The Israel lobby's buying off of nearly every senior politician in the United States, facilitated by our system of legalized bribery, is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact. The lobby's campaign of vicious character assassination, smearing and blacklisting against those who defend Palestinian rights-including the Jewish historian Norman Finkelstein and university students, many of them Jewish, in organizations such as Students for Justice in Palestine-is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact. Twenty-four state governments' passage of Israel lobby-backed legislation requiring their workers and contractors, under threat of dismissal, to sign a pro-Israel oath and promise not to support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact. The shameless decision in 2014 by all 100 U.S. senators, including Bernie Sanders, to pass a Soviet-style plebiscite proposed by the Israel lobby to affirm Israel's "right to defend itself" during the 51 days it bombed and shelled homes, water treatment plants, power stations, hospitals and U.N. schools in Gaza, killing 2,251 Palestinians, including 551 children, is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact. The U.S. refusal, including in the United Nations and other international bodies, to criticize Israel's apartheid state and routine violation of international law is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact. The well-funded campaigns by the Israel lobby, which works closely with Israel's Ministry of Strategic Affairs, to discredit any American politician or academic who even slightly deviates from Israeli policy is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact. (One infamous example of a U.S. politician kowtowing was the unconstitutional invitation by then-House Speaker John Boehner to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address Congress in 2015 to denounce President Barack Obama's Iranian nuclear agreement.) The massive interference in our internal affairs by Israel and the Israel lobby, far exceeding that of any other country, including Russia or China, is not an anti-Semitic trope. It is a fact.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is setting a high bar for impeachment of President Donald Trump, saying he is "just not worth it" even as some on her left flank clamor to start proceedings.

Pelosi said in an interview with The Washington Post that "I'm not for impeachment" of Trump.

"Unless there's something so compelling and overwhelming and bipartisan, I don't think we should go down that path, because it divides the country," she said.


While she has made similar comments before, Pelosi is making clear to her caucus and to voters that Democrats will not move forward quickly with trying to remove Trump from office. And it's a departure from her previous comments that Democrats are waiting on special counsel Robert Mueller to lay out findings from his Russia investigation before considering impeachment.

The People's Bank of China increased its gold reserves for a third straight month in February, bringing total holdings to 1,874 tons, or 60.26 million ounces. The move is part of China's strategy to shift away from the US dollar.

According to the central bank, it has added about 32 tons of the precious metal to its coffers in the last three months, purchasing some 10 tons in February.

Before December, the Chinese central bank had not reported an increase in gold reserves for more than two years, and the official figures remained unchanged from October 2016 to November 2018. Analysts say Beijing is trying "to diversify its reserves" away from the greenback.

The uptick in gold holdings comes at a time when global central banks are hoarding the commodity. In January, China dropped to sixth place among the world's largest holders of gold behind Russia.

The amount of gold added by global central banks in 2018 hit the second highest annual total on record, according to World Gold Council (WGC) estimates. Countries bought 651.5 metric tons of gold last year, and now hold nearly 34,000 tons. As a safe haven hedge, gold will become more attractive in 2019, due to greater market uncertainties and the expansion of protectionist economic policies, WGC forecasts.

UK police have confirmed that a group calling itself the Irish Republican Army (IRA) has claimed responsibility for a spate of parcel bombs that were received at buildings in London and Glasgow last week.

The group, which is also known as the 'New IRA', say five devices were posted to UK addresses but only four have been detected so far.

Police say the paramilitary organization claimed responsibility for the explosive parcels by sending a statement containing a recognized codeword to a Northern Irish media outlet.

Defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Tuesday if one wants tonic of motivation, he or she should meet Wing Commander Abhinandan Varthaman.

IAF pilot Varthaman was released by Pakistan on March 1 as a 'peace gesture' by Pakistan amid escalating tensions between the two countries. On her meeting with the airforce officer, Sitharaman said, "When I met Abhinandan Varthaman, he was calm and composed. He bore no malice against Pakistan. He said it was my job to fight, and I did".

Speaking at the Aaj Tak National Security Summit, Sitharaman said, "Pakistan always says it is also a victim of terrorism. But if you are, please take action. Don't play victim". The minister said Pakistan has always remained in denial mode when it comes to their involvement in the terror activities.

Referring to the recent dogfight between Indian and Pakistani airforce in February, Sitharaman said, "It is sad that Pakistan is still in denial on shooting down of F-16 aircraft, but we have proof and we have shown some proof of missile, which are compatible only with F-16. I am not revealing the fact, but social media from Pakistan side has revealed the fact about death of their pilot in dog fight."

"Pakistan did not admit to have lost its jawans in Kargil war too. They won't even now," Sitharaman added.

A slightly altered plan for exiting the European Union laid down by Prime Minister Theresa May is expected to be defeated at the British Parliament on Tuesday, moving the country closer to a no-deal Brexit.

MPs are to cast their second meaningful vote on the Brexit deal this year, which may well be the last one, after May secured a legally binding assurance from Brussels on the contentious issue of the Irish backstop. The first vote in mid-January resulted in a historic worst-ever parliament defeat for a British government, and this week is not expected to be successful.

The Labour opposition dismissed the slightly altered deal beforehand, saying Theresa May's assurances are not even close to the changes that she promised.

Influential Tory lawmaker Damian Collins said he will vote 'no' because "nothing has really changed since last November."

Former US Vice President Dick Cheney has attacked the Trump administration's "isolationist" foreign policy, lecturing Mike Pence on not living up to his example as one of the primary architects of Middle Eastern destabilization.

"We're getting into a situation where our friends and allies around the world that we depend upon are going to lack confidence in us," Cheney said, seemingly unaware of the irony dripping from his words.


"I worry that the bottom line of that kind of an approach is we have an administration that looks a lot more like Barack Obama than Ronald Reagan," he added, perhaps forgetting that Obama's foreign policy largely consisted of continuing the wars that began under Cheney's own watch - with a few more thrown in for good measure.

Even the hire of an actual Reagan relic to run the administration's Venezuelan regime change - enforced democracy-dispenser Elliott Abrams, last seen threatening US allies with "secondary sanctions" for refusing to back the self-proclaimed president Juan Guaido - did not soothe the former VP's ire.

The region was taken by Israel from Syria during the Six-Day War of 1967. Neither the UN nor the US recognizes the territory as belonging to Israel.

US Republican Senator Lindsey Graham said on Monday that he will push the Trump administration to formally recognize the disputed region of the Golan Heights as part of Israel, according to a report by The Hill.

Graham made the announcement after a joint tour of the territory by him, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US Envoy to Israel David Friedman.

Last month, Senators Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Tom Cotton (R-AR), together with Representative Mike Gallagher (R-WI), introduced a resolution "to ensure that Israel retains control of the Golan Heights."



​Netanyahu, who is currently facing criminal indictment in Israel on bribery charges, has used the US' support as a trump card for his re-election campaign, even using photos of President Donald Trump and American politicians in his campaign posters, The Hill reports. The trip to the disputed territories in company of Graham and Friedman was supposed to demonstrate American support to the media once again, The Jerusalem Post says.

The Trump administration is threatening to withhold intelligence from Germany if the country does not drop a potential contract with Chinese telecommunications firm Huawei.

The Wall Street Journal obtained a letter dated Friday from U.S. Ambassador Richard Grenell to Germany's economics minister saying that intelligence sharing would be limited if Huawei or other Chinese vendors are allowed to participate in building Germany's 5G network.

The U.S. has been urging allies to drop Huawei for months. Intelligence officials have expressed concerns that the telecommunications giant is spying on behalf of the Chinese government.

The push comes as many countries begin adopting the next-generation wireless technology known as 5G. With people becoming increasingly dependent on the internet, U.S. officials are increasingly sounding the alarm over the potential for Chinese spying.

The OPCW could not come up with an unbiased report on the alleged 2018 chemical attack in Douma, as acknowledging that it was faked would've made the US strikes against Syria illegitimate, the Russian envoy to the OPCW told RT.

In early March, the final report by the Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) stated that there were "reasonable grounds" to believe that "molecular chlorine" was used as a chemical weapon in the Syrian city of Douma on April 7, 2018.

On Monday, Russian experts held a press-conference to respond to that paper. Moscow's Permanent Representative to OPCW, Alexander Shulgin, told RT after the event that the chemical arms watchdog's findings were "full of gaps, discrepancies and inconsistences."