A storm of controversy erupted earlier this year in Iran, after local media outlets announced that a "Mossad spy" and "Israeli infiltrator" had gained the trust of the country's senior leadership, penetrated into the highest halls of power, and had even been employed as a writer for Ayatollah Khamenei himself.

Although the stories did not disclose the name of the infiltrator, it was clear that the individual in question was Catherine Perez-Shakdam. Almost immediately, Iranian media such as Press TV and The Tehran Times began silently but furiously removing all her content from their pages. Perhaps most worrying from an Iranian government perspective, Khamenei.ir, Ayatollah Khamenei's own website, had to delete her articles and disavow her.

Catherine Perez-Shakdam is a French-born journalist and analyst who had married a Yemeni man, converted to Shia Islam and wore a hijab. In her professional life, she penned articles denouncing Israeli and Saudi crimes, lionized armed Palestinian resistance, and supported the Iranian government. She had earlier also been a frequent contributor to MintPress News - a fact that likely bolstered her anti-imperialist credibility.

The Democrats' Senate Majority Political Action Committee announced Tuesday it would be returning about $3 million in donations from Sam Bankman-Fried, the disgraced FTX CEO who faces criminal charges, including campaign finance charges, after his multi-billion dollar digital asset company collapsed.

A spokesperson for the PAC told CNBC on Tuesday:

"Following the serious allegations against FTX, Senate Majority PAC previously set aside the contribution amounts from Sam Bankman-Fried and Nishad Singh with the intention of returning the funds once we receive proper direction from federal law enforcement officials based on their legal proceedings."

The PAC is also returning donations from the company's former head engineer, Nishad Singh.

The Democrats' House Majority PAC said they will return about $6 million from the CEO, another of several Democrat-affiliated groups quickly clearing their names from association with Bankman-Fried and FTX.

Bankman-Fried led FTX, a digital asset exchange platform that skyrocketed in popularity and financial success before cratering in recent weeks, losing tens of billions of dollars worth of assets. That scandal has left Democrats facing backlash and questions over donations they received from the CEO.

Bankman-Fried has since been charged with stealing billions of dollars in part to shore up his hedge fund, raising ethical questions and suggesting wrongdoing at the troubled firm.

According to a 20 December report released by Lebanese newspaper Al-Akhbar, the US is currently attempting to rebuild Liwa Thuwwar al-Raqqa (Raqqa Revolutionary Brigade) - a former Islamist militia opposed to Damascus.

The report states that the US efforts are aimed at appeasing Turkiye by facilitating the withdrawal of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) from the border - as Ankara has requested - and replacing it with a revived version of the former opposition group to serve as a buffer zone on the Syrian-Turkish border.

In order to make this happen, US officers told the group's leader in a recent meeting to consolidate a formidable force of up to 3,000 fighters, and assured him that Washington would secure their monthly pay-checks.

At the same time, the plan aims to compromise Russian efforts at mediation between the SDF and Turkiye by "pulling the rug out from under" Moscow's proposition to Ankara. Russia's proposition calls for a pullback of the Kurdish militia and the deployment of the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) along the Syrian-Turkish border.

Tucker Carlson lit into Congress Wednesday for "fawning" over Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as the United States' southern border "collapses completely."

"As the American border collapses completely, our Congress turns its fawning attention to the Ukraine and the man our congress has been funding with the tax dollars to prosecute a war whose consequences can be more profound than most Americans understand," Carlson said as Zelenskyy concluded his address to a joint meeting of Congress.

Zelenskyy met with President Joe Biden in the White House prior to his Wednesday evening address to Congress, the Washington Times reported. During his address to Congress, Zelenskyy called aid to Ukraine an "investment" in protecting democracy around the world.

Ukraine may present its vision of peace around the last week in February, near the first anniversary of Russia's offensive against the country, the Wall Street Journal has reported. The US newspaper, citing European and Ukrainian diplomats, claimed President Vladimir Zelensky and his team are currently working on such a formula.

In its article on Thursday, the media outlet alleged that the Ukrainian leadership wants to strengthen its position at the negotiating table by making gains on the battlefield against Russia before unveiling any peace proposals.

A group of five House Republicans on a shadow committee released a report on Wednesday with key findings about security failings they say were ignored by the official Democrat-led House Jan. 6 committee.

The report focuses on "why the Capitol was left so unprepared" on Jan. 6, 2021, when protests turned violent, and the U.S. Capitol building was breached.

The GOP group's key findings point to alleged failures by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Democrat leadership, and the U.S. Capitol Police. This includes claims that Republicans were intentionally excluded from security conversations by then-House Seargent at Arms Paul Irving at the direction of Pelosi's office.

The Iran nuclear deal, officially known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), is now, for all practical purposes, dead. Just like in the legendary Dead Parrot sketch by Monty Python, this deal is no more. It has gone to meet its maker. This is a former deal.

The undertaker, significantly, was none other than the senile character currently impersonating the "leader of the free world".

His name may be Joe Biden, but "Biden" is in fact a combo in the background dictating every line of the script the Crash Test Dummy in question haltingly tries to deliver, either mimicking the words whispered to his earpiece or struggling to read a teleprompter.

A new video, shot in early November, surfaced earlier this week where "Biden" says the JCPOA deal is dead. "But we're not going to announce it. Long story."

The long story it is. When he was relatively less senile, on his campaign trail over two years ago, "Biden" promised that Washington would rejoin the JCPOA, which was unilaterally torn apart by his predecessor Donald Trump in 2018.

After he arrived at the White House, "Biden" - actually his handlers - appointed Robert Malley as special envoy to Iran, tasked to oversee the whole process, including discussions towards a renewed JCPOA.

Malley played the spoiler role to perfection. The sanctions obsession prevailed over any serious attempt to revive the JCPOA.

In parallel, what former CIA analyst Ray McGovern has memorably defined as MICIMATT - the military-industrial-Congressional-intelligence-media-academia-think tank complex - revved up the blame game on Iran 24/7, now guilty because of a "hardline new president" incapable of "constructive dialogue with the West".

The original JCPOA clinched in Vienna in 2015 - I followed most of the process live - was very convenient at the time for the then-Barack Obama administration, the so-called EU3 (France, UK and Germany) and even Russia and China.

Obama believed that a deal would lead Tehran to be more amenable toward Washington.

Now the geopolitical chessboard has completely changed. The European Union plus the Brexiters have been reduced to an outsize satrapy of the American Empire.

The Russia-China strategic partnership is considered by the Americans as an existential threat. And Iran on top of it has been admitted as a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).

So there's no incentive whatsoever for the Straussians/neo-cons and neoliberalcons who control Washington's foreign policy to revive the JCPOA.

Washington is backing Kiev to pursue the "manic idea of defeating the Russians on the battlefield," Ambassador Anatoly Antonov says.

Russia's ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, has accused Washington of waging a "proxy war" against Moscow, saying that all the statements and declarations made during Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky's visit only further prove that the Biden administration is not interested in a peaceful settlement.

"The Hollywood-style trip to Washington by the head of the Kiev regime has confirmed that the administration's conciliatory statements about the lack of intention to start a confrontation with Russia are just empty words," Antonov said, according to a transcript of his response to a journalist published by the Russian Embassy in Washington on Wednesday night.

The countries should bolster their own defense to become less dependent on both the bloc and Washington, the French president says.

French President Emmanuel Macron has said European NATO members should become more autonomous and less dependent on the US-led alliance regarding their own security. He made the remarks late Wednesday, as he spoke to reporters in Paris after returning from a summit in Amman, Jordan.

"An alliance isn't something I should depend on. It's something that I should choose, something I work with," Macron stated. "We must rethink our strategic autonomy."

President Biden let slip to a group of protesters that the Iran nuclear deal "is dead" before adding, "but we are not going to announce it — long story," a video that surfaced Tuesday reveals.

Biden made the off-the-cuff remark Nov. 4 to Iranian American protesters who trailed him to an event in California.

"President Biden, could you please announce that JCPOA is dead? Can you just announce that?" a woman asks, using the formal acronym for the 2015 agreement that softened US policy toward Iran in exchange for promises that Tehran wouldn't seek a nuclear bomb.