Puppet MastersS


Star of David

We'll see: Report says Washington 'ends' Israeli freedom of action inside Lebanon


The Cradle
Tue, 23 Jun 2026 20:03 UTC
israel bomb lebanon village 2026
© AFP/via Getty ImagesSmoke rising from an Israeli bombardment near the village of Mayfadoun in southern Lebanon on June 6, 2026.
Iran has reportedly threatened to end negotiations with the US if Israel continues to refuse withdrawal from Lebanon

The US government has informed Israel that it no longer has authorization for "unrestricted" military action in Lebanon, despite continued Israeli attacks and occupation in the country, Channel 12 reported on 23 June.

Washington has allegedly informed Tel Aviv that "the previous authorization for unrestricted action in Lebanon had expired." US President Donald Trump is "imposing restrictions on Israel, not only in Lebanon but also in other arenas."

"These directives prohibit operations in areas such as the capital, Beirut, and the Tyre district in southern Lebanon," the report went on to say.

Meanwhile, Israel has refused to withdraw from south Lebanon and has not fully ended attacks.
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Briefcase

House GOP issue contempt threat against ActBlue: Dem fundraiser refuses to turn over hundreds of documents

Samuel Chamberlain and Josh Christenson
New York Post
Tue, 23 Jun 2026 19:36 UTC
ActBlue CEO Regina Wallace-Jones
© Tom Williams/CQ Roll CallActBlue CEO Regina Wallace-Jones at the House inquiry into allegedly fraudulent donations to the organization, June 10, 2026
The leaders of three Republican House committees threatened Monday to hold Democratic fundraising powerhouse ActBlue in contempt of Congress after the firm refused to turn over more than 400 documents, citing attorney-client privilege.

A letter from House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil (R-Wis.), Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), and Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) gave ActBlue until Friday to provide the messages, including statements by two members of its legal team indicating the fundraiser was not being forthcoming about overseas donations that were illegally funneled to Democratic campaigns.

"These documents reportedly contain evidence that ActBlue accepted foreign donations, misled Congress, and then retaliated against an employee who spoke up about it," the lawmakers wrote. "ActBlue appears to be withholding these documents from the Committees in an attempt to cover up the scope and duration of its misconduct."

Comment: Forgotten History on X provides an excellent explainer:



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Red Flag

Keir Starmer's resignation is an illusion of democracy

Constantin von Hoffmeister
RT
Mon, 22 Jun 2026 15:56 UTC
Starmer
© Dan Kitwood/Getty ImagesUK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announces his resignation
His exit satisfies public anger, but the system stays intact: new faces, same donors, same policies, same insulation from voters.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer's resignation on Monday exemplifies the cynical sham of 'democratic renewal' in a system dominated by globalist plutocratic interests.

Starmer stood outside 10 Downing Street and announced that he was stepping down as leader of the Labour Party and head of government. He cynically masked his political execution as a voluntary departure made 'with good grace' for the sake of the party's chances at the next election. The grim reality is that his hand was forced by an imploding cabinet and years of plummeting approval ratings fueled by economic paralysis, disastrous U-turns, and outright voter disgust.

Media outlets immediately framed the moment as "historic," a signal that the system had listened, that accountability had prevailed, and that Britain might now chart a different course. Yet this narrative rings hollow. Starmer's departure is not a rupture but another installment in a long-running political theater designed to sustain the illusion of choice while preserving the underlying structures of power. In contemporary Western 'democracy', genuine transformation remains elusive because the system functions less as rule by the people and more as management by a self-appointed new 'aristocracy', whose priorities consistently diverge from those of native populations.
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Arrow Down

Netanyahu's war on Iran was a pitch for Israel's future, and it failed

Abdal Jawad Omar
Mondoweiss
Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00 UTC
Netanyahu and army personnel
© Israeli Prime Minister Office/APA ImagesIsraeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu • 36th Division of the Israeli army along the border with South Lebanon
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz and Deputy Chief of Staff Maj. Gen. Tamir Yadai • May 30, 2026
Netanyahu has staked Israel's economic future on becoming a Mediterranean trade hub to replace the Strait of Hormuz. The war on Iran was supposed to make that possible, but it consumed the fiscal space, U.S. backing, and Gulf capital needed for it.

There is a version of the war on Iran that Benjamin Netanyahu would like you to believe is only about centrifuges and the survival of the Jewish state. The other, far less discussed version, is one where Israel's prize is a railway.

Israel's ambition, on the evidence of its own Prime Minister's words, is to become the Mediterranean terminus of trade flowing out of the Gulf and South Asia — the place where Asian containers meet European ports without troubling the Strait of Hormuz. The war, however it ends, is one route to that destination. The irony, and it is not a small one, is that the campaign generating the opportunity is also consuming the means to seize it.

Netanyahu said as much himself twice, three years apart, sparing us the trouble of reading between the lines.

Comment: Israel is off the rails...literally.

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Umbrella

US-Iran talks in Switzerland: What is known so far?


RT
Sun, 21 Jun 2026 23:02 UTC
Iran delegation
© Hamed Malekpour/Getty ImagesThe Iranian delegation, led by Parliament Speaker Mohammad Baqer Ghalibaf • Obbuergen, Switzerland • June 21, 2026
The negotiations were allegedly interrupted after the Iranian delegation protested new threats by President Donald Trump.

Negotiations between the US and Iran, mediated by Qatar and Pakistan, commenced on Sunday in the Swiss lake resort of Burgenstock. The meeting is the first round of talks aimed at reaching a final settlement to the war in line with a memorandum of understanding signed earlier this week.

The US was represented by Vice President J.D. Vance, as well as President Donald Trump's special envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner.

The Iranian delegation, led by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Parliament Speaker Mohammad Ghalibaf, included the head of the Iranian central bank, the deputy oil minister, and the chairman of the National Iranian Oil Company.

The talks were initially scheduled for Friday but were postponed after Israeli attacks on Lebanon. According to the Iranian Mehr news agency, Sunday's negotiations were also halted some 80 minutes into the meeting, after Trump threatened to "hit Iran very hard again."

Comment: Not the time, place nor justification for a presidential tizzy fit. PrimaDon should know better.

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Attention

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer expected to resign on Monday

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Sun, 21 Jun 2026 04:35 UTC
Keir Starmer
© Peter Macdiarmid/Pool/REUTERSKeir Starmer
Keir Starmer's premiership appears to have entered its final act. Just over a week after Andy Burnham stormed back into Parliament with a crushing by-election win, the Prime Minister is - according to senior Labour figures cited by The Observer - preparing to set out a timetable for his own departure, with a "clear statement" possible as early as Monday.

It would be a remarkable collapse. Starmer led Labour to a landslide less than two years ago. He now looks unable to command the confidence of his own benches for much longer, with cabinet ministers, union leaders and donors reportedly among those who have been involved in the conversations about his future.

Burnham, the outgoing Greater Manchester mayor, did not just win Makerfield - he buried it. Official figures show him taking 24,927 votes, 54.8% of the total, beating Reform UK's Rob Kenyon by a 9,231-vote margin in a seat where Nigel Farage's party had been threatening to turn Labour's crisis into a rout. The result gives Burnham the Commons seat he needs, clears his path to a leadership challenge, and leaves Starmer's position looking terminal.
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Attention

If Russia retaliated...

Alex Krainer
Alex Krainer's Substack
Tue, 23 Jun 2026 18:04 UTC
Before leaving 10 Downing Street, Sir Keir Starmer authorized another large-scale attack on Russia. If we're not already in a nuclear war, we only have Vladimir Putin's restraint to thank.
If Russia retaliated...
© Alex Krainer's Substack
British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer resigned yesterday. Before he departed 10 Downing Street the last time, he authorized another strike against Russia. Ukraine, UK's "one hundred year" ally, conducted one of the largest attacks on Russian territory to date, using air-launched cruise missiles to hit military-related facilities in Voronezh city. The facilities in question produce components for Russian Kh-101 cruse missiles, Iskander-K missiles and Pantsir-S1 air defenses.

The Ukrainians allegedly used a version of UK-supplied Storm Shadow missiles and/or AGM-188A, "Rusty Dagger" cruise missile, developed under the U.S. Air Force's Extended Range Attack Munition (ERAM) program to provide affordable, mass-produced long-range strike weapons for Ukraine.

Other missiles and drones were aimed at targets in the Moscow Oblast but apparently without any major damage reported. Today, President Putin gave a statement accusing the United States and Europe of directly enabling the strikes by providing satellite intelligence, targeting data, and navigation support for the long range attack and warning that such involvement signifies NATO's direct entry into the war. Putin was telling the truth, as we know from a leaked 38-min. WebEx conversation of a group of German Generals.
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Black Magic

Feeling emboldened after attacks on Moscow, Zelensky threatens Belarus with military action

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Mon, 22 Jun 2026 22:49 UTC
zelensky lukashenko ukraine belarus
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky and Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko.
Ukraine is feeling more confident of late as its long-range drones have made the Moscow area - as well as dozens of oil refineries across the country burn.

Zelensky if seeking to flex yet again in recent days by issuing an ultimatum to Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, threatening that close Russian ally and 'Union State' Belarus could face attacks out of Ukraine if it fails to dismantle the air defense radar array along its southern border.

The Ukrainian leader even issued a timeline and deadline, in a social media post on Friday night telling Lukashenko to "remove that equipment."
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Bizarro Earth

Best of the Web: Cuba passes sweeping free-market reforms in biggest economic shift since revolution

Andrea Rodriguez.
PBS
Fri, 19 Jun 2026 21:03 UTC
cuba economic reforms forced america
© Andrea RodríguezA man walks near a vintage taxi before the Cuban government presents far-reaching economic measures that could mark the most significant shift toward a market economy since the 1959 revolution, in Havana, Cuba, June 17, 2026.
Observers on Friday called Cuba's new free-market reforms the most sweeping economic overhaul of the island's communist economy since the Cuban revolution, as the grandson of former President Raúl Castro said in an interview that Cuba must seek to move its economy forward.

The 176 measures aim to further decentralize Cuba's state-run economy, which has been left gasping by a tightened embargo under President Donald Trump. Under the island's current economic model, the government largely determines what is produced, who produces it, the prices at which goods are sold and how the country's resources are allocated.

The plan includes more space for private businesses, imports and exports without state intermediation, free hiring of personnel, authorization for private banks and investment by Cubans abroad. It even permits fast-food chains to establish themselves on the island.

Comment:

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Star of David

The Knesset revolt Netanyahu couldn't prevent

Noah Lamington
International Policy Digest
Thu, 18 Jun 2026 00:00 UTC
Benji and Knesset
© John LymanIsraeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu • The Knesset
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long asked the public to accept political instability in exchange for security. For years, that bargain formed the foundation of his appeal. Yet the latest crisis surrounding the Knesset suggests the arrangement is beginning to unravel. The attempt to dissolve parliament feels less like a calculated maneuver and more like evidence that the machinery of government is struggling to function. Rather than reinforcing Netanyahu's authority, the war that has dominated Israeli politics is increasingly exposing the vulnerabilities within his coalition.

Even if the parliamentary procedure itself is familiar, the outcome remains remarkable. An 110-0 vote reflects an almost complete absence of resistance, an unusual spectacle in one of the world's most contentious and fragmented political systems. Reuters and Al Jazeera have focused on the procedural dimensions of the vote, but the larger story lies in what the result reveals. A coalition that once appeared resilient through repeated crises now looks increasingly incapable of holding itself together.

Comment: Service to self. Is it worth millions of lives? Ask Netanyahu.

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