Puppet MastersS


MIB

New information surfaces: Khashoggi was acting as a foreign influence agent on behalf of Qatar

Jim Hanson
The Federalist
Thu, 27 Dec 2018 01:54 UTC
Jamal Khashoggi
© Agence France-Presse/GettyJamal Khashoggi
Jamal Khashoggi's op-eds published in the very influential Washington Post certainly qualify as attempts to change U.S. policy against Saudi Arabia and in favor of the Muslim Brotherhood.

The Washington Post has caused itself a major scandal since it has come to light they and their martyred "reformer" Jamal Khashoggi were publishing anti-Saudi propaganda for Qatar. They tried to bury this in a pre-Christmas Saturday news dump, but that can't stop the damage this will do to their reputation.

"Text messages between Khashoggi and an executive at Qatar Foundation International show that the executive, Maggie Mitchell Salem, at times shaped the columns he submitted to The Washington Post, proposing topics, drafting material and prodding him to take a harder line against the Saudi government," the Post wrote December 21.

The Post says they were unaware of this, although Khashoggi's Qatar connections were well known. They will have to answer for what is either incompetence in connecting these dots or simply not caring as Khashoggi's attacks on President Trump and the Saudis fit right in with their narrative. The Qatar Foundation denies they were paying him to produce the anti-Saudi material.

Comment:

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Map

Trump marks his first visit to a combat zone by surprising US troops in Iraq

S.A. Miller
Washington Times
Fri, 28 Dec 2018 13:48 UTC
Trump visit US troops Iraq
The President recently told troops in Iraq that it's not America's job to be global policeman
President Trump made a surprise visit Wednesday to U.S. troops in Iraq, his first visit as president to forces serving in a war zone.

The president was accompanied by first lady Melania Trump on the unannounced trip to at Al Asad Air Base west of Baghdad.

Addressing the service members, Mr. Trump said the defeat of the Islamic State, the terrorist group also known as ISIS, justified his recent decision to pull out all 2,000 U.S. troops from neighboring Syria.
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Propaganda

LinkedIn co-founder apologizes for funding propaganda campaign against Roy Moore

Jessica Chasmar
Washington Times
Fri, 28 Dec 2018 13:55 UTC
LinkedIn Reid Hoffman
LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman
LinkedIn's billionaire co-founder Reid Hoffman apologized Wednesday for funding a group that's been linked to a misinformation campaign against Republican candidate Roy Moore in the 2017 Alabama Senate runoff election.

During Mr. Moore's failed Senate bid against now-Sen. Doug Jones, Mr. Hoffman provided funding for American Engagement Technologies, a firm led by former Obama administration official Mikey Dickerson that was part of an effort to falsely portray Mr. Moore's campaign as being supported by the Russian government, The New York Times reported last week.

Mr. Hoffman denied knowing the group's motives in a Medium post on Wednesday, saying he was "embarrassed" he didn't vet the group more thoroughly.

Comment: RT reports more on how easy it is for 'cybersecurity' firms to meddle in elections while hiding behind Russian bogeymen:
American Engagement Technologies (AET), which Hoffman gave $750,000 to put $100,000 of the entrepreneur's money towards New Knowledge, a cybersecurity firm which fabricated some 1,000 Russian language Twitter accounts to follow Moore.

The company used the tactic to link the controversial Republican to so-called Russian influence campaigns and then fed it to the mainstream media. They also created misleading Facebook pages urging Republicans to support a 'write-in' candidate instead of supporting Moore. The ploy was revealed by New York Times earlier this month.

"I find the tactics that have been recently reported highly disturbing," Hoffman told the Washington Post. "For that reason, I am embarrassed by my failure to track AET - the organization I did support - more diligently as it made its own decisions to perhaps fund projects that I would reject."

AET is ran by former Barack Obama administration official, Mikey Dickerson, who previously helped the US government with its adoption of new technology.

Last week, Facebook suspended five accounts linked to the operation for "engaging in coordinated inauthentic behavior."One of the accounts belonged to the CEO of New Knowledge, Jonathon Morgan, who claims he was acting alone as a researcher and not on behalf of the company.

Morgan is also one of the developers of the Hamilton 68 dashboard, a tool that purports to look into ongoing Russian social media operations by monitoring Twitter accounts, the list of which is too secret to be disclosed.

Hamilton 68 has been used by US publication Mother Jones to bolster a December 2017 article titled: 'Russian Propagandists Are Pushing for Roy Moore to Win.'

Senator Doug Jones, the Democrat who narrowly defeated Moore last May, has called for a federal investigation. A move supported by the chastened Hoffman. "What is obvious now is that we have focused so much on Russia that we haven't focused on the fact that people in this country could take the same playbook and do the same damn thing," stated Jones.


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Info

Democrats want a 'Muslim transgender candidate' but will have to make due with Joe Biden

Naomi Lim
Washington Examiner
Thu, 27 Dec 2018 18:19 UTC
joe biden
Democrats will have to be content with former Vice President Joe Biden challenging President Trump in 2020 despite preferring a "Muslim transgender candidate," a frequent Fox News pundit said.

"They're looking for something more intersectional," Mark Steyn said Thursday during a segment on the cable news network. "They'd like a Muslim transgender candidate, but they're going to have to make do with Joe Biden."

The comments from Steyn, a conservative commentator, follow a Vanity Fair report on Wednesday that Biden is miffed with former President Barack Obama for meeting with other 2020 Democratic hopefuls like outgoing Rep. Beto O'Rourke. O'Rourke last month lost his bid for the Senate seat representing Texas against Sen. Ted Cruz.

Comment: See also:

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Smoking

Fascism everywhere: Russia devises 30-year tax plan to 'eradicate tobacco sales'


RT
Thu, 27 Dec 2018 13:03 UTC
smoking room russia
© Sputnik / Vladimir Vyatkin Sputnik / Vladimir VyatkinFILE PHOTO. A plate in a smoking room in a trade center in Moscow.
Russia's Health Ministry has prepared a comprehensive plan for how it wants to completely eradicate tobacco products in the country.

The draft document, officially dubbed "Concept for implementing state policy to counter consumption of tobacco," will eventually get cigarettes out of Russian shops, health officials say, "which will ensure maximum decrease of mortality from tobacco-related diseases". It would be a great boon to national healthcare, since each year some 500,000 Russians die of such causes, they say.

Tobacco addicts however should not panic just now. The ministry says the plan will decrease smoking by 0.5 percent points a year, resulting in about 5 percent of people still affected by the habit in 30 years. Then tobacco products would gradually be phased out of stores.

Comment: It seems Russia, like much of the planet, has succumbed to the anti-smoking lie - for now. Because, while many European countries have gone full dictator, there are signs that Russia does take a more objective view towards matters and has been at the forefront of a number of unconventional scientific endeavours. And so perhaps they'll come to see the many benefits of tobacco smoking: And check out SOTT radio's:

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War Whore

Trump's troop pullout more likely imperialist reconfiguration rather than peace


Strategic Culture Foundation
Fri, 28 Dec 2018 10:14 UTC
us troops
President Trump's sudden call for US troops to withdraw from Syria and Afghanistan has left many observers scratching their heads.

Yes, in general, it is to be welcomed that American forces are leaving Syria. They have been there illegally, in contravention of Syria's sovereignty, for the past four years. US troops getting out of the Arab country potentially allows for a political settlement to take hold after nearly eight years of war.

As for Afghanistan, US troops have been there for nearly 18 years on a dubious mission to "combat terrorism". Again, the removal of US soldiers from the Central Asian country could, potentially, lead to less war and more political stability.

Russia has welcomed in principle the move by Trump to withdraw forces from Syria. However, as the Russian foreign ministry noted this week, it is not clear "what the US gambit involves". Moscow's wariness is well-placed.

There seems to be a lot of American politicking behind Trump's abrupt decision-making. His call for "our boys to come home" caught the Pentagon and many hawkish Republicans and Democrats by surprise. The word was they were "blind-sided" by the president's order. What could be going on, in part, is Trump looking toward the 2020 presidential election, and posing as the "peace candidate" making good, superficially, on his past electoral promises to end overseas American wars.

Comment: See also:

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Rocket

From hypersonic glider to nuke subs, latest Russian arms on brink of deployment


RT
Fri, 28 Dec 2018 08:31 UTC
russian tu-160 bomber
© RIA Novosti / Maxim / Russian Defense Ministry / Kazan Sputnik/Sergey MamontovA Tu-160 strategic bomber; (top left) Avangard glider; (bottom left) nuclear submarine cruiser
Moscow has finished testing its newest hypersonic glider which will enter service in 2019. As the date nears, RT has picked several state-of-the-art weapons that are due to boost Russia's deterrence soon.

Modern weapons projects can take decades of development, and for obvious reasons are shrouded in layers of secrecy and obfuscation. Here are five Russian weapons, which are pretty much certain to enter service within a year or so.

Avangard hypersonic glider

The Avangard hypersonic glider was successfully tested on Wednesday and missiles tipped with it will be delivered to strategic troops as soon as next year. The weapon is expected to become the standard warhead for the upcoming Sarmat extended-range ICBM.


Comment: See also:

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Laptop

India wants tech platforms to remove encryption, scrub "unlawful" content

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Thu, 27 Dec 2018 08:15 UTC
Modi
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi
The government of India wants tech platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp and Google to remove content it deems "unlawful" within 24 hours of official notice, and develop "automated tools" which would "proactively identify and remove such material," reports BuzzFeed, citing the publication of the proposed rules by India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY).

The rules would also require companies to break end-to-end encryption to allow the government to snoop on communications.
India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) published the proposed rules on its website following a report on Monday by the Indian Express revealing the government's proposal to modify the country's primary IT law to work them in. The report comes days after India's government seemingly authorized 10 federal agencies to snoop into every computer in the country last week.

The proposed measures have provoked concerns from privacy activists who say they would threaten free speech and enable mass surveillance. -BuzzFeed

Comment: This already happens in the US and EU - except they cover it up with some pretext like "hate-speech" or "copyright" in order to 'protect the public'.

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Star of David

Psycho Netanyahu applauds IDF's reckless endangerment of civilian airline passengers in Christmas air raid on Syria


RT
Thu, 27 Dec 2018 00:19 UTC
An Israeli air force F-15 fighter jet
© Amir Cohen / ReutersAn Israeli air force F-15 fighter jet
Israeli PM and acting defense chief Benjamin Netanyahu has praised the capabilities of his air force a day after IDF jets endangered two civilian flights while carrying out Christmas Day strikes against 'Iranian targets' in Syria.

"We are standing steadfast on our red lines in Syria and everywhere else," Netanyahu told cadets at a graduation ceremony at Hatzerim Air Force Base, noting that the air force's unmatched potential allows them to reach areas "near and far, very far."

While singing the praises to the "special capabilities" of his country's airborne forces and arsenals that can destroy any target, Netanyahu did not directly comment on the latest strikes in Syria. He also failed to respond to the criticism of the Russian military which earlier had accused the Israeli air force of directly endangering two civilian flights over Damascus and the Lebanese capital Beirut during Tuesday night's raid.

Comment: Early on, Israel was celebrating the possibility that senior Hezbollah officials had been injured or killed by the Israeli strike, but the report proved later to be false, as reported by Sputnik. RFE/RL later claimed that three Syrian soldiers had been injured, but offered no further details. The majority of the Israeli missiles were shot down, but two did land in Syrian territory.

Israel continued to crow about its hit on an alleged Iranian weapons depot, offering satellite photos.
Israeli company ImageSat International has published a series of satellite images allegedly showing the extent of the damage from Wednesday's Israeli airstrike on Syria.

The company claims that the images indicate that a 900-square meter (8,000 square foot) storage facility near Damascus was completely destroyed, while an international airport in the Syrian capital was allegedly never targeted.
israel airstrike syria christmas
© ImageSat InternationalSatellite photos released by Israeli firm ImageSat International on December 27, 2018
The publication of the photos came after the Jerusalem Post cited the Israeli news agency Nziv.net as saying that the Israeli Air Force destroyed an arms depot with Iranian weapons in the Wednesday airstrike.
israel strike damascus airport christmas
© ImageSatInternationalSatellite photos released by Israeli firm ImageSat International on December 27, 2018
According to the report, the weapons depot, located about 40 kilometres (24 miles) from the border with Israel, stored Fajr-5 missiles.

Iran has repeatedly insisted that its forces maintain an exclusively advisory role in Syria, denying any plans to establish a permanent military presence in the country.
israel strike damascus airport christmas
© ImageSatInternationalSatellite photos released by Israeli firm ImageSat International on December 27, 2018
1.5-Hour Long Israeli Airstrike on Syria

Earlier on Wednesday, the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported that the Israeli Air Force carried out a 1.5-hour long attack on Syria, with the majority of the Israeli missiles being intercepted by Syrian air defences.

SANA claimed that the Israeli missiles were launched from Lebanese airspace and that the attack left three servicemen injured, and damaged an ammunition depot.

Gen. Maj. Igor Konashenkov, spokesman for the Russian Defence Ministry, for his part, stated that six Israeli F-16 fighter jets directly threatened two civilian planes when conducting the airstrike, something that was confirmed by Lebanese Minister of Public Works and Transport Youssef Fenianos.
Syria has gone on to claim that Israel launched the air strikes with the support of the US:
Syria's Foreign Ministry said in a letter to the United Nations on Wednesday that Israel's missile attack on Damascus and its suburbs is an evidence of unlimited support that Washington gives to Tel Aviv.

"Syria underlines that Israel's continuous aggressive policy is possible due to the unlimited and consistent support of the American administration," reads the statement.

The ministry added that Israeli attacks seek to drag out the Syrian conflict and boost the morale of terrorist groups that confront Bashar al-Assad's government. Damascus also called on the UN to take steps against Israil in order to prevent such incidents in the future.

Lebanon, for its part, announced that it would send a complaint to the UN Security Council against Israel over its invasion in the country's airspace to attack Syria.

"There was an agreement that Lebanon will file an urgent complaint to the UN Security Council against Israel and will take a decision that will protect Lebanon and [its] citizens," said Lebanese Minister of Public Works and Transport Youssef Fenianos.
Israel's military has so far refused to comment on its reprehensible use of civilian passenger planes as cover for the attack:

'Treacherous': Israeli air force used Syrian civilian airliners as cover for Christmas Day attack on Damascus
[T]he Russian Ministry of Defense confirmed that the IDF jets flew in to firing position - just as two civilian passenger airliners were in the air preparing for their landings into both Beirut and Damascus airports.

As a result, Syrian military defense units did not deploy its surface-to-air missiles and electronic jamming "to prevent a tragedy" and instead allowed Damascus air traffic control divert one of its passenger flights to an emergency destination at Khmeimim in Latakia.

Israel's IDF would have been fully aware of these passenger airline flights, and therefore would have specifically chosen this exact position and timing in order to carry out their air operation against Syria. Based on this, one can logically conclude then that the IDF placed those civilian flight in danger, and that the Israeli military used those civilian airline flights as cover to increase their odds of executing a successful military airstrike.

Had the Syrian military not hesitated, and engaged the initial Israeli bogey - and accidentally hit one of the passenger airliners the IDF was using as cover - the international outrage would have been substantial, with the western media most certainly blaming 'the Assad Regime' and 'Putin's Russia' for the 'humanitarian tragedy.' It's possible that an incident would have been enough to prompt renewed calls for the US forces to remain in Syria - effectively reversing the announcement made by President Trump last week to withdraw US troops from their illegal occupation on northeastern Syria. Whether this was the Israeli motive for carrying out such a risky move is uncertain, but yesterday's reckless incident by Israel follows a familiar and disturbing pattern of using other country's aircraft as cover in order bait Syria's air defenses to hit the wrong targets while conveniently concealing their own visibility on their enemy's radar systems.


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Chess

India takes over operations of Iran's strategic Chabahar Port


RFE/RL
Tue, 25 Dec 2018 00:36 UTC
Chabahar Port, Iran
Chabahar Port, Iran
India has formally taken over operations at Iran's strategic Chabahar Port, a move that could have significant geopolitical ramifications in the region.

The port on the Indian Ocean, inaugurated last year, is being built largely by India and is expected to provide a key supply route for Afghanistan while allowing India to bypass rival Pakistan to trade with Central Asia.

Representatives from India, Iran, and Afghanistan met in Tehran to formally hand over control to state-owned India Ports Global Limited (IPGL).

An Iranian official was quoted by the official IRNA news agency as saying that IPGL had been granted the lease for "a temporary period of 18 months and a ten-year period afterwards."
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