Al Jazeera News interviews Jeremy Scahill, best-selling author of Blackwater and Dirty Wars, about his recent whistleblower-sourced story "The Assassination Complex" on The Intercept which begins "From his first days as commander in chief, the drone has been President Barack Obama's weapon of choice, used by the military and the CIA to hunt down and kill the people his administration has deemed — through secretive processes, without indictment or trial — worthy of execution."

It is extraordinary to look back at Western Cold War propaganda; the scaremongering posters and films in which America is under attack from a vast alien force abroad and undercover agents at home. Very few intelligent people today would accept this propaganda as an accurate representation of reality. It is easy to see in hindsight that much Cold War propaganda was designed to create a climate of fear domestically and drum up support for overseas militarism.

Nevertheless, one of the most profoundly depressing things about the British press today is how uncritically it parrots the official line when it comes to foreign policy. Since the Ukrainian crisis, the British media seem to have killed off their critical faculties and burned the remains for good measure. Even intelligent analysts and commentators have forgotten the lessons of the Cold War and have so easily slipped back into a pale imitation of a Cold War narrative.

When it comes to the coverage of Russian bombing in Syria, however, the British media have surpassed themselves. The reporting on Russian airstrikes in Syria has ranged from the idiotic to the dishonest to the frankly astonishing. A headline in The Times a few weeks ago read 'Putin defies the West!'. Clearly, Putin didn't get the memo that Russian foreign policy is now controlled in Brussels and Washington.

It is hard to sympathize

Some U.S. official is whining because his flock of bastards gets hurt:

"Putin is deliberately targeting our forces," a U.S. official, who is disappointed in the U.S. response to Russia, told Fox News.

"Our guys are fighting for their lives," said the official, estimating up to 150 CIA-trained moderate rebels have been killed by the Russians.

"Our forces", "our guys" - hmm. The official is referring to the CIA-mercenaries who are fighting under al-Qaeda's command:

Advancing alongside the Islamist groups, and sometimes aiding them, have been several of the relatively secular groups, like the Free Syrian Army, which have gained new prominence and status because of their access to the TOWs.

Even in smaller quantities, the missiles played a major role in the insurgent advances that eventually endangered Mr. Assad's rule. While that would seem like a welcome development for United States policy makers, in practice it presented another quandary, given that the Nusra Front was among the groups benefiting from the enhanced firepower.

It is a tactical alliance that Free Syrian Army commanders describe as an uncomfortable marriage of necessity, because they cannot operate without the consent of the larger and stronger Nusra Front.

The "official" should go to jail for, at least, indirectly arming and supporting the terrorists of Jabhat al-Nusra aka al-Qaeda in Syria.

If you are Palestinian, expect to be killed by Israeli forces at any time, even if you are an Israeli citizen. Reasons for the killing are not important. It is enough to be Palestinian in order for soldiers or police to feel that your death is trivial, especially considering that individuals are rarely, if ever, held accountable. To justify the killing, members of the Israeli forces may simply claim that the attacker tried to stab someone. Claims are not disputed by their superiors or anyone in government, irrespective of evidence to the contrary provided by human rights organizations, including international ones.

Attacking someone with a knife can be dangerous. However, in most of the recent cases in which Palestinians were killed, lives were not under immediate threat, justifying the use of lethal force. Under the UN Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement Officials of 1979: "[T]he use of firearms is considered an extreme measure. Every effort should be made to exclude the use of firearms." The UN Basic Principles on the Use of Force and Firearms by Law Enforcement Officials similarly affirm, "intentional lethal use of firearms may only be made when strictly unavoidable in order to protect life." Accordingly, the extrajudicial killings, like the ones regularly taking place against Palestinians, are in violation of international standards.

Omar Robert Hamilton compiled a list of Israel's actions since the Gaza ceasefire at the LRB blog two weeks ago. The catalog has obviously gotten much longer in the interim, but this list is a poetic reminder of the power imbalance in a conflict that is treated so often in the U.S. as mutual. I excerpt about half of Hamilton's catalog. Full list at the link:

On 26 August a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas was agreed, bringing a fragile end to a war that killed 2150 Palestinians (mostly civilians) and 73 Israelis (mostly soldiers). Since then Hamas has not fired a single rocket, attacked an Israeli target, or done anything to break the terms of the ceasefire. In the last month, Israel has done the following:

1. Annexed another 1500 acres of West Bank land
2. Seized $56 million of PA tax revenue...
3. Killed a 22-year-old, Issa al Qatari, a week before his wedding
4. Killed 16-year-old Mohammed Sinokrot with a rubber bullet to the head
5. Tortured a prisoner to the point of hospitalisation
6. Refused 13 members of the European Parliament entry into Gaza
7. Detained at least 127 people across the West Bank, including a seven-year-old boy in Hebron and two children, aged seven and eight, taken from the courtyard of their house in Silwad - and tear-gassed their mother
8. Continued to hold 33 members of the Palestinian Legislative Council in prison
9. Continued to hold 500 prisoners in administrative detention without charge or trial...
10. Continued building a vast tunnel network under Jerusalem
11. Stormed the al Aqsa mosque compound with a group of far right settlers
12. Assisted hundreds of settlers in storming Joseph's Tomb in Nablus
13. Prevented students from entering al Quds University, firing stun grenades and rubber bullets at those who tried to go in
14. Earned unknown millions on reconstruction materials for Gaza, where 100,000 people need their destroyed homes rebuilt. The total bill is estimated at $7.8 billion

See more examples here.

Tonight, Hamas official Ismail Radwan called for a third intifada on Al-Aqsa TV and other media outlets: "Our people in the West Bank, Gaza and inside [Israel], tomorrow is the day of rage, the day of confrontation, and the day of renewing the intifada."

Hamas is attempting to ride popular sentiment and ignite a fire which the Palestinian Authority, Israel's biggest asset in sustaining the occupation, cannot control.

A whole generation of Palestinian youth have grown under Israeli occupation in the post-second intifada era, along with the PA's "security coordination" with Israel, and sentiment against the US-funded PA is widespread. While the PA typically collaborates to repress Palestinian demonstrations, as it did with brute force in the beginning of the latest protests, officials have opted to let them continue for fear the demonstrators may turn on it, finally eroding and collapsing the PA.

Meanwhile, support for Hamas has steadily increased as its strategy of military confrontation resonates with a majority of Palestinians. The election of Hamas in Bir Zeit University - the West Bank's most liberal university - served as a bellwether for a political shift occurring among the young and educated Palestinian generation. The vote also indicated a major reaffirmation of Palestinian support for armed resistance.

There are concerns the US military may have destroyed crucial evidence in a potential war crimes investigation after an American tank forced its way onto the site of the bombed Doctors Without Borders (MSF) hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan.

The October 3 attack on the hospital, which was being run by the medical charity Doctors Without Borders, also known as Medecins sans Frontieres (MSF), killed 10 patients and 12 staff members.

MSF released a statement saying they had been informed of the "intrusion" of the site by a US tank, with members of a joint US-NATO-Afghan team investigating the attack.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejected the U.S. State Department's allegations that Israel is using excessive force to fight terrorism Thursday, saying that the allegations are unfair, false, and justify Palestinian terrorism. "This allegation is totally false. It's also utterly unfair, because it's so obviously, patently false," he said.

When asked whether Israel was worried about losing the support of its allies because of the State Department's concerns, Netanyahu said that Israel is using the amount of legitimate force necessary to protect its citizens against the threat of terrorism. "Israel is using exactly the kind and the amount of legitimate force that any one of those governments would use if they had people wielding knives, meat cleavers, axes, trying to kill people on their streets," he said.

Netanyahu said that if America, or any other country were facing the threat of terrorism, they would protect their citizens just as Israel is. "What do you think would happen in New York if you saw people rushing into crowds trying to murder people? You think they would do anything different than what we are doing? They might, actually, but certainly not less," he said.

The Prime Minister added that the State Department's allegations of excessive force give terrorists yet another justification for killing innocent Israelis.

The recent visit of deputy crown prince and Saudi Arabia's minister of defence Mohammad bin Salman to Russia, along with the talks he held in Sochi with Russia's President Vladimir Putin on October 11, were largely interpreted as a sign of rapprochement between Moscow and Riyadh. Some analysts have even suggested that the new Saudi leadership, which is not entirely satisfied with Washington, is seeking Russia's support against the so-called "Ferrari revolution movement" within the ruling elites of the kingdom. The British media has even published two letters written by an anonymous Saudi prince, who openly called for the overthrow of the king Salman, since there's a growing sense of discontent in the ruling clan.

Yet, one can hardly imagine a naive enough soul that can sincerely believe in the prospect of a Russian-Saudi rapprochement. After all, Saudi Arabia - is de facto a sort of an American colony state. Its financial system is closely tied to the Federal Reserve just like Saudi Arabia's national currency is tied to dollar. If one is to considered the fact that there's US military bases all across the Arabian Peninsula , it would be safe to assume that Washington is perfectly capable of replacing one ruling clan of the kingdom with another in the matter of hours. Nevertheless, the ruling elites in Riyadh are stubborn in the belief that promises to provide Russia with 10-15 billion dollars of investments will change Russia's position on the key issues of the Middle Eastern politcy overnight, even when Syria, Iraq, Iran or Yemen are concerned. Before Prince Mohammad to use this childish tactics, since the former head of Saudi intelligence services Prince Bandar was especially keen on promising Russia staggering sums in investments.

According to Russian Energy Ministry, Energy Minister Alexander Novak and Pakistan's Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Shahid Khaqan Abbasi have signed an intergovernmental agreement on the North-South gas pipeline.

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak and Pakistan's Minister for Petroleum and Natural Resources Shahid Khaqan Abbasi have signed an intergovernmental agreement on the North-South gas pipeline, the Russian Energy Ministry informs.

"The construction of the 'North-South' gas pipeline is bringing trade-economic cooperation between Russia and Pakistan to a new level," Novak said as quoted in the ministry's Friday statement.

According to Abbasi, the new pipeline will be a major step in solving the problem of energy resource deficit in Pakistan's central and northern regions, which is hampering Pakistan's economic growth.