Puppet MastersS


Attention

Amnesty International to President Trump: 'Arming Saudi Arabia & Bahrain risks complicity with war crimes'

A view of destruction in a street in the southwestern city of Taiz, Yemen March 16, 2017
© Anees Mahyoub / ReutersA view of destruction in a street in the southwestern city of Taiz, Yemen March 16, 2017
US President Donald Trump should cancel impending weapons sales to Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, since this could put civilians in even greater danger and implicate the US in war crimes, Amnesty International said in a letter sent to the president.

"The deals would arm members of a military coalition that has attacked thousands of civilians in Yemen and violated international humanitarian law," the human rights group said in a press release published on Tuesday.

The organization noted that its experts found unexploded US bombs and "identifiable fragments of exploded US bombs" among the destroyed civilian buildings in Yemen.

If the US approves the deals while banning Yemenis from coming to the US, it would be like "throwing gasoline on a house fire and locking the door on [the] way out," according to Margaret Huang, Amnesty International USA executive director.

Comment: Further reading:


Snakes in Suits

Hawaiian federal judge issues nationwide restraining order against Trump's second travel ban

Hawaii district court
© Hugh Gentry / ReutersHawaii Attorney General Douglas Chin (R) arrives at the U.S. District Court Ninth Circuit in Honolulu, Hawaii.
Hours before President Donald Trump's revised ban on issuing visas to travelers from six majority-Muslim countries was set to go into effect, a federal judge in Hawaii issued a temporary restraining order preventing the ban's implementation nationwide. "Plaintiffs have met their burden of establishing a strong likelihood of success on the merits of their Establishment Clause claim," Judge Derrick Watson wrote in his decision Wednesday, referring to the First Amendment's requirement of the separation of church and state.

Hawaii Attorney General Douglas Chin argued the ban discriminated on the basis of nationality, exceeded the president's authority and was "motivated by anti-Muslim animus." He previously referred to the executive order as "Muslim Ban 2.0"

Trump responded to the ruling during a rally in Nashville, Tennessee, Wednesday evening, vowing to take the case to the Supreme Court if necessary. "The order he blocked was a watered down version of the first order," which "should have never been blocked to start with," Trump told the crowd.

Comment: The restraining order accuses President Trump of illegal actions. Presidential bans are not illegal. All presidents from Reagan to Obama have used them multiple times on their authority, at their discretion, authorized by the Immigration and Nationality Act. It should be "end of story." Unfortunately this restraining order is a 38-page diatribe, nearly all of it irrelevant.

See also: California joins multi-state lawsuit against Trump's travel ban


Cardboard Box

Package sent to German finance ministry contained explosives - police - Update

Police ribbon
© Lukas Schulze / DPA / Global Look Press
A suspicious package found early Wednesday at the German finance ministry in Berlin contained explosives, according to police.

The package was addressed to Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble but was flagged by security services in the ministry's post office, according to German newspaper, Bild. Wires were seen protruding from the package as it passed through an X-ray machine, the report said.

An evacuation of the scene was carried out before the package was removed and taken to Grunewald by explosive experts for examination, reports Bild. There have been no reports of injuries so far.

Comment: A militant Greek group has claimed responsibility for Wednesday's parcel bomb mailed to the German finance ministry in Berlin, claiming the failed attack was part of a campaign they dubbed 'Nemesis Project.'
"We still have the rage. We sent the package to Germany's finance minister as part of the second act of Nemesis Plan," Conspiracy of Fire Cells said in a statement posted on a radical anti-establishment website. "Nothing is over, everything continues."


The parcel was mailed from an Athens post office to German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble. He took a hardline stance during Greece's financial crisis, insisting on the implementation of austerity measures.

The parcel was intercepted by the finance ministry's mail department. It did not explode, but police confirmed it contained explosives.



Star of David

UN labels Israel 'apartheid regime', Israel retorts UN like Nazis

sign end apartheid
© wordpress.com
A United Nations agency today labeled Israel an "apartheid regime," in a report that found the country guilty "beyond a reasonable doubt" of the "grave charge" of operating systematic discrimination and oppression against the Palestinian people. The United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA) published the document, Israeli Practices towards the Palestinian, People and the Question of Apartheid, [PDF]. ESCWA is mandated to review Israeli aggressions.

The findings of the report are non-binding and reflect contributions from professor of political science at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale Virginia Tilley and former UN Special Rapporteur Richard Falk. It concluded UN organs should sanction Israel and coordinate with civil society groups in boycott campaigns.

Apartheid, the report described, is "a crime against humanity" and defined as:
"[I]nhuman acts...committed in the context of an institutionalized regime of systematic oppression and domination by one racial group over any other racial groups or groups and committed with the intention of maintaining that regime."
While neither Jews [n]or Palestinians are racial groups, the report stated, the apartheid standard was met because ESCWA found a "racial character" to the policies of the Israeli government enacted toward both Jews and Palestinians. This is expressed inside of Israel through separate categories for a citizen's "nationality" (Jewish or Arab) and in the occupied territories by the absence of citizenship for Palestinians.

Israel was said to have divided Palestinians into different spheres of governance, each with fewer rights than Jewish-Israelis. Sub-sections of the report outline Palestinians citizens of Israel, West Bank and Gaza residents, Jerusalem residents, and external refugees, all of whom have unequal rights in comparison to Jewish-Israeli citizens. "Strategic fragmentation of the Palestinian people is the principal method by which Israel imposes an apartheid regime," ESCWA said. Individual treatment to each group may not meet the apartheid definition, when taken together the report said, it does.

The UN body regarded Israel as producing "one comprehensive regime developed for the purpose of ensuring the enduring dominion over non-Jews in all land exclusively under Israeli control in whatever category."

Comment: The march to apartheid has been going on for decades and should have been addressed by the UN long ago. One question: What took them so long?

Aljazeera includes the following:
The report is a "detailed analysis of Israeli legislation, policies and practices" that highlights how Israel "operates an apartheid regime", including through "demographic engineering".
  • Palestinian citizens of Israel are described as "subjected to oppression on the basis of not being Jewish", it said.
  • Palestinians in East Jerusalem similarly experience "discrimination in access to education, healthcare, employment, residency and building rights", as well as "expulsions and home demolitions".
  • Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip are governed by "military law" alongside Jewish settlers "governed by Israeli civil law", the report said.
  • Palestinian refugees and exiles are "prohibited from returning to their homes in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territory" on the basis that they "constitute a 'demographic threat' and that their return would alter the demographic character of Israel".
As well as urging governments to back BDS, the report recommends that the UN and its member states should "revive the Special Committee against Apartheid, and the United Nations Centre Against Apartheid (1976-1991)", which would then "report authoritatively on Israeli practices and policies relating to the crime of apartheid".

The report could contribute to an already deteriorating relationship between the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the United Nations.

Israel's UN envoy Danny Danon issued a statement condemning the report late on Wednesday. "The attempt to smear and falsely label the only true democracy in the Middle East by creating a false analogy is despicable and constitutes a blatant lie," he said.

UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric, when asked about the report, said it was published without any prior consultations with the UN Secretariat and its views do not reflect those of the secretary-general.



Calculator

Tillerson says State Department's 'historically high' spending 'simply not sustainable'

Tillerson
© Toru Hanai / ReutersU.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson arrives at Haneda International Airport in Tokyo, Japan March 15, 2017.
U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said on Thursday the State Department's current spending was "not sustainable," and he willingly accepted the "challenge" President Donald Trump had given in proposing to cut more than a quarter of his agency's budget.

Trump's budget proposal for the fiscal year beginning on Oct. 1 would cut 28 percent of the budget for U.S. diplomacy and foreign aid, according to documents provided by the White House. The combined budget for the State Department and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) would be $25.6 billion.

Speaking in Tokyo at the start of a trip to Asia focused on the threat from North Korea, Tillerson defended the cuts as a necessary correction to a "historically high" budget that had grown to address conflicts abroad in which the United States was engaged, as well as disaster aid.

"Clearly the level of spending that the State Department has been undertaking, particularly in this past year, is simply not sustainable," he said. "As time goes by, there will be fewer military conflicts that the U.S. will be directly engaged in."

Caesar

Putin: Foreign diplomats should 'reject chaos' & join Russia in creating a fair world

Putin
© Sergei Savostyanov/TASS
Putin invites foreign diplomats to join Russia in the creation of a "fair world order" that respects "national sovereignty"

On Thursday afternoon, Russian President Vladimir Putin welcomed 18 new foreign ambassadors to Russia during a ceremony at the Alexander Hall of the Grand Kremlin Palace.

Hardhat

Is Trump's $1 Trillion Infrastructure Plan a Boondoggle?

sun on rails infrastructure
© Marco Nürnberger
"We are going to fix our inner cities and rebuild our highways, bridges, tunnels, airports, schools, hospitals.... And we will put millions of our people to work as we rebuild it."

— President Donald Trump
Donald Trump's $1 trillion infrastructure plan is not an infrastructure plan and it won't put $1 trillion of fiscal stimulus into the economy. It's basically a scheme for handing over public assets to private corporations that will extract maximum profits via user fees and tolls. Because the plan is essentially a boondoggle, it will not lift the economy out of the doldrums, increase activity or boost growth. Quite the contrary. When the details of how the program is going to be implemented are announced, public confidence in the Trump administration is going to wither and stock prices are going to plunge. This scenario cannot be avoided because the penny-pinching conservatives in the House and Senate have already said that they won't support any plan that is not "revenue neutral" which means that any real $1 trillion spending package is a dead letter. Thus, it's only a matter of time before the Trump's plan is exposed as a fraud and the sh** hits the fan.

Comment:


Arrow Up

Pepe Escobar - Relax, global citizen; The CIA is benign & benevolent

John Hurt
© Screen shot from 1984 via YouTube
The massive WikiLeaks Vault 7 release is an extremely important public service. It's hard to find anyone not concerned by a secret CIA hacking program targeting virtually the whole planet - using malware capable of bypassing encryption protection on any device from iOS to Android, and from Windows to Samsung TVs.

In a series of tweets, Edward Snowden confirmed the CIA program and said code names in the documents are real; that they could only be known by a "cleared insider;" the FBI and CIA knew all about the digital loopholes, but kept them open to spy; and that the leaks provided the "first public evidence" that the US government secretly paid to keep US software unsafe.

If that's not serious enough, WikiLeaks alleges that "the CIA has lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal;" several hundred million lines of code — more than what is used to run Facebook.

Someone among the former US government hackers and contractors ended up leaking portions of the CIA archive (Snowden II?). WikiLeaks also stressed how the CIA had created, in effect, its "own NSA" - maximum unaccountability included.

Even though millions already knew - without the technical details - that they were being spied upon by their iPhone or their 4K Samsung, the Vault 7 revelations are far more relevant - and practical - to the average citizen than the 24/7 hysteria fingering President Trump as a Putin puppet. Intel sources are volunteering the - still unexplored - Vault 7 treasure trove is more crucial than what Snowden himself revealed.

And still, vast corporate media sectors embedded with the neocon/neoliberal galaxy are spinning that Vault 7 benefits Trump by changing the subject from alleged Russian hacking interference in the US elections and possible Obama administration-ordered hacks of Team Trump's communications.

So, if anyone hasn't got the message, the song remains the same.
  • WikiLeaks + Snowden + Russia + Trump = the bad guys.
  • CIA deploying its own NSA around the world = the good guys.
After all, CIA spokesman Jonathan Liu duly issued a non-denial denial.

Loony mainstream factions are even advancing that "the Russians" leaked the CIA info to WikiLeaks, thus fueling more suspicion that Russia will interfere in upcoming French and German elections.

Snakes in Suits

Poroshenko says Ukraine just 'destroyed' Minsk Agreement but blames Russia

Petro Poroshenko
After urging Ukraine's National Security and Defense Council to impose a state-sanctioned blockade on Donbass on Wednesday, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko said he would "propose another law that would be in line with Ukraine's national interests" because recognizing eastern Ukrainian territories not under Kiev's control as "occupied" would "destroy" the Minsk process.

A rather bizarre admission from Ukraine' president — especially because he supports the blockade — but this kind of erratic behavior should be expected from a man who feasts on Roshen bars and Lindsey Graham's Ugg boots.

Comment: More on the crazy Ukraine situation:


Bad Guys

Despite int'l protest, US ally Saudi Arabia planning 'heinous' assault on Yemen's largest port city

Yemen Aden man port
A Yemeni man looks at a World Food Program ship at the port of Aden, Yemen, Tuesday, July 21, 2015.

Despite a warning from the UN to end its existing blockades of Yemeni ports, a Saudi-led coalition is planning another major assault on the nation's largest port city of Al Hudaydah, a move that threatens to worsen Yemen's already unprecedented humanitarian crisis.

While the Syrian conflict has long dominated international coverage of Middle Eastern crises, the humanitarian crisis in Yemen has been continually overlooked by the mainstream media. Since March 2015, the nation has been in a state of chaos following the overthrow of former Yemeni President Abdrabbuh Mansur Hadi, who was installed by the United States and Saudi governments, by a grassroots political movement led by the Houthis.

Following the Houthi-led coup, Saudi Arabia essentially invaded Yemen, eager to maintain control over the strategic Bab al-Mandab strait, a critical area for the region's oil trade. The Saudis' efforts to maintain their undue influence in Yemeni politics and maintain hegemony over a key oil route has now manifested as a war effort bordering on genocide — one that has claimed the lives of more than 10,000 people, most of them civilians. In addition, more than a third of Saudi airstrikes in the nation are believed to have destroyed civilian targets.

Comment: Check out: Russian FM: Saudi plan to attack Yemen port city would 'cut millions off from food & aid supplies'
The coalition's "plans to storm Yemen's biggest port of Hudaydah give rise to serious concerns," Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement published on the ministry's official website.

She added that battles in this area "would not only inevitably lead to a mass exodus of the [local] population but would also de facto cut the [Yemeni] capital of Sanaa from... food and humanitarian aid supplies."