Puppet MastersS


Jet4

The end is nigh: Battle for Idlib slowly comes into sight

b
Moon of Alabama
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 23:08 UTC
Syria war November 3, 2017
© Thomas van LingerSyria - general situation on November 3, 2017
There have been few significant movements during the last weeks. The war on Syria slowly grinds towards its end. The political tussle continues as ever. U.S. Secretary of Defense Mattis made a curious announcement of plans he can not fulfill.

Our last Syria summary looked at the situation around the last refuge area of the Islamic State near the Syrian-Iraqi border:
The twin-cities of Abu Kamal (al-Bukamal) in Syria and al-Qaim in Iraq are ISIS' last urban refuge. The cities are on the south site of the Euphrates with the important border crossing between them. Coming from the east Iraqi government troops retook the al-Qaim crossing today. They now control the border and are breaking into the city proper. Syrian government forces approach Abu Kamal from the north-west and from south-east.
...
The U.S. proxy forces north of the Euphrates announced that they had taken several oil-fields north of the river and were also progressing towards Abu Kamal. The Syrian government and its allies fear that the U.S. [is trying to take] Abu Kamal itself. It could then claim to have control over the border crossing towards Iraq and severe that important line of communication. A race is on to prevent that.
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Quenelle

French lawmakers walk out to protest Israel shill Meyer Habib's anti-Palestinian diatribe

Ali Abunimah
Electronic Intifada
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 22:35 UTC
france walkout lawmakers anti-palistine speech
Lawmakers walking out of France's National Assembly on Wednesday in protest at an anti-Palestinian diatribe.
This video shows lawmakers walking out of France's National Assembly on Wednesday in protest at an anti-Palestinian diatribe by one of their colleagues, Meyer Habib.

France reserves a number of parliamentary seats for citizens living overseas, and Habib represents French citizens in the Eastern Mediterranean, including Israel.

But in practice, Habib, who is close to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, functions more as a spokesperson for Israel's government.

Habib was responding to European affairs minister Nathalie Loiseau, who told parliament that the French government "hopes for the quick release" of Salah Hamouri.

Hamouri is a Palestinian-French human rights defender who has been held without charge or trial by Israel since August.
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Vinyl

Whistle-blower claims to have recordings of 'Russian officials' giving donations to Clinton Foundation

Jeff Poor
Breitbart
Wed, 15 Nov 2017 10:00 UTC
Peter Schweizer on Hannity
In an appearance Tuesday on Fox News Channel's "Hannity," Breitbart editor at Large Peter Schweizer, president of the Government Accountability Institute and author of "Clinton Cash," revealed there were audio recordings of Russian officials demonstrating they were willing to use "bribery" to get favors from the former President Bill Clinton and his wife former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

According to Schweizer, that included giving donations to the Clinton Foundation.


Comment: ...which is how ALL business is conducted in Washington, from ALL foreign entities via ALL 'Foundations' to ALL powerful people in DC.


He added that had there been this body of evidence compiled on anyone else in an elected office, from President Donald Trump on down, they'd be under investigation.


Partial transcript as follows:

Comment: 'But Clinton did it too!' has been a terrible line of defense for the Trump administration (and their few allies in the media) to take.

They should never have gone on the defensive about Russiagate: they should have stuck to what they first called it: 'FAKE NEWS!' and called out the intel agencies' lies.

Alas, the People of the Lie are persistent pathologicals, so they pull most normies into their orbit sooner or later.

While shady deals likely went on on between Clinton and Russian companies, what if anything has that got to do with Putin 'hacking the US election'? NADA.

There's only one rogue nation worthy of the name: the US (specifically, the ramified networks comprising the Deep State, and its corrupting influence the world over), and there's no-one more ''involved in bribery, extortion, racketeering, money laundering and kickbacks" than the Clintons.

As for these alleged recordings allegedly unmasking 'Russian officials' being 'deviant Russians', well, we'll just have to wait and see, won't we.

For more:

The real Russiagate? FBI uncovered Russian bribery plot before Obama admin approved nuclear deal with Russia - UPDATE

FBI informant cleared to testify before Congress on Obama-era Uranium One Russia scandal - sources say Trump personally gave the order

New FOIA documents reveal FBI scramble to preserve records in Uranium One scandal

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War Whore

US and its vassal states Israel and Saudi Arabia are plotting war with Iran and Hezbollah

Kurt Nimmo
Newsbud
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 20:35 UTC
Hezbollah
Hezbollah
Having failed to unseat Bashar al-Assad in Syria, the United States has switched its focus to Hezbollah in Lebanon.

In an act of blatant hypocrisy, the US House has passed "Sanctioning Hezbollah's Illicit use of Civilians as Defenseless Shields Act," a bill that sanctions Hezbollah for alleged war crimes while ignoring its own checkered past brimming with war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Congress didn't need to do much in the way of homework prior to introducing this bill. Israel did that for them when its Intelligence and Terrorism Center at the Center for Special Studies, a research group that collaborates closely with the Israel Defense Forces and the American Jewish Congress, released report on Hezbollah's purported use of human shields during the 2006 war in Lebanon.

This is a remarkable allegation considering Israel specifically and indiscriminately targeted Lebanon's civilian population. "Israel's indiscriminate airstrikes, not Hezbollah's shielding as claimed by Israeli officials, caused most of the approximately 900 civilian deaths in Lebanon during the July-August 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah," Human Rights Watch reported in September, 2007.
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Gold Seal

Best of the Web: James Bovard: Trump's liberal critics are increasingly unhinged, authoritarian

James Bovard
The Hill
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:23 UTC
liberal snowflake protester screaming trump Inauguration
© YouTube / On Demand NewsA woman screams at the heavens during the inauguration of President Donald Trump, 2017
Last week's anniversary of Trump's election sparked widespread teeth-gnashing by the nation's pundits. Trump is supposedly the gravest threat to American democracy since the secession of the Confederacy. His presidency, probably, continues to be a boon for antidepressant sales across the land.

New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg, in a column last week headlined "Anniversary of the Apocalypse," lamented the "terror-struck and vertiginous days" after Trump's win and the ongoing "metaphysical whiplash" and "hideous interregnum," which leaves her "poleaxed by grief at the destruction of our civic inheritance." Professor Henry Giroux of McMaster University frothed that Trump's "ascendancy in American politics has made visible a culture of cruelty, a contempt for civic literacy, a corrupt mode of governance and a disdain for informed judgment that has been decades in the making."

It is understandable that folks would be riled by Trump's bluster about revoking the broadcast licenses of his critics or calling for the firing of protesting football players. His administration's rhetoric on trade and the drug war threaten to revive moronic policies that should have been banished forever by perennial failures. But while Trump poses plenty of constitutional perils, many of his opponents are even more authoritarian.
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Red Flag

Production of opium in Afghanistan doubled over 2016 despite the West "trying" to stamp it out


RT
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 20:19 UTC
poppy field
© Parwiz Parwiz / ReutersAn Afghan man works on a poppy field in Jalalabad province
Opium production in Afghanistan has almost doubled this year over 2016, according to a United Nations survey. As the Taliban returns to territory liberated by UK forces in 2001, the booming drugs industry is further proof the war failed in its basic aims.

One of the justifications given by former Prime Minister Tony Blair for Britain's intervention in Afghanistan against the Taliban back in 2001 was to stop the production of opium poppies used to make heroin.

In a speech at Labour Party Conference that year, he said the UK must intervene alongside the US.

"The arms the Taliban are buying today are paid for by the lives of young British people buying their drugs on British streets. This is another part of the regime we should destroy," he said.

Comment: While some parts of Western governments give lip service to cutting the amount of heroin produced in Afghanistan, the hidden actors of the Deep State are at the same time making sure it doesn't slow down:

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Snakes in Suits

Fraud and criminal Bill Browder wants to stop Cyprus from revealing his offshore assets to Russia


RT
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 20:23 UTC
William browder fraud russia magnitsky
© ReutersSome of hedgefunder William Browder's firms were caught involved in $230 million tax fraud in Russia
A group of MEPs have urged Cyprian authorities not to cooperate with Russia on an inquiry against the man behind the Magnitsky Act, William Browder. Now, a Russian lawyer claims that Browder himself arranged this petition to hide data on his operations.

Browder, a US-born British investor and the founder of Hermitage Capital Management, fears that his fraudulent investment schemes involving offshore assets in Cyprus would be revealed to European authorities if Cyprus continues to cooperate with Moscow on its probe against him, Natalya Veselnitskaya, a Russian lawyer who conducted her own investigation into Browder's operations, told RT. She added that Browder is actively trying to paint the investigation against him as politically motivated.

"He [Browder] is afraid of the Russian probe that has conclusive evidence of his financial crimes and proof that his theory of Magnitsky's death is an absolute fake. That's why Browder is ready to stage any provocation," Veselnitskaya said. She went on to say that the investor's decision to intervene was particularly "influenced by the fact that the entire network of offshore companies that make up his organized criminal group is located on the territory of Cyprus."

Comment: We wouldn't expect any less from a fraud like Bill Browder. Only a guy like him could run a massive criminal operation, then play the victim when he gets caught - all while blaming his victims for doing exactly what he has done. The guy is a snake and a con.

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Star of David

Jewish identity politics gone crazy: "Anti-Semitism" bill could equate criticism of Israel with racism - Jewish community split over implications for dual-loyalty

Kyle Stanton
Mondoweiss
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 20:01 UTC
trachtenberg cooper
© C-SPAN
On November 7, the House Judiciary Committee held hearings over the Anti-Semitism Awareness Act, a bill that would broaden the definition of antisemitism to include criticism of Israel. If passed, the legislation would instruct the Department of Education to consider the State Department's definition of antisemitism when investigating educational institutions for discrimination under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. The House Judiciary Committee heard testimonies in support of the bill from individuals representing institutions such as the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Anti-Defamation League. Those who argued against the bill were Jewish Studies professors and representatives of advocacy groups.

During the question and answer portion of the hearing, an exchange between Rabbi Abraham Cooper of the Simon Wiesenthal Center and Dr. Barry Trachtenberg, the Chair of Jewish History at Wake Forest University, was revealing and rooted in American Jewish history. Trachtenberg argued that the State Department's definition of antisemitism was deeply flawed because it defines all accusations of American Jewish dual-loyalty as inherently antisemitic. By these standards, the ideas of Theodor Herzl could be defined as antisemitic. Herzl argued that because Jews represent one people, it is useless for them to be loyal to any other state but the proposed Jewish State. Rabbi Cooper seemed to misunderstand the argument, reflexively accusing Trachtenberg of providing "cannon fodder for antisemites".

Comment: Want to know the logical endpoint of identity politics? Look no further than Israel: victim-mentality extraordinaire and apartheid state.

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Jet2

More than half of Germany's main battle tanks found to be unfit for service


RT
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 19:57 UTC
Leopard 2 tanks
© Fabian Bimmer / ReutersLeopard 2 tanks
More than half of the German military's 255 Leopard 2 main battle tanks are unfit for service, while a sizeable part of the combat vehicles is considered only conditionally operational as they lack critical spare parts, a media report found.

The German army has been well known in the past for its ability to deploy well-trained and maintained tank formations against the enemy, but this belief seems to be fading. Only 95 out of the Bundeswehr's 244 Leopard 2 main battle tanks are combat-ready, Funke media group has learnt from a Defense Ministry report. The report has been published by Focus magazine.

Some 53 tanks have been disarmed, seven are being used for testing, while 89 vehicles are "conditionally operational" as they cannot be repaired without critical spare parts. The Defense Ministry report especially highlights multiple cases in which "unavailability of the required spare parts would be detrimental."

Comment: The German, US and EU politicians can rattle their sabers at Russia all they want, but clearly if there were any actual military confrontations Russia would wipe the floor with them considering their military superiority:

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Light Saber

Hell freezes over: First ever bill on Palestinian human rights introduced to U.S. Congress

Sheren Khalel
Mondoweiss
Thu, 16 Nov 2017 19:58 UTC
IDF arrests palestinian child
© Associated Press/Mahmoud IlleanIsraeli border police officers detain a Palestinian youth in Jerusalem's Old City, Monday, July 17, 2017.
Rep. Betty McCollum (D-MN) introduced a House bill on Tuesday that seeks to prohibit the U.S. from funding the detention and prosecution of Palestinian children in the Israeli military court system. The legislation is said to be the first time a bill on Palestinian human rights has ever been introduced to Congress.

The 11-page bill comes several weeks after a report was released by Israeli rights groups, with the support of the European Union, which revealed "broad, systemic abuse by Israeli authorities," against Palestinian teenagers detained in occupied East Jerusalem.

The bill, dubbed the " "Promoting Human Rights by Ending Israeli Military Detention of Palestinian Children Act," begins by detailing the provisions laid out by the the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child, signed by both the U.S. and Israel in the 90s (the U.S. signed the treaty, but did not ratify it, while Israel both signed and ratified the treaty into Israeli law).

Comment: Introduction is a long way from passage. Expect a full-court press against this bill from AIPAC, JDL, B'nai Brith, the Christian Zionist crazies and other tentacles of the Israeli Lobby.

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