UKROGATE is the real foreign meddling scandal in the 2016 US Presidential election. These are just some of the people who should be thoroughly investigated for their ties to Kiev.
Incoming FBI Director Cristopher Wray has stated that he would be interested in investigating links between officials of the Ukrainian regime and the Hillary Clinton campaign.

With evidence mounting that high level officials in Kiev actively worked with the Clinton campaign to try and influence US voters, it is imperative that any future investigation isn't whitewashed simply because Kiev's tactics failed to win the election for Clinton.

Although the investigation into Donald Trump's non-existent links with Russia have unsurprisingly come up with virtually nothing of interest, the methods of the investigation ought to be examined and replicated where necessary in a future Ukraine-Clinton investigation.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the so-called Russiagate investigation is that seemingly anyone connected to Donald Trump who ever had a conversation with a Russian, irrespective of their lack of involvement in Russian politics, is a person of interest to investigators.

The same tactics could be accurately applied to an investigation into Clinton and the Democratic party's links with Ukraine.

Here are the people that ought to be questioned.

Europe has been content to blame its current societal and economic decline on malfeasant leaders like EU Jean-Claude Juncker, German Chancellor Angela Merkel or France's ex-president François Hollande. If the people of Europe only knew the real actors behind, Israel would not be unscathed in this whole Arab Spring charade. Yes, Europe has the Israelis to thank for sapping what's left of the EU's strength. Here's a story you won't read in the New York Times, but one the Wall Street Journal will hint at.

This morning I was astonished to find a Wall Street Journal story that framed Israel's support for Syrian insurgents against the government of President Bashar Hafez al-Assad. In a strange twist of the fates, by reporters Rory Jones in Tel Aviv, Noam Raydan in Beirut and Suha Ma'ayeh in Amman, Jordan, the newspaper owned by Genie Oil investor billionaire Rupert Murdoch suddenly decided to spill some of the beans on Israel's role in the Syria. The WSJ story is but one of the recent revelations hinting at how Israel played a key role in the conflict that has destroyed Syria, and which has flooded Europe with refugees and potential terrorists. The lead from the WSJ is telling:

"Israel has been regularly supplying Syrian rebels near its border with cash as well as food, fuel and medical supplies for years, a secret engagement in the enemy country's civil war aimed at carving out a buffer zone populated by friendly forces."

The United Arab Emirates may be added to lawsuits brought by the families of 9/11 victims against Saudi Arabia for its alleged role in the 2001 attacks.

Families of the victims have been fighting to bring a case against Saudi Arabia for its alleged role in funding and supporting Al-Qaeda. In September 2016, the Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA) came into effect, allowing US citizens to sue foreign countries for terrorism by providing legal exemption to sovereign immunity.

Fifteen of the 19 hijackers who carried out the September 11, 2001 attacks were Saudis, while two of them were from the UAE.

The Middle East Eye reports that UAE's alleged support for Al-Qaeda has been raised in legal circles in light of the recent diplomatic spat between Qatar and Saudi Arabia, UAE, Bahrain and Egypt, causing families of the victims to discuss taking legal action against the UAE before the statute of limitations expires in January 2019.

"The UAE needs some attention and our lawyers need to start delving into it in a more concerted way," said Kristen Breitweiser, whose husband was killed on 9/11. "I'm simply going to say this - to me, their hands don't seem clean and I think their role in the 9/11 attacks and their connection to the hijackers bears further investigation."

China and Syria have already begun discussing post-war infrastructure investment, with a 'Matchmaking Fair for Syria Reconstruction' held in Beijing

Amid the proverbial doom and gloom pervading all things Syria, the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune sometimes yield, well, good fortune. Take what happened this past Sunday in Beijing.

The China-Arab Exchange Association and the Syrian Embassy organized a Syria Day Expo crammed with hundreds of Chinese specialists in infrastructure investment. It was a sort of mini-gathering of the Asia Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB), billed as "The First Project Matchmaking Fair for Syria Reconstruction". And there will be serious follow-ups: a Syria Reconstruction Expo; the 59th Damascus International Fair next month, where around 30 Arab and foreign nations will be represented; and the China-Arab States Expo in Yinchuan, Ningxia Hui province, in September.

Qin Yong, deputy chairman of the China-Arab Exchange Association, announced that Beijing plans to invest $2 billion in an industrial park in Syria for 150 Chinese companies.

"Is Russia an enemy of the United States?" NBC's Kasie Hunt demanded of Ted Cruz. Replied the runner-up for the GOP nomination, "Russia is a significant adversary. Putin is a KGB thug."

To Hillary Clinton running mate Tim Kaine, the revelation that Donald Trump Jr. entertained an offer from the Russians for dirt on Clinton could be considered "treason."

Treason is giving aid and comfort to an enemy in a time of war. Are we really at war with Russia? Is Russia really our enemy?

Why Russia is a Hostile Power is the title of today's editorial in The Washington Post that seeks to explain why Middle America should embrace the Russophobia of our capital city:

"Vladimir Putin adheres to a set of values that are antithetical to bedrock American values. He favors spheres of influence over self-determination; corruption over transparency; and repression over democracy."

Yet, accommodating a sphere of influence for a great power is exactly what FDR and Churchill did with Stalin, and every president from Truman to George H. W. Bush did with the Soviet Union.

When East Germans, Hungarians, Czechs, Poles rose up against Communist regimes, no U.S. president intervened. For those nations were on the other side of the Yalta line agreed to in 1945. Bush I and James Baker even accused Ukrainians of "suicidal nationalism" for contemplating independence from Russia.

Can the US truly be this stupid?

The US is threatening China with sanctions. Last week Nikki Haley made the threat at the UN Security Council - though she did not mention China by name. And now the proverbial "senior US officials" have leaked to Reuters that the Trump administration is drawing up sanctions that will be imposed on China if the latter can't make North Korea capitulate before the US.

It's not exactly clear if the sanctions being drawn up are seriously meant to be implemented, or if they are just a stick designed to make China agree to even tougher North Korea sanctions. Seeing how brainless and prone to bullying the US is, the China sanctions probably have a decent chance of being put in place either way.

Understanding what is happening to Thailand helps observers understand how the US undermined and destabilized Libya, Syria, and beyond.

The US recently granted Thai national and fugitive Jom Petchpradab asylum, paving the way for a possible green card for the political agitator and supporter of ousted Thai prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra.

This comes as the US tightens immigration laws to deal with influxes of victims fleeing the pan-regional wars it is conducting from North Africa and the Middle East, to Central Asia and beyond - including the now 6 year war in Syria and approaching 17 year occupation of Afghanistan.

A contrasting juxtaposition in my twitter feed:

First the U.S. Central Command tweet with this statement by the commander of the U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, General Nicholson:

GENERAL NICHOLSON STATEMENT ON THE KILLING OF THE THIRD ISIS-K EMIR BY U.S. AND AFGHAN FORCES IN THE LAST 12 MONTHS
...
"This operation is another success in our campaign to defeat ISIS-K in Afghanistan in 2017," said Nicholson. "Abu Sayed is the third ISIS-K emir we have killed in the last year and we will continue until they are annihilated. There is no safe haven for ISIS-K in Afghanistan." [bold added]

Then the Micah Zenko tweet with this interview with the commander of U.S. Central Command, General Votel. Votel is the direct superior of the above Nicholson:

Q: ISIS leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi — dead or alive? And does it matter anymore?

Votel: [..] I hope that he is (dead), frankly. [..] That said, we've been doing this long enough to know that leaders are killed and we've killed plenty of them. And that there's always somebody who is going to step up into those positions so we shouldn't think that just killing Baghdadi is the key here. He can be replaced. So in that regard, it may not matter as much. [bold added]

With at least 320,000 cases of cholera in the country, the outbreak is caused by widespread damage to infrastructure during the Saudi-led war, U.N. officials said.

While the latest figures confirmed over 320,000 cases of cholera in Yemen, the World Health Organization announced that it would be canceling the planned shipment of nearly one million cholera vaccines to the country torn apart by a Saudi Arabia-led bombing campaign, citing security and logistical concerns in the decision to cancel the shipment.

An initial shipment of 500,000 doses are currently in Djibouti, ready to be shipped, however WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier told reporters that the doses might be rerouted to several countries in Africa instead.

WHO's latest figures indicate that there have been around 320,000 cases of cholera, a disease that causes uncontrollable diarrhea and severe dehydration that can be deadly without treatment. The conditions in Yemen in the midst of a Saudi-led, U.S.-sponsored war have led to a spread of the disease on an epidemic scale. Lack of access to clean water, famine, and destruction of health-infrastructure resulting from the war have been the primary drivers of the outbreak.

Beijing describes the latest overflight of Chinese warplanes between two Japanese islands in the western Pacific as "routine exercises," and says that Tokyo should "get used to" the practice.

China downplayed Japan's claims that Thursday's Xian H-6 bomber drills over a waterway between the Japanese islands of Miyako and Okinawa was something "unusual." Beijing said that the warplanes legally passed through the Miyako Strait and did not rule out such drills in the future.

"It is legitimate for Chinese military planes to fly through the strait, and more similar training will be conducted on the high seas as needed," Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman Ren Guoqiang stated on Friday, as cited by Xinhua news agency.