Puppet MastersS


Explosion

Best of the Web: Hezbollah's '9/11': Iranian ambassador among 1,000+ wounded after Israel remotely detonates pagers

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Tue, 17 Sep 2024 16:04 UTC
mossad attack hezbollah explode pagers
Stillframe of one of the pagers exploding in a crowded market full of civilians.
Update(10:50ET):

An eyewitness tells Al Jazeera: "There's more than 400 men here. Their pagers exploded, the ones they use for communication." There are regional Lebanese media reports of over 1,200 Hezbollah operatives injured.

Reuters is confirming that Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon Mojtaba Amani is among the wounded in the series of pager explosions, based on a report in Iran's Mehr news outlet. Follow up reports say he was only lightly injured. Some of the explosions happened in Syria as well, reports say. There are reports of civilian deaths in Beirut, including children. Some of the explosions happened inside homes, where the pagers were on shelves or bedstands.

Comment: Updates from Al Jazeera:
(16:20 GMT) 'No northern Israel resident returning home after explosions'

Amir Oren, a columnist at Israeli publication Haaretz focusing on military and government affairs, says "not one Israeli hostage" and "not
one Israeli resident is going back home in the north after the exploding pagers".

Speaking to Al Jazeera from West Jerusalem, he said: "What Israel should have done - and many in the Israeli defence establishment have recommended - is to get a ceasefire in Gaza, which will bring about the ceasefire in the north and then let diplomacy take effect."

Oren said "hopefully" the incident in Lebanon will be "a substitute for a ground manoeuvre" and "not a precursor", noting that it's in Israel's interest "to get the war over both in Gaza and in Lebanon".

But he added: "Netanyahu for his personal, political and even judicial reasons - he is, of course, standing trial for bribery and other offences and is supposed to testify on his own defence come December 2 - would like to prolong the war and probably to broaden it.

"Whether he has the power within the cabinet, within the Israeli political system to do it, I doubt it. He has veto power over others but up to now he has not managed to provoke anything in regards to Hezbollah where he can later leapfrog from there to Iran. [US] President [Joe] Biden has been adamant not to let him do it for very good reasons of American national interest," Oren continued.

"So there is a delicate balance Netanyahu and others in the Israeli decision-making elite - hopefully he will not prevail."
(16:10 GMT) 'New brand' of communication devices heated, then exploded: Report

It remains unclear at this time how the communication devices used in Lebanon were rigged to explode.

A Hezbollah official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, told The Associated Press the new brand of handheld pagers used by the group first heated up, then exploded.

A source close to the group, requesting anonymity to discuss sensitive matters, told AFP news agency the blasts were an "Israeli breach" of its communication system. He didn't elaborate. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military.
(15:10 GMT) 'A very sophisticated attack'

We have some more comments from military analyst Elijah Magnier on the near simultaneous pager explosions in Lebanon.
  • This is a very sophisticated attack, and normally at this scale, it requires the collaboration of more than one entity.
  • If Israeli intelligence managed to compromise the pagers that have been supplied to Hezbollah, this [does not exclude] that they have managed to access the supply by Iran because Iran supplies Hezbollah with most of its equipment.
  • An operation of this scale needs the presence of high explosives, even in small quantities, and an awfully long time to sit at every single pager and manually insert 1 to 3 grammes [0.4 to 0.11oz] of highly explosive material and yet conserve the functionality of the pager, the screen and all the electronics without all of this being affected.
  • That requires the work of more than one intelligence service and a break in the channel of supply.
  • That can also indicate that there is an explosive because batteries don't explode on their own in Beirut, in th Bekaa Valley, in the south of Lebanon and in Syria and everywhere there is a pager at the same instant.
  • This is not something related to the malfunction of the pager, but it is something that is implemented in it and exploded by a frequency, most likely a radio frequency.
  • In this case, we understand Israeli intelligence has placed this explosive with the support of a third country before they reached Hezbollah
  • This means that they have not only taken their time but they also sat on this supply for a long time before it reached its final destination and most probably the Iranians will now be examining all their products and equipment to make sure that nobody has tampered in what they have acquired.
A timely warning:



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Bad Guys

Debate 'was rigged' - Trump


RT
Wed, 11 Sep 2024 13:59 UTC
trump
© Getty Images / Chip SomodevillaDonald Trump talks to journalists after debating Kamala Harris in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, September 10, 2024
Former US President Donald Trump has criticized the "dishonest" moderation of his debate with Vice President Kamala Harris by ABC News, saying he would only consider a rematch if it were hosted by "a fair network."

Speaking to Fox's Sean Hannity immediately after Tuesday night's debate, Trump claimed that he emerged from the encounter as the victor. Informed by Hannity that Harris reportedly wants a second debate, Trump seemed dismissive of the idea.

"She wants it because she lost," Trump told Hannity. "You know what happens when you're a prizefighter and you lose, you immediately want a new fight... maybe if it was on a fair network I would do that."

Comment: See also: ABC debate moderators spark public's fury for aggressive fact-checking of Trump, easy treatment of Harris

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TV

Desperation - Attacks on RT reveal the sad truth about the West

Tarik Cyril Amar
RT
Tue, 17 Sep 2024 09:42 UTC
Tony Blinken
© Drew AngererU.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
With their crusade against their own dissidents, the US and its allies betray the desperation of their collective propaganda machine.

The US and its ever-loyal followers Canada and Great Britain have launched a fresh information war offensive. If "fresh" is the word: In a new season of the long-running, apparently never-ever ending Russia Rage show (aka "Russiagate") that at least the American "elites" simply cannot get enough of, it is again - drum roll - RT that is the target. This time, it stands accused not "merely" of spreading "disinformation" (that is, any information Western governments do not like) but of intelligence work as well.

And then some. Such as trying to influence the American elections (yaaawn) and somehow being linked to collecting volunteer contributions for Russia's war effort in Ukraine - a form of outreach, by the way, which is exactly the same as what Ukrainian organizations do. There also is an even more terrifying revelation. It has dawned on some troglodytes in the US State Department that RT is not relying on mechanical typewriters and the telegraph but has a "cyber" capability!

Comment: See also:

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Eye 2

Meta bans RT


RT
Tue, 17 Sep 2024 07:53 UTC
META
© Nikolas Kokovlis / NurPhoto via Getty Images
The Facebook owner has announced the move after Washington claimed Russian outlets are espionage offshoots.

US tech giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, has banned several Russian news networks, including RT. Since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in 2022, Meta has been cooperating with a ban on RT imposed by numerous Western nations, particularly EU members.

In a statement on Monday, the company said the deplatforming of the media outlets from its apps is due to "foreign interference activity" and would be implemented globally over the next several days.

The US government sanctioned RT last week, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken claiming that the outlet is "functioning as a de facto arm of [Russian] intelligence."

Comment: See also:

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Bullseye

Lavrov: Even Orwell couldn't have imagined totalitarianism like that of the rules based world order


SABA
Mon, 16 Sep 2024 00:22 UTC
El ministro de Asuntos Exteriores de Rusia, Serguéi Lavrov.
Speaking at a press conference with his Egyptian counterpart Badr Ahmed Abdel Ati, the Russian minister said that despite Orwell's fertile imagination and historical insight, he could not have imagined what a totalitarian state would look like.

Lavrov said: "Orwell described some of the features of such a state, but he could not reach the depth of totalitarianism that we see now in the framework of the so-called rule-based system," Lavrov said.

Comment: Footage:

Indeed. Whilst the rules-based-reality may not be quite as fantastical as 1984 - although it has its moments - its sinister reach is certainly all pervasive, and the cruelty and death that lie in its wake are near unfathomable:

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Nuke

Nuclear war off the board

Julian MacFarlane
News Forensics
Mon, 16 Sep 2024 22:06 UTC
As I wrote last time, Vladimir Putin is not playing chess with the Americans - but Wei Chi, what the Japanese call Go.

The Americans make one move at a time, trying to take Russian pieces off the board, as in chess or maybe checkers.

In Wei Chi, stones are not taken off the board - they must be "captured" by being surrounded so they cannot move. That takes a lot of strategic thinking. You win when your opponent can no longer move — since you have deprived him of options by occupying the squares around him. The goal is to render him powerless.
GO Piecies
© News Forensics
Recently, NATO, specifically the Brits. enabled Ukraine's incursion into Kursk.

To carry out this attack, the Ukrainians had to deplete their forces in Donetsk. As a result now the key logistics hubs of Provosk, Chasov Yar, and Ugledar are surrounded.

When they fall, the UAF will find it difficult to supply its forces, much less move or maneuver in occupied Donetsk, Kharkov, and Kherson — just as a Wei Chi player finds himself with limited or no freedom or movement when his opponent has him hemmed in on at least three sides. Look again at the photo above.

The West predictably responded by attacking what they thought were key pieces on the Russian "board" - threatening to supply Ukraine with weapons, operators and targeting, for long range strikes into Russia.

On the Wei Chi board, however, there are no "key pieces" — no pawns or rooks or bishops or queens or whatever - it's all about strategy. And position.
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AK47

Best of the Web: Would-Be Trump Assassin Palled Around With Neo-Nazi Azov Brigade In Ukraine: What Did The Government Know?

Tyler Durden
ZeroHedge
Mon, 16 Sep 2024 21:01 UTC
ryan routh trump assassin azov brigade ukraine
© LinkedIn/XRyan Routh with members of Ukraine's military
Perhaps the most interesting angle to attempted Trump assassin Ryan Routh's recent history in his Ukraine connection. We documented that when he went to Ukraine to recruit for its International Legion in 2022 he was a Western mainstream media darling for a time, having been quoted on behalf of the cause to get more foreign fighters thrown into the battle against Russia by a who's who of major media sources from FT to Newsweek to the NY Times.

But when he arrived in Ukraine, according to these media reports, the 58-year old Routh himself was considered too old to fight alongside the Ukrainian army. "So plan B," Routh described to one outlet, "was to come to Kiev and promote the idea of many others coming to join the International Legion. We need thousands of people here to fight alongside Ukrainians."

"There are about 190 countries on our planet, and if the governments are not officially sending soldiers here, then we civilians should pick up this torch and make it happen," he described. He had told Newsweek in a video interview from Ukraine that the war with Russia was as simple as "good vs. evil" and essentially the same as good guys and bad guys in the Hollywood movies Americans grew up with. It was not a gray conflict, he described, but "black and white".

Comment: Russia has a theory. Ukraine seems to have a lot to lose from a Trump presidency.



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Bizarro Earth

Genocide in the foreground, world war looming in the background


The Free Thought Project
Mon, 16 Sep 2024 00:00 UTC
putinrockets
© thefreethoughtproject.comRussian President Vladimir Putin
"If I were to describe our present geopolitical situation in ten words or less it would be "Genocide in the foreground, world war looming in the background."
- Caitlin Johnstone
While attention is justifiably focused on the present horrors in Gaza and the imminent possibility that it could spark another war in the middle east, the world's power structures are once again dividing themselves up into two increasingly intimate alliance groups with an increasingly hostile and militaristic posture toward each other.

As Ukraine loses more and more territory and soldiers to Russia, both Washington and Kyiv are demonstrating an openness to ramping up attacks on a nuclear superpower in ways that would have been unthinkable a few years ago. Meanwhile, Russia and China are growing more and more intimate in preparation for future aggressions from the US power alliance.

Antiwar's Dave Decamp has a few articles out right now which highlight this disturbing trend simmering in the background amid the waking nightmare in the foreground, on top of all the other dangerous escalations we've been discussing in this space.
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X

No ceasefire in Zelensky's plan


RT
Sun, 15 Sep 2024 15:50 UTC
Ukraine guy
© Ciftci/Anadolu Agency via Getty ImagesOn Watch
Dmitry Litvin has dismissed as "fake" a recent article in Bild claiming Kiev is prepared to suspend hostilities in certain areas.

Kiev has no intention of ceasing hostilities with Moscow anywhere along the current front line, contrary to what the German tabloid Bild would have its readers believe, a communications adviser to Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky has stated. Dmitry Litvin also stressed the importance of US support for Kiev's "victory plan," as its success very much depends on Washington's generosity.

On Saturday, Bild claimed that Zelensky plans to travel to the US in the coming weeks to present his revised strategy to President Joe Biden as well as to Democratic nominee Kamala Harris and her Republican rival, Donald Trump. According to the report, the main points include a "demand to be allowed to deploy Western long-range weapons deep inside Russia, as well as Ukraine's readiness to accept local ceasefires along certain portions of the front, and thus a provisional freezing of the situation."

Speaking to Ukraine's LIGA.net media outlet later that same day, Litvin insisted that "Bild has spread a fake."

Comment: Waging a war of attrition is not, repeat, not Kiev's forté.

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Russian Flag

The NATO/Ukraine defeat in Kursk (and beyond)

Gordon Hahn
gordonhahn.com
Sat, 14 Sep 2024 00:00 UTC
Map UkraineRussia
© Unknown
Contrary to the view of Beltway pundits regarding the sunny side or various alleged successes of Ukraine's Kursk incursion, the Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskiy's newest simulacra attack - substituting a fake reality for the real one - has led to yet another predictable catastrophe in the real world of war and politics. Zelenskiy's gambit had no military logic behind it. Its essence was made up of a propagandistic/PR component and perhaps a terrorist element. It was a reckless, desperate last roll of the dice to overturn the playing board which never had a hope of succeeding. Not one of the goals stated by Ukrainian officials was achieved, nor was the unstated, potential goal of seizng the Kursk Nuclear Power Plant achieved. What was 'achieved' was a decimation of some of Ukraine's best remaining men and materiel.

Ukrainian officials publicly stated several goals of the operation:

(1) to force Moscow to redeploy troops away from Russian forces' increasingly rapid advance on Pokrovsk and across the Donetsk front;
(2) to seize Russian territory to encourage Moscow to negotiate and to trade for the return of Ukrainian lands in peace talks with Moscow;
(3) to capture Russian prisoners of war to exchange for Ukrainian prisoners;
(4) to create angst in Russia among the elite and population in order to weaken support for the war and/or Putin's hold on power; and
(5) to make Russia feel the pain of death and destruction that Ukraine has been feeling (Zelenskiy alone said this).

None of these goals was achieved.
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