Brainwashed zombies and hypocrites

So up to 3 million people took to the streets of Paris, including 40 heads of state, to denounce the murders of 17 victims of a streak of Takfiri terror attacks this past week.

Where were they?

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Afghanistan?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the Shia of Saudi Arabia? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against Shia of Bahrain?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Chechnia?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the Serbian people?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against Libyan people?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the Syrian people? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Iraq?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Kurdistan?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Lebanon? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Nigeria?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Pakistan?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of India? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Russia?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Somalia?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Kenya? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Yemen? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Algeria? Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Indonesia?  Nowhere.

Where were these 3 millions and 40 heads of state when abject Takfiri terror was unleashed against the people of Iran?  Nowhere.

Why not?

More questions

Did they not crucify babies in Algeria?  Did they not torture hostages on video in Chechnia?  Did they not spray weddings with bullets in Bosnia?  Did they not blow up bombs in Indonesia?  Did they not skin people alive in Afghanistan?  Did they not keep hostages with live wolves in holes in Chechnia?  Did they not torture to death and crucify people in Syria?

Or is it that some innocent victims are more equal then others?

Why is it that when all of Europe supported the Syrian Takfiris AND the Ukrainian Nazis 3 million of people did not take to the streets?

How many of those 3 million people and 40 heads of state really do not know that Takfirism has been lovingly and carefully nurtured, organized, financed, trained, federated, directed, supported, armed and protected by the AngloZionist Empire?

How many of those 3 million people and 40 heads of state really do not know that Takfirism is a golem which has two functions - to be unleashed against those who dare disobey the Empire and to terrify the people of the West into accepting a police state?

Will we ever learn?

We have already seen all that.  On 9/11 the American people were literally conditioned to react with fear and hysteria.  It worked perfectly and we all know how that ended: with many major wars and millions (Iraq!) of dead people.  Most Americans simply stopped thinking and substituted a panic reaction to careful analysis.  Today Europe is doing exactly the same thing.  The same causes will yield the same results.  Will we ever learn?

And who is the enemy anyway?

Oh sure, they are being oblique about it.  "We are not against Islam!!", "Islam is a religion of peace!!" , "we have nothing against Muslims!!!".

Yeah, right!

The truth is while "they" have nothing against "Islam" and "good Muslims" they ALSO "just happen" to think that "multiculturalism has failed" and that "Islam is incompatible with western societies". Not only that, but since "bad Muslims" tend to hide amongst "good Muslims", let's just stay on the "safe side" and keep a very VERY "close eye" on all "them Muslims" just in case one of them happened to suddenly turn into a  crazed Jihadi suicide bomber.  Right?

Wrong!

Did you notice how ALL these Takfiri freaks "just happen" to have had PLENTY of contacts of all sorts with western security services?  It's like a Ku Klux Klan meeting in the USA: for 10 hooded participants you have 2 morons and 8 Federal Agents working undercover.  Same exact deal for these Takfiris.  And then the two morons do something really really bad, and the 8 Federal Agents "just happen" to vanish in thin air (or commit suicide).  Does that have anything to do with Islam?  Of course not.  It has everything to do with the deep state and the covert manipulation of probably every single terrorist group on the planet.

So what would make more sense: to fear Muslims or the western security services which carefully manipulate the Takfiri freaks?

The truth is what the very same western security agencies which control the Takfiri freaks want us all to hate Muslims.  Why?  Simply to create an atmosphere if social chaos, civil strive and even civil war.   So while we are busing hunting down those "evil Muslims" they can continue to exploit us all.

So what can we do?

Simple!  Our imperial overlords want us to do exactly three things:

• Be terrified
• Hate
• Stop thinking

So all we need to do is to

• Reject fear, endorse courage
• Love
• Think

It is really that simple.  If we fear, hate and stop thinking - they win. If we refuse to fear, if we love and if we think - we win.  Their entire Empire has been built on fear, hate and stupidity.  Let' bring it down by courage, love and intelligence!

What we saw today in Paris was 3 millions and 40 heads of state demonstrating for two basic reasons: some were brainwashed by the media frenzy, others did so for political reasons.  3 million brainwashed zombies and hypocrites.  Let them.  But let us also proclaim loud and clear that we are NOT falling into their trap, that they will NOT pollute our souls with hatred and our brains with stupidity, that if there are millions of brainwashed and zombified people, there are billions who see through the lies and who reject this entire "mental landscape" of hate, fear and stupidity.

The Saker

I am NOT Charlie

Okay, let's be clear.  I am not Muslim.  I oppose terrorism.  I don't even support the death penalty.  I loathe Takfirism.  I oppose violence as a means to make a political or ethical point.  I fully support freedom of speech, including critical speech and humor.

But this morning I am most definitely NOT Charlie.

In fact, I am disgusted and nauseated by the sick display of collective hypocrisy about the murders in France.  Here is why:

Charlie Hebdo for the Darwin Awards

The folks at Charlie Hebdo had it coming. Here is what I wrote about them in September 2012 when they published their famous caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed: Worthy of the Darwin Awards, if you ask me.  Excellent, the “gene pool” of the French “caviar-Left” badly needs some cleaning".  Today I fully stand by my words.

Just a stupid dare?

Let me ask you this: what would be the point of, say, taking a nap on train tracks?  You don't have to "agree" with the train which will run you over, but it still will, won't it?  What about taking a nap on train tracks specifically to make a point?  To prove that the train is bad?  To dare it?  To make fun of it?  Would that not be the height of stupidity?  And yet, that is *exactly* what Charlie Hebdo did.  I would even argue that that his how Charlie Hebdo made it's money, daring the "Muslim train" to run them over.  You think I am exaggerating?  Check out the caricature which one of the folks who got murdered yesterday had just posted.  The text reads: "Still no terrorist attacks in France - Wait, we have until the end of January to send you are best wishes".  The crazy person shown in the drawing is packing a Kalashnikov and wearing an Afghan "Pakol" - the typical "crazy Muslim" in Charlie Hebdo's world.  Talk about a stupid dare...

"Spitting in people's souls"

There is an expression in Russian: spitting in somebody's soul.  It fully applies here.  Muslims worldwide have be unambiguously clear about that.  They take blasphemy very, very seriously, as they do the name of the Prophet and the Quran.  If you want to really offend a Muslim, ridicule his Prophet or his Holy Book.  That is not a secret at all.  And when Charlie Hebdo published their caricatures of the Prophet and when they ridiculed him the a deliberately rude and provocative manner, they knew what they were doing: they were very deliberately deeply offending 1.6 billion Muslims world wide.  Oh, and did I mention that in Islam blasphemy is a crime punishable by death?  Well, it turns out that of 1.6 billion Muslims exactly three decided to take justice in their own hands and kill the very deliberately blaspheming Frenchmen.    You don't have to be Muslim or to approve of the death penalty for blasphemy to realize that this was inevitable and that this has nothing to do with Islam as a religion.  Offend any group as large as 1.6 billion and sooner or later you will find 1-5 folks willing to use violence to make you pay for it.   This is a statistical inevitability.

Are some victims more equal then others?

So 12 deliberately "soul spitting blasphemers" were murdered and all of France is in deep mourning.  The media worldwide does such a good job presenting it all as a planetary disaster that many thousands people worldwide say "I am Charlie", sob, light candles and take a "courageous" stance for freedom of speech.

Crocodile tears if you ask me.

The Empire's freedom fighter

The fact is that the AngloZionists have carefully and lovingly nurtured, organized, armed, financed, trained, equipped and even directed the Takfiri crazies for decades.  From the war in Afghanistan to Syria today these murderous psychopaths have been the foot-soldiers of the AngloZionist Empire for decades.  But, apparently, nobody cares about their victims in Afghanistan, in Bosnia, in Chechnia, in Kosovo, in Libya, in Kurdistan, in Iraq or elsewhere.  There these liver-eating murderers are "freedom fighters" who get full support.  Including from the very same media which today is in mourning over Charlie Hebdo.  Apparently, in the western ethos some victims are more equal then others.

And when is the last time somebody in Europe shed a single tear over the daily murders of innocent people in the Donbass whose murder is paid for and directly directed by the western regimes?

How stupid do they think we are?

And then this.  Even a drooling idiot knew that Charlie Hebdo was THE prime target for that kind of attack.  And I promise you that French cops are not drooling idiots.  Yet, for some reason, they were nowhere to be seen that day.  Only a van with two (or one?) cop was parked nearby (hardly an anti-terrorist protection detail) and one poor cop was shot and then executed with an AK shot to the head while he was begging for mercy.  Is this the best the French state can do?

Hardly.

So what is going on here?  I will tell you what - the EU 1%ers are now capitalizing on these murders to crack down on their own population.  Sarkozy already met Hollande and they both agreed that new levels of firmness and vigilance need to be implemented.  Does that not reek of a French 9/11?

So no, I am most definitely NOT Charlie this morning and I am disgusted beyond words with the obscene display of doubleplusgoodthinking "solidarity" for a group of "caviar-lefties" who made their money spitting in the souls of billions of people and then dared them to do something about it.  And I am under no illusion whatsoever about the fact that cui bono clearly indicates that the French regime either organized it all, or let it happen or, at the very least, makes maximal political use of it all.

But most of all, I am disgusted with all those who play along and studiously avoid asking the right questions about all this.  I guess they really are "Charlies" all of them.

I am not.

The Saker

PS: PLEASE POST YOUR COMMENTS ON THE NEW BLOG, NOT HERE!!!

The illegal arrest of Giulietto Chiesa - yet another example of European hypocrisy

by Leonardo

On December 15, 2014 the Italian reporter Giulietto Chiesa, who had been invited to take part in a conference in Tallinn on Russian-European relations, was detained by the Estonian authorities for a few hours after being declared "persona non grata". Facts appear to point to a deliberate move on the part of the Estonian authorities meant to prevent the journalist from attending the conference, thus censoring the speech he was supposed to deliver.

Before diving into the facts, a little background info intended as a frame of reference. 
 

Giulietto Chiesa, journalist and MEP

Giulietto Chiesa is an Italian journalist and former member of the European Parliament. He has been correspondent from Moscow for two different italian newspapers (La Stampa and L'Unità) for 20 years, since 1980. 

In Italy he is presently marginalized for his very critical opinions on a few issues which the mainstream media still consider as taboo. Chiesa is a member of the 9/11 Consensus Panel, a board whose goal is "to provide the world with a clear statement, based on expert independent opinion, of some of the best evidence opposing the official narrative about 9/11". He is also known for being very vocal in opposing western imperialism and the hysterical russophobia that is being spread by the mainstream media. He wrote many articles condemning NATO aggression against Libya, the destabilization of Syria, the eastward expansion of NATO and the western backed coup in Kiev.

According to the Estonian Public Broadcasting, Chiesa was invited in Tallinn on December 15, 2014 by the Impressum NGO to attend a conference titled "Should Europe fear Russia?". Apparently, Estonian authorities consider the Impressum NGO as a russian propaganda proxy. Chiesa had already spoken at Impressum events twice before.

According to Chiesa, he arrived in Tallinn at 12.45 and gave an interview to an Estonian TV channel, had lunch and then went back to his hotel room in order to complete the preparation for the speech he was supposed to give at 19.00.

One and a half hours before the appointed time, a group of four Estonian policemen knocked on his room's door and took him into custody, intimating him to follow them to the local police station. Chiesa was later informed that he was being detained because he was the target of an entry ban signed on 13 December 2014 and valid for one month. He stated that he repeatedly asked the police to show him the related documents but his requests were denied.  He was jailed for four hours, until the arrival of the Italian Ambassador, who managed to have him released a few hours later, after applying diplomatic pressure.

While the incident made the first page of a few Italian online newspapers it didn't get much attention on the Italian television networks, that at most mentioned it casually.

The incident caused some diplomatic friction between Italy and Estonia and the Estonian Ambassador in Rome was summoned by the Italian Foreign Minister looking for answers. 

It also prompted inquiries in both the Italian and European Parliament where a group of representatives (mostly belonging to the leftist list "The Other Europe with Tsipras") filed a protest against what they suspect might constitute an extralegal detention, a violation of the Treaty on European Union, the European Convention on Human Rights and the European Charter on Fundamental Rights.

The Estonian authorities perspective is that Chiesa is a security threat and the detention was justified.

Legal aspects notwithstanding, the detention of Chiesa clearly appears to be motivated by censorship and intimidation: the Estonian authorities are openly troubled by the Italian reporter opinions and they acted to prevent him from sharing them with the few hundred people who were attending the conference. The accusation that Chiesa is some kind of Russian agent of propaganda and as such is a threat to the Estonian state does feel like an excuse: if he really was an immediate and serious danger they would never release him after just a few hours. Which makes the urgency of the detention suspect at best. Also, the timing of the ban, just a few days before Chiesa was to attend the conference, suggests very strongly that the measure was surgically targeted.

What's really troubling - actually, outrageous - is that, no matter if laws were broken or the authorities abused their power, a EU country has infringed on the freedom of speech right of a European citizen, journalist and former member of the parliament. Apparently, the Estonian government - and not the Estonian citizens who could attend the conference and debate or criticize the speech - gets to decide what is Russian propaganda and what isn't. The message is crystal clear and even intimidating. Just think about how a much less renowned journalist could react after realizing that expressing any harshly critical opinion that doesn't measure to the standards of what the authorities consider legit criticism could get him/her branded as a security threat and a Russian agent.

It would also be interesting to know what the authorities of all the other western countries who maintain a heavy state sponsored NGO presence abroad think of the Estonian authorities attitude towards NGOs accused of being instruments of Russian propaganda. If they share the evaluation then how can the double standard be logically reconciled?

This incident casts another shadow on Europe and suggests that the tearing of the democratic fabric and the degeneration of the common sense that follows in the wake of the anti-Russian media campaign might be slowly spreading to the whole continent.

Absolutely *fantastic* statement by Alexei Pushkov about the PACE

This statement is nothing short of *fantastic*.

If anybody has a transcript in English, please send it to me, I would love to post it here.  A subtitled video would even be better.

I think that what Pushkov said was nothing short of history: he fully unmasked the phenomenal hypocrisy of the EU.

For those who understand Russian - please see for yourself.

The Saker

War crimes and atrocities in Syria - a common sense approach

According to the BBC, the UN bureaucrats are now trying to implicate Syrian President Assad in war crimes. According to UN Commissioner Navi Pillay "the scale of viciousness of the abuses being perpetrated by elements on both sides almost defies belief" and evidence indicated responsibility "at the highest level of government, including the head of state".  Notice the nuance?  Both sides have perpetrated atrocities, but the evidence only "points to the highest levels of government" and, just in case somebody had any doubts, Mrs Pillay adds "including the head of state".

One might wonder whether this accusation against Assad personally might be based on the so-called doctrine of "command responsibility" but the answer is clearly "no".  After all since Mrs. Pillay referred to "evidence" and it is unlikely that she just meant by that "evidence indicating that Assad was the President of Syria".  So what kind of "evidence" pointing "directly at the head of state" could she have?

Written orders by Assad to commit war crimes?
Radio intercepts of Assad ordering war crimes?
Witnesses testifying that Assad gave criminal orders?
Witnesses testifying that they saw Assad commit war crimes personally?

As soon as we think about that it becomes quite obvious that what Mrs Pillay has is nothing or, more accurately, all she has is the usual mix of rumors, assumptions, and the usual assortment of testimonies amounting to little more than simple hearsay.

Now, there is no doubt in my mind that unspeakable atrocities were, indeed, committed by both sides.  This is not only normal, this is inevitable.  Any civil war will inevitably result in atrocities.  Since I wrote a full article on this topic (entitled "A few basic reminders about wars, civil wars and human right") I will not repeat it all here other than saying that there is no such thing as a civil war without atrocities.  In fact, there is no such thing as war - civil or international - without atrocities.  To deny that, or say that it is possible to have wars without atrocities, is simply not to understand the very nature of war.

I fully agree with the the words of the chief American prosecutor at Nuremberg, Robert H. Jackson, who said the the crime of aggression (to initiate a civil or international war) is the ultimate crime because "it contains within itself the accumulated evil" of all the other war crimes.  I therefore conclude the party most guilty of all the crimes committed during a war is the one starting the war because wars always produce atrocities and because absent such an initiation of war no crimes would have been committed.  In other words, I submit that it is logical to conclude that it is the side which triggered the civil war which is - by definition - most guilty for all the atrocities committed in the course of this war by all the parties, even the "other sides'" atrocities and war crimes.

The other point which I want to make here is this: historically, when orders have been given to commit atrocities there is very rarely any evidence of those orders coming form the top.  For example, in the case of Nazi Germany, the so-called "Wannsee Conference Protocol" is open to many possible interpretations and there is really no hard evidence at all that Hitler ever gave an explicit order to commit any genocide.

[Side note: This actually makes the entire Nuremberg trial a rather bizarre event.  Think about it: the Bolsheviks (especially Lenin and Trotsky) openly and officially gave orders to take hostages, execute civilians and openly defended terrorism, while the Anglos committed atrocities worldwide, invented concentration camps (Boer war), used slavery at a massive scale in the USA, "multi-genocided" an entire continent (Native Americans), used nukes on Japanese cities, deliberately firebombed German civilians, etc. and yet these powers got to judge the Nazis for their (very real) atrocities even though it was impossible to establish the personal responsibility of most Nazi dignitaries.  Still, I think that Nuremberg trials was useful because it raised many important question even if the answers it gave were dubious at best]

Similarly, the recent trials of Saddam Hussein, Slobodan Milosevic, Radovan Karadzic or Nikolae Ceausescu and other "ex-allies turned villain" have always resulted in cases of obvious "victor's justice" in which politically pre-judged individuals are tried by kangaroo courts.  This is not to say that the forces under the command of these men did not commit atrocities - just that there is zero real evidence that these men personally actually gave any such orders.

It is much easier to prosecute actual executioners, those who personally participated in war crimes and atrocities.  But the "big guys" - top officials or heads of state - are usually removed the the actual killers by several layers of command authority.  So at the very best, one can charge them with failure to protect and of criminal negligence (via the doctrine of "command responsibility").

Personally, I very much doubt that head of states actually often give any criminal orders to commit atrocities, at least since 1945.  This is not just a matter of protecting themselves from future prosecutions, but also because this is bad PR and because atrocities are usually counter-productive anyway.

There are, of course, the various cases of mass atrocities in Africa, ranging from the infamous Radio des Mille Collines in Rwanda to the kind of grotesque atrocities the world witnessed in Sierra Leone, where mid to high level leaders did clearly give genocidal orders.  But these are cases of basically psychopathic leaders who cannot be considered typical heads of state.

Keep in mind that the UN does not have its own intelligence service.  It cannot intercept phone-calls, letters, emails or anything else.  Of course, there are a number of powers (global and regional) which could share intelligence with the UN.  The problem is that any government or agency with the capabilities to pass on intelligence to the UN is also - by definition - perfectly capable of severely manipulating the intelligence it shares or even of completely make up non-existing facts and stories (WMD in Iraq anybody?).

So all the UN really can get is the testimony of witnesses and "open source" public information, such as newspaper articles.  Again, at the very best this can yield local anecdotes and the identities of local executioners.  Not real evidence against the the big guys running the state.

So should we dismiss the UN report and just say that both sides have committed atrocities?

No.  Why? 

Because whatever atrocities the government forces have committed they are at least not proud of them, they do not present them as justice, much less so divine justice.  Whereas the Wahabi liver-eaters are not only extremely proud of their atrocities, they also claim to commit them in the name of God, hence the endless streams of beheading and shooting videos on the Internet showing large crowds of people gathered together to witness "Islamic Justice" at the hands of local officials followed by execution against the backdrop of a hysterical mob screaming Allahu Akbar!  Talk about "command responsibility":  these executions are ordered by "Islamic" "courts" presided by "Islamic" "judges" who are all well-know, recognized state officials and not some masked death squad leaders of local commanders acting on their own initiative.

Nobody in his right mind would compare the actions of  Canadian Luka Magnotta (real name:"Eric Clinton Kirk Newman")  who dismembered a student with the regular chopping off limbs and heads which regularly occurs in Saudi Arabia: in the first case we are dealing with the actions of a deranged maniac while in the second case, we are dealing with the medieval barbarity of an official law system, backed by the state and presented as ordained by God.  Likewise, we cannot compare the atrocities committed by the government forces and the insurgency because in the former case they are never upheld as normative while the the second case they are also presented as ordained by God.

But the UN, of course, puts the bulk of the blame on Assad, with no real evidence and against the principles basic common sense.

And yet my beef is not with the UN.  Having personally worked at the UN for several years I know the system and I expect nothing else of it.  The folks that really disgust me are all the academics, politicians, journalists, bloggers and self-righteous armchair strategists who first fully support a violence uprising and then express outrage when government forces commit atrocities even though supporting the former meant accepting the latter.  Likewise, I despise those doubleplusgoodthinkers who always will accuse the government forces of atrocities while systematically looking away from the atrocities committed by the putative "good guys".  These hypocrites are cowards who do not have the basic intellectual courage to accept the fact that there are no good guys in a civil war or, more accurately, that the ratio of good to bad guys very rapidly becomes pretty even in all parties involved as soon as a civil war starts.

The Saker

Mind blowing hypocrisy - this time by John Kerry

I just read this:

US Secretary of State John Kerry has said the militant Lebanese Shia Islamist group Hezbollah and Iran are helping perpetuate President Bashar al-Assad's "campaign of terror" in Syria. Mr Kerry said thousands of Hezbollah fighters were contributing significantly to the violence. He added that Iran was actively supporting Hezbollah's involvement.

Oh jeez, Mr. Kerry is deploring that foreign elements are involved in the war on Syria.  But how is it that Mr. Kerry had nothing to say when many tens of thousands of foreign fighters invaded Syria from Lebanon and Turkey?  Where was Mr. Kerry when the Israelis bombed Syrian targets, not once, but twice?  

Kerry also had bad things to say about Russia and its fulfillment of military contracts with Syria.  But why did Mr. Kerry have nothing to say when US allies like France and Qatar flooded the country with weapons?

Could it be because Washington's puppets are losing this war?

Indeed, all the information seems to confirm that the strategic town of al Qusayr has almost been liberated from the Wahabi crazies.  The Syrian military is said to be in control of the center of the city, while Hezbollah controls all the roads in and out of the city.  The insurgents are still in control of several heavily fortified neighborhoods, equipped with tunnels and bunkers.  Unless the insurgency manages to break through the Hezbollah blockade the outcome is basically a matter of time.

Hence Mr. Kerry's hypocritical histrionics.

The Saker

Pope thanks CIA war criminal for "protecting the world"

by Jay Janson for "Information Clearing House"

Panetta said the Pope said to him, “Thank you for helping to protect the world.” said he replied, “Pray for me.” Fellow Catholics, can only hope that the Pope said something else that Panetta was reluctant to mention to US foreign policy promoting reporters. One paragraph re Panetta’s crimes, Reagan’s Assist. Sec of Treasury quoted, and the usual plea for a responsible public to call for prosecution of illegal war.

 

Panetta, at Vatican, Says Pope Thanks Him for Service, NY Times, 1/16/13, by Elizabeth Bumiller, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/17/world/europe/defense-secretary-leon-panetta-meets-pope.html?ref=world

"ROME — Leon E. Panetta had an audience on Wednesday morning at the Vatican with Pope Benedict XVI, who told him, Mr. Panetta said, “Thank you for helping to protect the world.” Mr. Panetta said he replied, “Pray for me.”
Mr. Panetta, ... who attends Mass every Sunday, is halfway through a week-long trip to Europe meant as a goodbye tour of American allies"

The reader is invited to read the whole short NY Times report before going on to the paragraph below on Panetta's to-be-prosecuted crimes, a quote from Reagan's Asst. Sec. of Treasury Paul Craig Roberts, and the author's commiseration with fellow born-Catholics.

During Panetta's time as CIA Director and Secretary of Defense US illegal wars (illegal, even according to Ron Paul), have gone on un-mercilessly in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen at the cost of thousands of lives of men,women and children murdered in their own beloved, innocent and poor nations. Under Panetta thugs were paid to destroy the government in the most prosperous and democratic nation in Africa before US NATO bombing took place while a near million Libyans in a population of only six million demonstrated for their Green democracy government and Gadaffi. At last count 60'000 have died in Syria for the attempt of the former former colonial powers led by the US and satellites like Israel, Saudi Arabia and Turkey to do the same there in the face to similar massive pro-government rallies which are denied coverage in the Pentagon fed network news programs.

'It is a known fact that the CIA has violated US law and international law with its assassinations, kidnappings and torture. But it is not this criminal agency that will be held accountable. Instead, those who will be punished will be those moral beings who, appalled at the illegality and inhumanity of the CIA, leaked the evidence of the agency's crimes. The CIA has asked the US Justice (sic) Department to investigate what the CIA alleges is the "criminal disclosure" of its secret program to murder suspected foreign terrorist leaders abroad. As we learned from Gitmo, those suspected by America are overwhelmingly innocent." [Paul Craig Roberts, CIA's Hypocracy Astonishes the World, www.vdare.com, 9/6/2009]

Those brought up as Catholics, can only hope that the Pope said something else to that monstrous war criminal that Panetta was reluctant to mention to US foreign policy promoting reporters.
 
Jay Janson is an archival research peoples historian activist, musician and writer

Hypocrisy and blasphemy

Hypocrisy:

So the French are intervening militarily in Mali.  The rationale behind this intervention is threefold:

a) It was requested by the President of Mali
b) It is to prevent 'al-Qaeda' from running over the country
c) It is to protect French citizens in Mali

Needless to say, the Anglosphere fully approves.

I can't help but wonder about another possibility:

Assad would request the military assistance of Russia to prevent "al-Qaeda" from running over Syria and Russia would sent its forces to protect Russian citizens in Syria.  Can you imagine the outrage that would create in the doubleplusgoodthinking West?

This reminds me of one of my favorite quote by Chomsky from his Distorted Morality speech:

The hypocrite is the person who applies to others standards that he refuses to apply to himself. So if you are not a hypocrite you assume that if something is right for us then it's right for them and if it is wrong when they do it, it is wrong when we do it.

Simple, basic, and yet constantly ignored.

As I have said many, many times here, the Russians will not intervene militarily in Syria, if only because they do not have the means to do so.  At the very most, they will use their forces to evacuate Russians citizens if things really go badly.  And they might agree to participate to a UNSC mandated peacekeeping force.

And yet I cannot help but marvel at the insane hypocrisy of it all.  The US, UK and France are arming 'al-Qaeda' in Libya and Syria, while fighting against the very same 'al-Qaeda' in Mali (or Yemen for that matter).  Crazy.

On another topic.

Blasphemy:

For centuries, the Papacy's Jesuits used to justify their most obscene and immoral actions with the ad majorem Dei gloriam (to the greater glory of God) motto.  Sadly, the modern equivalent appears to be the ubiquitous Allahu Akbar (God is greater).

As a religious person myself, I have no problem at all with the idea of acting for the greatest glory of God or with the idea that God is greater than anything else.  By as a religious person, I am deeply offended by the use of these otherwise pious mottos to accompany the most disgusting, brutal, cruel and perverted actions. 

The Internet is replete of videos of unspeakable atrocities committed by Muslim thugs and every single one of them is accompanied by a mantric repetition of Allahu Akbar by those committing the atrocity.  I find this sickening.

What these people are doing is defiling the name of God each time they utter it.  I can hardly imagine a worse blasphemy than the use of the name of the All-Loving God as a background to the worst kind of hateful atrocity!

These murderers claim to be followers of the Prophets, yet they completely ignore the commandment of the Decalogue which clearly states Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord thy God will not acquit him that takes his name in vain (Exodus 20:7).  If speaking God's name in vain is an offense, how much more of an offense is speaking His name during the commission of an atrocity!

May those who defile the name of God be accursed!

The Saker

The stupid charade is finally over

The stupid charade is finally over - the Hague tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has cleared the last two Croat generals not in the face of new evidence, but on a technicality:

Last year the two men were convicted of murder, persecution and plunder.  Judges at the time ruled that they were part of a criminal conspiracy led by late Croatian President Franjo Tudjman to "permanently and forcibly remove" the Serb civilian population from Krajina.  But on Friday, Judge Meron said there had been no such conspiracy.

No conspiracy and therefore, no crime.   Nice, no!?

Bottom line: only Serbs committed any crimes during the war in Bosnia.  All other parties to this conflict were innocent of any crimes.  No such thing as a Croatian war criminal, no such thing as a Muslim war criminal.

You got to love the "humanitarian Disneyland" the Empire lives in...

The Saker

Isareli regime shows its true nature (again)

The Israeli regime has clearly shown its real nature again by awarding its "Presidential Medal" to one of the most evil politicians of our times, the notorious war criminal Henry Kissinger.

But then, there is a certain logic to this: a criminal regime whose leaders are all criminals, running a criminal political entity grant a fellow criminal the highest recognition.  Makes sense, doesn't it?

By the way, this Presidential Medal is a creation of the notorious war criminal Shimon Peres who shares another distinction with Henry Kissinger: they both also got the Nobel Peace Prize (I kid you not).

Amazing....

Saudi woman to be lashed for defying driving ban

The BBC reports that a court in Saudi Arabia has sentenced a woman to 10 lashes for breaking the country's ban on female drivers. Well, I have always said that Saudi Arabia is the worst hell hole on the planet and that Saudi Wahabism is quasi-demonic religious sect every bit as bad the Ziocon propaganda depicts it to be.  But the brazen arrogance of actually officially enforcing such laws still amazes me.

To think that the USA, which fancies itself some kind of "world defender of human rights", is allied with these Saudi crazies is just the pinnacle of ridicule...

SAS teams allegedly on the hunt for Gaddafi

According to the Sydney Morning Herald (dunno how reliable this paper is), UK SAS teams are leading a hunt to capture Gaddafi and a 1.6 million dollar bounty has been put on his head. 

According to NPR (aka "Neocon Public Radio" - reliability: zero), an "international effort" (nice euphemism for "intervention") is underway to capture Gaddafi, and the bounty is at 2 million dollars.

I can only suppose that they do that under the heading "all necessary measures to protect the civilian population".

The West's hypocrisy truly has no limits...

Check out the front page of Haaretz today

NICOSIA, Cyprus - Dr. Ibrahim Kalin, the chief adviser to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, emphasized Wednesday in a conversation with Haaretz that Turkey intends to normalize its relations with Israel across the board. "From the return of the ambassador, the renewal of joint military maneuvers, military and civilian cooperation, ministerial visits, and to all other areas, relations will return to how they were before the flotilla incident" of 2010, Kalin said.

Full article here: http://www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/turkey-set-on-fully-mending-ties-with-israel-says-prime-minister-erdogan-s-adviser-1.374331

Three top contenders for the Guinness Book of World Records in the "biggest hypocrites" category

What is happening in Libya makes me sick to my guts and gives a strong desire to scream insults at somebody.  And yet, when I saw these headlines today I really had to laugh.  Here are the headlines, verbatim (typo included):

• Arab League criticises Western strikes on Libya
• Russia criticizes Western military intervention in Libya
• China Criticizes the Allied Attacks against Libya

When I read this I just had to laugh and admit that the outraged criticisms from these folks had a certain virtuosity which is uniquely devoid of any sense of shame.

I think that it would be only fair and pay them the ultimate compliment by declaring that the Arab League, Russia and China have succeeded in displaying an "Israeli-like" level of hypocrisy!  Not an easy feat, that is for sure.

The Saker

Libyan fatcats turn their coats in the USA

It is kind of disgusting to see how Libyan apparachiks from the Libyan diplomatic corps in the USA going on al-Jazeera and calling for a UN imposed no-fly zone over their country because of the alleged 'genocide' taking place there.

I have exactly zero love for that crazy buffoon Gadaffi, but his diplomats are even more spineless and hypocritical than him.

Still, the worst liars and hypocrites are - who else? - Western diplomats who claim to care about the bloodshed in Libya.

In all this mess, the only people I have respect for are the Libyan (Yemeni, Bahraini) people trying to get rid of their colonial masters.

Kosovo Case in the International Court of Justice: Time to Shed Illusions

by Pyotr Iskenderov for the Strategic Culture Foundation

On July 22, the UN International Court of Justice in the Hague will issue its opinion on the status of Kosovo, the breakaway province which unilaterally declared independence from Serbia on February 17, 2008. For the first time in its history, the Court is to judge on the legality of the proclamation of independence by a territory of a UN-member country without the consent of the latter. The ruling is sure to set a precedent for scores of likewise cases, including those in the post-Soviet space.

The International Court of Justice has been looking into the legality of the unilaterally proclaimed Kosovo independence from the standpoint of international law since the fall of 2008. The request was submitted to the Court by the UN General Assembly following Serbia's demand. After heated debates, the delegations voted in Belgrade's favor: 77 voted for having the case examined by the International Court of Justice, 6 voted against, and 74 abstained. The countries which chose to abstain were mostly the EU members which at the time regarded Kosovo's independence as a decided matter but did agree that Serbia had the right to present its position in the Court. The countries which voted against were the US and Albania as the key architects of the Kosovo independence and a number of Asia-Pacific countries.

The International Court of Justice was supposed to unveil its ruling in April, 2010 but, as the media found out, serious disagreements surfaced among the Court judges and the process took longer than initially expected. Moreover, there were indications that the West deliberately postponed the ruling to exert additional pressure on Belgrade over the extradition of former commander of the army of Bosnian Serbs R. Mladic to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia.

At the moment it is clear that the architects of the new world order are not going to wait any longer, especially considering that the ruling will yet have to be examined by the UN General Assembly which is entitled to make the final decision. Serbia's foreign minister V. Jeremic said the Court verdict would not put the final dot in the dispute over Kosov. He projected that the struggle over votes in the UN General Assembly would be much more serious. Jeremic said Belgrade realized that it would have to face aggressive and heavily funded Albanian propaganda and demands to drop its position, but stressed that Serbia should do its best to preserve domestic political unity and that the peaceful diplomatic struggle for Serbia's territorial integrity and a compromise over Kosovo and Metohija should continue. Jeremic expressed the hope that the verdict of the International Court of Justice would become a moment of truth and ring a warning to those in Pristina who thought they would be able to tailor the international law to their wishes. Are there real grounds for Jeremic's optimism and what verdict can we expect from the International Court of Justice?

One of Serbia's officially stated objectives behind getting the case examined by the International Court of Justice was to impede the recognition of Kosovo's independence across the world. To an extent, the plan has worked. Whereas 48 countries recognized the independence of Kosovo within the term of six months prior to the October 8, 2008 UN General Assembly's decision to send the Kosovo case to the International Court of Justice, only 21 country did the same over nearly two years since the date. As of today, the independence of Kosovo is recognized by 69 of the 192 UN countries. On the other hand, only one country – Costa-Rica – stated officially that it may reverse its decision depending on the Court verdict. As for the EU, the countries still denying recognition to Kosovo are Greece, Spain, Cyprus, Romania, and Slovakia.

Serbia's problem is that the disposition in the International Court of Justice happens to be the opposite of that in the UN General Assembly. In the Court, 9 of 15 judges including the presiding one represent Japan, Sierra Leone, Jordan, the US, Germany, France, New Zealand, Somali, and Great Britain, namely the countries which have recognized the independence of Kosovo. The opposite position is espoused by Slovakia, Mexico, Morocco, Russia, Brazil, and China. Therefore, Serbia's other officially stated goal – to achieve international acknowledgement of the illegitimacy of the unilateral proclamation of independence by Kosovo – appears unrealistic.

There is information that in the past several months the International Court of Justice judges considered three potential rulings. The first one can be indefinitely worded, contain condemnations of both the Kosovo unilateralism and Serbia's politics under S. Milosevic, and say neither Yes nor No to the independence of Kosovo. This gentle option will materialize if Serbia capitulates in what concerns the extradition of Mladic.

The second potential ruling, which was mainly advocated by France, was supposed to carry the statement by International Court of Justice that the issue is purely political and can only be addressed at the level of the UN Security Council. The scenario does appear improbable at least because to make such a statement the Court would not have had to get bogged on the case since October, 2008 or hold closed hearings in December, 2009.

There is also the third potential ruling, and the current impression is that the majority of the judges are going to opt for it. The verdict can be premised in the assumption that, allegedly, the Kosovo case is unique, the coexistence of Kosovo Albanians and Serbia within a single statehood is impossible, the talks on the status of the province collapsed, and therefore the unilateral declaration of independence by Kosovo – and its subsequent recognition by a number of countries - were a forced step and a smaller evil. The verdict will be accompanied by the dissenting opinions of some of the judges who do not recognize the independence of Kosovo due to fundamental regards, but this will not change the fact that the verdict will be favorable to Albanians.

By the way, Kosovo administration is absolutely convinced that the coming verdict of the International Court of Justice will be news to it. Kosovo foreign minister Skender Hyseni has already broadcast the Kosovo administration's determination to gain control over the whole territory of the province, which practically means subduing its northern, Serb-populated part. The verdict of the International Court of Justice can provide a legal backing for the hard-line policy.

While the judicial contest over Kosovo is likely lost for Serbia and the countries supporting it, the long-term repercussions of the coming verdict and the role it can play in other conflict cases should be assessed from a broader perspective. The conclusions and even more so the arguments of the International Court of Justice will be studied carefully with an eye to similar conflicts, including those in the Caucasus and other parts of the post-Soviet space. The options open to Russia in this context certainly deserve attention.

From the outset, the Russian leadership stated quite reasonably that its decision to recognize the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia was based on an understanding of the situation in the Caucasus and not in any way on the Kosovo precedent. Nevertheless, the fact that the International Court of Justice would express no opposition to the independence of Kosovo would automatically weaken the West's case against the recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia by Russia. Moreover, opportunities would arise to subject to an overhaul the general principles of conflict resolution in the Balkan and the Caspian regions, for example, in Bosnia, Macedonia, or Karabakh. In fact, Russia is confronted with the following dilemma. As far as the international law and the territorial integrity principles are concerned, Moscow would certainly prefer to see the International Court of Justice issue a pro-Serbian verdict, but a Realpolitik approach can help discern alternative horizons in the situation, and then the Serbian cause is not completely lost regardless of what the Court eventually says. Perhaps, it is time for Moscow to shed counterproductive illusions in domestic politics and geopolitics. Unlike Belgrade's efforts aimed at securing the Serbian interests in the Balkan region and supporting Serbs in Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina and elsewhere, the plan centered around the International Court of Justice has never looked really promising.

Petr Iskenderov is a senior research fellow at the Institute for Slavic Studies of the Russian Academy of Science and an international commentator at Vremya Novstey and the Voice of Russia.

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Commentary: The court, predictably, did what it was expected to do: in the words of the BBC, the International Court of Justice rejected Serbian claims that the move had violated its territorial integrity. One may wonder what it would take to actually "violate Serbian sovereignty" if an illegal seizure by a alliance of foreign powers and a violent imposition of a new sovereignty does not.

The International Court of Justice also seems to have 'forgotten' the admittedly 'minor' 'detail' that the NATO aggression against Yugoslavia was absolutely illegal. Just like the 'liberal' pundits who blame Dubya for his illegal war forget that it was Clinton who engaged in the first such aggressions.

Truly, the absolute hypocrisy of international community towards the issue of the wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo is without precedent. When these wars took place, the international community, the pundits, the journalists, the commenators - in one word everybody, showed an amazing, breathtaking lack of integrity, honesty or courage. Basically, the big powers wanted to make an example being smashing Yugoslavia and nobody said word.

The famous words of Pastor Martin Niemöller about how "First they came..." were forgotten or, more accurately, ignored.  As they say in the USA, when you head is in the sand, your ass is in the air and what began in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo lead directly to what happened later in Iraq and is about to happen in Iran.  Somehow, nobody understood that what happened in the former Yugoslavia was not only the end of a mult-cultural state in the Balkans, but the death of international law.  Just as the infamous 1938 Kristallnacht was not about broken storefronts but about the end of the rule of law and ushering into a new era of endless violence and murder, so the NATO wars in the Balkans ushered us all into the era of endless wars of aggression.

I can hardly express my total disgust with this topic and with all the parties involved - Serbs included (for those who forgot, the "Serbian Serbs" - those in rump Yugoslavia - agreed to impose a blockade on the Bosnian Serbs; nowadays the Serbian government is basically a stooge for the EU and NATO).  The only people who had the guts to do the right thing were the Russian paratroopers who dashed from Bosnia into Pristina but who were betrayed by the Elstin regime.  You know the motto of the Russian paratroopers?  "Никто кроме нас" (Nobody except us).  How true and how sad.

The Saker

West moves in support of Israeli nukes

Press TV reports:

The West seeks to protect Israel from nuclear inspections after a major initiative to place Tel Aviv's nuclear activities on the IAEA agenda.

Western nations are reportedly trying to foil the bid in a politically charged vote called no-action motion.

A no-action motion may be tabled if a member state believes the subject-matter of a proposed resolution falls outside the competence of a UN body. If successful, it would halt the debate on the resolution altogether.

In the United Nations, before a motion can be put to vote the defending side is allowed to move a specific no action motion, allowing the obstruction of the counter motion submitted to the plenary assembly for voting.

If successful, this would be the third time that the Israeli nuclear program is protected from inspection.

The UN nuclear watchdog, the IAEA, agreed on Monday to put the issue of 'Israel's nuclear capabilities' on the agenda of its annual meeting in Vienna upon a request by the 118-member Non-Aligned Movement and the Arab League.

In reaction to the decision, Israel filed a motion to remove the issue from the IAEA agenda. It also termed the move as inconsistent, 'substantially unwarranted and flawed'.

Based on the initiative, the IAEA seeks to pass a resolution, calling for a nuclear weapon free Middle East.

Under its policy of 'strategic ambiguity' Israel has neither admitted nor denied possession of nuclear weapons. It, however, reportedly has up to 200 nuclear warheads in its arsenal.

Russia's representative at the UNSC blasts the West's hypocrisy

Washington's Hypocrisy

By Dmitry Rogozin for the International Herald Tribune

The U.S. administration is trying to stick the label of "bad guy" on Russia for exceeding the peacekeeping mandate and using "disproportionate force" in the peace-enforcement operation in Georgia.

Maybe our American friends have gone blind and deaf at the same time. Mikheil Saakashvili, the president of Georgia, is known as a tough nationalist who didn't hide his intentions of forcing Ossetians and Abkhazians to live in his country.

We were hoping that the U.S. administration, which had displayed so much kindness and touching care for the Georgian leader, would be able to save him from the maniacal desire to deal with the small and disobedient peoples of the Caucasus.

But a terrible thing happened. The dog bit its master. Saakashvili gave an order to wipe Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, from the face of earth.

The Georgian air force and artillery struck the sleeping town at midnight. More than 1,500 civilians perished in the very first hours of the shelling. At the same time, Georgian special forces shot 10 Russian peacekeepers who didn't expect such a betrayal from their Georgian colleagues.

The Kremlin attempted to reach Saakashvili, who was hiding, by phone. All this time the Russian Joint Staff forbid the surviving peacekeepers to open return fire. Finally our patience was exhausted. The Russian forces came to help Tskhinvali and its civilian population.

In reply to the insulting criticism by President Bush that Russia used "disproportionate force," I'd like to cite some legal grounds for our response. Can shooting peacekeepers and the mass extermination of a civilian population - mainly Russian citizens - be regarded as hostile action against a state? Is it ground enough to use armed force in self-defense and to safeguard the security of these citizens?

Tbilisi concealed the scope of the humanitarian catastrophe in South Ossetia. Saakashvili's constant lies about the true state of affairs in Georgia were attempts to lay the fault at somebody else's door.

The Russian response is entirely justified and is consistent with both international law and the humanitarian goals of the peacekeeping operation conducted in South Ossetia. I will try to explain.

The Georgian aggression against South Ossetia, which came as a straightforward, wide-scale attack on the Russian peacekeeping contingent - Russian armed forces legally based on the territory of Georgia - should be classified as an armed attack on the Russian Federation, giving grounds to fulfill the right to self-defense - the right of every state according to Article 51 of the UN Charter.

As for the defense of our citizens outside the country, the use of force to defend one's compatriots is traditionally regarded as a form of self-defense. Countries such as the United States, Britain, France and Israel have at numerous times resorted to the use of armed force to defend their citizens outside national borders.

Such incidents include the armed operation of Belgian paratroopers in 1965 to defend 2,000 foreigners in Zaire; the U.S. military intervention in Grenada in 1983 under the pretext of protecting thousands of American nationals, who found themselves in danger due to a coup d'êtat in this island state; the sending of American troops to Panama in 1989 to defend, among others, American nationals.

We also have to keep in mind the present-day military interventions by the U.S. and its allies in Yugoslavia, Iraq and Afghanistan. By the way, the last three cases are examples of tough American interventions when its own citizens did not need direct protection. But in spite of those countries' massive civilian losses at the hands of American soldiers, no one blamed Washington for a "disproportionate use of force."

Of course, the history of international relations is full of abuses committed under the pretext of defending citizens.

In order to draw a clear line between lawful and unlawful use of force, one can single out a number of objective criteria: first, the existence of a real threat to life or systematic and violations of human rights; second, the absence of other, peaceful means of resolving the conflict; third, a humanitarian aim for an armed operation; and four, proportionality - i.e., limitation on the time and means of rescue.

Russia's actions were in full compliance with these criteria. In conducting its military action, Russian troops also strictly observed the requirements of international humanitarian law. The Russian military did not subject civil objects and civilians on the territory of Georgia to deliberate attacks.

It is hard to believe that in such a situation any other country would have remained idle. Let me quote two statements:

One: "We are against cruelty. We are against ethnic cleansing. A right to come back home should be guaranteed to the refugees. We all agree that murders, property destruction, annihilation of culture and religion are not to be tolerated. That is what we are fighting against. Bombardments of the aggressor will be mercilessly intensified."

Two: "We appeal to all free countries to join us but our actions are not determined by others. I will defend the freedom and security of my citizens, whatever actions are needed for it. Our special forces have seized airports and bridges... air forces and missiles have struck essential targets."

Who do you think is the author of these words? Medvedev? Putin? No. The first quote belongs to Bill Clinton, talking about NATO operation against Yugoslavia. The author of the second quote is the current resident of the White House, talking about the U.S. intervention in Iraq.

Does that mean that the United States and NATO can use brute force where they want to, and Russia has to abstain from it even if it has to look at thousands of its own citizens being shot? If it's not hypocrisy, then what IS hypocrisy?

Dmitry Rogozin is Russia's ambassador to NATO.