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On feeding the Israel Lobby in America

Philip Giraldi
The Unz Review
Thu, 08 Aug 2019 17:13 UTC
Israel lobby in Washington graphic
If you have been wondering when the twenty Democratic aspirants for the presidency will begin a serious discussion of American foreign policy in the Middle East, where Washington has been bogged down in both current and impending wars, you are not alone. With the honorable exception of Tulsi Gabbard, no one seems keen to touch that particular live wire.

Part of the problem is the journalists who are asking the questions in the debates. To be sure, the publication of The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy by professors John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt back in 2007 opened the door to a frank discussion of why the United States is involved in unresolvable conflicts on behalf of a tiny client state. But unfortunately, while it is now possible to find in the mainstream media some honest analysis of Israel's ability to corrupt policy formulation in Washington, in general the Jewish state continues to get a pass from both the press and politicians on all issues that matter.
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Bad Guys

Pakistan downgrades diplomatic relations with India, expels envoy, but doesn't want war


RT
Wed, 07 Aug 2019 17:11 UTC
pakistan kashmir
© Global Look Press/ZUMAPRESS/Rana Sajid Hussain
Pakistan says it's going to downgrade diplomatic relations with India and suspend trade with the neighbor state, dubbing New Delhi's decision to revoke the autonomous status of Kashmir as "unilateral and illegal".

Pakistan vowed to take the Kashmir issue to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC), while Prime Minister, Imran Khan, told the Pakistani military to "continue vigilance."

He was chairing a National Security Committee meeting, where it was also decided to review all 'bilateral arrangements'. Islamabad also announced that India's envoy to Pakistan, Ajay Bisaria, will be expelled from the country as part of the response measures.

Bilateral trade between India and Pakistan that has now been suspended amounted to around $2.5 billion last year. That's roughly 3 percent of Islamabad's total annual trade.


Comment: Pakistan also plans to suspend rail service and ban Bollywood films (again). But they are not considering a military response:
At a news conference on Thursday, Pakistan's Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said Islamabad still reserved the right to respond. "We're not looking at a military option," Qureshi said, but added: "Don't we reserve a right to respond in case of any aggression?"
See also:

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Boat

Pompeo lauds 'maritime expert' UK for joining US anti-Iran flotilla


RT
Wed, 07 Aug 2019 16:41 UTC
royal navy patrol grace 1
© REUTERS/Jon Nazca
A Royal Navy patrol vessel guards the oil tanker Grace 1, after it was seized off Gibraltar, July 20, 2019
Numerous countries may have declined the US invitation to patrol the Strait of Hormuz to 'protect' western ships from Iran, but the UK has once again come through for the 'special relationship,' delighting the top US diplomat.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo looked particularly pleased after meeting his newly minted UK counterpart Dominic Raab in Washington on Wednesday, due to London's decision to "assist in the protection of freedom of navigation in the Straits of Hormuz."

"You've got centuries of maritime expertise under your belt, so you understand the importance of protecting international shipping from unprovoked attacks," Pompeo told Raab during their brief press conference at the State Department, calling the UK move a "victory for meaningful, effective multilateralism."


Comment: Translation: "Thanks for being the only sucker to agree with our dumb idea."


Washington has been pushing for an international naval armada that would patrol the crucial shipping lane for months, first attempting to blame Iran for suspicious attacks on four tanker ships in June. The attempt fizzled after the tankers' owners expressed skepticism about the US version of events, however.

And then London got involved. On July 4, UK authorities in Gibraltar impounded a tanker they said was illegally transporting Iranian oil to Syria. Iran retaliated by seizing a British-flagged tanker in the Persian Gulf two weeks later.

Comment: Great idea, right? Especially considering Israel has voiced their support. Well, here's what the IRGC's Commander-in-Chief Maj. Gen. Hossein Salami has to say about that:
"The enemy knows that any new war endangers the survival of the Zionist regime, and will be followed by its irreversible fall," the commander said, referring to Israel while speaking at a military meeting in Kermanshah province, western Iran on Thursday, his remarks quoted by IRNA.

"The Zionists and some of their allies do not show a desire for war today because they know that if it occurred, it would move into their lands," Salami added. According to the commander, the "enemy knows" that a resisting force had been created "in Syria, Lebanon, Palestine and elsewhere" which could threaten them in the event of a conflict.

Referring to the US-UK coalition 'maritime security coalition forming in the Middle East as a "coalition of demons," Salami suggested that Iran was already involved in a war with the great powers of the West, facing "maximum political and economic pressures, psychological operations, cultural assaults, economic seizures, and even security threats and military intimidation."
He's right: And here's Iranian Defence Minister Brig. Gen. Amir Hatami:
"The region should not be an area for foreigners," Hatami said, speaking in a conference call with his counterparts from Qatar, Kuwait and Oman on Thursday.

"There is no doubt that the countries of the Persian Gulf region should ensure security in the region. The Islamic Republic of Iran is also an important country for maintaining stability in the Gulf," the minister said.

Commenting on Operation Sentinel, the US-proposed effort to deploy a military coalition to ensure freedom of navigation through the Persian Gulf, the Strait of Hormuz and the Gulf of Oman, Hatami stressed that such a coalition would only have the opposite effect.

"The military coalition that America is seeking to form with the excuse of 'securing maritime transport' will only increase insecurity in the region," the defence minister stressed, adding that Washington itself, not Tehran, was the primary source of tensions in the region.

As far as media reports of the potential involvement of Israel in the US-led coalition are concerned, Hatami warned that Israeli participation in the coalition would be "highly provocative, and could have disastrous consequences for the region." The senior officer did not clarify what these 'consequences' might be.


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Eye 1

Meat tax proposed to combat climate change by two political parties in Germany


Deutsche Welle
Thu, 08 Aug 2019 16:14 UTC
meat
Meat is relatively cheap for consumers in Germany. But that could all be about to change as lawmakers from across the political spectrum back proposals aimed at climate protection and animal welfare.

German politicians from the Social Democrats (SPD) and the Greens on Wednesday proposed raising the value added tax (VAT) on meat to the standard rate of 19%. Currently, meat is taxed at a reduced rate of 7% like most foodstuffs.

"I am in favor of abolishing the VAT reduction for meat and earmarking it for more animal welfare," said Friedrich Ostendorf, agricultural policy spokesperson for the Greens.

Comment: Real meat, even that raised through factory farming, is an expense many already struggle to afford and this tax will only serve to force more people into unhealthy, processed food choices. But, just as there was little resistance to the anti-smoking coercion, we can expect to see similar tactics applied to everything deranged politicians consider, regardless of the facts, to be 'bad for us' - although you can be sure their salaries will be sufficient to cover the extra taxes and most will continue eating meat: For insight into what's really causing the shift in climate, check out: Behind the Headlines: Earth changes in an electric universe: Is climate change really man-made?

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Arrow Down

Trump temporarily suspends US foreign aid pending review


RFE/RL
Wed, 07 Aug 2019 16:31 UTC
Donald Trump
© Palácio do Planalto, Flickr
US president Donald Trump, pictured in June 2019.
U.S. President Donald Trump has frozen foreign-aid funding until the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) reviews any money that hasn't been spent, officials say.

The freeze impacts 10 bank accounts overseen by the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) and the State Department, a senior administration official told RFE/RL.

The OMB made the request to USAID and the State Department on August 3 and has yet to receive information about how much is currently in those accounts and how they plan to use the money.

The fiscal year ends on September 30.

The funding amounts in question are between $2 billion and $4 billion, a USAID official told CNN.

The OMB will then make a decision about how to move forward with the funds after it studies the accounts.

Comment: 'Foreign aid' includes 'democracy promotion' - i.e. fomenting color revolutions - among other shady foreign meddling practices. It's also a means of keeping foreign nations on welfare and preventing their own sovereign development. That's not to say all foreign aid is necessarily a bad thing, but just look at the billions in aid given to Israel, for example. It's pure extortion.

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Cookies

Cookies for everyone! Hong Kong 'revolution' leader photographed meeting US consulate official in Marriott Hotel


RT
Thu, 08 Aug 2019 15:34 UTC
joshua wong us government

'Say cheese...'
A Hong Kong activist who has played an active role in the ongoing anti-Beijing protests has raised suspicions after being photographed meeting with a senior official from the US consulate.

Joshua Wong Chi-fung, the secretary-general of pro-democracy party Demosisto, told the Hong Kong Standard that there was nothing sinister behind his recent meeting with Julie Eadeh, a political unit chief of the US consulate general in Hong Kong. Their rendezvous, which was caught on camera, was quickly seized upon by pro-Beijing media.

"I even went to Washington several times, so what's so special about meeting a US consul?" Wong told the Standard.


Comment: Oh look! Those "grassroots" Hong Kong protests that the Western media, government and much of the population have been all agog over and effusively 'empathizing' with are not actually grassroots at all but yet one more example of 'regime change' as part of the US geopolitical strategizing.

Duped again!

How many more times are needed before people get a clue? (Probably lots, unfortunately).

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Star of David

'People get ready': Israeli org issues video calling for the rebuilding of the Third Temple


Sputnik
Tue, 06 Aug 2019 20:28 UTC
Israel 3rd temple
© YouTube/The Temple Institute
Tisha b'Av: People Get Ready!
The video's authors aren't the only ones who wish to see the Third Temple built, as last month, a prominent Israeli theologian argued that there's never been any religious ruling that would tell the Jews to wait for the Temple to "fall from the sky."

The Temple Institute, an organisation in Israel that seeks to bring forth the construction of the Third Temple, has recently issued a new video in a bid to promote their agenda.

The video, uploaded on YouTube on 4 August and titled "People Get Ready!", features a recital of a fragment from the Book of Isaiah related to the prophesised building of that holy site:
"It will happen in the end of days: The mountain of the Temple of HaShem will be firmly established as the head of the mountains, and it will be exalted above the hills, and the nations will stream to it."

Comment: See also:

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Calendar

Iran ready to talk once US sanctions lifted, asks UN to intervene


RFE/RL
Wed, 07 Aug 2019 01:12 UTC
Rohani Zarif

Iranian President Hassan Rohani (center right) walks with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif (left).
Iran on August 6 asked the UN to push back on U.S. sanctions and the Islamic republic's President Hassan Rohani said restrictive measures must be lifted first before negotiations can start about the country's nuclear program.

Tension between the two countries stems from last year when U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew from a 2015 nuclear deal between Tehran and world powers and imposed new and harsher sanctions on Iran's oil and financial sectors.

Iranian state TV showed Rohani meeting with Foreign Minister Mohammad Zarif, who both are on a U.S. sanctions list, while reiterating that the restrictive measures are an act of "economic terrorism."

Comment: Iran has exceeded its stockpile because of US sanctions, and the US knew this was going to happen. Iran has made it very clear it is willing to abide by the agreement but, at the moment, no one in the West is willing to hold the US accountable:

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Wall Street

Trump berates US Fed's monetary policy: 'China is not the problem. The Federal Reserve is...'

Jeff Cox
CNBC
Thu, 08 Aug 2019 09:42 UTC
Donald Trump
© AP Photo/ Susan Walsh
President Donald Trump pressed his demand Wednesday for the Federal Reserve to accelerate interest rate cuts, saying the U.S. central bank needs to keep pace with its global counterparts.

"They must Cut Rates bigger and faster, and stop their ridiculous quantitative tightening NOW," Trump said in a series of early morning tweets.

The call comes with U.S. government bond yields tumbling and the closely watched spread between the 3-month and 10-year notes at its biggest inversion since April 2007, just as the economy was heading into the financial crisis.

Comment: What else can he do but complain?

The Central Bank System rules all.

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Light Saber

'The end of us all!' Duterte will NEVER let US deploy nukes or troops in the Philippines


RT
Wed, 07 Aug 2019 04:32 UTC
missile
© Reuters / US Air Force / Senior Airman Ian Dudley
The Philippines will never allow the US to deploy nuclear weapons on its soil to counter China's growing influence in the region, President Duterte declared, slamming Washington's untrustworthiness even in small arms deals.

Following American withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty with Russia last week, Washington made clear that it is now free to deploy ground-launched ballistic nuclear missiles with ranges of 500 to 5,500 kilometers anywhere in the world - including Asia, to counter China in the region.

Manila, which has recently enjoyed closer ties with China, will never allow American plans to materialize on its soil, Rodrigo Duterte stressed Tuesday."That will never happen because I will not allow it," Duterte said. "I will never allow any foreign troops... I don't want to fight China."

Comment: Duterte's language may often be colourful but he also tends to make more sense and speak more truth than many other politicians. And in the above, intentionally or not, he clues us in to who the US is really targeting: China.

See also:


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