Gordon Duff

I recently returned from the Terrorism and Religious Extremism Conference in Damascus. While there, I had the opportunity to meet with Syrian militia leaders. What they had to tell me and show me confirmed some of my suspicions. I already knew that the United States had trained at least 3000 ISIS “cadre” leaders at camps in Jordan. Colonel Jim Hanke US Army Special Forces (ret) had accompanied me and spoke of this during the conference.

However, the militia leaders brought evidence. They had photographed not only ISIS dead but their identity papers as well. One group of 74 killed in fighting near Kobani included 15 Ukrainians and 8 Chechens. Others included fighters from Saudi Arabia, Yemen but the rest were from North Africa. There was no gloating over the dead despite the fact the exchange took place in a restaurant at the Damas Rose, a government owned hotel in Syria. There was a sadness, a solemnity about this as even ISIS dead, reputed to be mass murderers, looked no different than others, all young, bearded though many distinctly European.

What was surprising was the lack of curiosity as to how any of these fighters had gotten into Syria in the first place. I had travelled through Lebanon, was picked up by security at the airport and, on the way to Damascus, stopped many times at military checkpoints and subjected to 4 hours of background checks at remote border crossings. Even inside Syria it took hours to get clearance despite carrying a letter from the Minister of Justice.

Simply put, jihadists don’t just walk through Lebanon. This leaves only two possibilities, they travel through Turkey, something more than obvious or they receive transit across Israel. A cursory examination of the geography of the region leaves only two other remote possibilities. One is that they manage to cross the Red Sea like Moses or they are flown in somehow, magically passing through airport security checkpoints all overseen by Interpol, America’s Department of Homeland Security and NATO financed security forces.

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Gordon Duff

The United States Army, operating from a secret base in Arizona, has declared war on independent media through hacking, blocking communications and sabotaging both radio broadcasts.

Computer security teams working with Veterans Today traced a pattern of attacks to Fort Huachuca, headquarters of the US Army Intelligence School.

This base, in the tiny town of Sierra Vista, Arizona, just north of the Mexican border, is home, not only to this spying operation but also to America’s drone program as well. Every drone attack begins there, with “pilots” trained at Fort Huachuca and drones developed and tested there.

The attacks on independent news and media organizations were discovered when a number of websites, not just Veterans Today, began noting unusual traffic patterns and clumsy hacking attempts. Security software traced these attacks to Fort Huachuca and to a number of local police computer systems around the US.

At Fort Huachuca, the internet censorship, operating to block websites worldwide that report news unfavorable to some US policies or that are critical of Israel, a pattern clearly recognized, was traced to commands tasked with training “Cyber Warfare” specialists. These training classes, funded by Congress and paid for by the American people, are intended to protect government computer systems from attacks by unfriendly governments and terror organizations.

In reality however there are other issues as well. America protects her secrets but those secrets are, more often than not, how the American government violates America’s laws. The Cyber Warfare specialists of Fort Huachuca, operating well outside the authority of the US Constitution, censor the internet, run “sock puppet” websites spreading propaganda and disinformation, orchestrate smear campaigns against journalists and activists who are not under total control and use electronic countermeasures to silence freedom of speech.

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Stephen Lendman

Post-9/11, Washington declared war on Islam. Islamophobia facilitates war on terror policy. Muslims became public enemy number one. Imperial wars followed. Endless direct and proxy ones continue. Others are planned.

Dehumanizing Islam violates core US beliefs about religious freedom and respecting all faiths equally. America only respects money power and imperial dominance.

It targets anyone challenging its quest for global hegemony. Millions of corpses attest to its resolve. They're strewn across North Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and other parts of the world without end. Their numbers increase daily.

The business of America is war, imperial dominance, and corporate empowerment. Ravaging one country after another follows. Fear is created and manipulated to facilitate what should be condemned. Where it ends who knows. Perhaps a mushroom-shaped cloud future awaits.

Muslims know America's dark side best. It victimizes them daily. Millions died since Gulf War mass killings ignited nearly 22 years of genocidal slaughter.

They've been mercilessly targeted for praying to the wrong God. They're used for political advantage. They're pretexts for permanent wars. They're ongoing with no end in sight.

Media scoundrels misreport or ignore them. Attacks on US Cairo and Benghazi diplomatic missions made headlines and ignited rage. Capitol Hill flags were ordered lowered to half mast. US Libyan ambassador Chris Stevens and three members of his staff were killed. Millions of dead Muslims go unnoticed.

Stevens previously was Obama's representative to America's puppet Libyan National Transition Council. It helped Washington and NATO partners ravage the country mercilessly.

They're responsible for killing tens of thousands of civilians, causing widespread destruction, leaving countless numbers homeless, displaced, and impoverished, as well as ending cherished social programs Gaddafi instituted.

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Stephen Lendman

Washington and Israel wage dirty covert wars. Iran's been targeted for years. Imperial aims are prioritized. Rule of law principles don't matter. Israel wants sole regional dominance. America wants it globally. Lawless tactics continue. They include cyber attacks, other sabotage, targeted assassinations, deadly explosions, sophisticated satellite, drone, and other spying, bogus accusations, a virtual blockade, hostile saber rattling, multiple rounds of sanctions, and attempts to cripple its central bank and oil industry. In addition, relentless anti-Iranian propaganda substitutes malicious misinformation and bald-faced lies for accuracy and truth.

At issue is Iranian independence. The Islamic Republic threatens no one. Its nuclear program is peaceful. It seeks cooperative international relations. It wants its sovereign rights respected. However, belligerence is America's option of choice. Regime change is planned. It wants pro-Western governments replacing independent ones. Peace and stability are sabotaged. Pretexts are created. One war follows another. After Syria comes Iran.

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Gordon Duff

Slowly, every police department in the United States, at the behest of the Department of Homeland Security, is being trained by Israeli groups.

As part of this training, there is an increased move to use of military uniforms, armored vehicles, heavy weapons, illegal surveillance, lying to the people, press and courts and systematic interference in the electoral system. - They are becoming “Israeli.”

The door to this foreign influence in America was thrown open by the Department of Homeland Security and, in particular, Michael Chertoff, an Israeli citizen who was, in particular, most instrumental as former Director of DHS in implementing policies challenged as unconstitutional, policies the new “Israeli trained” American police are tasked with stopping opposition to.

“Israelization” of American police is a simple process:

■ Total militarization of police, military tactics, utter disrespect for civil law, the constitution, civil liberties, freedom of speech and the unbridled growth of centralized power under unlimited corruption; government by money and organized crime.
■ Systematic suppression of dissent
■ Systematic use of intimidation to control the electoral process at every level of government
■ Seamless coordination with military and “internationalist” groups to prepare for mass internment of sectors of the population, numbering in the millions
■ Coordinated use of full military power including but not limited to bombing, strafing, heavy artillery and summary executions, the same methods Israel uses on a daily basis
■ Even more control of the press, based on the Israeli model, with two “controlled” views, on pro-government and the second, “controlled opposition.”

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Roger Tucker

The recent open letter Granting No Quarter: A Call for the Disavowal of the Racism and Antisemitism of Gilad Atzmon, apparently written by Ali Abunimah, has come as a shock to many people, including yours truly. Not only have the Zionists colonized Palestine and subjected them to a permanent campaign of genocide, but as anyone who has been paying attention knows, they have colonized the Western democracies, turning them into obedient puppets. Now it appears that they have also colonized the Palestine Solidarity movement.

At the end of this essay are links to a number of responses supporting Atzmon and what he stands for. These cover the ground pretty well, but I’d like to add a critical look at the language used by Abunimah et al and some of the notions underlying such terminology. I’ll start with the title itself, which begins with the curious phrase “Granting No Quarter.” The phrase is familiar to anyone who has read books or seen films based on British naval warfare set in the 18th or early 19th centuries. - this is as extreme as it gets. This from a group of mostly Palestinian supporters of the Palestinian struggle against Israel in opposition to another such supporter. That is sufficiently mind-boggling in itself, but Ali Abunimah, and I would assume at least some of his fellow signatories, are also supporters of One Democratic State as the solution to the basic conflict in the Middle East, as is Atzmon. Some fundamental and portentous difference, beyond a mere dispute about strategy or tactics, must be responsible for such a total and uncompromising attack on a seemingly close ally. It allows for no debate, no compromise – no quarter offered or accepted.

Some observers have implied that Ali & Co. have actually gone over to the enemy, or may have been Zionist agents from day one, and that the Jewish members of these Solidarity groups are acting as their handlers. For the sake of argument, I’m going to assume that is not so, that they are perfectly sincere in considering themselves loyal to the Palestinian cause as they conceive it. Looking at the signatories of the Letter we find some successful academics, Abunimah and Massad being the most prominent. They have prospered as unofficially sanctioned spokesmen for the Palestinian cause in the US and have no incentive to rock the boat. If they presented any perceived danger to tribal Jewry, they would likely find themselves on the street, as has happened to a number of academics, many of them Jewish, who have dared to challenge the predominant Jewish narrative. This points to a simple motivation based on economic and professional self-interest, but I believe there’s more to it than that.

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Gilad Atzmon

I learned last night from an Israeli online journal, that two days before the Utøya Island massacre, AUF’s (Labour Party's youth movement) leader Eskil Pedersen gave an interview to the Dagbladet, Norway's second largest tabloid newspaper, in which he unveiled what he thinks of Israel.

In the course of the interview, Pedersen stated that he “believes the time has come for more drastic measures against Israel, and (that he) wants the Foreign Minister to impose an economic boycott against the country.”

Pedersen went on to say, “The peace process goes nowhere, and though the whole world expect Israel to comply, they do not. We in Labour Youth will have a unilateral economic embargo of Israel from the Norwegian side.”

The AUF Labour Party Youth Movement have been devoted promoters of the Israel Boycott campaign, the newspaper Dagbladet reporting that

“The AUF has long been a supporter of an international boycott of Israel, but the decision at the last congress, demands that Norway imposes a unilateral economic embargo on the country and it must be stricter than before.” “I acknowledge that this is a drastic measure”, [stated Pedersen,] “but I think it gives a clear indication that we are tired of Israel's behaviour, quite simply”.

Yesterday we also learned that mass-murderer Anders Behring Breivik was openly enthusiastic about Israel. According to a variety of internet outlets, Behring Breivik was a regular poster on several Norwegian internet sites, notably the blog Document.no, which is run by Hans Rustad, a former left-wing journalist. Hans Rustad is Jewish, extremely pro-Zionist, and warns against ‘Islam-isation’, violence, and other social problems he assumes to be connected with Muslim immigration.

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Silvia Cattori
Silvia Cattori's Blog

Jazz saxophonist Gilad Atzmon has a blog where he denounces the policy of his country of origin, Israel. He is not afraid to bluntly tell what he regards to be the truth. He is impervious to the concept of self-censorship. He tells here how little respect he has for the Western press. (*)

Silvia Cattori: Your political analyses, translated into dozen languages [1], reach a wide readership on the web. For whom exactly do you write?

Gilad Atzmon: I write mainly to myself. I try to understand the world around me. A few years ago, I understood that a lot of people out there are interested in the thoughts I indulge myself with, so I started to let other people have access into my boiling destructive mind.

Silvia Cattori: At a time when the press has reached its lowest point ever, are you among those who still continue to read newspapers?

Gilad Atzmon: No, for many years I do not buy newspapers, because I am interested in Middle East, and the mainstream media has very little to offer on that front. Probably the only expert within the British or even English-speaking media press is Robert Fisk. If I want to know what happens in the Middle East I go to “Counterpunch”, “Information Clearing House”, “Veterans Today”, “Rense.com”, “Uprooted Palestinian”, “PalestineTelegraph”, “Palestine Chronicle”, “Dissident Voice”, “Uruknet”, and other great sites. Our websites and blogs are far more informative than the mainstream media. We are the experts. We are becoming the main source of information. I see how many people are coming to visit my site. If there is a crisis in Gaza for instance, they want to see what Gordon Duff, Ramzy Baroud, Alan Hart, Israel Shamir, Alex Cockburn, Ali Abunimah have to say about it. I have zero respect for the mainstream media. And if the mainstream media wishes to survive, it had better move on quickly, otherwise it is finished.

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Bruce G. Richardson
Dawat Independent Media Center (DIMC)

Tora Bora: For some time, rumors continue to circulate that Osama bin Laden has passed-away due to organ failure during December of 2010. Witnesses have since come forth to report and attest to the fact that they had attended his funeral. Though difficult to corroborate, Osama bin Laden’s medical history suggests a very strong possibility that he has indeed passed on, an event which would render U.S. justification for war, null and void.

Thanks to an obsessive and biased media, who function as the title of a new book suggests, as The Piano Player in the Brothel, and combined with a majority of ill-informed, anti-Islamic Members of Congress; bin Laden has heretofore been cast as a religious zealot and threat to the continued existence of a Christian, democratic world. As the alleged mastermind and architect of the September 11, 2001 attack on America, Osama bin Laden has surfaced as America’s primary justification for war on Afghanistan.

The world has long been aware of bin Laden’s critical, life-threatening kidney disease, disease that requires ongoing, daily organ-dialysis therapy to sustain life. The problems inherent in dialysis are legion: Infection as a result of an unsustainable, bacteria-free treatment environment, are just two of a multitude of problems that may be encountered by attending physicians. The United States Government contends that Osama bin Laden is in hiding in the rugged, mountainous regions of Paktia Province. Yet on examination, the logistical problems inherent in providing such a high degree of medical sophistication and technology required for this treatment in a hostile and mountainous locale, render such statements as self-serving and suspect. If this rendition were indeed factual, where and how would attending medical personnel, transport heavy, fragile equipment into the mountains, create a bacteria-free environment, safe from an armada consisting of an American ground and air posse in hot pursuit, and then have the capability to generate an uninterrupted electrical power source critically necessary for the dialysis equipment to perform properly? The improbability if not impossibility of such a logistical nightmare is mind numbing. When faced with the facts, the U.S. Government’s rendition of events that justifies and led to a war against a people that posed no threat to the country and played absolutely no role in 9/11, defies credibility and logic.

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Gordon Duff
Veterans Today

We Know They Know But They Don't Care

This week, most members of congress, 100% of the new “Tea Party,” swore allegiance to the State of Israel. To those of us at Veterans Today, we have a problem with this. We have never been all that enthusiastic about Congress in the first place. They are a gutless bunch who feather their own nests, finance their campaigns with laundered drug money and have turned Washington into a modern day Gomorrah, a city of rent boys and call girls.

We have a few issues to pick with Israel.

There is no way any loyal member of the United States military or veteran of its services is likely to “kiss and make up” with Israel until we receive an official apology for the attack on the USS Liberty. Even the “official” veterans organizations, generally a gutless bunch made up of the same spineless sycophants as congress, have spoken up on this one.

Our next issue is 9/11. We know Israel was involved in a major way though there is no way Israel alone could have ordered NORAD to ground its planes. We know members of all key committees in Congress were given a “top secret” briefing on 9/11 and told the following things:

● The World Trade Center was destroyed, not by planes but because of a “national security issue” in order to “save lives.”
● The attack on the Pentagon was not the hijacked aircraft claimed but a different cause that is “classified.”
● The subsequent attacks on Afghanistan and Iraq were necessary for the US to maintain control of energy resources to prevent economic collapse.
● Israel “assisted” the United States on 9/11 and may “appear” culpable but was not.

These things are childish lies, of course. The perverts, cowards and gullible rubes that make up congress, one of the most corrupt institutions on earth, were beaming with self importance, having been briefed on a great conspiracy. After all, many members of congress went to college, some to law school, and are much more deserving and certainly much more important than “normal people.” We call this condition “malignant narcissism.”

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