting Assad as US, UK and France press for inquiry into chemical weapons stockpiles” and this one pretended that the issue is for “Russia to stop protecting Assad,” who is the democratically elected and popular President of Syria, and not to stop the invasion of Syria since 2011 by U.S. and Saudi backed foreign jihadists to overthrow him. Furthermore, as regards “press for inquiry into chemical weapons stockpiles,” the real and urgent issue right now is to allow the Organization for the Prevention of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) into Douma to hold an independent and authoritative investigation into the evidence there. Russia pressed for it at the U.N. Security Council and the U.S. and its allies blocked it there. But the OPCW went anyway — even after the U.S.-allied invasion on April 14th — and this courageous resistance by them against the U.S. dictatorship can only be considered heroic. Now that they are there, the remaining jihadists in Douma are firing shots at them to drive them away.

That type of ‘news’-reporting is virtually universal in The West, among the U.S. and its allied governments, which refer to themselves as ‘democracies’ and refer to any Government that they wish to overthrow and replace by their own selected dictator, as ‘dictatorships’, such as these regimes had referred to Iraq in 2003, Libya in 2011, Syria forever, and Ukraine in 2014. It’s Newspeak.

Eric Zuesse, originally posted at strategic-culture.org

About the author

Investigative historian Eric Zuesse is the author, most recently, of They’re Not Even Close: The Democratic vs. Republican Economic Records, 1910-2010, and of CHRIST’S VENTRILOQUISTS: The Event that Created Christianity. Besides TGP, his reports and historical analyses are published on many leading current events and political sites, including The Saker, Huffpost, Oped News, and others.

 

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What will it take to bring America to live according to its own self image?

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FROM TROY TO DAMASCUS: SEEING THE LIGHT

HELP ENLIGHTEN YOUR FELLOWS. BE SURE TO PASS THIS ON. SURVIVAL DEPENDS ON IT.

By Hugh O’Neill, M.A. (Maritime History)

AN ENDANGERED, PRECIOUS CITY The city of Damascus is located in Southern Syria in the Middle East. It is considered to be one of the oldest continually inhabited cities in the world, as there have been excavations showing that it was inhabited as early as 10,000-8,000 B.C. (UNESCO 2016) Damascus was a major city in the past because of its location in the crossroads of Africa, Europe, and Asia. Over the years it has been controlled by several empires including the Roman, Byzantine, Hellenistic, and Islamic empires. What is left today symbolizes the different cultures and how they impacted the city through the years. (Click on image) (1)

War may be defined as the deployment of mass violence to acquire resources of the many to benefit the few. Homer would have us believe that many thousands of Greek heroes left their homes and families for ten years so that King Menelaus could rescue Helen his queen who had been abducted by Paris, son of King Priam of Troy. We also learn from Homer of the cunning of the Greeks with their deception of the wooden horse. Ultimately, Troy was sacked in an orgy of extreme rapine and violence. Such base behaviour had to be given a veneer of honour - hence Homer’s paean to heroic deeds and men as mere playthings of fickle Gods who could be blamed for Man’s extreme passions, his successes and failures, his fate. There is a line from Vergil’s Aeneid, which we can equally apply to Homer’s epics: “I fear the Greeks and the gifts they bear”. Perhaps, Homer’s gift to the Greeks was both deception and self-deception? Never look a wooden gift horse in the mouth?

War may be defined as the deployment of mass violence to acquire resources of the many to benefit the few. Homer would have us believe that many thousands of Greek heroes left their homes and families for ten years so that King Menelaus could rescue Helen his queen who had been abducted by Paris, son of King Priam of Troy.

Troy sits at the Southern entrance to the Dardanelles (the narrow straits connecting the Mediterranean to the Black Sea, the dividing line between Asia and Europe). The Gallipoli Peninsula forms the Northern shore, and the name Gallipoli is from the Greek Kallis Polis (beautiful city). More than 3,000 years after the Hellenic fleet landed at Troy, an army of British Colonials in 1915 stormed the beaches of Gallipoli, but this time, there was no beautiful woman to be rescued. The official reason was to take Turkey out of the war and open up a front behind the Germans. The much less heroic truth however, is that Britain wanted the Ottoman Empire’s vast oil reserves and had already divided the spoils before the ANZAC landings. The ‘heroic’ deeds of Lawrence of Arabia were a complete sham: the British helped the Arab tribes throw off the Ottoman yoke in exchange for the British. The 1916 Sykes-Picot Agreement between Britain and France created vassal states to “divide and rule”.

Oil is essential for mechanized armies to wage wars and its control was the cause of both World Wars, and the current mayhem in the Middle East. Both CIA and MI6 have a long history of covert interference in the democratic process in all the Arab countries to “protect UK/US interests”. The current wars since 9/11 were planned well before that event, and needed only an excuse (“casus belli”) to put “boots on the ground”. It is notable that prior to Britain, US and France uniting in their latest unholy trinity to smite Syria, the ruler of Saudi Arabia visited all 3 capitals carrying his Midas cheque-book, spending billions on armaments to continue his war on Yemen, the poorest of all the Arab states.

Damascus has been fought over throughout its existence because of its strategic value. The story we know best is that of Saul of Tarsus: fresh from the stoning of St. Stephen on the road to Damascus, he was blinded by a great light and a voice from Heaven asking “Saul, Saul. Why persecutest thou me?” When we look back to the stoning of Stephen, we find a story of his trial before the Sanhedrin Court for blasphemy at which false testimony was presented. As Stephen was being stoned, he prayed for his persecutors’ forgiveness: “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do”. One of Moses’ Ten Commandments forbade the bearing of false witness: Fake News, Propaganda and Disinformation is the domain of the CIA.

If we can understand that our own governments lie in pursuit of “national interests” i.e. oil and arms sales, which results in the horrific killing and maiming of millions of innocents, plus thousands of young men duped into killing and dying for their country, then it is clear that our governments’ amorality depends on our gullibility: the same old lie: “Dulce et Decorum est, Pro patria mori”? Democracy is predicated on an “informed” electorate: if all we consume is propaganda, then we cannot make informed choices: “Father forgive them, for they know not what they do”.

Official Histories are unreliable testimony. Truth is often found in fables e.g. the “Emperor’s New Clothes” invites us to see our leaders as they really are. Orwell wrote in his prophetic 1984: “Those who control the present, control the past. Who controls the past, controls the future.” Perhaps Orwell is like Priam’s daughter Cassandra – the gift of prophecy cursed by no-one believing.

(1) See more about Damascus endangerment by Washington's indecent wars.

 

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS

Things to ponder

While our media prostitutes, many Hollywood celebs, and politicians and opinion shapers make so much noise about the still to be demonstrated damage done by the Russkies to our nonexistent democracy, this is what the sanctimonious US government has done overseas just since the close of World War 2. And this is what we know about. Many other misdeeds are yet to be revealed or documented.

Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” — acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump — a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report

 



Freedom Rider: Yaser Murtaja and Marie Colvin

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HELP ENLIGHTEN YOUR FELLOWS. BE SURE TO PASS THIS ON. SURVIVAL DEPENDS ON IT.

By Margaret Kimberley, BAR editor and senior columnist

“The corporate media share in the culpability.”

Yaser Murtaja was a Palestinian journalist acting in his professional capacity when he was murdered by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). He was covering the second Great Return March in Gaza and was clearly identified as press when an Israeli sniper fired a fatal shot.

Yaser Murtaja should not be forgotten. His death must be uppermost in our minds when the Syrian government is accused of deliberately murdering a journalist and is sued for $300 million in a United States court. Marie Colvin was covering the Syrian war in 2012 for the British newspaper The Sunday Times. She was killed when the Syrian army shelled the building where she and others were embedded with the Free Syrian Army, a group committed to regime change. The court filing claims that the Syrian government tracked Colvin’s movement and assassinated her. Ordinarily foreign governments can’t be sued in United States courts but as a designated “terrorist” state the rule does not apply to Syria.

“We are told to believe that President Assad would carry out these attacks on the same day that United Nations inspectors arrive or whenever he is winning on the battlefield.”

War propaganda is the order of the day in the ongoing effort to continue war in Syria. President Bashar Assad has been accused of carrying out chemical weapons attacks against his people ever since the American backed effort began in 2011. We are told to believe that he would carry out these attacks on the same day that United Nations inspectors arrive or whenever he is winning on the battlefield.

The real issue is that Assad is still the president of Syria with the help of his Russian and Iranian allies. He has defeated the terrorists sent to unseat him and he and his allies are forces to be reckoned with. NATO governments know that their people will not support war against his country unless they believe that he is an evil dictator who gasses babies every day.

His opponents are armed with money and contacts at the highest levels of the American and European governments. There is an entire media industry devoted to disparaging him and in so doing making the case for continued war. The White Helmets are a fiction, a creation of al Qaeda, an organization we are otherwise told to hate and fear. Far from being disinterested rescuers the White Helmets are part of the terror network that has nearly destroyed Syria and killed thousands of people. They routinely stage footage of their rescues and of gas attacks but only the leftist media dare to point out that easily provable fact.

“War propaganda is the order of the day in the ongoing effort to continue war in Syria.”

The White Helmets are not alone. Every anti-Assad lie comes with the seal of approval from the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). Despite the grandiose name the SOHR is just one man living in the U.K. named Rami Abdel Rahman. Rahman is a native Syrian who actually hasn’t been inside his homeland in 16 years.

This week the SOHR reports chlorine gas attacks carried out against the civilian population by the Assad government. The moment is very opportune but there is no evidence that the latest reported attack took place at all. The terrorists use these charges to regroup and to be given safe passage so that they may attack another day. The lies are not just propagandistic. They are tools for continuing this horrible conflict.

The corporate media share in the culpability. They have chosen sides and repeat verbatim every outlandish fiction that will make the case for imperialism. None of them allow a counter narrative to see the light of day. There are many knowledgeable people whose expertise would call into question charges of gas attacks and assassinated reporters. But they are disappeared from discourse and casual followers of the news have no idea that they exist.

“The White Helmets are a fiction, a creation of al Qaeda, an organization we are otherwise told to hate and fear.”

The lawsuit in the Marie Colvin case is nothing but war propaganda. Her family will never collect from the Syrian government but that isn’t the point of this case. Is it meant to create a compliant population who will believe anything they are told and not ask questions when the United States starts a hot war with Syria and its Russian and Iranian allies.

Who will file a lawsuit on behalf of Yaser Murtaja? He died covering protests that Palestinians have a right to hold according to international law. But Israel doesn’t need to respect the law because of American financial and military support. If there were justice both of those governments would be sued or better yet their leaders would be tried at the Hague as war criminals.

The Israelis brag that they “know where every bullet lands.” This ghoulish statement is a confession that they knowingly shot and killed a member of the press corps. His family will have no right to sue that government or its patron the United States. There is no hand wringing for Murtaja in the corporate media or from liberals who think themselves humanitarian.

“Israel doesn’t need to respect the law because of American financial and military support.”

Marie Colvin was killed because she was covering a war zone and was embedded with a group devoted to Assad’s overthrow. Ms. Colvin had already lost the sight in one eye after covering another war in Sri Lanka. She knew the risks of her profession and continued to take them. There is no comparison between her death and Murtaja, a man who was trapped in Gaza with 2 million other people and who devoted himself to chronicling their oppression.

Some victims are considered worthy and others are thought to be unworthy. Some are ignored and others are elevated so that the rulers can get away with advocating evil deeds. Of course no one would have died in Syria if Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton hadn’t joined with NATO and monarchy states to destroy another nation after their gruesome success in Libya. Perhaps the next lawsuit should target them and their cronies. That would be true justice.

Appendix


Imperial propaganda by the herd, and the unreliability of supposed "progressive" sources.
Is The Intercept really to be trusted?
The pack is saying Pres. Assad deliberately tracked and murdered an intrepid war correspondent, Marie Colvin. A lawsuit against Syria has been filed in the US

After the Skripal sordid affair—as transparent a Western false flag as any—the imperialist media herd are suddenly trying to muster another uproar, striking in unison to disseminate wide and far their latest fabrication against Bashir al-Assad, this time as a cold-blooded killer of journalists. Thus the Marie Colvin story is suddenly in the news again (was originally reported in July of 2016 by the WaPo, see image), but is being resuscitated precisely at the moment of renewed pressure on Russia and Assad.  Those who pay attention to these things and are not on the pay of the empire know that this kind of thing will continue because it stems from the innermost dynamic and perceived need of an amoral ruling clique that depends on lies to advance its fortunes (literally) in collaboration with their revoltingly ignorant and servile media.

That the fix is in is rather undeniable. Observe how everyone seems to be using almost the same headlines, obviously carefully calibrated for maximum effect. Do a Google search and you'll find literally dozens of such entries on the Internet alone, while print and television presstitutes are contributing their usual load to give further traction to this loathsome fabrication. Amid the noise, the unkindest cut is to find The Intercept, again, among those shouting the loudest. And yet, we also see in the same issue other stories, filed by other reporters who seem to maintain an anti-imperialist viewpoint. What gives? Is this some sort of a trap? The Intercept is not talking, and neither is Glenn Greenwald, the maverick star reporter that first made this outfit famous by striking a deal with billionaire backer Pierre Omidyar, a silicon valley tycoon who struck gold on eBay's IPO.  The deal was, if we are to believe the rumor mill, that Omidyar would provide funding for a truly independent journalistic collective, free from the usual pressures encountered in most corporate media venues. And that supposedly would include him, the boss, yes, no meddling by the owner.  If so, this may have been a fool's errand, or call it a Faustian deal for Greenwald, since it is becoming clear Omidyar is somehow exerting pressure on the editorial mix, perhaps arguing for a "diversification" of viewpoints, that old shibboleth about "objectivity" requiring two different viewpoints, and the rest of that shopworn mythology. Some, including this writer, believe that a mix of stories like this is calculated to create legitimacy and credibility to use the resource successfully later, only on issues that matter the most (to the plutocracy), while sacrificing others that may have no significance, tactically or strategically in the empire's eternal war on truth. —P. Greanville

Insouciant Marie Colvin strolling around in Syria.

BELOW: The Intercept's jarring piece on Colvin, joining the mainstream, nay, lending them credibility. Maybe that's what it's all about. 

The Intercept story (9 April 2018), by Johnny Dwyer and Ryan Gallagher claiming Colvin was murdered to silence her for reporting on war crimes. See The Intercept.

Britain's The Telegraph (among others), giving validity to the same lie.

 

The CIA's own broadsheet, the Washington Post, printed a story on Colvin two years ago, in July of 2016. Her death is now being used to stoke the fires of further war in tormented Syria.

About the author
 Black Agenda report's Senior Editor and Columnist Margaret Kimberley's Freedom Rider column appears weekly at the Black Agenda Report. Kimberley lives in New York City, and can be reached via e-Mail at Margaret.Kimberley (at) BlackAgendaReport.com. She maintains a frequently updated blog as well as at http://freedomrider.blogspot.com. 

 

Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

Degeneracy and Fundamentalism of Western Media Control

HELP ENLIGHTEN YOUR FELLOWS. BE SURE TO PASS THIS ON. BREAKING THE EMPIRE'S MEDIA MONOPOLY IS UP TO YOU.

SAA soldiers with flag

Dedicated to ‘my’ magazine, NEO.

su_dropcap style="light" size="4"]T[/su_dropcap]here is nothing sadder and more pathetic, than a notorious liar shouting, spitting saliva, insulting normal people left and right, while terrorizing those who are telling the truth.

Lately, the West has gone clearly berserk. The more it is scared of losing control over the brains of billions of people in all corners of the world, the more aggressively it is screaming, kicking and making a fool of itself.

It doesn’t even hide its intentions, anymore. The intentions are clear: to destroy all of its opponents, be they in Russia, China, Iran or in any other patriotic and independent-minded state. To silence all the media outlets that are speaking the truth; not the truth as it is defined in London, Washington, Paris or Berlin, but the truth as it is perceived in Moscow, Beijing, Caracas or Teheran; the truth that simply serves the people, not the fake, pseudo-truth fabricated in order to uphold the supremacy of the Western Empire.

Huge funds are now being allocated for the mortal propaganda onslaught, originating predominantly in both London and Washington. Millions of pounds and dollars have been allocated and spent, officially and openly, in order to ‘counter’ the voices of Russian, Chinese, Arab, Iranian and Latin American people; voices that are finally reaching ‘the Others’ – the desolate inhabitants of the ‘global south’, the dwellers of the colonies and neo-colonies; the modern-day slaves living in the ‘client’ states.

The mask is falling down and the gangrenous face of Western propaganda is being exposed. It is awful, frightening, but at least it is what it is, for everyone to see. No more suspense, no surprises. It is all suddenly out in the open. It is frightening but honest. This is our world. This is how low our humanity has sunk. This is the so-called world order, or more precisely, neo-colonialism.

*

The West knows how to slaughter millions, and it knows how to manipulate masses. Its propaganda has always been tough (and repeated a thousand times, not unlike corporate advertisements or the WWII fascist indoctrination campaigns) when it originates in the United States, or brilliantly Machiavellian and lethally effective when coming from the United Kingdom. Let us never forget: the U.K. has been murdering and enslaving hundreds of millions of innocent and much more advanced human beings, for many long centuries and all over the world. Due to its talent in brainwashing and manipulating the masses, Great Britain has been getting away with countless genocides, robberies and even managing to convince the world that it should be respected and allowed to retain both a moral mandate and the seat at the U.N. Security Council.

The Western regime knows how to lie, shamelessly but professionally, and above all, perpetually. There are thousands of lies piling up on top of each other, delivered with perfect upper-class ‘educated’ accents: lies about Salisbury, about Communism, Russia, China, Iran, Venezuela, Cuba, North Korea, Syria, Yugoslavia, Rwanda, South Africa, Libya, refugees. There are lies about the past, present and even about the future.

Nobody is laughing, seeing such imperialist thugs like the U.K. and France preaching, all over the world and with straight face, about both freedom and human rights. Not laughing, yet. But many are slowly getting outraged.

People in the Middle East, Africa, Asia and Latin America are beginning to realize that they have been fooled, cheated, lied to; that the so called ‘education’ and ‘information’ coming from the West have been nothing else other than shameless indoctrination campaigns. For years I worked on all continents, compiling stories and testimonies about the crimes of imperialism, and about the awakening of the world, ‘summarized’ in my 840-page book: “Exposing Lies Of The Empire”.

Millions can now see, for the first time, that media outlets such as BBC, DW, CNN, Voice of America, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, have been encoding them mercilessly and thoroughly, for years and decades. Reuters, AP, AFP and several other Western press agencies, have managed to create a uniformed narrative for the entire planet, with local newspapers everywhere in the world now publishing identical fabrications that originate from Washington, London, Paris and other Western capitals. Totally false pictures about such important subjects as the Soviet Union, Communism, China, but also freedom and democracy, have been engraved into billions of human brains.

The main reason for the opening of the eyes of people of the world which is still oppressed by Western imperialism, is, the relentless work of media outlets such as the Russian-based New Eastern Outlook (NEO), RT and Sputnik, as China-based CGTN, China Radio International and China Daily, Venezuela-based TeleSur, Lebanese Al-Mayadeen, and Iranian Press TV. Of course, there are many other proud and determined anti-imperialist media outlets in various parts of the world, but the above-mentioned ones are the most important vehicles of the counter-propaganda coming from the countries that fought for their freedom and simply refused to be conquered, colonized, prostituted and brainwashed by the West.

One mighty anti-imperialist coalition of truly independent states has been forming and solidifying. It is now inspiring billions of oppressed human beings everywhere on Earth, giving them hope, promising a better, optimistic and just future. Standing at the vanguard of many positive changes and expectations is the ‘new media’.

And the West is watching, horrified, desperate and increasingly vitriolic. It is willing to destroy, to kill and to crush, just in order to stop this wave of ‘dangerous optimism’ and strive for true independence and freedom.

*

There are now constant attacks against the new media of the free world. In the West, RT is being threatened with expulsion, brilliant and increasingly popular New Eastern Outlook (NEO) came just recently under vicious cyber-attack from, most likely, professional Western hackers. TeleSur is periodically crippled by sanctions shamefully unleashed against Venezuela, and the same banditry is targeting Iranian Press TV.

You see, the West may be responsible for billions of ruined lives everywhere in the world, but it is still faces no sanctions, no punitive actions. While countries like Russia, Iran, China, Cuba, DPRK or Venezuela have to ‘face consequences’ mainly in the form of embargoes, sanctions, propaganda, direct intimidation, even military bullying, simply for refusing to accept the insane Western global dictatorship, and for choosing their own form of the government and political as well as economic system.

The West simply doesn’t seem to be able to tolerate dissent. It requires full and unconditional obedience, an absolute submission. It acts as both religious fundamentalist and a global thug. And to make things worse, its citizens appear to be so programmed or so indifferent or both, that they are not capable of comprehending what their countries and their ‘culture’ are doing to the rest of the world.

*

When being interviewed, I am often asked: “is the world facing real danger of WWIII?”

I always reply “yes”. It is because it appears that both North America and Europe are unable to stop forcing the world into obedience and to virtual slavery. They appear to be unwilling to accept any rational and democratic arrangement on our Planet. Would they sacrifice one, tens or hundreds of millions of human beings, just in order to retain control over the universe? Definitely they would! They already have, on several occasions, without thinking twice, with no regret and no mercy.

The gamble of the Western fundamentalists is that the rest of the world is so much more decent and much less brutal, that it could not stomach yet another war, another carnage, another bloodbath; that it rather surrenders, rather gives up all its dreams for a much better future, instead of fighting and defending itself against what increasingly appears to be an inevitable Western military attack.

*

Such calculations and ‘hopes’ of the Western fanatics are false. Countries that are now being confronted and intimidated are well aware what to expect if they give up and surrender to Western insanity and imperialist designs.

People know, they remember what it is like to be enslaved.

Russia under Yeltsin, collapsed, being plundered by Western corporations, being spat at, in the face, by the European and North American governments; its life expectancy dropped to sub-Saharan African levels.

China survived unimaginable agony of “humiliation period’, being ransacked, plundered and divided by French, British and the U.S. invaders.

Iran robbed of its legitimate and socialist government, having to live under a sadistic maniac, the Western puppet, the Shah.

The entire ‘Latin’ America, with its open veins, with ruined culture, with Western religion forced down its throat; with literally all democratically-elected socialist and Communist governments and leaders either overthrown, or directly murdered, or at least manipulated out of power by Washington and its lackeys.

North Korea, survivor of a beastly genocide against its civilians, committed by the U.S. and its allies in the so-called Korean War.

Vietnam and Laos, raped and humiliated by the French, and then bombed to the stone ages by the U.S. and its allies.

South Africa… East Timor… Cambodia…

There are living carcasses, decomposing horrid wrecks, left after the Western deadly ‘liberating’ embraces: Libya and Iraq, Afghanistan and Honduras, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of Congo, to name just a few. These are serving as warnings to those who still have some illusions left about the Western ‘good will’ and spirit of justice!

Syria… Oh Syria! Just look what the West has done to a proud and beautiful country which refused to fall on its knees and lick Washington’s and London’s feet. But also, look how strong, how determined those who truly love their country can be. Against all odds, Syria stood up, it fought foreign-backed terrorists, and it won, surrounded and supported by the great internationalist coalition! The West thought it was triggering yet another Libyan scenario, but instead, it encountered an iron fist, nerves of steel, another Stalingrad. Fascism was identified, confronted and stopped. At an enormous cost, but stopped!

The entire Middle East is watching.

The entire world is watching.

People now see and they remember. They are beginning to remember clearly what happened to them. They are starting to understand. They are emboldened. They clearly comprehend that slavery is not the only way to live their lives.

*

The Anti-Western or more precisely, anti-imperialist coalition is now solid like steel. Because it is one great coalition of victims, of people who know what rape is and what plunder is, and what thorough destruction is. They know precisely what is administered by the self-proclaimed champions of freedom and democracy – by the Western cultural and economic fundamentalism.

This coalition of independent and proud nations is here to protect itself, to protect each other, as well as the rest of the world.

It will never surrender, never back up. Because the people have spoken and they are sending clear messages to their leaders: “Never again! Do not capitulate. Do not yield to the Western intimidations. We will fight if attacked. And we will stand, proudly, on our own feet, no matter what, no matter what brutal force we have to face. Never on our knees, comrades! We will never again fall to our knees in front of those who are spreading terror!”

And the media in these wonderful countries that are resisting Western imperialism and terror is spreading countless optimistic and brave messages.

And the Western establishing is watching and shaking and soiling its pants.

It knows the end of its brutal rule over the world is approaching. It knows those days of impunity are ending. It knows the world will soon judge the West, for the centuries of crimes it has been committing against humanity.

It knows that the media war will be won by ‘us’, not by ‘them’.

The battlefield is being defined. With some bright exceptions, the Westerners and their media outlets are closing ranks, sticking to their masters. Like several other writers, I had been unceremoniously kicked out from Counterpunch, one of the increasingly anti-Communist, anti-Russian, anti-Syrian and anti-Chinese U.S.-based publications. From their point of view, I was writing for several ‘wrong’ publications. I am actually proud that they stopped publishing me. I am fine where I am: facing them, as I am facing other mass-circulation media outlets of the West.

The extent of Western ideological control of the world is degenerate, truly perverse. Its media and ‘educational’ outlets are fully at the service of the regime.

But the world is waking up and confronting this deadly cultural and political fundamentalism.

A great ideological battle is on. These are exciting, bright times. Nothing could be worse than slavery. Chains are being broken. From now on, there will be no impunity for those who have been torturing the world for centuries.

Their lies, as well as their armor, will be confronted and stopped! 

About the Author
 Andre Vltchek is philosopher, novelist, filmmaker and investigative journalist. He’s a creator of Vltchek’s World in Word and Images, a writer of revolutionary novel Aurora and several other books. He writes especially for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”
https://journal-neo.org/2018/04/08/degeneracy-and-fundamentalism-of-western-media-control/ [/su_box]

 

Parting shot—a word from the editors
The Best Definition of Donald Trump We Have Found

In his zeal to prove to his antagonists in the War Party that he is as bloodthirsty as their champion, Hillary Clinton, and more manly than Barack Obama, Trump seems to have gone “play-crazy” -- acting like an unpredictable maniac in order to terrorize the Russians into forcing some kind of dramatic concessions from their Syrian allies, or risk Armageddon.However, the “play-crazy” gambit can only work when the leader is, in real life, a disciplined and intelligent actor, who knows precisely what actual boundaries must not be crossed. That ain’t Donald Trump -- a pitifully shallow and ill-disciplined man, emotionally handicapped by obscene privilege and cognitively crippled by white American chauvinism. By pushing Trump into a corner and demanding that he display his most bellicose self, or be ceaselessly mocked as a “puppet” and minion of Russia, a lesser power, the War Party and its media and clandestine services have created a perfect storm of mayhem that may consume us all.— Glen Ford, Editor in Chief, Black Agenda Report