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  • French senators propose CRIMINALIZING anyone who criticizes Israel

    Sixteen French senators submitted a bill last week, aiming to penalize anti-Zionism in France. For analysts, this is a seemingly suppressive move in cracking down on pro-Palestinian protests.
    Article 25 of the bill specified that those who contest the existence of the State of Israel by one of the means set out in Article 23 shall be punished by one year’s imprisonment and a fine of 45,000 euros. "Insult committed against the State of Israel, by any of the means set out in Article 23, shall be punishable by two years' imprisonment and a fine of 75,000 euros. Those who, by the same means, have directly provoked hatred or violence against the State of Israel shall be punished by five years imprisonment and a fine of 100,000 euros," the bill stated.

    Moreover, Article 23 of the bill covered the transmission of offensive words as follows: by speeches, shouts, or threats made in public places or meetings, or by writings, prints, drawings, engravings, paintings, emblems, images, or any other written medium, speech or image, sold or distributed, offered for sale or exhibited in public places or meetings.


    Senator Stephane Le Rudulier of the LR party (the Republicans) announced via a series of posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, that he had submitted the text with 15 other politicians. The bill represents "anti-Zionism as prohibited and condemned as anti-Semitism," the politician said. He also likened anti-Zionism to anti-Semitism, arguing that "the rise of anti-Semitism is fueled by the hatred of Israel, a disguised form of hatred towards Jews."

    In a letter addressed to France's Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne last month, he deplored the "existence of a fifth column of Palestinian terrorism in France" and called for the dissolution of pro-Palestine parties such as La France Insoumise (LFI), the New Anticapitalist Party (NPA) and the Jeune Garde, which he alleged are promoting terrorism.

    Brighteon.TV


    Earlier in October France's interior minister ordered local authorities to ban all pro-Palestinian demonstrations. French President Emmanuel Macron urged French people not to allow the war in the Mideast to erupt into tensions at home. Right after Macron spoke on TV about the Mideast conflict, Paris police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse pro-Palestinian protesters who had defied a ban and demonstrated Thursday against the Israeli government. "Let us not bring ideological adventures here (to France) by imitation or by projection. Let us not add national fractures ... to international fractures," Macron said. "Let us stay united."

    France's Jewish population, estimated at more than half a million, is the largest in Europe and the third-biggest in the world, after Israel and the United States.

    Paris protesters chant: "Israel, assassin," "Macron, accomplice"

    Thousands of protesters marched through the rain-dampened streets of Paris on November 4, with some shouting "Israel, assassin."

    They were loudly denouncing Macron, chanting "Macron, accomplice" and showing support for Palestine while shouting "Palestine will live, Palestine will win," as they carried Palestinian flags. Some had placards that read "Immediate ceasefire," a cry also recited repeatedly by the crowd. Banners on a sound system truck at the center of the march read "Stop the massacre in Gaza."

    Paris’s police chief authorized the march, which ran between two large public squares in eastern Paris, Republique and Nation, but vowed that any behavior deemed "antisemitic or sympathetic toward terrorism will not be tolerated by police officers mobilized to keep order." It was one of the first, big gatherings in support of Palestinians to be legally allowed in Paris since the Hamas attack on October 7.

    Ultimately, the rallyists are calling for peace between the two conflicting nations. "We came here today to show the people of France's solidarity with the Palestinian people and our support for peace, for a peace solution with two states, an Israeli state and a Palestinian state," said Antoine Guerreiro, a 30-year-old civil servant. Meanwhile, Wahid Barek, a 66-year-old retiree, lamented the deaths of both Israeli and Palestinian civilians. "I deplore civilian deaths on both sides. Civilians have nothing to do with these actions. It really is shameful," he said. (Related: Days after saying 'every Jewish person is a Zionist,' ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt says anti-Zionist Jews are a 'hate group.')

    Catch the latest news about the Israel-Gaza conflict on WWIII.news.

    Sources for this article include:

    HarapanDaily.com

    MoroccoWorldNews.com

    APNews.com

    TimesOfIsrael.com

    VOANews.com


    https://www.naturalnews.com/2023-11-14-french-senators-propose-to-criminalize-israel-critics.html
    French senators propose CRIMINALIZING anyone who criticizes Israel Sixteen French senators submitted a bill last week, aiming to penalize anti-Zionism in France. For analysts, this is a seemingly suppressive move in cracking down on pro-Palestinian protests. Article 25 of the bill specified that those who contest the existence of the State of Israel by one of the means set out in Article 23 shall be punished by one year’s imprisonment and a fine of 45,000 euros. "Insult committed against the State of Israel, by any of the means set out in Article 23, shall be punishable by two years' imprisonment and a fine of 75,000 euros. Those who, by the same means, have directly provoked hatred or violence against the State of Israel shall be punished by five years imprisonment and a fine of 100,000 euros," the bill stated. Moreover, Article 23 of the bill covered the transmission of offensive words as follows: by speeches, shouts, or threats made in public places or meetings, or by writings, prints, drawings, engravings, paintings, emblems, images, or any other written medium, speech or image, sold or distributed, offered for sale or exhibited in public places or meetings. Senator Stephane Le Rudulier of the LR party (the Republicans) announced via a series of posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, that he had submitted the text with 15 other politicians. The bill represents "anti-Zionism as prohibited and condemned as anti-Semitism," the politician said. He also likened anti-Zionism to anti-Semitism, arguing that "the rise of anti-Semitism is fueled by the hatred of Israel, a disguised form of hatred towards Jews." In a letter addressed to France's Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne last month, he deplored the "existence of a fifth column of Palestinian terrorism in France" and called for the dissolution of pro-Palestine parties such as La France Insoumise (LFI), the New Anticapitalist Party (NPA) and the Jeune Garde, which he alleged are promoting terrorism. Brighteon.TV Earlier in October France's interior minister ordered local authorities to ban all pro-Palestinian demonstrations. French President Emmanuel Macron urged French people not to allow the war in the Mideast to erupt into tensions at home. Right after Macron spoke on TV about the Mideast conflict, Paris police used tear gas and water cannons to disperse pro-Palestinian protesters who had defied a ban and demonstrated Thursday against the Israeli government. "Let us not bring ideological adventures here (to France) by imitation or by projection. Let us not add national fractures ... to international fractures," Macron said. "Let us stay united." France's Jewish population, estimated at more than half a million, is the largest in Europe and the third-biggest in the world, after Israel and the United States. Paris protesters chant: "Israel, assassin," "Macron, accomplice" Thousands of protesters marched through the rain-dampened streets of Paris on November 4, with some shouting "Israel, assassin." They were loudly denouncing Macron, chanting "Macron, accomplice" and showing support for Palestine while shouting "Palestine will live, Palestine will win," as they carried Palestinian flags. Some had placards that read "Immediate ceasefire," a cry also recited repeatedly by the crowd. Banners on a sound system truck at the center of the march read "Stop the massacre in Gaza." Paris’s police chief authorized the march, which ran between two large public squares in eastern Paris, Republique and Nation, but vowed that any behavior deemed "antisemitic or sympathetic toward terrorism will not be tolerated by police officers mobilized to keep order." It was one of the first, big gatherings in support of Palestinians to be legally allowed in Paris since the Hamas attack on October 7. Ultimately, the rallyists are calling for peace between the two conflicting nations. "We came here today to show the people of France's solidarity with the Palestinian people and our support for peace, for a peace solution with two states, an Israeli state and a Palestinian state," said Antoine Guerreiro, a 30-year-old civil servant. Meanwhile, Wahid Barek, a 66-year-old retiree, lamented the deaths of both Israeli and Palestinian civilians. "I deplore civilian deaths on both sides. Civilians have nothing to do with these actions. It really is shameful," he said. (Related: Days after saying 'every Jewish person is a Zionist,' ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt says anti-Zionist Jews are a 'hate group.') Catch the latest news about the Israel-Gaza conflict on WWIII.news. Sources for this article include: HarapanDaily.com MoroccoWorldNews.com APNews.com TimesOfIsrael.com VOANews.com https://www.naturalnews.com/2023-11-14-french-senators-propose-to-criminalize-israel-critics.html
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    French senators propose CRIMINALIZING anyone who criticizes Israel – NaturalNews.com
    Sixteen French senators submitted a bill last week, aiming to penalize anti-Zionism in France. For analysts, this is a seemingly suppressive move in cracking down on pro-Palestinian protests. Article 25 of the bill specified that those who contest the existence of the State of Israel by one of the means set out in Article 23 […]
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  • In a world where the pursuit of financial prosperity is a common aspiration, numerous self-help programs promise to unlock the secrets of wealth manifestation. One such program that has gained considerable attention is the Genie Script. In this review, we will delve into the key aspects of the Genie Script Wealth Manifestation program, exploring its principles, effectiveness, and whether it lives up to the hype.

    The Genie Script Philosophy:

    At its core, the Genie Script is grounded in the belief that individuals can reshape their financial destinies through the power of manifestation. The program emphasizes the importance of aligning thoughts, emotions, and actions with the goal of attracting abundance into one's life. Drawing inspiration from the law of attraction, the Genie Script asserts that a positive mindset and focused intention can significantly impact one's financial reality.

    Components of the Genie Script:

    Scripting Techniques:
    Central to the Genie Script is the practice of scripting, where participants are encouraged to write detailed, affirmative statements about their financial goals. This process is designed to reinforce positive beliefs, foster clarity, and enhance the manifestation process. Users are guided in crafting scripts that vividly depict their desired financial outcomes.

    Visualization Exercises:
    Visualization plays a crucial role in the Genie Script program. Users engage in regular exercises where they mentally picture themselves achieving their financial goals. This visualization technique is intended to create a strong connection between the individual and their aspirations, fostering a sense of belief and inevitability.

    Affirmation Integration:
    Affirmations are another cornerstone of the Genie Script methodology. Participants are encouraged to recite positive affirmations daily, reinforcing the idea that wealth and abundance are not only attainable but are already on their way. The program provides a structured approach to incorporating these affirmations into daily routines.

    Effectiveness and User Experiences:

    While success stories abound, the effectiveness of the Genie Script program can vary from person to person. Some individuals report significant improvements in their financial situations, citing a newfound sense of clarity, increased motivation, and, in some cases, tangible financial gains. Others, however, may not experience the same level of success, highlighting the subjective nature of such programs.

    It's crucial to note that the Genie Script is not a guaranteed path to instant wealth. Like any self-help program, its effectiveness depends on the user's commitment, belief in the process, and consistent application of the prescribed techniques.

    Call to Action:

    If you are intrigued by the prospect of transforming your financial reality and are open to exploring the principles of manifestation, the Genie Script may be worth considering. However, it's essential to approach it with realistic expectations, understanding that results may vary.

    Before embarking on the Genie Script journey, take the time to research and reflect on whether its principles align with your beliefs and goals. Additionally, consider seeking reviews and testimonials from individuals who have already undergone the program to gain insights into their experiences.

    https://sites.google.com/view/newgeniescript/home
    In a world where the pursuit of financial prosperity is a common aspiration, numerous self-help programs promise to unlock the secrets of wealth manifestation. One such program that has gained considerable attention is the Genie Script. In this review, we will delve into the key aspects of the Genie Script Wealth Manifestation program, exploring its principles, effectiveness, and whether it lives up to the hype. The Genie Script Philosophy: At its core, the Genie Script is grounded in the belief that individuals can reshape their financial destinies through the power of manifestation. The program emphasizes the importance of aligning thoughts, emotions, and actions with the goal of attracting abundance into one's life. Drawing inspiration from the law of attraction, the Genie Script asserts that a positive mindset and focused intention can significantly impact one's financial reality. Components of the Genie Script: Scripting Techniques: Central to the Genie Script is the practice of scripting, where participants are encouraged to write detailed, affirmative statements about their financial goals. This process is designed to reinforce positive beliefs, foster clarity, and enhance the manifestation process. Users are guided in crafting scripts that vividly depict their desired financial outcomes. Visualization Exercises: Visualization plays a crucial role in the Genie Script program. Users engage in regular exercises where they mentally picture themselves achieving their financial goals. This visualization technique is intended to create a strong connection between the individual and their aspirations, fostering a sense of belief and inevitability. Affirmation Integration: Affirmations are another cornerstone of the Genie Script methodology. Participants are encouraged to recite positive affirmations daily, reinforcing the idea that wealth and abundance are not only attainable but are already on their way. The program provides a structured approach to incorporating these affirmations into daily routines. Effectiveness and User Experiences: While success stories abound, the effectiveness of the Genie Script program can vary from person to person. Some individuals report significant improvements in their financial situations, citing a newfound sense of clarity, increased motivation, and, in some cases, tangible financial gains. Others, however, may not experience the same level of success, highlighting the subjective nature of such programs. It's crucial to note that the Genie Script is not a guaranteed path to instant wealth. Like any self-help program, its effectiveness depends on the user's commitment, belief in the process, and consistent application of the prescribed techniques. Call to Action: If you are intrigued by the prospect of transforming your financial reality and are open to exploring the principles of manifestation, the Genie Script may be worth considering. However, it's essential to approach it with realistic expectations, understanding that results may vary. Before embarking on the Genie Script journey, take the time to research and reflect on whether its principles align with your beliefs and goals. Additionally, consider seeking reviews and testimonials from individuals who have already undergone the program to gain insights into their experiences. https://sites.google.com/view/newgeniescript/home
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  • Biden’s Legacy Should Be Forever Haunted by the Names of Gaza’s Dead Children
    Biden’s support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel’s greatest crimes.

    Jeremy Scahill November 14 2023, 12:24 p.m.
    KHAN YUNIS, GAZA - NOVEMBER 13: Palestinians including children are brought to Nasser Hospital for treatment aftermath of Israeli attack in Khan Yunis, Gaza on November 13, 2023. (Photo by Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu via Getty Images)
    As Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza last week, including strikes against multiple hospitals, and presided over a forced exodus of hundreds of thousands of civilians from their homes, President Joe Biden was asked about the chances of a Gaza ceasefire. “None,” Biden shot back. “No possibility.”

    With a death toll that has now surpassed 11,000 Palestinians, including nearly 5,000 children, the extent of Biden’s public divergence from his “great, great friend” Benjamin Netanyahu’s scorched-earth war of annihilation amounts to meekly worded suggestions of “humanitarian pauses.”

    On Friday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken remarked, “far too many Palestinians have been killed; far too many have suffered these past weeks, and we want to do everything possible to prevent harm to them and to maximize the assistance that gets to them.” These disingenuous platitudes melt into a puddle of blood when juxtaposed with the administration’s actions.

    The Biden administration has funneled weapons, intelligence support, and unwavering political backing for Israel’s public campaign to erase from the earth Gaza’s existence as a Palestinian territory. As Israeli settlers wage campaigns of terror against the Palestinians in the West Bank, the U.S. remained entrenched in its global isolation, voting last week against a U.N. resolution demanding an end to the illegal settlements. The resolution condemned illegal Israeli settlements, calling them “illegal and an obstacle to peace.” The resolution, which passed 145-7, called for “the immediate and complete cessation of all Israeli settlement activities in all of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” Only five countries joined the U.S. and Israel in voting “no”: Canada, Hungary, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Nauru.

    As the capitals of major world cities have seen massive protests on a scale not registered since the 2003 Iraq invasion, Netanyahu has been on a U.S. media blitz, appearing on Sunday talk shows to cast the stakes of his war “to destroy Hamas” as akin to World War II. “Without it none of us have a future. And it’s not only our war, it’s your war too. It’s the battle of civilization against barbarism,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “And if we don’t win here, this scourge will pass. The Middle East will pass to other places. The Middle East will fall. Europe is next. You will be next.”

    Netanyahu has brazenly exploited the grief of Israeli citizens whose lives were torn apart on October 7 when Hamas launched a series of coordinated attacks inside Israel. Those raids resulted in the deaths of 846 civilians, 278 Israeli soldiers, and 44 police officers, according to the latest figures provided by Israel. Some family members of the victims, as well as relatives of the 240 hostages taken by Hamas and other militant groups — among them infants and the elderly — have emerged as some of the most vocal critics of Netanyahu’s government. A small number have spoken out against his attacks on Gaza, though their voices are largely drowned out by pro-war voices in Western media coverage.

    “I beg you, I beg also my government, and the pilots and soldiers, who may be called to go into Gaza. Don’t agree. Protect the area around the Gaza Strip, but don’t agree to go in and kill innocent people,” said Noy Katsman, whose older brother Hayim was killed on October 7 at the kibbutz he had lived on for a decade. Maoz Inon’s parents were also killed that day. “Today, Israel is repeating an old mistake it made many times in the last century. We must stop it,” Inon wrote. “Revenge is not going to bring my parents back to life. It is not going to bring back other Israelis and Palestinians killed either. It is going to do the opposite. It is going to cause more casualties. It is going to bring more death.”

    Over the past month, Biden has cast doubt on the extent of Palestinian civilian deaths, defended Netanyahu’s violent extremist agendas, and made clear that the U.S. position amounts to this: collectively punishing Palestinians for the actions of Hamas falls under the doctrine of “self-defense.” Biden has stood by Israel as government officials have openly described an agenda of ethnically cleansing Palestinians, proclaiming a “Gaza Nakba,” threatening to do to Beirut what Israel has done to Gaza, labeling hospitals and ambulances “legitimate military targets,” and accusing U.N. workers of being Hamas and journalists of being “accomplices in crimes against humanity.” More than 100 U.N. workers and at least 40 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7. Approximately one in 200 Palestinians have died in Gaza since the start of Israel’s attacks.

    National security adviser Jake Sullivan, when asked Sunday on CNN if Israel is abiding by the rules of war, replied, “I’m not going to sit here and play judge or jury on that question. What I’m going to do is state the principle of the United States on this issue, which is straight forward: Israel has a right, indeed a responsibility, to defend itself against a terrorist group.” The U.S. is simultaneously increasing the flow of weapons to Israel — and Biden proposed $14.5 billion in additional military assistance — while its senior national security official cannot state whether Israel is conducting operations in contravention of international law.

    Keenly aware of the growing opposition to Israel’s war at home and abroad, and even within his own administration, Biden and his advisers have sought to push a narrative that they are seeking to moderate Israel’s tactics. They make sure the U.S. press know that Biden had urged against a full-scale ground invasion, proposed limited pauses to the bombing, and expressed concerns about the humanitarian crisis for Palestinian civilians. On Monday, after days of relentless Israeli attacks on Gazan hospitals and desperate pleas from international doctors and health and aid organizations, Biden finally addressed the issue, but only after being directly asked. “Hospitals must be protected,” he said in response to a question from the press. “My hope and expectation is that there will be less intrusive action relative to hospitals.”

    The White House’s mounting effort to spin itself as being concerned about civilian deaths and doing all it can to urge Israel to avoid massacring civilians on an industrial scale is an effort to obfuscate the U.S. role as Israel’s central ally enabling this slaughter. It is a grotesque parlor game that only works if facts and history don’t matter. And in Biden’s case, that history is extensive.

    NEW YORK, UNITED STATES - 2023/11/09: Students, teachers, and pro-Palestinian allies march through Midtown Manhattan during a Student Walkout protest calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Since October 7, the Israeli army's bombardment of the Palestinian enclave, in retaliation for the Hamas attack on Israel that killed over 1,400 people, has seen thousands of buildings razed to the ground, more than 10,000 people killed and 1.4 million displaced whilst Gaza remains besieged. (Photo by Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images)
    Students, teachers, and Palestine solidarity allies call for a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel during a student walkout in Manhattan on Nov. 9, 2023.
    Photo: Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images
    Support for Israel’s Wars

    For 50 years, Biden has been consistent in his support for Israel’s wars against the Palestinians. Time and again he has backed and facilitated campaigns of terror waged by a nuclear power against a people who have no state, no army, no air force, no navy, and an almost nonexistent civilian infrastructure. As Gaza burns in a smoldering pyre of death and destruction, 80-year-old Biden may be overseeing the final act in his devotion to Israel’s most extreme agenda. His legacy should be forever haunted by the names of the dead children of Gaza, thousands of whom have died in a matter of weeks under the hellfire of U.S.-manufactured weapons and support.

    Biden has been in public office longer than almost any U.S. politician in history. His career in the U.S. Senate began on the eve of the 1973 Arab–Israeli war when he traveled to meet Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. “I sat across the desk for an hour as she flipped those maps up and down, chain smoking, telling me about the [1967] Six Day War,” Biden said. He called it “one of the most consequential meetings I’ve ever had in my life.” But, as has been in the case with more than a few of Biden’s vignettes about his central role in historical events, in his numerous and varied retelling of that story, he seems to have exaggerated how important that meeting was to Meir and the Israelis.


    Related

    Joe Biden: Career Defender of Israel’s Crimes and Impunity

    Over the ensuing decades and up to the current horrors being inflicted on the people of Gaza, Biden has operated as one of the staunchest promoters of Israel’s colonialist agenda, often defending Israel’s disproportionate use of force, collective punishment, and at times outright massacres. “Were there not an Israel, the United States would have to invent an Israel to protect her interests in the region,” Biden said on the Senate floor in 1986. He repeated that same line earlier this year during a July visit by Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Washington. During Biden’s trip to Israel last month, as Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza and the civilian death toll skyrocketed, he told Netanyahu and his war cabinet, “I don’t believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist.”

    Building support for Israel’s military might and funneling money and political support to Israel has been a central component of Biden’s career-long foreign policy agenda. He is fond of calling himself “Israel’s best Catholic friend.” In 2016, during a visit to Israel, Netanyahu heaped praise on Biden, then vice president. “The people of Israel consider the Biden family part of our family,” he said. “I want to thank you personally for your, for our personal friendship of over 30 years. We’ve known each other a long time. We’ve gone through many trials and tribulations. And we have an enduring bond that represents the enduring bond between our people.”

    Most Read

    There is one story from these decades of Biden’s dedication to Israel that seems eerily prescient given the bloodbath playing out in Gaza right now. It took place early in the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. In public, Biden was neither a cheerleader for the invasion nor an opponent. But in a private meeting of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with Prime Minister Menachem Begin in June 1982, Biden’s support for the brutality of the invasion appeared to outstrip even that of the Israeli government.

    As the Israeli prime minister was grilled in the Senate over Israel’s disproportionate use of force, including the targeting of civilians with cluster bomb munitions, Biden, in Begin’s words, “rose and delivered a very impassioned speech” defending the invasion. Upon his return to Israel, Begin told Israeli reporters he was shocked when Biden “said he would go even further than Israel, adding that he’d forcefully fend off anyone who sought to invade his country, even if that meant killing women or children.” Begin said, “I disassociated myself from these remarks,” adding, “I said to him: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war. Sometimes there are casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt civilians.”

    Coming from Begin, the comments were striking, because he had been notorious as a leader of the Irgun, a militant group that carried out some of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing accompanying the creation of the state of Israel, including the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre. The details of his exchange with Biden about Lebanon did not receive attention in the U.S. press. Instead, the New York Times focused on what it termed the “bitterest exchange” between Biden and Begin over the issue of Israeli settlements, which Biden opposed because, he said, it was hurting Israel’s reputation in the U.S. “He hinted — more than hinted — that if we continue with this policy, it is possible that he will propose cutting our financial aid,” Begin alleged.

    Over the years, Biden has referenced this confrontation when explaining his opposition to the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank as a disagreement among very good friends. Biden has long argued that these expansions undermine prospects for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, though his rhetoric has often been contradicted by his actions, as was the case with his opposition to last week’s U.N. vote labeling the settlements illegal.

    US Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee?s (AIPAC) annual policy conference at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, May 5, 2009. AFP PHOTO / Saul LOEB (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images)
    U.S. Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual policy conference in Washington, D.C., on May 5, 2009.
    Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images
    “Innocents Got Killed”

    In the 1990s, as Biden solidified his reputation as a top foreign policy senator, he often helped shepherd legislation and funding packages to Israel that human rights groups and international aid organizations said would hinder efforts at brokering lasting peace and further entrench the state of apartheid imposed on millions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.

    Biden was an early proponent of moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a move that finally took place in 2018 under the Trump administration. In 1995, Biden helped pass a Senate resolution demanding that the embassy be moved by May of that year. Despite objections that it would harm ongoing Israeli–Palestinian peace talks by deciding a key issue by fiat, Biden said the move would send a positive signal to the region. “To do less would play into the hands of those who would do their hardest to deny Israel the full attributes of statehood,” Biden said.

    In 2001, following rare public criticism from the Bush administration directed at Israel’s policy of assassinating suspected Palestinian militants, Biden defended Israel’s right to carry out such killings and even rebuked President George W. Bush for criticizing them. “My view has always been that disagreements between Israel and the United States, those differences should be aired privately, not publicly,” Biden said. He also defended the legality of targeted killings, which at the time were considered highly questionable by legal experts for occurring outside a declared conflict. “I don’t believe this is a policy of assassinations,” Biden said, referring to the targeting of suspected Hamas members. “There is in effect a declared war, a declaration by an organization that has said its goal is to do as much as it can to kill Israeli civilians.”

    In July 2006, Israel was bombing both Gaza and southern Lebanon, with Biden cheering it on. The Israelis, Biden said on MSNBC, “have in both cases, both in Gaza and in southern Lebanon, done the right thing.” In the face of international condemnations of Israel’s brutality in its attacks, Biden defended Israel. “I find it fascinating — people talk about, ‘Has Israel gone too far?’ No one talks about whether Israel’s justified in the first place,” he said on “Meet the Press.” Unless critics of Israel recognize that it was a victim of terrorism, he said, “I think it’s awful — I think it’s a secondary question whether Israel’s gone too far.”

    Biden said his “only criticism of the Israelis is they’re not that great at public relations.” He compared Israel’s attacks on Gaza and Lebanon to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks. “It’s a little bit like the same thing we had when we went into Afghanistan,” Biden said at a press conference in July 2006. “We went into Afghanistan, remember, we took out a wedding party by accident? Remember, we took out — with these very sophisticated missiles we had, we accidentally killed some citizens? Was ever a war more justified than us going into Afghanistan? I can’t think of any war since World War II more justified. Yet innocents got killed in us trying to protect America’s interests.” By August 2006, more than 1,000 people were killed in Israel’s war against Lebanon, and UNICEF estimated that 30 percent of the casualties were children.

    During his time as vice president, Biden often played the role of placating his friend Netanyahu who famously loathed President Barack Obama. During those eight years, Obama largely maintained long-standing U.S. posture of showering Israel with weapons and other aid despite repeated political spats with Netanyahu, most prominently over Iran and Israeli settlements. During numerous episodes when Israel unleashed gratuitous violence, drawing international condemnation, Biden served as Israel’s most prominent American defender.

    In the early summer of 2010, a group of mostly Turkish activists attempted to deliver a flotilla of humanitarian aid to the besieged Gaza Strip. The attempt was interdicted by the Israeli military, which launched a raid on one ship that resulted in the deaths of nine people, including one American citizen. The raid triggered an international outcry and led to a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey, while drawing further attention to the civilian impact of the ongoing Israeli siege of Gaza.

    Biden took the lead in defending the raid to the U.S. public. In an interview with PBS, he described the raid as “legitimate” and argued that the flotilla organizers could have disembarked elsewhere before transferring the aid to Gaza. “So what’s the big deal here? What’s the big deal of insisting it go straight to Gaza?” Biden asked about the humanitarian mission. “Well, it’s legitimate for Israel to say, ‘I don’t know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight — 3,000 rockets on my people.’” No weapons were ever found on the ship, only humanitarian supplies. Amid the fury that the raid generated and the muted response from Obama, Biden’s remarks were welcomed by AIPAC spokesperson Josh Block, who said at the time, “We appreciate the many strong statements of support for Israel from members of Congress and the vice president today.”

    After the 2014 Gaza war — a seven-week Israeli ground invasion that killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (two-thirds of them civilians) and caused widespread displacement and destruction of civilian infrastructure — Biden boasted of how the Obama administration had “steadfastly stood before the world and defended Israel’s right to defend itself,” declaring, “We have an obligation to match the steel and the spine of the people of Israel with an ironclad, nonnegotiable commitment to Israel’s physical security.”

    In May 2021, a few months into Biden’s presidency, Israel intensified its ethnic-cleansing campaign against Palestinians in East Jerusalem, forcibly evicting people from their homes to hand them over to Israeli settlers. The incendiary situation was then exacerbated during a Ramadan siege by Israeli forces at one of the holiest sites in Islam, Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. In response, Hamas began launching rockets into Israel. Netanyahu retaliated by ordering a massive 11-day bombing campaign against Gaza, striking residential buildings, media outlets, hospitals, and a refugee camp.

    As the civilian death toll among Palestinians began to rise, Ned Price, the State Department spokesperson, characterized the operation as Israel exercising its right to self-defense. When he was then asked whether the principle of self-defense also applied to Palestinians, he struggled to answer before saying, “Broadly speaking, we believe in the concept of self-defense. We believe it applies to any state.” When Matt Lee of The Associated Press pointed out that Palestinians do not have a state, Price said, “I’m not in a position to debate the legalities from up here.”

    More than 250 Palestinians died during Israel’s siege, including dozens of children. More than 70,000 Palestinians were displaced. Throughout the bombing, the U.S. staunchly defended Israel’s disproportionate attacks, with Biden declaring on May 16, “there has not been a significant overreaction” from Israel before pivoting to condemn Hamas’s firing of rockets into civilian areas of Israel.

    GAZA CITY, GAZA - NOVEMBER 8: Palestinians who left their houses and live at the Nassr hospital, are trying to feed their children during food shortages as the Israeli attacks continue in Gaza City, Gaza on November 8, 2023. (Photo by Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images)
    Displaced Palestinians at Nassr hospital try to feed their children during food shortages on Nov. 8, 2023.
    Photo: Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images
    Evidence of Genocidal Intent

    Following Hamas’s horrifying attacks on October 7, Biden and his administration have defended Israel’s mass bombardment of Gaza, and U.S. weapons shipments have been accelerated. Biden called his proposal for additional military support an “unprecedented commitment to Israel’s security that will sharpen Israel’s qualitative military edge,” saying, “We’re going to make sure other hostile actors in the region know that Israel is stronger than ever.”

    This crisis has undoubtedly solidified Biden’s legacy as one of the premiere American defenders of Israel’s crimes, including disproportionate attacks against an overwhelmingly defenseless civilian population, in the history of U.S. politics.

    In an alternate reality — one where the rule of law is applied equally to all states — Israeli leaders would likely face war crimes charges for the razing of Gaza. Leading genocide scholars and international law experts have cited the statements of Israeli officials about the aims of their operations in Gaza as potential evidence of “genocidal intent.” A coalition of international lawyers representing Palestinian rights groups has already petitioned the International Criminal Court to open a criminal inquiry and issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and other officials.

    Such attempts at accountability should not focus solely on Israeli leaders, according to some U.S. constitutional law organizations. The U.S. is Israel’s premiere bankroller and arms dealer, not to mention its political defender. There are several U.S. laws and treaties that prohibit support for, and failure to prevent, genocidal activities. Among these is the Genocide Convention Implementation Act, signed into law in 1988. Its sponsor? A senator named Joe Biden.


    Related

    Palestinians Sue Biden for Failing to Prevent Genocide in Gaza

    On Monday, the Center for Constitutional Rights filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza seeking to block the Biden administration from providing further military aid to Israel. The suit names Biden, Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. “They have continued to provide both military and political support for Israel’s unfolding genocidal campaign while imposing no red lines,” said Katherine Gallagher, one of the lawyers who filed the case. “The United States has a clear and binding obligation to prevent, not further, genocide. They have failed in meeting their legal and moral duty to use their considerable power to end this horror. They must do so.”

    It is unfathomable, given the current world order, that any meaningful legal accountability will be served on U.S. or Israeli leaders. But on a moral level, it is important to remember these legal efforts to confront the slaughter and the complicity of Biden and other Western leaders. The U.S.-enabled horrors of the past five weeks should remain a bloody, permanent stain on the fabric of Biden’s political career and legacy. Among the U.S. political elite, it will simply be noted as Biden doing his job.


    https://theintercept.com/2023/11/14/gaza-israel-genocide-biden-legacy/
    Biden’s Legacy Should Be Forever Haunted by the Names of Gaza’s Dead Children Biden’s support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel’s greatest crimes. Jeremy Scahill November 14 2023, 12:24 p.m. KHAN YUNIS, GAZA - NOVEMBER 13: Palestinians including children are brought to Nasser Hospital for treatment aftermath of Israeli attack in Khan Yunis, Gaza on November 13, 2023. (Photo by Mustafa Hassona/Anadolu via Getty Images) As Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza last week, including strikes against multiple hospitals, and presided over a forced exodus of hundreds of thousands of civilians from their homes, President Joe Biden was asked about the chances of a Gaza ceasefire. “None,” Biden shot back. “No possibility.” With a death toll that has now surpassed 11,000 Palestinians, including nearly 5,000 children, the extent of Biden’s public divergence from his “great, great friend” Benjamin Netanyahu’s scorched-earth war of annihilation amounts to meekly worded suggestions of “humanitarian pauses.” On Friday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken remarked, “far too many Palestinians have been killed; far too many have suffered these past weeks, and we want to do everything possible to prevent harm to them and to maximize the assistance that gets to them.” These disingenuous platitudes melt into a puddle of blood when juxtaposed with the administration’s actions. The Biden administration has funneled weapons, intelligence support, and unwavering political backing for Israel’s public campaign to erase from the earth Gaza’s existence as a Palestinian territory. As Israeli settlers wage campaigns of terror against the Palestinians in the West Bank, the U.S. remained entrenched in its global isolation, voting last week against a U.N. resolution demanding an end to the illegal settlements. The resolution condemned illegal Israeli settlements, calling them “illegal and an obstacle to peace.” The resolution, which passed 145-7, called for “the immediate and complete cessation of all Israeli settlement activities in all of the Occupied Palestinian Territory.” Only five countries joined the U.S. and Israel in voting “no”: Canada, Hungary, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, and Nauru. As the capitals of major world cities have seen massive protests on a scale not registered since the 2003 Iraq invasion, Netanyahu has been on a U.S. media blitz, appearing on Sunday talk shows to cast the stakes of his war “to destroy Hamas” as akin to World War II. “Without it none of us have a future. And it’s not only our war, it’s your war too. It’s the battle of civilization against barbarism,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “And if we don’t win here, this scourge will pass. The Middle East will pass to other places. The Middle East will fall. Europe is next. You will be next.” Netanyahu has brazenly exploited the grief of Israeli citizens whose lives were torn apart on October 7 when Hamas launched a series of coordinated attacks inside Israel. Those raids resulted in the deaths of 846 civilians, 278 Israeli soldiers, and 44 police officers, according to the latest figures provided by Israel. Some family members of the victims, as well as relatives of the 240 hostages taken by Hamas and other militant groups — among them infants and the elderly — have emerged as some of the most vocal critics of Netanyahu’s government. A small number have spoken out against his attacks on Gaza, though their voices are largely drowned out by pro-war voices in Western media coverage. “I beg you, I beg also my government, and the pilots and soldiers, who may be called to go into Gaza. Don’t agree. Protect the area around the Gaza Strip, but don’t agree to go in and kill innocent people,” said Noy Katsman, whose older brother Hayim was killed on October 7 at the kibbutz he had lived on for a decade. Maoz Inon’s parents were also killed that day. “Today, Israel is repeating an old mistake it made many times in the last century. We must stop it,” Inon wrote. “Revenge is not going to bring my parents back to life. It is not going to bring back other Israelis and Palestinians killed either. It is going to do the opposite. It is going to cause more casualties. It is going to bring more death.” Over the past month, Biden has cast doubt on the extent of Palestinian civilian deaths, defended Netanyahu’s violent extremist agendas, and made clear that the U.S. position amounts to this: collectively punishing Palestinians for the actions of Hamas falls under the doctrine of “self-defense.” Biden has stood by Israel as government officials have openly described an agenda of ethnically cleansing Palestinians, proclaiming a “Gaza Nakba,” threatening to do to Beirut what Israel has done to Gaza, labeling hospitals and ambulances “legitimate military targets,” and accusing U.N. workers of being Hamas and journalists of being “accomplices in crimes against humanity.” More than 100 U.N. workers and at least 40 journalists and media workers have been killed in Gaza since October 7. Approximately one in 200 Palestinians have died in Gaza since the start of Israel’s attacks. National security adviser Jake Sullivan, when asked Sunday on CNN if Israel is abiding by the rules of war, replied, “I’m not going to sit here and play judge or jury on that question. What I’m going to do is state the principle of the United States on this issue, which is straight forward: Israel has a right, indeed a responsibility, to defend itself against a terrorist group.” The U.S. is simultaneously increasing the flow of weapons to Israel — and Biden proposed $14.5 billion in additional military assistance — while its senior national security official cannot state whether Israel is conducting operations in contravention of international law. Keenly aware of the growing opposition to Israel’s war at home and abroad, and even within his own administration, Biden and his advisers have sought to push a narrative that they are seeking to moderate Israel’s tactics. They make sure the U.S. press know that Biden had urged against a full-scale ground invasion, proposed limited pauses to the bombing, and expressed concerns about the humanitarian crisis for Palestinian civilians. On Monday, after days of relentless Israeli attacks on Gazan hospitals and desperate pleas from international doctors and health and aid organizations, Biden finally addressed the issue, but only after being directly asked. “Hospitals must be protected,” he said in response to a question from the press. “My hope and expectation is that there will be less intrusive action relative to hospitals.” The White House’s mounting effort to spin itself as being concerned about civilian deaths and doing all it can to urge Israel to avoid massacring civilians on an industrial scale is an effort to obfuscate the U.S. role as Israel’s central ally enabling this slaughter. It is a grotesque parlor game that only works if facts and history don’t matter. And in Biden’s case, that history is extensive. NEW YORK, UNITED STATES - 2023/11/09: Students, teachers, and pro-Palestinian allies march through Midtown Manhattan during a Student Walkout protest calling for a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. Since October 7, the Israeli army's bombardment of the Palestinian enclave, in retaliation for the Hamas attack on Israel that killed over 1,400 people, has seen thousands of buildings razed to the ground, more than 10,000 people killed and 1.4 million displaced whilst Gaza remains besieged. (Photo by Michael Nigro/Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images) Students, teachers, and Palestine solidarity allies call for a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel during a student walkout in Manhattan on Nov. 9, 2023. Photo: Pacific Press/LightRocket via Getty Images Support for Israel’s Wars For 50 years, Biden has been consistent in his support for Israel’s wars against the Palestinians. Time and again he has backed and facilitated campaigns of terror waged by a nuclear power against a people who have no state, no army, no air force, no navy, and an almost nonexistent civilian infrastructure. As Gaza burns in a smoldering pyre of death and destruction, 80-year-old Biden may be overseeing the final act in his devotion to Israel’s most extreme agenda. His legacy should be forever haunted by the names of the dead children of Gaza, thousands of whom have died in a matter of weeks under the hellfire of U.S.-manufactured weapons and support. Biden has been in public office longer than almost any U.S. politician in history. His career in the U.S. Senate began on the eve of the 1973 Arab–Israeli war when he traveled to meet Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir. “I sat across the desk for an hour as she flipped those maps up and down, chain smoking, telling me about the [1967] Six Day War,” Biden said. He called it “one of the most consequential meetings I’ve ever had in my life.” But, as has been in the case with more than a few of Biden’s vignettes about his central role in historical events, in his numerous and varied retelling of that story, he seems to have exaggerated how important that meeting was to Meir and the Israelis. Related Joe Biden: Career Defender of Israel’s Crimes and Impunity Over the ensuing decades and up to the current horrors being inflicted on the people of Gaza, Biden has operated as one of the staunchest promoters of Israel’s colonialist agenda, often defending Israel’s disproportionate use of force, collective punishment, and at times outright massacres. “Were there not an Israel, the United States would have to invent an Israel to protect her interests in the region,” Biden said on the Senate floor in 1986. He repeated that same line earlier this year during a July visit by Israeli President Isaac Herzog to Washington. During Biden’s trip to Israel last month, as Israel intensified its attacks on Gaza and the civilian death toll skyrocketed, he told Netanyahu and his war cabinet, “I don’t believe you have to be a Jew to be a Zionist, and I am a Zionist.” Building support for Israel’s military might and funneling money and political support to Israel has been a central component of Biden’s career-long foreign policy agenda. He is fond of calling himself “Israel’s best Catholic friend.” In 2016, during a visit to Israel, Netanyahu heaped praise on Biden, then vice president. “The people of Israel consider the Biden family part of our family,” he said. “I want to thank you personally for your, for our personal friendship of over 30 years. We’ve known each other a long time. We’ve gone through many trials and tribulations. And we have an enduring bond that represents the enduring bond between our people.” Most Read There is one story from these decades of Biden’s dedication to Israel that seems eerily prescient given the bloodbath playing out in Gaza right now. It took place early in the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982. In public, Biden was neither a cheerleader for the invasion nor an opponent. But in a private meeting of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee with Prime Minister Menachem Begin in June 1982, Biden’s support for the brutality of the invasion appeared to outstrip even that of the Israeli government. As the Israeli prime minister was grilled in the Senate over Israel’s disproportionate use of force, including the targeting of civilians with cluster bomb munitions, Biden, in Begin’s words, “rose and delivered a very impassioned speech” defending the invasion. Upon his return to Israel, Begin told Israeli reporters he was shocked when Biden “said he would go even further than Israel, adding that he’d forcefully fend off anyone who sought to invade his country, even if that meant killing women or children.” Begin said, “I disassociated myself from these remarks,” adding, “I said to him: No, sir; attention must be paid. According to our values, it is forbidden to hurt women and children, even in war. Sometimes there are casualties among the civilian population as well. But it is forbidden to aspire to this. This is a yardstick of human civilization, not to hurt civilians.” Coming from Begin, the comments were striking, because he had been notorious as a leader of the Irgun, a militant group that carried out some of the worst acts of ethnic cleansing accompanying the creation of the state of Israel, including the 1948 Deir Yassin massacre. The details of his exchange with Biden about Lebanon did not receive attention in the U.S. press. Instead, the New York Times focused on what it termed the “bitterest exchange” between Biden and Begin over the issue of Israeli settlements, which Biden opposed because, he said, it was hurting Israel’s reputation in the U.S. “He hinted — more than hinted — that if we continue with this policy, it is possible that he will propose cutting our financial aid,” Begin alleged. Over the years, Biden has referenced this confrontation when explaining his opposition to the expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank as a disagreement among very good friends. Biden has long argued that these expansions undermine prospects for a peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians, though his rhetoric has often been contradicted by his actions, as was the case with his opposition to last week’s U.N. vote labeling the settlements illegal. US Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee?s (AIPAC) annual policy conference at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center in Washington, DC, May 5, 2009. AFP PHOTO / Saul LOEB (Photo credit should read SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images) U.S. Vice President Joe Biden speaks at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual policy conference in Washington, D.C., on May 5, 2009. Photo: Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images “Innocents Got Killed” In the 1990s, as Biden solidified his reputation as a top foreign policy senator, he often helped shepherd legislation and funding packages to Israel that human rights groups and international aid organizations said would hinder efforts at brokering lasting peace and further entrench the state of apartheid imposed on millions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza. Biden was an early proponent of moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a move that finally took place in 2018 under the Trump administration. In 1995, Biden helped pass a Senate resolution demanding that the embassy be moved by May of that year. Despite objections that it would harm ongoing Israeli–Palestinian peace talks by deciding a key issue by fiat, Biden said the move would send a positive signal to the region. “To do less would play into the hands of those who would do their hardest to deny Israel the full attributes of statehood,” Biden said. In 2001, following rare public criticism from the Bush administration directed at Israel’s policy of assassinating suspected Palestinian militants, Biden defended Israel’s right to carry out such killings and even rebuked President George W. Bush for criticizing them. “My view has always been that disagreements between Israel and the United States, those differences should be aired privately, not publicly,” Biden said. He also defended the legality of targeted killings, which at the time were considered highly questionable by legal experts for occurring outside a declared conflict. “I don’t believe this is a policy of assassinations,” Biden said, referring to the targeting of suspected Hamas members. “There is in effect a declared war, a declaration by an organization that has said its goal is to do as much as it can to kill Israeli civilians.” In July 2006, Israel was bombing both Gaza and southern Lebanon, with Biden cheering it on. The Israelis, Biden said on MSNBC, “have in both cases, both in Gaza and in southern Lebanon, done the right thing.” In the face of international condemnations of Israel’s brutality in its attacks, Biden defended Israel. “I find it fascinating — people talk about, ‘Has Israel gone too far?’ No one talks about whether Israel’s justified in the first place,” he said on “Meet the Press.” Unless critics of Israel recognize that it was a victim of terrorism, he said, “I think it’s awful — I think it’s a secondary question whether Israel’s gone too far.” Biden said his “only criticism of the Israelis is they’re not that great at public relations.” He compared Israel’s attacks on Gaza and Lebanon to the U.S. invasion and occupation of Afghanistan after the September 11 attacks. “It’s a little bit like the same thing we had when we went into Afghanistan,” Biden said at a press conference in July 2006. “We went into Afghanistan, remember, we took out a wedding party by accident? Remember, we took out — with these very sophisticated missiles we had, we accidentally killed some citizens? Was ever a war more justified than us going into Afghanistan? I can’t think of any war since World War II more justified. Yet innocents got killed in us trying to protect America’s interests.” By August 2006, more than 1,000 people were killed in Israel’s war against Lebanon, and UNICEF estimated that 30 percent of the casualties were children. During his time as vice president, Biden often played the role of placating his friend Netanyahu who famously loathed President Barack Obama. During those eight years, Obama largely maintained long-standing U.S. posture of showering Israel with weapons and other aid despite repeated political spats with Netanyahu, most prominently over Iran and Israeli settlements. During numerous episodes when Israel unleashed gratuitous violence, drawing international condemnation, Biden served as Israel’s most prominent American defender. In the early summer of 2010, a group of mostly Turkish activists attempted to deliver a flotilla of humanitarian aid to the besieged Gaza Strip. The attempt was interdicted by the Israeli military, which launched a raid on one ship that resulted in the deaths of nine people, including one American citizen. The raid triggered an international outcry and led to a diplomatic crisis between Israel and Turkey, while drawing further attention to the civilian impact of the ongoing Israeli siege of Gaza. Biden took the lead in defending the raid to the U.S. public. In an interview with PBS, he described the raid as “legitimate” and argued that the flotilla organizers could have disembarked elsewhere before transferring the aid to Gaza. “So what’s the big deal here? What’s the big deal of insisting it go straight to Gaza?” Biden asked about the humanitarian mission. “Well, it’s legitimate for Israel to say, ‘I don’t know what’s on that ship. These guys are dropping eight — 3,000 rockets on my people.’” No weapons were ever found on the ship, only humanitarian supplies. Amid the fury that the raid generated and the muted response from Obama, Biden’s remarks were welcomed by AIPAC spokesperson Josh Block, who said at the time, “We appreciate the many strong statements of support for Israel from members of Congress and the vice president today.” After the 2014 Gaza war — a seven-week Israeli ground invasion that killed more than 2,000 Palestinians (two-thirds of them civilians) and caused widespread displacement and destruction of civilian infrastructure — Biden boasted of how the Obama administration had “steadfastly stood before the world and defended Israel’s right to defend itself,” declaring, “We have an obligation to match the steel and the spine of the people of Israel with an ironclad, nonnegotiable commitment to Israel’s physical security.” In May 2021, a few months into Biden’s presidency, Israel intensified its ethnic-cleansing campaign against Palestinians in East Jerusalem, forcibly evicting people from their homes to hand them over to Israeli settlers. The incendiary situation was then exacerbated during a Ramadan siege by Israeli forces at one of the holiest sites in Islam, Al Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem. In response, Hamas began launching rockets into Israel. Netanyahu retaliated by ordering a massive 11-day bombing campaign against Gaza, striking residential buildings, media outlets, hospitals, and a refugee camp. As the civilian death toll among Palestinians began to rise, Ned Price, the State Department spokesperson, characterized the operation as Israel exercising its right to self-defense. When he was then asked whether the principle of self-defense also applied to Palestinians, he struggled to answer before saying, “Broadly speaking, we believe in the concept of self-defense. We believe it applies to any state.” When Matt Lee of The Associated Press pointed out that Palestinians do not have a state, Price said, “I’m not in a position to debate the legalities from up here.” More than 250 Palestinians died during Israel’s siege, including dozens of children. More than 70,000 Palestinians were displaced. Throughout the bombing, the U.S. staunchly defended Israel’s disproportionate attacks, with Biden declaring on May 16, “there has not been a significant overreaction” from Israel before pivoting to condemn Hamas’s firing of rockets into civilian areas of Israel. GAZA CITY, GAZA - NOVEMBER 8: Palestinians who left their houses and live at the Nassr hospital, are trying to feed their children during food shortages as the Israeli attacks continue in Gaza City, Gaza on November 8, 2023. (Photo by Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images) Displaced Palestinians at Nassr hospital try to feed their children during food shortages on Nov. 8, 2023. Photo: Abed Zagout/Anadolu via Getty Images Evidence of Genocidal Intent Following Hamas’s horrifying attacks on October 7, Biden and his administration have defended Israel’s mass bombardment of Gaza, and U.S. weapons shipments have been accelerated. Biden called his proposal for additional military support an “unprecedented commitment to Israel’s security that will sharpen Israel’s qualitative military edge,” saying, “We’re going to make sure other hostile actors in the region know that Israel is stronger than ever.” This crisis has undoubtedly solidified Biden’s legacy as one of the premiere American defenders of Israel’s crimes, including disproportionate attacks against an overwhelmingly defenseless civilian population, in the history of U.S. politics. In an alternate reality — one where the rule of law is applied equally to all states — Israeli leaders would likely face war crimes charges for the razing of Gaza. Leading genocide scholars and international law experts have cited the statements of Israeli officials about the aims of their operations in Gaza as potential evidence of “genocidal intent.” A coalition of international lawyers representing Palestinian rights groups has already petitioned the International Criminal Court to open a criminal inquiry and issue arrest warrants for Netanyahu and other officials. Such attempts at accountability should not focus solely on Israeli leaders, according to some U.S. constitutional law organizations. The U.S. is Israel’s premiere bankroller and arms dealer, not to mention its political defender. There are several U.S. laws and treaties that prohibit support for, and failure to prevent, genocidal activities. Among these is the Genocide Convention Implementation Act, signed into law in 1988. Its sponsor? A senator named Joe Biden. Related Palestinians Sue Biden for Failing to Prevent Genocide in Gaza On Monday, the Center for Constitutional Rights filed a federal lawsuit on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza seeking to block the Biden administration from providing further military aid to Israel. The suit names Biden, Blinken, and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin. “They have continued to provide both military and political support for Israel’s unfolding genocidal campaign while imposing no red lines,” said Katherine Gallagher, one of the lawyers who filed the case. “The United States has a clear and binding obligation to prevent, not further, genocide. They have failed in meeting their legal and moral duty to use their considerable power to end this horror. They must do so.” It is unfathomable, given the current world order, that any meaningful legal accountability will be served on U.S. or Israeli leaders. But on a moral level, it is important to remember these legal efforts to confront the slaughter and the complicity of Biden and other Western leaders. The U.S.-enabled horrors of the past five weeks should remain a bloody, permanent stain on the fabric of Biden’s political career and legacy. Among the U.S. political elite, it will simply be noted as Biden doing his job. https://theintercept.com/2023/11/14/gaza-israel-genocide-biden-legacy/
    THEINTERCEPT.COM
    Biden’s Legacy Should Be Forever Haunted by the Names of Gaza’s Dead Children
    Biden’s support for the terror bombing of Gaza continues his long history as a steadfast supporter of Israel’s greatest crimes.
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  • In a world where the pursuit of financial prosperity is a common aspiration, numerous self-help programs promise to unlock the secrets of wealth manifestation. One such program that has gained considerable attention is the Genie Script. In this review, we will delve into the key aspects of the Genie Script Wealth Manifestation program, exploring its principles, effectiveness, and whether it lives up to the hype.

    The Genie Script Philosophy:

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    Components of the Genie Script:

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    Visualization plays a crucial role in the Genie Script program. Users engage in regular exercises where they mentally picture themselves achieving their financial goals. This visualization technique is intended to create a strong connection between the individual and their aspirations, fostering a sense of belief and inevitability.

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    Affirmations are another cornerstone of the Genie Script methodology. Participants are encouraged to recite positive affirmations daily, reinforcing the idea that wealth and abundance are not only attainable but are already on their way. The program provides a structured approach to incorporating these affirmations into daily routines.

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    It's crucial to note that the Genie Script is not a guaranteed path to instant wealth. Like any self-help program, its effectiveness depends on the user's commitment, belief in the process, and consistent application of the prescribed techniques.

    Call to Action:

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    https://sites.google.com/view/newgeniescript/home
    In a world where the pursuit of financial prosperity is a common aspiration, numerous self-help programs promise to unlock the secrets of wealth manifestation. One such program that has gained considerable attention is the Genie Script. In this review, we will delve into the key aspects of the Genie Script Wealth Manifestation program, exploring its principles, effectiveness, and whether it lives up to the hype. The Genie Script Philosophy: At its core, the Genie Script is grounded in the belief that individuals can reshape their financial destinies through the power of manifestation. The program emphasizes the importance of aligning thoughts, emotions, and actions with the goal of attracting abundance into one's life. Drawing inspiration from the law of attraction, the Genie Script asserts that a positive mindset and focused intention can significantly impact one's financial reality. Components of the Genie Script: Scripting Techniques: Central to the Genie Script is the practice of scripting, where participants are encouraged to write detailed, affirmative statements about their financial goals. This process is designed to reinforce positive beliefs, foster clarity, and enhance the manifestation process. Users are guided in crafting scripts that vividly depict their desired financial outcomes. Visualization Exercises: Visualization plays a crucial role in the Genie Script program. Users engage in regular exercises where they mentally picture themselves achieving their financial goals. This visualization technique is intended to create a strong connection between the individual and their aspirations, fostering a sense of belief and inevitability. Affirmation Integration: Affirmations are another cornerstone of the Genie Script methodology. Participants are encouraged to recite positive affirmations daily, reinforcing the idea that wealth and abundance are not only attainable but are already on their way. The program provides a structured approach to incorporating these affirmations into daily routines. Effectiveness and User Experiences: While success stories abound, the effectiveness of the Genie Script program can vary from person to person. Some individuals report significant improvements in their financial situations, citing a newfound sense of clarity, increased motivation, and, in some cases, tangible financial gains. Others, however, may not experience the same level of success, highlighting the subjective nature of such programs. It's crucial to note that the Genie Script is not a guaranteed path to instant wealth. Like any self-help program, its effectiveness depends on the user's commitment, belief in the process, and consistent application of the prescribed techniques. Call to Action: If you are intrigued by the prospect of transforming your financial reality and are open to exploring the principles of manifestation, the Genie Script may be worth considering. However, it's essential to approach it with realistic expectations, understanding that results may vary. Before embarking on the Genie Script journey, take the time to research and reflect on whether its principles align with your beliefs and goals. Additionally, consider seeking reviews and testimonials from individuals who have already undergone the program to gain insights into their experiences. https://sites.google.com/view/newgeniescript/home
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  • In a world where the pursuit of financial prosperity is a common aspiration, numerous self-help programs promise to unlock the secrets of wealth manifestation. One such program that has gained considerable attention is the Genie Script. In this review, we will delve into the key aspects of the Genie Script Wealth Manifestation program, exploring its principles, effectiveness, and whether it lives up to the hype.

    The Genie Script Philosophy:

    At its core, the Genie Script is grounded in the belief that individuals can reshape their financial destinies through the power of manifestation. The program emphasizes the importance of aligning thoughts, emotions, and actions with the goal of attracting abundance into one's life. Drawing inspiration from the law of attraction, the Genie Script asserts that a positive mindset and focused intention can significantly impact one's financial reality.

    Components of the Genie Script:

    Scripting Techniques:
    Central to the Genie Script is the practice of scripting, where participants are encouraged to write detailed, affirmative statements about their financial goals. This process is designed to reinforce positive beliefs, foster clarity, and enhance the manifestation process. Users are guided in crafting scripts that vividly depict their desired financial outcomes.

    Visualization Exercises:
    Visualization plays a crucial role in the Genie Script program. Users engage in regular exercises where they mentally picture themselves achieving their financial goals. This visualization technique is intended to create a strong connection between the individual and their aspirations, fostering a sense of belief and inevitability.

    Affirmation Integration:
    Affirmations are another cornerstone of the Genie Script methodology. Participants are encouraged to recite positive affirmations daily, reinforcing the idea that wealth and abundance are not only attainable but are already on their way. The program provides a structured approach to incorporating these affirmations into daily routines.

    Effectiveness and User Experiences:

    While success stories abound, the effectiveness of the Genie Script program can vary from person to person. Some individuals report significant improvements in their financial situations, citing a newfound sense of clarity, increased motivation, and, in some cases, tangible financial gains. Others, however, may not experience the same level of success, highlighting the subjective nature of such programs.

    It's crucial to note that the Genie Script is not a guaranteed path to instant wealth. Like any self-help program, its effectiveness depends on the user's commitment, belief in the process, and consistent application of the prescribed techniques.

    Call to Action:

    If you are intrigued by the prospect of transforming your financial reality and are open to exploring the principles of manifestation, the Genie Script may be worth considering. However, it's essential to approach it with realistic expectations, understanding that results may vary.

    Before embarking on the Genie Script journey, take the time to research and reflect on whether its principles align with your beliefs and goals. Additionally, consider seeking reviews and testimonials from individuals who have already undergone the program to gain insights into their experiences.

    https://sites.google.com/view/newgeniescript/home
    In a world where the pursuit of financial prosperity is a common aspiration, numerous self-help programs promise to unlock the secrets of wealth manifestation. One such program that has gained considerable attention is the Genie Script. In this review, we will delve into the key aspects of the Genie Script Wealth Manifestation program, exploring its principles, effectiveness, and whether it lives up to the hype. The Genie Script Philosophy: At its core, the Genie Script is grounded in the belief that individuals can reshape their financial destinies through the power of manifestation. The program emphasizes the importance of aligning thoughts, emotions, and actions with the goal of attracting abundance into one's life. Drawing inspiration from the law of attraction, the Genie Script asserts that a positive mindset and focused intention can significantly impact one's financial reality. Components of the Genie Script: Scripting Techniques: Central to the Genie Script is the practice of scripting, where participants are encouraged to write detailed, affirmative statements about their financial goals. This process is designed to reinforce positive beliefs, foster clarity, and enhance the manifestation process. Users are guided in crafting scripts that vividly depict their desired financial outcomes. Visualization Exercises: Visualization plays a crucial role in the Genie Script program. Users engage in regular exercises where they mentally picture themselves achieving their financial goals. This visualization technique is intended to create a strong connection between the individual and their aspirations, fostering a sense of belief and inevitability. Affirmation Integration: Affirmations are another cornerstone of the Genie Script methodology. Participants are encouraged to recite positive affirmations daily, reinforcing the idea that wealth and abundance are not only attainable but are already on their way. The program provides a structured approach to incorporating these affirmations into daily routines. Effectiveness and User Experiences: While success stories abound, the effectiveness of the Genie Script program can vary from person to person. Some individuals report significant improvements in their financial situations, citing a newfound sense of clarity, increased motivation, and, in some cases, tangible financial gains. Others, however, may not experience the same level of success, highlighting the subjective nature of such programs. It's crucial to note that the Genie Script is not a guaranteed path to instant wealth. Like any self-help program, its effectiveness depends on the user's commitment, belief in the process, and consistent application of the prescribed techniques. Call to Action: If you are intrigued by the prospect of transforming your financial reality and are open to exploring the principles of manifestation, the Genie Script may be worth considering. However, it's essential to approach it with realistic expectations, understanding that results may vary. Before embarking on the Genie Script journey, take the time to research and reflect on whether its principles align with your beliefs and goals. Additionally, consider seeking reviews and testimonials from individuals who have already undergone the program to gain insights into their experiences. https://sites.google.com/view/newgeniescript/home
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  • A Planned US-Israeli Attack on Iran is Contemplated
    The U.S. led War on the People of Palestine and the Middle East is a Criminal Undertaking


    Introduction

    We stand in Solidarity with Palestine. But we must recognize that the United States Military and Intelligence apparatus is firmly behind Israel’s genocide directed against the People of Palestine.

    .

    And this must be part of the solidarity campaign, namely to Reveal the Truth regarding Washington’s insidious role, which is part of a carefully planned military agenda directed against Palestine and the broader Middle East. Netanyahu is a proxy, with a criminal record. He has the unbending support of Western Europe’s “Classe politique”.

    .

    The U.S. led War on the People of Palestine and the Middle East is a Criminal Undertaking

    Israel and the Zionist lobby in the U.S. are NOT exerting undue influence AGAINST U.S. Foreign Policy as outlined by numerous analysts.

    Quite the opposite. The Zionist lobby is firmly aligned with U.S. foreign policy, and Vice Versa. It targets those who are opposed to war, who call for a cease fire. It exerts influence in favour of the conduct of the U.S. military agenda in support of Israel.



    The US military-intelligence establishment in coordination with powerful financial interests is calling the shots in regards to Israel’s genocidal intent to “Wipe Palestine off the Map”.

    .

    America’s Military Doctrine: Deliberately Targeting and Killing Civilians

    The targeting of civilians and the killing of children in Gaza is modelled on numerous US sponsored massacres of civilians (1945-2023) including the 2004 attack on Fallujah. (More than 30 Million mainly civilian deaths in US-led wars in what is euphemistically called the “post War Era”).
    .

    Veteran War correspondent Felicity Arbuthnot reflected on the indescribable barbarity of the 2004 Fallujah massacre, which resulted in countless deaths and destruction. It was a genocide conducted by the U.S military:
    .

    “The Americans invaded, chillingly: “house to house, room to room”, raining death and destruction on the proud, ancient “City of Mosques.”

    Marines killed so many civilians that the municipal soccer stadium had to be turned into a graveyard …

    One correspondent wrote: “There has been nothing like the attack on Fallujah since the Nazi invasion and occupation of much of the European continent – the shelling and bombing of Warsaw in September 1939, the terror bombing of Rotterdam in May 1940.”



    Fallujah, 2004

    .

    The U.S. is supportive of the Israeli genocide directed against the people of Palestine. Prime Minister Netanyahu is a criminal. He is Washington’s proxy, unreservedly endorsed and supported by the Biden Administration as well as the U.S. Congress.

    .

    Zionism constitutes the ideological underpinnings of contemporary U.S. imperialism and its unending war against the people of the Middle East.

    .

    The Zionist “Greater Israel” dogma –as in all wars of religion since the dawn of mankind– is there to mislead people Worldwide as to “who is really pulling the strings”.

    .

    Zionism has become a useful instrument which is embodied in U.S. military doctrine. The “Promised Land” broadly coincides with America’s hegemonic agenda in the Middle East, namely what the U.S. military has designated as the “New Middle East”.

    .

    Cui Bono: “To Whom Does it Benefit”

    There are strategic, geopolitical and economic objectives behind Israel’s genocide directed against the people of Palestine. “Crimes are often committed to benefit their perpetrators”: Israel’s War against the People of Palestine serves the interests of Big Money, the Military Industrial Complex, Corrupt Politicians…

    The Genocide is implemented by Netanyahu on behalf of the United States.

    The US military and intelligence apparatus are behind Israel’s criminal bombing and invasion of Gaza. The unfolding Middle East War is largely directed against Iran.

    .

    .

    Iran and the Nuclear Issue

    Historical Antecedents. Using Israel As a Means to Attacking Iran

    In 2003, the war on Iran project (Operation Theatre Iran Near Term, TIRANNT)) was already Déjà Vu. It had been on the drawing board of the Pentagon for more than 15 years.

    Let us recall that at the outset of Bush’s Second Term, Vice President Dick Cheney dropped a bombshell, hinting, in no uncertain terms, that Iran was “right at the top of the list” of the rogue enemies of America. And that Israel would, so to speak,

    “be doing the bombing for us” [paraphrase] , without US military involvement and without us putting pressure on them “to do it”. For further details see my article below was first published by Global Research in May 2005, as well as PBS Interview with Z. Brzezinski

    This Dick Cheney-style option is currently (November 2023) once more on the drawing board of the Pentagon, namely the possibility that Israel which is already bombing Lebanon and Syria, would be incited to wage an attack on Iran (acting on behalf of the United States).

    US Congress Resolution (H. RES. 559) Accuses Iran of Possessing Nuclear Weapons

    Careful timing: In June 2023, the US House of Representatives adopted Resolution (H. RES. 559) which provides a “Green Light” to wage war on Iran.

    The US House passed a resolution that allows the use of force against Iran, intimating without a shred of evidence that Iran has Nuclear Weapons:

    Resolved, That the House of Representatives declares it is the policy of the United States—

    (1) that a nuclear Islamic Republic of Iran is not acceptable;

    (2) that Iran must not be able to obtain a nuclear weapon under any circumstances or conditions;

    (3) to use all means necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon; and

    (4) to recognize and support the freedom of action of partners and allies, including Israel, to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

    Click below to access the complete text of H. RES 559



    Israel’s Undeclared Nuclear Weapons Arsenal

    Whereas Iran is tagged (without evidence) as a Nuclear Power by the U.S. House of Representatives, Washington fails to acknowledge that Israel is an undeclared nuclear power.

    In recent developments, Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu, “admitted to the world that Israel has nuclear weapons ready to be used against Palestinians”

    The Times of Israel reported that: “Amichai Eliyahu said Sunday [November 5, 2023] that one of Israel’s options in the war against Hamas was to drop a nuclear bomb on the Gaza Strip”

    Video on Israel’s Nuclear Weapons Facility

    English subtitles



    .

    .

    The War on Energy

    Unspoken Objective of a US-NATO-Israel War against Iran: Natural Gas

    Reserves of Natural Gas: Iran ranks Second after Russia. Russia, Iran and Qatar possess 54.1 percent of the World’s reserves of natural gas.

    -Russia 24.3%,

    -Iran 17.3%,

    -Qatar, 12.5 % (in partnership with Iran)

    versus

    -5.3 % for the US

    President Joe Biden ordered to “blow up” (September 2022) the Nordstream Pipeline, which constitutes a U.S. Act of War against the European Union.

    In the words of Joe Biden:

    “There will be no longer a Nord Stream 2”. Statement at White House Press Conference (February 7, 2022)

    America’s strategic objective was, despite its meagre reserves of natural gas:

    To Force the European Union to buy LNG “Made in America”.

    What this implies is that America’s military agenda against Russia and Iran constitutes a means to hike up EU energy prices, which is an act economic warfare against the People of Europe.






    The Iran-Qatar Natural Gas Partnership

    The maritime gas reserves of the Persian Gulf are under a (joint ownership) partnership between Qatar and Iran (See diagram below).





    The Biden Administration is Intent upon Destabilizing the Iran-Qatar Partnership

    This partnership is supportive of the People of Palestine.

    In March 2022, “President Joe Biden following a meeting with Qatar’s Emir Sheik Tamim “designated Qatar as a major non-NATO ally of the United States, fulfilling the promise that he had made to Qatar earlier this year [2022], the White House said” Reuters



    “The designation is granted by the United States to close, non-NATO allies that have strategic working relationships with the U.S. military.

    Biden promised Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, in January [2022] during a meeting at the White House that he would grant Qatar the special status.” Reuters See also followup Reuters article.

    What is at stake are cross-cutting coalitions. Qatar is a “Partner” of Iran in relation to the strategic reserves of maritime gas in the Persian Gulf. There is no formaI military cooperation between the two countries.

    Washington’s unspoken agenda is to break and/or destabilize Qatar’s Partnership with Iran, by integrating Qatar into the US-NATO military orbit.

    It is worth noting that a few days prior to the October 7, 2023 Hamas operation, the Emir of Qatar Sheik Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani “laid the foundation stone for the Northern Dome expansion project” in Iran’s Pars South Field (See map above).

    “the Emir of Qatar said the groundbreaking for the Northern Dome expansion project was laid today, which is in line with Qatar’s strategy to strengthen its position as a global LNG producer …

    This joint gas field, known as “South Pars” in Iran, is the largest natural gas field in the world and contains 50.97 trillion cubic meters of gas and about 7.9 billion cubic meters of natural gas condensate.

    At the time of writing, the implications of Qatar’s “Special Status” Military Alliance with the U.S. remain unclear.

    America’s Al-Udeid military base in Qatar (left) is the largest US base in the Middle East.

    Have the status and functions of Al Udeid changed since the signing of the March 2022 agreement designating Qatar as a “Major Non NATO Ally of the US”

    Qatar is both A Partner of Iran as well as a Major Non NATO Ally of the U.S. Reports confirm the development of a close relationship between the commanders of the US Air Force and the Qatari Emiri Air Force.

    Qatar is a “Powder Keg”?

    The U.S. foreign policy objective is to ultimately destroy and undermine that “friendship” with Iran which is highly valued and supported by Qatari citizens.

    The export of gas from South Pars North Dome transits through Iran, Turkey and Russia.

    Qatar, Russia and Iran (the 3 largest holders Worldwide of natural gas reserves) reached an agreement in 2009 to create a ‘Gas Troika’, a trilateral gas cooperation entity including the development of joint projects.

    A large number of countries including South Korea, India, Japan, China are importing LNG from Qatar.

    Last year (November 2022), “QatarEnergy signed a 27-year deal to supply China’s Sinopec with liquefied natural gas”. Qatar has also a strategic alliance with China.

    Washington’s objective under the disguise of America’s “Major Non-NATO Alliance” with Qatar is to:

    Break the Qatar-Iran Partnership
    Exclude Iran from the Joint Maritime Gas Field
    Exert US Control over the Maritime Gas Field in the Persian Gulf
    Weaken and Disable the “Gas Troika” (Russia, Iran, Qatar)
    Create Chaos in the Global Energy Market,
    Undermine the Trade in Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) to Numerous Countries
    .

    Iran. Third Largest Reserves of Oil Worldwide

    Iran is not only second in terms of its gas reserves after Russia, it ranks third Worldwide in relation to its oil reserves (12% of Worldwide oil reserves) versus a meagre 4% for the U.S.








    The Ben Gurion Canal Project

    .

    U.S. Seeks Dominance over Strategic International Waterways

    The Ben Gurion Canal Project was initially a “secret” (classified) U.S. project formulated in 1963 by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory LLNG, a strategic think tank (focussing on nuclear radiation) on contract with the U.S Department of Energy. The LLNG project was formulated in response to the nationalization of the Suez Canal in July 1956 by President Gamal Abdel Nasser (1956-1970). Its intent was to bypass the Suez Canal.

    The Ben Gurion Canal project is currently contemplated as means control the channels of international maritime trade to the detriment of the people of the Middle East. It also seeks to destabilize China’s maritime commodity trade.



    In the context of the broader US-led Middle East War, the Ben Gurion Canal Project is part of America’s hegemonic military agenda. It is consistent with Netanyahu’s “Plan to Wipe Palestine Off the Map”.

    According to Yvonne Ridley:

    “The only thing stopping the newly-revised [Ben Gurion Canal] project from being revived and rubber-stamped is the presence of the Palestinians in Gaza. As far as Netanyahu is concerned they are standing in the way of the project” (Yvonne Ridley, November 10, 2023, emphasis added)

    The U.S led war is intent upon confiscating all Palestinian territories, which would be appropriated by the State of Israel, acting as a strategic “Anglo-American Hub” in the Middle East:

    The Ben Gurion Canal will give Israel in particular and other friendly nations the freedom from blackmail arising out of access to the Suez Canal.

    Arab states have been leveraging the Red Sea to pressure Israel and in response, Israel has decided to gain more control of the Red Sea. These African countries have cultural and economic affinities with the Arab states. One of the main military benefits for Israel is that it gives Israel the strategic options as the Ben Gurion Canal will totally take away the importance of Suez for the US military if needed in the aid for Israel.

    Israel aims to push Egypt further into a corner by eliminating Suez in the global trade and energy corridor and becoming a global trade and energy logistics center.

    Experts are of the opinion that this situation will shake the strategic-energy balance of China’s Belt and Road Project initiative in the Mediterranean, along with the Strait of Hormuz, which is the transfer point of 30 percent of the world’s energy. The Ben Gurion Canal would have the solid backing of the West. (Eurasia Review, November 7, 2023, emphasis added)

    .

    “Greater Israel”.

    Strategic “Anglo-American Hub”

    The Promised Land of Greater Israel coincides with America’s Colonial Design in the Middle East

    The Greater Israel design is not strictly a Zionist Project for the Middle East, it is an integral part of US foreign policy, its strategic objective is to extend US hegemony as well as fracture and balkanize the Middle East.

    In this regard, Washington’s strategy consists in destabilizing and weakening regional economic powers in the Middle East including Turkey and Iran. This policy –which is consistent with the Greater Israel– is accompanied by a process of political fragmentation.



    Since the Gulf war (1991), the Pentagon has contemplated the creation of a “Free Kurdistan” which would include the annexation of parts of Iraq, Syria and Iran as well as Turkey



    “The New Middle East”: Unofficial US Military Academy Map by Lt. Col. Ralph Peters

    .

    “America’s Promised Land”. Global Warfare

    When viewed in the current context, including the siege on Gaza, the Zionist Plan for the Middle East coincides with America’s long war against the Middle East. As we mentioned earlier the Zionist agenda provides an ideological and religious justification of America’s long war against the Middle East.

    The 1979-80. the so-called Soviet Afghan War, engineered by the CIA
    The 1980-88 Iraq-Iran War engineered by the U.S.
    The 1991 Gulf War against Iraq,
    The 2001 The US-NATO Invasion of Afghanistan,
    The 2003 Invasion of Iraq
    The 2006 War on Lebanon,
    The Arab Spring,
    The 2011 war on Libya,
    The 2015 war on Yemen
    Obama’s 2014-2017 “Counter-Terrorism” Operation against Iraq and Syria
    The ongoing wars against Syria, Iraq and Yemen
    The “Greater Israel” project consists in weakening and eventually fracturing neighboring Arab states as part of a US-Israeli expansionist project, with the support of NATO.

    Needless to day, the ideological and religious underpinnings of the “Greater Israel” project are consistent with America’s imperial design.

    While the Zionist agenda is not the driving force, it serves the useful purpose of misleading public opinion concerning America’s long war against the people of the Middle East.

    The Historical Context: A Sequence of Military Plans and Scenarios to Wage War on Iran

    Since the launching of the Theater Iran Near Term (TIRANNT) war games scenario in May 2003 (leaked classified doc), an escalation scenario involving military action directed against Iran and Syria had been envisaged, of which Syria was the first stage.

    TIRANNT was followed by a series of military plans pertaining to Iran. Numerous post 9/11 official statements and US military documents had pointed to an expanded Middle East war, involving the active participation of Israel.

    Israel is America’s ally. Military operations are closely coordinated. Israel does not act without Washington’s approval.

    U.S.-Israeli Air Defense

    Barely acknowledged by the media, the US and Israel have an integrated air defense system, which was set up in early 2009, shortly after the Israel invasion of Gaza under “Operation Cast Led”.

    The X-band radar air defense system set up by the US in Israel in 2009 would

    “integrate Israel’s missile defenses with the U.S. global missile detection network, which includes satellites, Aegis ships on the Mediterranean, Persian Gulf and Red Sea, and land-based Patriot radars and interceptors.” (Sen. Joseph Azzolina, Protecting Israel from Iran’s missiles, Bayshore News, December 26, 2008). )

    What this means is that Washington calls the shots. Confirmed by the Pentagon, the US military controls Israel’s Air Defense:

    ”This is and will remain a U.S. radar system,’ Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said.

    ‘So this is not something we are giving or selling to the Israelis and it is something that will likely require U.S. personnel on-site to operate.’” (Quoted in Israel National News, January 9, 2009, emphasis added).

    At the outset of Obama’s Second Term, the US and Israel initiated discussions pertaining to a “US personnel on site” presence in Israel, namely the establishment of a “permanent” and “official” military base inside Israel.

    And on September 17, 2017, a US Air Defense base located in the Negev desert was inaugurated.

    According to the Israeli IDF spokesperson, the objective is to send a “message to the region, ” including Iran, Lebanon, Syria and Palestine.

    Of utmost relevance:

    Israel would not be able to act unilaterally against Iran, without a green light from the Pentagon which controls key components of Israel’s air defense system.

    In practice, a war on Iran, would be a joint US-NATO-Israeli endeavor, coordinated by US Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with America’s allies playing a key (subordinate) role.

    Michel Chossudovsky, October 31, 2017, November 11, 2023

    Planned US-Israeli Attack on Iran

    by

    Michel Chossudovsky

    May 2005

    At the outset of Bush’s second term, Vice President Dick Cheney dropped a bombshell. He hinted, in no uncertain terms, that Iran was “right at the top of the list” of the rogue enemies of America, and that Israel would, so to speak, “be doing the bombing for us”, without US military involvement and without us putting pressure on them “to do it”:

    “One of the concerns people have is that Israel might do it without being asked… Given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first, and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards,” (quoted from an MSNBC Interview Jan 2005)

    Israel is a Rottweiler on a leash: The US wants to “set Israel loose” to attack Iran. Commenting the Vice President’s assertion, former National Security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski in an interview on PBS, confirmed with some apprehension, yes: Cheney wants Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to act on America’s behalf and “do it” for us:

    “Iran I think is more ambiguous. And there the issue is certainly not tyranny; it’s nuclear weapons. And the vice president today in a kind of a strange parallel statement to this declaration of freedom hinted that the Israelis may do it and in fact used language which sounds like a justification or even an encouragement for the Israelis to do it.”

    The foregoing statements are misleading. The US is not “encouraging Israel”. What we are dealing with is a joint US-Israeli military operation to bomb Iran, which has been in the active planning stage for more than a year. The Neocons in the Defense Department, under Douglas Feith, have been working assiduously with their Israeli military and intelligence counterparts, carefully identifying targets inside Iran (see Seymour Hersh)

    Under this working arrangement, Israel will not act unilaterally, without a green light from Washington. In other words, Israel will not implement an attack without the participation of the US.

    Covert Intelligence Operations: Stirring Ethnic Tensions in Iran

    Meanwhile, for the last two years, Washington has been involved in covert intelligence operations inside Iran. American and British intelligence and special forces (working with their Israeli counterparts) are involved in this operation.

    “A British intelligence official said that any campaign against Iran would not be a ground war like the one in Iraq. The Americans will use different tactics, said the intelligence officer. ‘It is getting quite scary.'” (Evening Standard, 17 June 2003)

    The expectation is that a US-Israeli bombing raid of Iran’s nuclear facilities will stir up ethnic tensions and trigger “regime change” in favor of the US. (See Arab Monitor).

    Bush advisers believe that the “Iranian opposition movement” will unseat the Mullahs. This assessment constitutes a gross misjudgment of social forces inside Iran. What is more likely to occur is that Iranians will consistently rally behind a wartime government against foreign aggression. In fact, the entire Middle East and beyond would rise up against US interventionism.

    Retaliation in the Case of a US-Israeli Aerial Attack

    Tehran has confirmed that it will retaliate if attacked, in the form of ballistic missile strikes directed against Israel (CNN, 8 Feb 2005). These attacks, could also target US military facilities in the Persian Gulf, which would immediately lead us into a scenario of military escalation and all out war.

    In other words, the air strikes against Iran could contribute to unleashing a war in the broader Middle East Central Asian region.

    Moreover, the planned attack on Iran should also be understood in relation to the timely withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, which has opened up a new space, for the deployment of Israeli forces. The participation of Turkey in the US-Israeli military operation is also a factor, following an agreement reached between Ankara and Tel Aviv.

    In other words, US and Israeli military planners must carefully weigh the far-reaching implications of their actions.

    Israel Builds up its Stockpile of Deadly Military Hardware

    A massive buildup in military hardware has occurred in preparation for a possible attack on Iran.

    Israel has recently taken delivery from the US of some 5,000 “smart air launched weapons” including some 500 BLU 109 ‘bunker-buster bombs. The (uranium coated) munitions are said to be more than “adequate to address the full range of Iranian targets, with the possible exception of the buried facility at Natanz, which may require the [more powerful] BLU-113 bunker buster“:

    “Given Israel’s already substantial holdings of such weapons, this increase in its inventory would allow a sustained assault with or without further US involvement.” (See Richard Bennett)

    Gbu 28 Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28)

    The Israeli Air Force would attack Iran’s nuclear facility at Bushehr using US as well Israeli produced bunker buster bombs. The attack would be carried out in three separate waves “with the radar and communications jamming protection being provided by U.S. Air Force AWACS and other U.S. aircraft in the area”. (See W Madsen)

    Bear in mind that the bunker buster bombs can also be used to deliver tactical nuclear bombs. The B61-11 is the “nuclear version” of the “conventional” BLU 113. It can be delivered in much same way as the conventional bunker buster bomb. (See Michel Chossudovsky, see also this)

    According to the Pentagon, tactical nuclear weapons are “safe for civilians”. Their use has been authorized by the US Senate. (See Michel Chossudovsky)

    Moreover, reported in late 2003, Israeli Dolphin-class submarines equipped with US Harpoon missiles armed with nuclear warheads are now aimed at Iran. (See Gordon Thomas)

    Even if tactical nuclear weapons are not used by Israel, an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities not only raises the specter of a broader war, but also of nuclear radiation over a wide area:

    “To attack Iran’s nuclear facilities will not only provoke war, but it could also unleash clouds of radiation far beyond the targets and the borders of Iran.” (Statement of Prof Elias Tuma, Arab Internet Network, Federal News Service, 1 March 2005)

    Moreover, while most reports have centered on the issue of punitive air strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, the strikes would most probably extend to other targets.

    While a ground war is contemplated as a possible “scenario” at the level of military planning, the US military would not be able to wage a an effective ground war, given the situation in Iraq. In the words of former National Security Adviser Lawrence Eagelberger:

    “We are not going to get in a ground war in Iran, I hope. If we get into that, we are in serious trouble. I don’t think anyone in Washington is seriously considering that.” ( quoted in the National Journal, 4 December 2004).

    Iran’s Military Capabilities

    Despite its overall weaknesses in relation to Israel and the US, Iran has an advanced air defense system, deployed to protect its nuclear sites; “they are dispersed and underground making potential air strikes difficult and without any guarantees of success.” (Jerusalem Post, 20 April 2005).

    It has upgraded its Shahab-3 missile, which can reach targets in Israel. Iran’s armed forces have recently conducted high-profile military exercises in anticipation of a US led attack. Iran also possesses some 12 X-55 strategic cruise missiles, produced by Ukraine. Iran’s air defense systems is said to feature Russian SA-2, SA-5, SA-6 as well as shoulder-launched SA-7 missiles (Jaffa Center for Strategic Studies).

    The US “Military Road Map”

    The Bush administration has officially identified Iran and Syria as the next stage of “the road map to war”.

    Targeting Iran is a bipartisan project, which broadly serves the interests of the Anglo-American oil conglomerates, the Wall Street financial establishment and the military-industrial complex.

    The broader Middle East-Central Asian region encompasses more than 70% of the World’s reserves of oil and natural gas. Iran possesses 10% of the world’s oil and ranks third after Saudi Arabia (25 %) and Iraq (11 %) in the size of its reserves. In comparison, the US possesses less than 2.8 % of global oil reserves. (See Eric Waddell, The Battle for Oil)

    The announcement to target Iran should come as no surprise. It is part of the battle for oil. Already during the Clinton administration, US Central Command (USCENTCOM) had formulated “in war theater plans” to invade both Iraq and Iran:

    “The broad national security interests and objectives expressed in the President’s National Security Strategy (NSS) and the Chairman’s National Military Strategy (NMS) form the foundation of the United States Central Command’s theater strategy. The NSS directs implementation of a strategy of dual containment of the rogue states of Iraq and Iran as long as those states pose a threat to U.S. interests, to other states in the region, and to their own citizens. Dual containment is designed to maintain the balance of power in the region without depending on either Iraq or Iran. USCENTCOM’s theater strategy is interest-based and threat-focused. The purpose of U.S. engagement, as espoused in the NSS, is to protect the United States’ vital interest in the region – uninterrupted, secure U.S./Allied access to Gulf oil. (USCENTCOM, USPolicy , emphasis added)

    Main Military Actors

    While the US, Israel, as well as Turkey (with borders with both Iran and Syria) are the main actors in this process, a number of other countries, in the region, allies of the US, including several Central Asian former Soviet republics have been enlisted. Britain is closely involved despite its official denials at the diplomatic level. Turkey occupies a central role in the Iran operation. It has an extensive military cooperation agreement with Israel. There are indications that NATO is also formally involved in the context of an Israel-NATO agreement reached in November 2004.

    Planning The Aerial Attack on Iran

    According to former weapons inspector Scott Ritter, George W. Bush has already signed off on orders for an aerial attack on Iran, scheduled for June.(See this)

    The June cut-off date should be understood. It does not signify that the attack will occur in June. What it suggests is that the US and Israel are “in a state of readiness” and are prepared to launch an attack by June or at a later date. In other words, the decision to launch the attack has not been made.

    Ritter’s observation concerning an impending military operation should nonetheless be taken seriously. In recent months, there is ample evidence that a major military operation is in preparation:

    1) several high profile military exercises have been conducted in recent months, involving military deployment and the testing of weapons systems.

    2) military planning meetings have been held between the various parties involved. There has been a shuttle of military and government officials between Washington, Tel Aviv and Ankara.

    3) A significant change in the military command structure in Israel has occurred, with the appointment of a new Chief of Staff.

    4) Intense diplomatic exchanges have been carried out at the international level with a view to securing areas of military cooperation and/or support for a US-Israeli led military operation directed against Iran.

    5) Ongoing intelligence operations inside Iran have been stepped up.

    6) Consensus Building: Media propaganda on the need to intervene in Iran has been stepped up, with daily reports on how Iran constitutes a threat to peace and global security.

    Timeline of Key Initiatives

    In the last few months, various key initiatives have been taken, which are broadly indicative that an aerial bombing of Iran is in the military pipeline:

    November 2004 in Brussels: NATO-Israel protocol: Israel’s IDF delegation to the NATO conference to met with military brass of six members of the Mediterranean basin nations, including Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania. NATO seeks to revive the framework, known as the Mediterranean Dialogue program, which would include Israel. The Israeli delegation accepted to participate in military exercises and “anti-terror maneuvers” together with several Arab countries.

    January 2005: the US, Israel and Turkey held military exercises in the Eastern Mediterranean, off the coast of Syria. These exercises, which have been held in previous years were described as routine.

    February 2005. Following the decision reached in Brussels in November 2004, Israel was involved for the first time in military exercises with NATO, which also included several Arab countries.

    February 2005: Assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The assassination, which was blamed on Syria, serves Israeli and US interests and was used as a pretext to demand the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon.

    February 2005: Sharon fires his Chief-of-Staff, Moshe Ya’alon and appoints Air Force General Dan Halutz. This is the first time in Israeli history that an Air Force General is appointed Chief of Staff (See Uri Avnery)

    The appointment of Major General Dan Halutz as IDF Chief of Staff is considered in Israeli political circles as “the appointment of the right man at the right time.” The central issue is that a major aerial operation against Iran is in the planning stage, and Maj General Halutz is slated to coordinate the aerial bombing raids on Iran. Halutz’s appointment was specifically linked to Israel’s Iran agenda: “As chief of staff, he will in the best position to prepare the military for such a scenario.”

    March 2005: NATO’s Secretary General was in Jerusalem for follow-up talks with Ariel Sharon and Israel’s military brass, following the joint NATO-Israel military exercise in February. These military cooperation ties are viewed by the Israeli military as a means to “enhance Israel’s deterrence capability regarding potential enemies threatening it, mainly Iran and Syria.” The premise underlying NATO-Israel military cooperation is that Israel is under attack:

    “The more Israel’s image is strengthened as a country facing enemies who attempt to attack it for no justified reason, the greater will be the possibility that aid will be extended to Israel by NATO. Furthermore, Iran and Syria will have to take into account the possibility that the increasing cooperation between Israel and NATO will strengthen Israel’s links with Turkey, also a member of NATO. Given Turkey’s impressive military potential and its geographic proximity to both Iran and Syria, Israel’s operational options against them, if and when it sees the need, could gain considerable strength. ” (Jaffa Center for Strategic Studies, http://www.tau.ac.il/jcss/sa/v7n4p4Shalom.html )

    The Israel-NATO protocol is all the more important because it obligates NATO to align itself with the US-Israeli plan to bomb Iran, as an act of self defense on the part of Israel. It also means that NATO is also involved in the process of military consultations relating to the planned aerial bombing of Iran. It is of course related to the bilateral military cooperation agreement between Israel and Turkey and the likelihood that part of the military operation will be launched from Turkey, which is a member of NATO.

    Late March 2005: News leaks in Israel indicated an “initial authorization” by Prime Minster Ariel Sharon of an Israeli attack on Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment plant “if diplomacy failed to stop Iran’s nuclear program”. (The Hindu, 28 March 2005)

    March-April 2005: The Holding in Israel of Joint US-Israeli military exercises specifically pertaining to the launching of Patriot missiles.

    US Patriot missile crews stationed in Germany were sent to Israel to participate in the joint Juniper Cobra exercise with the Israeli military. The exercise was described as routine and “unconnected to events in the Middle East”: “As always, we are interested in implementing lessons learned from training exercises.” (UPI, 9 March 2005).

    April 2005: Donald Rumsfeld (right) was on an official visits to Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan and Azerbaijan. His diplomatic endeavors were described by the Russian media as “literally circling Iran in an attempt to find the best bridgehead for a possible military operation against that country.”

    In Baku, Azerbaijan Rumsfeld was busy discussing the date for deployment of US troops in Azerbaijan on Iran’s North-Western border. US military bases described as “mobile groups” in Azerbaijan are slated to play a role in a military operation directed against Iran.

    Azerbaijan is a member of GUUAM, a military cooperation agreement with the US and NATO, which allows for the stationing of US troops in several of the member countries, including Georgia, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan. The stated short term objective is to “neutralize Iran”. The longer term objective under the Pentagon’s “Caspian Plan” is to exert military and economic control over the entire Caspian sea basin, with a view to ensuring US authority over oil reserves and pipeline corridors.

    During his visit in April, Rumsfeld was pushing the US initiative of establishing “American special task forces and military bases to secure US influence in the Caspian region:

    “Called Caspian Watch, the project stipulates a network of special task forces and police units in the countries of the regions to be used in emergencies including threats to objects of the oil complex and pipelines. Project Caspian Watch will be financed by the United States ($100 million). It will become an advance guard of the US European Command whose zone of responsibility includes the Caspian region. Command center of the project with a powerful radar is to be located in Baku.” ( Defense and Security Russia, April 27, 2005)

    Rumsfeld’s visit followed shortly after that of Iranian President Mohammad Khatami’s to Baku.

    April 2005: Iran signs a military cooperation with Tajikistan, which occupies a strategic position bordering Afghanistan’s Northern frontier. Tajikistan is a member of “The Shanghai Five” military cooperation group, which also includes Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia. Iran also has economic cooperation agreements with Turkmenistan.

    Mid April 2005: Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon meets George W Bush at his Texas Ranch. Iran is on the agenda of bilateral talks. More significantly, the visit of Ariel Sharon was used to carry out high level talks between US and Israeli military planners pertaining to Iran.

    Late April 2005. President Vladmir Putin is in Israel on an official visit. He announces Russia’s decision to sell short-range anti-aircraft missiles to Syria and to continue supporting Iran’s nuclear industry. Beneath the gilded surface of international diplomacy, Putin’s timely visit to Israel must be interpreted as “a signal to Israel” regarding its planned aerial attack on Iran.

    Late April 2005: US pressure in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been exerted with a view to blocking the re-appointment of Mohammed Al Baradei, who according to US officials “is not being tough enough on Iran…” Following US pressures, the vote on the appointment of a new IAEA chief was put off until June. These developments suggest that Washington wants to put forth their own hand-picked nominee prior to launching US-Israeli aerial attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities. (See VOA). (In February 2003, Al Baradei along with UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix challenged the (phony) intelligence on WMD presented by the US to the UN Security Council, with a view to justifying the war on Iraq.)

    Late April 2005. Sale of deadly military hardware to Israel. GBU-28 Buster Bunker Bombs: Coinciding with Putin’s visit to Israel, the US Defence Security Cooperation Agency (Department of Defense) announced the sale of an additional 100 bunker-buster bombs produced by Lockheed Martin to Israel. This decision was viewed by the US media as “a warning to Iran about its nuclear ambitions.”

    The sale pertains to the larger and more sophisticated “Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28) BLU-113 Penetrator” (including the WGU-36A/B guidance control unit and support equipment). The GBU-28 is described as “a special weapon for penetrating hardened command centers located deep underground. The fact of the matter is that the GBU-28 is among the World’s most deadly “conventional” weapons used in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, capable of causing thousands of civilian deaths through massive explosions.

    The Israeli Air Force are slated to use the GBU-28s on their F-15 aircraft. (See text of DSCA news release)

    Late April 2005- early May: Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan (right) in Israel for follow-up talks with Ariel Sharon. He was accompanied by his Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul, who met with senior Israeli military officials. On the official agenda of these talks: joint defense projects, including the joint production of Arrow II Theater Missile Defense and Popeye II missiles. The latter also known as the Have Lite, are advanced small missiles, designed for deployment on fighter planes. Tel Aviv and Ankara decide to establish a hotline to share intelligence.

    May 2005: Syrian troops scheduled to withdraw from Lebanon, leading to a major shift in the Middle East security situation, in favor of Israel and the US.

    Iran Surrounded

    The US has troops and military bases in Turkey, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, and of course Iraq.

    In other words, Iran is virtually surrounded by US military bases. (see Map below). These countries as well as Turkmenistan, are members of NATO`s partnership for Peace Program and have military cooperation agreements with NATO.



    Copyright Eric Waddell, Global Research, 2003

    In other words, we are dealing with a potentially explosive scenario in which a number of countries, including several former Soviet republics, could be brought into a US led war with Iran. IranAtom.ru, a Russian based news and military analysis group has suggested, in this regard:

    “since Iranian nuclear objects are scattered all over the country, Israel will need a mass strike with different fly-in and fly-out approaches – Jordan, Iraq, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and other countries… Azerbaijan seriously fears Tehran’s reaction should Baku issue a permit to Israeli aircraft to overfly its territory.” (Defense and Security Russia, 12 April 2005).

    Concluding remarks

    The World is at an important crossroads.

    The Bush Administration has embarked upon a military adventure which threatens the future of humanity.

    Iran is the next military target. The planned military operation, which is by no means limited to punitive strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities, is part of a project of World domination, a military roadmap, launched at the end of the Cold War.

    Military action against Iran would directly involve Israel’s participation, which in turn is likely to trigger a broader war throughout the Middle East, not to mention an implosion in the Palestinian occupied territories. Turkey is closely associated with the proposed aerial attacks.

    Israel is a nuclear power with a sophisticated nuclear arsenal. (See text box below). The use of nuclear weapons by Israel or the US cannot be excluded, particularly in view of the fact that tactical nuclear weapons have now been reclassified as a variant of the conventional bunker buster bombs and are authorized by the US Senate for use in conventional war theaters. (“they are harmless to civilians because the explosion is underground”)

    In this regard, Israel and the US rather than Iran constitute a nuclear threat.

    The planned attack on Iran must be understood in relation to the existing active war theaters in the Middle East, namely Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine.

    The conflict could easily spread from the Middle East to the Caspian sea basin. It could also involve the participation of Azerbaijan and Georgia, where US troops are stationed.

    An attack on Iran would have a direct impact on the resistance movement inside Iraq. It would also put pressure on America’s overstretched military capabilities and resources in both the Iraqi and Afghan war theaters. (The 150,000 US troops in Iraq are already fully engaged and could not be redeployed in the case of a war with Iran.)

    In other words, the shaky geopolitics of the Central Asia- Middle East region, the three existing war theaters in which America is currently, involved, the direct participation of Israel and Turkey, the structure of US sponsored military alliances, etc. raises the specter of a broader conflict.

    Moreover, US military action on Iran not only threatens Russian and Chinese interests, which have geopolitical interests in the Caspian sea basin and which have bilateral agreements with Iran. It also backlashes on European oil interests in Iran and is likely to produce major divisions between Western allies, between the US and its European partners as well as within the European Union.

    Through its participation in NATO, Europe, despite its reluctance, would be brought into the Iran operation. The participation of NATO largely hinges on a military cooperation agreement reached between NATO and Israel. This agreement would bind NATO to defend Israel against Syria and Iran. NATO would therefore support a preemptive attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and could take on a more active role if Iran were to retaliate following US-Israeli air strikes.

    Needless to say, the war against Iran is part of a longer term US military agenda which seeks to militarize the entire Caspian sea basin, eventually leading to the destabilization and conquest of the Russian Federation.

    The Antiwar Movement

    The antiwar movement must act, consistently, to prevent the next phase of this war from happening.

    This is no easy matter. The holding of large antiwar rallies will not in itself reverse the tide of war.

    High ranking officials of the Bush administration, members of the military and the US Congress have been granted the authority to uphold an illegal war agenda.

    What is required is a grass roots network, a mass movement at national and international levels, which challenges the legitimacy of the military and political actors, and which is ultimately instrumental in unseating those who rule in our name.

    War criminals occupy positions of authority. The citizenry is galvanized into supporting the rulers, who are “committed to their safety and well-being”. Through media disinformation, war is given a humanitarian mandate.

    To reverse the tide of war, military bases must be closed down, the war machine (namely the production of advanced weapons systems) must be stopped and the burgeoning police state must be dismantled.

    The corporate backers and sponsors of war and war crimes must also be targeted including the oil companies, the defense contractors, the financial institutions and the corporate media, which has become an integral part of the war propaganda machine.

    Antiwar sentiment does not dismantle a war agenda. The war criminals in the US, Israel and Britain must be removed from high office.

    What is needed is to reveal the true face of the American Empire and the underlying criminalization of US foreign policy, which uses the “war on terrorism” and the threat of Al Qaeda to galvanize public opinion in support of a global war agenda.

    Israel’s Nuclear Capabilities

    With between 200 and 500 thermonuclear weapons and a sophisticated delivery system, Israel has quietly supplanted Britain as the World’s 5th Largest nuclear power, and may currently rival France and China in the size and sophistication of its nuclear arsenal. Although dwarfed by the nuclear arsenals of the U.S. and Russia, each possessing over 10,000 nuclear weapons, Israel nonetheless is a major nuclear power, and should be publicly recognized as such.

    Today, estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal range from a minimum of 200 to a maximum of about 500. Whatever the number, there is little doubt that Israeli nukes are among the world’s most sophisticated, largely designed for “war fighting” in the Middle East. A staple of the Israeli nuclear arsenal are “neutron bombs,” miniaturized thermonuclear bombs designed to maximize deadly gamma radiation while minimizing blast effects and long term radiation- in essence designed to kill people while leaving property intact.(16) Weapons include ballistic missiles and bombers capable of reaching Moscow…

    The bombs themselves range in size from “city busters” larger than the Hiroshima Bomb to tactical mini nukes. The Israeli arsenal of weapons of mass destruction clearly dwarfs the actual or potential arsenals of all other Middle Eastern states combined, and is vastly greater than any conceivable need for “deterrence.”

    Many Middle East Peace activists have been reluctant to discuss, let alone challenge, the Israeli monopoly on nuclear weapons in the region, often leading to incomplete and uninformed analyses and flawed action strategies. Placing the issue of Israeli weapons of mass destruction directly and honestly on the table and action agenda would have several salutary effects. First, it would expose a primary destabilizing dynamic driving the Middle East arms race and compelling the region’s states to each seek their own “deterrent.”

    Second, it would expose the grotesque double standard which sees the U.S. and Europe on the one hand condemning Iraq, Iran and Syria for developing weapons of mass destruction, while simultaneously protecting and enabling the principal culprit. Third, exposing Israel’s nuclear strategy would focus international public attention, resulting in increased pressure to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction and negotiate a just peace in good faith. Finally, a nuclear free Israel would make a Nuclear Free Middle East and a comprehensive regional peace agreement much more likely. Unless and until the world community confronts Israel over its covert nuclear program it is unlikely that there will be any meaningful resolution of the Israeli/Arab conflict, a fact that Israel may be counting on as the Sharon era dawns.

    From John Steinbach, Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal, Global Research



    https://www.globalresearch.ca/planned-us-israeli-attack-on-iran-2/5615443
    A Planned US-Israeli Attack on Iran is Contemplated The U.S. led War on the People of Palestine and the Middle East is a Criminal Undertaking Introduction We stand in Solidarity with Palestine. But we must recognize that the United States Military and Intelligence apparatus is firmly behind Israel’s genocide directed against the People of Palestine. . And this must be part of the solidarity campaign, namely to Reveal the Truth regarding Washington’s insidious role, which is part of a carefully planned military agenda directed against Palestine and the broader Middle East. Netanyahu is a proxy, with a criminal record. He has the unbending support of Western Europe’s “Classe politique”. . The U.S. led War on the People of Palestine and the Middle East is a Criminal Undertaking Israel and the Zionist lobby in the U.S. are NOT exerting undue influence AGAINST U.S. Foreign Policy as outlined by numerous analysts. Quite the opposite. The Zionist lobby is firmly aligned with U.S. foreign policy, and Vice Versa. It targets those who are opposed to war, who call for a cease fire. It exerts influence in favour of the conduct of the U.S. military agenda in support of Israel. The US military-intelligence establishment in coordination with powerful financial interests is calling the shots in regards to Israel’s genocidal intent to “Wipe Palestine off the Map”. . America’s Military Doctrine: Deliberately Targeting and Killing Civilians The targeting of civilians and the killing of children in Gaza is modelled on numerous US sponsored massacres of civilians (1945-2023) including the 2004 attack on Fallujah. (More than 30 Million mainly civilian deaths in US-led wars in what is euphemistically called the “post War Era”). . Veteran War correspondent Felicity Arbuthnot reflected on the indescribable barbarity of the 2004 Fallujah massacre, which resulted in countless deaths and destruction. It was a genocide conducted by the U.S military: . “The Americans invaded, chillingly: “house to house, room to room”, raining death and destruction on the proud, ancient “City of Mosques.” Marines killed so many civilians that the municipal soccer stadium had to be turned into a graveyard … One correspondent wrote: “There has been nothing like the attack on Fallujah since the Nazi invasion and occupation of much of the European continent – the shelling and bombing of Warsaw in September 1939, the terror bombing of Rotterdam in May 1940.” Fallujah, 2004 . The U.S. is supportive of the Israeli genocide directed against the people of Palestine. Prime Minister Netanyahu is a criminal. He is Washington’s proxy, unreservedly endorsed and supported by the Biden Administration as well as the U.S. Congress. . Zionism constitutes the ideological underpinnings of contemporary U.S. imperialism and its unending war against the people of the Middle East. . The Zionist “Greater Israel” dogma –as in all wars of religion since the dawn of mankind– is there to mislead people Worldwide as to “who is really pulling the strings”. . Zionism has become a useful instrument which is embodied in U.S. military doctrine. The “Promised Land” broadly coincides with America’s hegemonic agenda in the Middle East, namely what the U.S. military has designated as the “New Middle East”. . Cui Bono: “To Whom Does it Benefit” There are strategic, geopolitical and economic objectives behind Israel’s genocide directed against the people of Palestine. “Crimes are often committed to benefit their perpetrators”: Israel’s War against the People of Palestine serves the interests of Big Money, the Military Industrial Complex, Corrupt Politicians… The Genocide is implemented by Netanyahu on behalf of the United States. The US military and intelligence apparatus are behind Israel’s criminal bombing and invasion of Gaza. The unfolding Middle East War is largely directed against Iran. . . Iran and the Nuclear Issue Historical Antecedents. Using Israel As a Means to Attacking Iran In 2003, the war on Iran project (Operation Theatre Iran Near Term, TIRANNT)) was already Déjà Vu. It had been on the drawing board of the Pentagon for more than 15 years. Let us recall that at the outset of Bush’s Second Term, Vice President Dick Cheney dropped a bombshell, hinting, in no uncertain terms, that Iran was “right at the top of the list” of the rogue enemies of America. And that Israel would, so to speak, “be doing the bombing for us” [paraphrase] , without US military involvement and without us putting pressure on them “to do it”. For further details see my article below was first published by Global Research in May 2005, as well as PBS Interview with Z. Brzezinski This Dick Cheney-style option is currently (November 2023) once more on the drawing board of the Pentagon, namely the possibility that Israel which is already bombing Lebanon and Syria, would be incited to wage an attack on Iran (acting on behalf of the United States). US Congress Resolution (H. RES. 559) Accuses Iran of Possessing Nuclear Weapons Careful timing: In June 2023, the US House of Representatives adopted Resolution (H. RES. 559) which provides a “Green Light” to wage war on Iran. The US House passed a resolution that allows the use of force against Iran, intimating without a shred of evidence that Iran has Nuclear Weapons: Resolved, That the House of Representatives declares it is the policy of the United States— (1) that a nuclear Islamic Republic of Iran is not acceptable; (2) that Iran must not be able to obtain a nuclear weapon under any circumstances or conditions; (3) to use all means necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon; and (4) to recognize and support the freedom of action of partners and allies, including Israel, to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. Click below to access the complete text of H. RES 559 Israel’s Undeclared Nuclear Weapons Arsenal Whereas Iran is tagged (without evidence) as a Nuclear Power by the U.S. House of Representatives, Washington fails to acknowledge that Israel is an undeclared nuclear power. In recent developments, Israeli Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu, “admitted to the world that Israel has nuclear weapons ready to be used against Palestinians” The Times of Israel reported that: “Amichai Eliyahu said Sunday [November 5, 2023] that one of Israel’s options in the war against Hamas was to drop a nuclear bomb on the Gaza Strip” Video on Israel’s Nuclear Weapons Facility English subtitles . . The War on Energy Unspoken Objective of a US-NATO-Israel War against Iran: Natural Gas Reserves of Natural Gas: Iran ranks Second after Russia. Russia, Iran and Qatar possess 54.1 percent of the World’s reserves of natural gas. -Russia 24.3%, -Iran 17.3%, -Qatar, 12.5 % (in partnership with Iran) versus -5.3 % for the US President Joe Biden ordered to “blow up” (September 2022) the Nordstream Pipeline, which constitutes a U.S. Act of War against the European Union. In the words of Joe Biden: “There will be no longer a Nord Stream 2”. Statement at White House Press Conference (February 7, 2022) America’s strategic objective was, despite its meagre reserves of natural gas: To Force the European Union to buy LNG “Made in America”. What this implies is that America’s military agenda against Russia and Iran constitutes a means to hike up EU energy prices, which is an act economic warfare against the People of Europe. The Iran-Qatar Natural Gas Partnership The maritime gas reserves of the Persian Gulf are under a (joint ownership) partnership between Qatar and Iran (See diagram below). The Biden Administration is Intent upon Destabilizing the Iran-Qatar Partnership This partnership is supportive of the People of Palestine. In March 2022, “President Joe Biden following a meeting with Qatar’s Emir Sheik Tamim “designated Qatar as a major non-NATO ally of the United States, fulfilling the promise that he had made to Qatar earlier this year [2022], the White House said” Reuters “The designation is granted by the United States to close, non-NATO allies that have strategic working relationships with the U.S. military. Biden promised Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani, in January [2022] during a meeting at the White House that he would grant Qatar the special status.” Reuters See also followup Reuters article. What is at stake are cross-cutting coalitions. Qatar is a “Partner” of Iran in relation to the strategic reserves of maritime gas in the Persian Gulf. There is no formaI military cooperation between the two countries. Washington’s unspoken agenda is to break and/or destabilize Qatar’s Partnership with Iran, by integrating Qatar into the US-NATO military orbit. It is worth noting that a few days prior to the October 7, 2023 Hamas operation, the Emir of Qatar Sheik Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani “laid the foundation stone for the Northern Dome expansion project” in Iran’s Pars South Field (See map above). “the Emir of Qatar said the groundbreaking for the Northern Dome expansion project was laid today, which is in line with Qatar’s strategy to strengthen its position as a global LNG producer … This joint gas field, known as “South Pars” in Iran, is the largest natural gas field in the world and contains 50.97 trillion cubic meters of gas and about 7.9 billion cubic meters of natural gas condensate. At the time of writing, the implications of Qatar’s “Special Status” Military Alliance with the U.S. remain unclear. America’s Al-Udeid military base in Qatar (left) is the largest US base in the Middle East. Have the status and functions of Al Udeid changed since the signing of the March 2022 agreement designating Qatar as a “Major Non NATO Ally of the US” Qatar is both A Partner of Iran as well as a Major Non NATO Ally of the U.S. Reports confirm the development of a close relationship between the commanders of the US Air Force and the Qatari Emiri Air Force. Qatar is a “Powder Keg”? The U.S. foreign policy objective is to ultimately destroy and undermine that “friendship” with Iran which is highly valued and supported by Qatari citizens. The export of gas from South Pars North Dome transits through Iran, Turkey and Russia. Qatar, Russia and Iran (the 3 largest holders Worldwide of natural gas reserves) reached an agreement in 2009 to create a ‘Gas Troika’, a trilateral gas cooperation entity including the development of joint projects. A large number of countries including South Korea, India, Japan, China are importing LNG from Qatar. Last year (November 2022), “QatarEnergy signed a 27-year deal to supply China’s Sinopec with liquefied natural gas”. Qatar has also a strategic alliance with China. Washington’s objective under the disguise of America’s “Major Non-NATO Alliance” with Qatar is to: Break the Qatar-Iran Partnership Exclude Iran from the Joint Maritime Gas Field Exert US Control over the Maritime Gas Field in the Persian Gulf Weaken and Disable the “Gas Troika” (Russia, Iran, Qatar) Create Chaos in the Global Energy Market, Undermine the Trade in Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) to Numerous Countries . Iran. Third Largest Reserves of Oil Worldwide Iran is not only second in terms of its gas reserves after Russia, it ranks third Worldwide in relation to its oil reserves (12% of Worldwide oil reserves) versus a meagre 4% for the U.S. The Ben Gurion Canal Project . U.S. Seeks Dominance over Strategic International Waterways The Ben Gurion Canal Project was initially a “secret” (classified) U.S. project formulated in 1963 by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory LLNG, a strategic think tank (focussing on nuclear radiation) on contract with the U.S Department of Energy. The LLNG project was formulated in response to the nationalization of the Suez Canal in July 1956 by President Gamal Abdel Nasser (1956-1970). Its intent was to bypass the Suez Canal. The Ben Gurion Canal project is currently contemplated as means control the channels of international maritime trade to the detriment of the people of the Middle East. It also seeks to destabilize China’s maritime commodity trade. In the context of the broader US-led Middle East War, the Ben Gurion Canal Project is part of America’s hegemonic military agenda. It is consistent with Netanyahu’s “Plan to Wipe Palestine Off the Map”. According to Yvonne Ridley: “The only thing stopping the newly-revised [Ben Gurion Canal] project from being revived and rubber-stamped is the presence of the Palestinians in Gaza. As far as Netanyahu is concerned they are standing in the way of the project” (Yvonne Ridley, November 10, 2023, emphasis added) The U.S led war is intent upon confiscating all Palestinian territories, which would be appropriated by the State of Israel, acting as a strategic “Anglo-American Hub” in the Middle East: The Ben Gurion Canal will give Israel in particular and other friendly nations the freedom from blackmail arising out of access to the Suez Canal. Arab states have been leveraging the Red Sea to pressure Israel and in response, Israel has decided to gain more control of the Red Sea. These African countries have cultural and economic affinities with the Arab states. One of the main military benefits for Israel is that it gives Israel the strategic options as the Ben Gurion Canal will totally take away the importance of Suez for the US military if needed in the aid for Israel. Israel aims to push Egypt further into a corner by eliminating Suez in the global trade and energy corridor and becoming a global trade and energy logistics center. Experts are of the opinion that this situation will shake the strategic-energy balance of China’s Belt and Road Project initiative in the Mediterranean, along with the Strait of Hormuz, which is the transfer point of 30 percent of the world’s energy. The Ben Gurion Canal would have the solid backing of the West. (Eurasia Review, November 7, 2023, emphasis added) . “Greater Israel”. Strategic “Anglo-American Hub” The Promised Land of Greater Israel coincides with America’s Colonial Design in the Middle East The Greater Israel design is not strictly a Zionist Project for the Middle East, it is an integral part of US foreign policy, its strategic objective is to extend US hegemony as well as fracture and balkanize the Middle East. In this regard, Washington’s strategy consists in destabilizing and weakening regional economic powers in the Middle East including Turkey and Iran. This policy –which is consistent with the Greater Israel– is accompanied by a process of political fragmentation. Since the Gulf war (1991), the Pentagon has contemplated the creation of a “Free Kurdistan” which would include the annexation of parts of Iraq, Syria and Iran as well as Turkey “The New Middle East”: Unofficial US Military Academy Map by Lt. Col. Ralph Peters . “America’s Promised Land”. Global Warfare When viewed in the current context, including the siege on Gaza, the Zionist Plan for the Middle East coincides with America’s long war against the Middle East. As we mentioned earlier the Zionist agenda provides an ideological and religious justification of America’s long war against the Middle East. The 1979-80. the so-called Soviet Afghan War, engineered by the CIA The 1980-88 Iraq-Iran War engineered by the U.S. The 1991 Gulf War against Iraq, The 2001 The US-NATO Invasion of Afghanistan, The 2003 Invasion of Iraq The 2006 War on Lebanon, The Arab Spring, The 2011 war on Libya, The 2015 war on Yemen Obama’s 2014-2017 “Counter-Terrorism” Operation against Iraq and Syria The ongoing wars against Syria, Iraq and Yemen The “Greater Israel” project consists in weakening and eventually fracturing neighboring Arab states as part of a US-Israeli expansionist project, with the support of NATO. Needless to day, the ideological and religious underpinnings of the “Greater Israel” project are consistent with America’s imperial design. While the Zionist agenda is not the driving force, it serves the useful purpose of misleading public opinion concerning America’s long war against the people of the Middle East. The Historical Context: A Sequence of Military Plans and Scenarios to Wage War on Iran Since the launching of the Theater Iran Near Term (TIRANNT) war games scenario in May 2003 (leaked classified doc), an escalation scenario involving military action directed against Iran and Syria had been envisaged, of which Syria was the first stage. TIRANNT was followed by a series of military plans pertaining to Iran. Numerous post 9/11 official statements and US military documents had pointed to an expanded Middle East war, involving the active participation of Israel. Israel is America’s ally. Military operations are closely coordinated. Israel does not act without Washington’s approval. U.S.-Israeli Air Defense Barely acknowledged by the media, the US and Israel have an integrated air defense system, which was set up in early 2009, shortly after the Israel invasion of Gaza under “Operation Cast Led”. The X-band radar air defense system set up by the US in Israel in 2009 would “integrate Israel’s missile defenses with the U.S. global missile detection network, which includes satellites, Aegis ships on the Mediterranean, Persian Gulf and Red Sea, and land-based Patriot radars and interceptors.” (Sen. Joseph Azzolina, Protecting Israel from Iran’s missiles, Bayshore News, December 26, 2008). ) What this means is that Washington calls the shots. Confirmed by the Pentagon, the US military controls Israel’s Air Defense: ”This is and will remain a U.S. radar system,’ Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said. ‘So this is not something we are giving or selling to the Israelis and it is something that will likely require U.S. personnel on-site to operate.’” (Quoted in Israel National News, January 9, 2009, emphasis added). At the outset of Obama’s Second Term, the US and Israel initiated discussions pertaining to a “US personnel on site” presence in Israel, namely the establishment of a “permanent” and “official” military base inside Israel. And on September 17, 2017, a US Air Defense base located in the Negev desert was inaugurated. According to the Israeli IDF spokesperson, the objective is to send a “message to the region, ” including Iran, Lebanon, Syria and Palestine. Of utmost relevance: Israel would not be able to act unilaterally against Iran, without a green light from the Pentagon which controls key components of Israel’s air defense system. In practice, a war on Iran, would be a joint US-NATO-Israeli endeavor, coordinated by US Strategic Command (STRATCOM) with America’s allies playing a key (subordinate) role. Michel Chossudovsky, October 31, 2017, November 11, 2023 Planned US-Israeli Attack on Iran by Michel Chossudovsky May 2005 At the outset of Bush’s second term, Vice President Dick Cheney dropped a bombshell. He hinted, in no uncertain terms, that Iran was “right at the top of the list” of the rogue enemies of America, and that Israel would, so to speak, “be doing the bombing for us”, without US military involvement and without us putting pressure on them “to do it”: “One of the concerns people have is that Israel might do it without being asked… Given the fact that Iran has a stated policy that their objective is the destruction of Israel, the Israelis might well decide to act first, and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards,” (quoted from an MSNBC Interview Jan 2005) Israel is a Rottweiler on a leash: The US wants to “set Israel loose” to attack Iran. Commenting the Vice President’s assertion, former National Security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski in an interview on PBS, confirmed with some apprehension, yes: Cheney wants Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to act on America’s behalf and “do it” for us: “Iran I think is more ambiguous. And there the issue is certainly not tyranny; it’s nuclear weapons. And the vice president today in a kind of a strange parallel statement to this declaration of freedom hinted that the Israelis may do it and in fact used language which sounds like a justification or even an encouragement for the Israelis to do it.” The foregoing statements are misleading. The US is not “encouraging Israel”. What we are dealing with is a joint US-Israeli military operation to bomb Iran, which has been in the active planning stage for more than a year. The Neocons in the Defense Department, under Douglas Feith, have been working assiduously with their Israeli military and intelligence counterparts, carefully identifying targets inside Iran (see Seymour Hersh) Under this working arrangement, Israel will not act unilaterally, without a green light from Washington. In other words, Israel will not implement an attack without the participation of the US. Covert Intelligence Operations: Stirring Ethnic Tensions in Iran Meanwhile, for the last two years, Washington has been involved in covert intelligence operations inside Iran. American and British intelligence and special forces (working with their Israeli counterparts) are involved in this operation. “A British intelligence official said that any campaign against Iran would not be a ground war like the one in Iraq. The Americans will use different tactics, said the intelligence officer. ‘It is getting quite scary.'” (Evening Standard, 17 June 2003) The expectation is that a US-Israeli bombing raid of Iran’s nuclear facilities will stir up ethnic tensions and trigger “regime change” in favor of the US. (See Arab Monitor). Bush advisers believe that the “Iranian opposition movement” will unseat the Mullahs. This assessment constitutes a gross misjudgment of social forces inside Iran. What is more likely to occur is that Iranians will consistently rally behind a wartime government against foreign aggression. In fact, the entire Middle East and beyond would rise up against US interventionism. Retaliation in the Case of a US-Israeli Aerial Attack Tehran has confirmed that it will retaliate if attacked, in the form of ballistic missile strikes directed against Israel (CNN, 8 Feb 2005). These attacks, could also target US military facilities in the Persian Gulf, which would immediately lead us into a scenario of military escalation and all out war. In other words, the air strikes against Iran could contribute to unleashing a war in the broader Middle East Central Asian region. Moreover, the planned attack on Iran should also be understood in relation to the timely withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon, which has opened up a new space, for the deployment of Israeli forces. The participation of Turkey in the US-Israeli military operation is also a factor, following an agreement reached between Ankara and Tel Aviv. In other words, US and Israeli military planners must carefully weigh the far-reaching implications of their actions. Israel Builds up its Stockpile of Deadly Military Hardware A massive buildup in military hardware has occurred in preparation for a possible attack on Iran. Israel has recently taken delivery from the US of some 5,000 “smart air launched weapons” including some 500 BLU 109 ‘bunker-buster bombs. The (uranium coated) munitions are said to be more than “adequate to address the full range of Iranian targets, with the possible exception of the buried facility at Natanz, which may require the [more powerful] BLU-113 bunker buster“: “Given Israel’s already substantial holdings of such weapons, this increase in its inventory would allow a sustained assault with or without further US involvement.” (See Richard Bennett) Gbu 28 Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28) The Israeli Air Force would attack Iran’s nuclear facility at Bushehr using US as well Israeli produced bunker buster bombs. The attack would be carried out in three separate waves “with the radar and communications jamming protection being provided by U.S. Air Force AWACS and other U.S. aircraft in the area”. (See W Madsen) Bear in mind that the bunker buster bombs can also be used to deliver tactical nuclear bombs. The B61-11 is the “nuclear version” of the “conventional” BLU 113. It can be delivered in much same way as the conventional bunker buster bomb. (See Michel Chossudovsky, see also this) According to the Pentagon, tactical nuclear weapons are “safe for civilians”. Their use has been authorized by the US Senate. (See Michel Chossudovsky) Moreover, reported in late 2003, Israeli Dolphin-class submarines equipped with US Harpoon missiles armed with nuclear warheads are now aimed at Iran. (See Gordon Thomas) Even if tactical nuclear weapons are not used by Israel, an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities not only raises the specter of a broader war, but also of nuclear radiation over a wide area: “To attack Iran’s nuclear facilities will not only provoke war, but it could also unleash clouds of radiation far beyond the targets and the borders of Iran.” (Statement of Prof Elias Tuma, Arab Internet Network, Federal News Service, 1 March 2005) Moreover, while most reports have centered on the issue of punitive air strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities, the strikes would most probably extend to other targets. While a ground war is contemplated as a possible “scenario” at the level of military planning, the US military would not be able to wage a an effective ground war, given the situation in Iraq. In the words of former National Security Adviser Lawrence Eagelberger: “We are not going to get in a ground war in Iran, I hope. If we get into that, we are in serious trouble. I don’t think anyone in Washington is seriously considering that.” ( quoted in the National Journal, 4 December 2004). Iran’s Military Capabilities Despite its overall weaknesses in relation to Israel and the US, Iran has an advanced air defense system, deployed to protect its nuclear sites; “they are dispersed and underground making potential air strikes difficult and without any guarantees of success.” (Jerusalem Post, 20 April 2005). It has upgraded its Shahab-3 missile, which can reach targets in Israel. Iran’s armed forces have recently conducted high-profile military exercises in anticipation of a US led attack. Iran also possesses some 12 X-55 strategic cruise missiles, produced by Ukraine. Iran’s air defense systems is said to feature Russian SA-2, SA-5, SA-6 as well as shoulder-launched SA-7 missiles (Jaffa Center for Strategic Studies). The US “Military Road Map” The Bush administration has officially identified Iran and Syria as the next stage of “the road map to war”. Targeting Iran is a bipartisan project, which broadly serves the interests of the Anglo-American oil conglomerates, the Wall Street financial establishment and the military-industrial complex. The broader Middle East-Central Asian region encompasses more than 70% of the World’s reserves of oil and natural gas. Iran possesses 10% of the world’s oil and ranks third after Saudi Arabia (25 %) and Iraq (11 %) in the size of its reserves. In comparison, the US possesses less than 2.8 % of global oil reserves. (See Eric Waddell, The Battle for Oil) The announcement to target Iran should come as no surprise. It is part of the battle for oil. Already during the Clinton administration, US Central Command (USCENTCOM) had formulated “in war theater plans” to invade both Iraq and Iran: “The broad national security interests and objectives expressed in the President’s National Security Strategy (NSS) and the Chairman’s National Military Strategy (NMS) form the foundation of the United States Central Command’s theater strategy. The NSS directs implementation of a strategy of dual containment of the rogue states of Iraq and Iran as long as those states pose a threat to U.S. interests, to other states in the region, and to their own citizens. Dual containment is designed to maintain the balance of power in the region without depending on either Iraq or Iran. USCENTCOM’s theater strategy is interest-based and threat-focused. The purpose of U.S. engagement, as espoused in the NSS, is to protect the United States’ vital interest in the region – uninterrupted, secure U.S./Allied access to Gulf oil. (USCENTCOM, USPolicy , emphasis added) Main Military Actors While the US, Israel, as well as Turkey (with borders with both Iran and Syria) are the main actors in this process, a number of other countries, in the region, allies of the US, including several Central Asian former Soviet republics have been enlisted. Britain is closely involved despite its official denials at the diplomatic level. Turkey occupies a central role in the Iran operation. It has an extensive military cooperation agreement with Israel. There are indications that NATO is also formally involved in the context of an Israel-NATO agreement reached in November 2004. Planning The Aerial Attack on Iran According to former weapons inspector Scott Ritter, George W. Bush has already signed off on orders for an aerial attack on Iran, scheduled for June.(See this) The June cut-off date should be understood. It does not signify that the attack will occur in June. What it suggests is that the US and Israel are “in a state of readiness” and are prepared to launch an attack by June or at a later date. In other words, the decision to launch the attack has not been made. Ritter’s observation concerning an impending military operation should nonetheless be taken seriously. In recent months, there is ample evidence that a major military operation is in preparation: 1) several high profile military exercises have been conducted in recent months, involving military deployment and the testing of weapons systems. 2) military planning meetings have been held between the various parties involved. There has been a shuttle of military and government officials between Washington, Tel Aviv and Ankara. 3) A significant change in the military command structure in Israel has occurred, with the appointment of a new Chief of Staff. 4) Intense diplomatic exchanges have been carried out at the international level with a view to securing areas of military cooperation and/or support for a US-Israeli led military operation directed against Iran. 5) Ongoing intelligence operations inside Iran have been stepped up. 6) Consensus Building: Media propaganda on the need to intervene in Iran has been stepped up, with daily reports on how Iran constitutes a threat to peace and global security. Timeline of Key Initiatives In the last few months, various key initiatives have been taken, which are broadly indicative that an aerial bombing of Iran is in the military pipeline: November 2004 in Brussels: NATO-Israel protocol: Israel’s IDF delegation to the NATO conference to met with military brass of six members of the Mediterranean basin nations, including Egypt, Jordan, Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Mauritania. NATO seeks to revive the framework, known as the Mediterranean Dialogue program, which would include Israel. The Israeli delegation accepted to participate in military exercises and “anti-terror maneuvers” together with several Arab countries. January 2005: the US, Israel and Turkey held military exercises in the Eastern Mediterranean, off the coast of Syria. These exercises, which have been held in previous years were described as routine. February 2005. Following the decision reached in Brussels in November 2004, Israel was involved for the first time in military exercises with NATO, which also included several Arab countries. February 2005: Assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri. The assassination, which was blamed on Syria, serves Israeli and US interests and was used as a pretext to demand the withdrawal of Syrian troops from Lebanon. February 2005: Sharon fires his Chief-of-Staff, Moshe Ya’alon and appoints Air Force General Dan Halutz. This is the first time in Israeli history that an Air Force General is appointed Chief of Staff (See Uri Avnery) The appointment of Major General Dan Halutz as IDF Chief of Staff is considered in Israeli political circles as “the appointment of the right man at the right time.” The central issue is that a major aerial operation against Iran is in the planning stage, and Maj General Halutz is slated to coordinate the aerial bombing raids on Iran. Halutz’s appointment was specifically linked to Israel’s Iran agenda: “As chief of staff, he will in the best position to prepare the military for such a scenario.” March 2005: NATO’s Secretary General was in Jerusalem for follow-up talks with Ariel Sharon and Israel’s military brass, following the joint NATO-Israel military exercise in February. These military cooperation ties are viewed by the Israeli military as a means to “enhance Israel’s deterrence capability regarding potential enemies threatening it, mainly Iran and Syria.” The premise underlying NATO-Israel military cooperation is that Israel is under attack: “The more Israel’s image is strengthened as a country facing enemies who attempt to attack it for no justified reason, the greater will be the possibility that aid will be extended to Israel by NATO. Furthermore, Iran and Syria will have to take into account the possibility that the increasing cooperation between Israel and NATO will strengthen Israel’s links with Turkey, also a member of NATO. Given Turkey’s impressive military potential and its geographic proximity to both Iran and Syria, Israel’s operational options against them, if and when it sees the need, could gain considerable strength. ” (Jaffa Center for Strategic Studies, http://www.tau.ac.il/jcss/sa/v7n4p4Shalom.html ) The Israel-NATO protocol is all the more important because it obligates NATO to align itself with the US-Israeli plan to bomb Iran, as an act of self defense on the part of Israel. It also means that NATO is also involved in the process of military consultations relating to the planned aerial bombing of Iran. It is of course related to the bilateral military cooperation agreement between Israel and Turkey and the likelihood that part of the military operation will be launched from Turkey, which is a member of NATO. Late March 2005: News leaks in Israel indicated an “initial authorization” by Prime Minster Ariel Sharon of an Israeli attack on Iran’s Natanz uranium enrichment plant “if diplomacy failed to stop Iran’s nuclear program”. (The Hindu, 28 March 2005) March-April 2005: The Holding in Israel of Joint US-Israeli military exercises specifically pertaining to the launching of Patriot missiles. US Patriot missile crews stationed in Germany were sent to Israel to participate in the joint Juniper Cobra exercise with the Israeli military. The exercise was described as routine and “unconnected to events in the Middle East”: “As always, we are interested in implementing lessons learned from training exercises.” (UPI, 9 March 2005). April 2005: Donald Rumsfeld (right) was on an official visits to Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Kyrgyzstan and Azerbaijan. His diplomatic endeavors were described by the Russian media as “literally circling Iran in an attempt to find the best bridgehead for a possible military operation against that country.” In Baku, Azerbaijan Rumsfeld was busy discussing the date for deployment of US troops in Azerbaijan on Iran’s North-Western border. US military bases described as “mobile groups” in Azerbaijan are slated to play a role in a military operation directed against Iran. Azerbaijan is a member of GUUAM, a military cooperation agreement with the US and NATO, which allows for the stationing of US troops in several of the member countries, including Georgia, Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan. The stated short term objective is to “neutralize Iran”. The longer term objective under the Pentagon’s “Caspian Plan” is to exert military and economic control over the entire Caspian sea basin, with a view to ensuring US authority over oil reserves and pipeline corridors. During his visit in April, Rumsfeld was pushing the US initiative of establishing “American special task forces and military bases to secure US influence in the Caspian region: “Called Caspian Watch, the project stipulates a network of special task forces and police units in the countries of the regions to be used in emergencies including threats to objects of the oil complex and pipelines. Project Caspian Watch will be financed by the United States ($100 million). It will become an advance guard of the US European Command whose zone of responsibility includes the Caspian region. Command center of the project with a powerful radar is to be located in Baku.” ( Defense and Security Russia, April 27, 2005) Rumsfeld’s visit followed shortly after that of Iranian President Mohammad Khatami’s to Baku. April 2005: Iran signs a military cooperation with Tajikistan, which occupies a strategic position bordering Afghanistan’s Northern frontier. Tajikistan is a member of “The Shanghai Five” military cooperation group, which also includes Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia. Iran also has economic cooperation agreements with Turkmenistan. Mid April 2005: Israel Prime Minister Ariel Sharon meets George W Bush at his Texas Ranch. Iran is on the agenda of bilateral talks. More significantly, the visit of Ariel Sharon was used to carry out high level talks between US and Israeli military planners pertaining to Iran. Late April 2005. President Vladmir Putin is in Israel on an official visit. He announces Russia’s decision to sell short-range anti-aircraft missiles to Syria and to continue supporting Iran’s nuclear industry. Beneath the gilded surface of international diplomacy, Putin’s timely visit to Israel must be interpreted as “a signal to Israel” regarding its planned aerial attack on Iran. Late April 2005: US pressure in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been exerted with a view to blocking the re-appointment of Mohammed Al Baradei, who according to US officials “is not being tough enough on Iran…” Following US pressures, the vote on the appointment of a new IAEA chief was put off until June. These developments suggest that Washington wants to put forth their own hand-picked nominee prior to launching US-Israeli aerial attacks on Iran’s nuclear facilities. (See VOA). (In February 2003, Al Baradei along with UN chief weapons inspector Hans Blix challenged the (phony) intelligence on WMD presented by the US to the UN Security Council, with a view to justifying the war on Iraq.) Late April 2005. Sale of deadly military hardware to Israel. GBU-28 Buster Bunker Bombs: Coinciding with Putin’s visit to Israel, the US Defence Security Cooperation Agency (Department of Defense) announced the sale of an additional 100 bunker-buster bombs produced by Lockheed Martin to Israel. This decision was viewed by the US media as “a warning to Iran about its nuclear ambitions.” The sale pertains to the larger and more sophisticated “Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28) BLU-113 Penetrator” (including the WGU-36A/B guidance control unit and support equipment). The GBU-28 is described as “a special weapon for penetrating hardened command centers located deep underground. The fact of the matter is that the GBU-28 is among the World’s most deadly “conventional” weapons used in the 2003 invasion of Iraq, capable of causing thousands of civilian deaths through massive explosions. The Israeli Air Force are slated to use the GBU-28s on their F-15 aircraft. (See text of DSCA news release) Late April 2005- early May: Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan (right) in Israel for follow-up talks with Ariel Sharon. He was accompanied by his Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul, who met with senior Israeli military officials. On the official agenda of these talks: joint defense projects, including the joint production of Arrow II Theater Missile Defense and Popeye II missiles. The latter also known as the Have Lite, are advanced small missiles, designed for deployment on fighter planes. Tel Aviv and Ankara decide to establish a hotline to share intelligence. May 2005: Syrian troops scheduled to withdraw from Lebanon, leading to a major shift in the Middle East security situation, in favor of Israel and the US. Iran Surrounded The US has troops and military bases in Turkey, Pakistan, Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, and of course Iraq. In other words, Iran is virtually surrounded by US military bases. (see Map below). These countries as well as Turkmenistan, are members of NATO`s partnership for Peace Program and have military cooperation agreements with NATO. Copyright Eric Waddell, Global Research, 2003 In other words, we are dealing with a potentially explosive scenario in which a number of countries, including several former Soviet republics, could be brought into a US led war with Iran. IranAtom.ru, a Russian based news and military analysis group has suggested, in this regard: “since Iranian nuclear objects are scattered all over the country, Israel will need a mass strike with different fly-in and fly-out approaches – Jordan, Iraq, Turkey, Azerbaijan, and other countries… Azerbaijan seriously fears Tehran’s reaction should Baku issue a permit to Israeli aircraft to overfly its territory.” (Defense and Security Russia, 12 April 2005). Concluding remarks The World is at an important crossroads. The Bush Administration has embarked upon a military adventure which threatens the future of humanity. Iran is the next military target. The planned military operation, which is by no means limited to punitive strikes against Iran’s nuclear facilities, is part of a project of World domination, a military roadmap, launched at the end of the Cold War. Military action against Iran would directly involve Israel’s participation, which in turn is likely to trigger a broader war throughout the Middle East, not to mention an implosion in the Palestinian occupied territories. Turkey is closely associated with the proposed aerial attacks. Israel is a nuclear power with a sophisticated nuclear arsenal. (See text box below). The use of nuclear weapons by Israel or the US cannot be excluded, particularly in view of the fact that tactical nuclear weapons have now been reclassified as a variant of the conventional bunker buster bombs and are authorized by the US Senate for use in conventional war theaters. (“they are harmless to civilians because the explosion is underground”) In this regard, Israel and the US rather than Iran constitute a nuclear threat. The planned attack on Iran must be understood in relation to the existing active war theaters in the Middle East, namely Afghanistan, Iraq and Palestine. The conflict could easily spread from the Middle East to the Caspian sea basin. It could also involve the participation of Azerbaijan and Georgia, where US troops are stationed. An attack on Iran would have a direct impact on the resistance movement inside Iraq. It would also put pressure on America’s overstretched military capabilities and resources in both the Iraqi and Afghan war theaters. (The 150,000 US troops in Iraq are already fully engaged and could not be redeployed in the case of a war with Iran.) In other words, the shaky geopolitics of the Central Asia- Middle East region, the three existing war theaters in which America is currently, involved, the direct participation of Israel and Turkey, the structure of US sponsored military alliances, etc. raises the specter of a broader conflict. Moreover, US military action on Iran not only threatens Russian and Chinese interests, which have geopolitical interests in the Caspian sea basin and which have bilateral agreements with Iran. It also backlashes on European oil interests in Iran and is likely to produce major divisions between Western allies, between the US and its European partners as well as within the European Union. Through its participation in NATO, Europe, despite its reluctance, would be brought into the Iran operation. The participation of NATO largely hinges on a military cooperation agreement reached between NATO and Israel. This agreement would bind NATO to defend Israel against Syria and Iran. NATO would therefore support a preemptive attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities, and could take on a more active role if Iran were to retaliate following US-Israeli air strikes. Needless to say, the war against Iran is part of a longer term US military agenda which seeks to militarize the entire Caspian sea basin, eventually leading to the destabilization and conquest of the Russian Federation. The Antiwar Movement The antiwar movement must act, consistently, to prevent the next phase of this war from happening. This is no easy matter. The holding of large antiwar rallies will not in itself reverse the tide of war. High ranking officials of the Bush administration, members of the military and the US Congress have been granted the authority to uphold an illegal war agenda. What is required is a grass roots network, a mass movement at national and international levels, which challenges the legitimacy of the military and political actors, and which is ultimately instrumental in unseating those who rule in our name. War criminals occupy positions of authority. The citizenry is galvanized into supporting the rulers, who are “committed to their safety and well-being”. Through media disinformation, war is given a humanitarian mandate. To reverse the tide of war, military bases must be closed down, the war machine (namely the production of advanced weapons systems) must be stopped and the burgeoning police state must be dismantled. The corporate backers and sponsors of war and war crimes must also be targeted including the oil companies, the defense contractors, the financial institutions and the corporate media, which has become an integral part of the war propaganda machine. Antiwar sentiment does not dismantle a war agenda. The war criminals in the US, Israel and Britain must be removed from high office. What is needed is to reveal the true face of the American Empire and the underlying criminalization of US foreign policy, which uses the “war on terrorism” and the threat of Al Qaeda to galvanize public opinion in support of a global war agenda. Israel’s Nuclear Capabilities With between 200 and 500 thermonuclear weapons and a sophisticated delivery system, Israel has quietly supplanted Britain as the World’s 5th Largest nuclear power, and may currently rival France and China in the size and sophistication of its nuclear arsenal. Although dwarfed by the nuclear arsenals of the U.S. and Russia, each possessing over 10,000 nuclear weapons, Israel nonetheless is a major nuclear power, and should be publicly recognized as such. Today, estimates of the Israeli nuclear arsenal range from a minimum of 200 to a maximum of about 500. Whatever the number, there is little doubt that Israeli nukes are among the world’s most sophisticated, largely designed for “war fighting” in the Middle East. A staple of the Israeli nuclear arsenal are “neutron bombs,” miniaturized thermonuclear bombs designed to maximize deadly gamma radiation while minimizing blast effects and long term radiation- in essence designed to kill people while leaving property intact.(16) Weapons include ballistic missiles and bombers capable of reaching Moscow… The bombs themselves range in size from “city busters” larger than the Hiroshima Bomb to tactical mini nukes. The Israeli arsenal of weapons of mass destruction clearly dwarfs the actual or potential arsenals of all other Middle Eastern states combined, and is vastly greater than any conceivable need for “deterrence.” Many Middle East Peace activists have been reluctant to discuss, let alone challenge, the Israeli monopoly on nuclear weapons in the region, often leading to incomplete and uninformed analyses and flawed action strategies. Placing the issue of Israeli weapons of mass destruction directly and honestly on the table and action agenda would have several salutary effects. First, it would expose a primary destabilizing dynamic driving the Middle East arms race and compelling the region’s states to each seek their own “deterrent.” Second, it would expose the grotesque double standard which sees the U.S. and Europe on the one hand condemning Iraq, Iran and Syria for developing weapons of mass destruction, while simultaneously protecting and enabling the principal culprit. Third, exposing Israel’s nuclear strategy would focus international public attention, resulting in increased pressure to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction and negotiate a just peace in good faith. Finally, a nuclear free Israel would make a Nuclear Free Middle East and a comprehensive regional peace agreement much more likely. Unless and until the world community confronts Israel over its covert nuclear program it is unlikely that there will be any meaningful resolution of the Israeli/Arab conflict, a fact that Israel may be counting on as the Sharon era dawns. From John Steinbach, Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal, Global Research https://www.globalresearch.ca/planned-us-israeli-attack-on-iran-2/5615443
    WWW.GLOBALRESEARCH.CA
    A Planned US-Israeli Attack on Iran is Contemplated
    Introduction We stand in Solidarity with Palestine. But we must recognize that the United States Military and Intelligence apparatus is firmly behind Israel’s genocide directed against the People of Palestine. . And this must be part of the solidarity campaign, namely to Reveal the Truth regarding Washington’s insidious role, which is part of a carefully planned military agenda directed against Palestine …
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  • Alexander Dugin: My Vision For The New World Order, And Gaza War – Alexander Dugin
    Kolozeg27/10/2023
    Posted on : 09/11/2023
    Alexander Dugin: My Vision For The New World Order, And Gaza War – Alexander Dugin
    New civilisations are on the rise, including Chinese, Islamic, Indian, African, and Latin American. Russia sees them as potential allies and partners in a genuine and equitable multipolar order, says Aleksandr Dugin.

    The current global order appears to be in a state of transition. What we are witnessing is a shift away from a unipolar world, which emerged following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the disintegration of the Soviet bloc, towards a multipolar world.

    The foundations of this multipolar world are becoming increasingly evident, with key players including Russia, China, the Islamic world, India, and potentially Africa and Latin America. These entities represent distinct civilisations, many of which are united within the BRICS group.

    Notably, after the 2023 Johannesburg summit, this group expanded to include significant countries from the Islamic world, such as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Egypt, as well as Ethiopia, bolstering the African perspective, and Argentina, further solidifying the presence of South American nations.



    Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud attends a meeting during the 2023 BRICS Summit at the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg Thursday, Aug. 24, 2023.

    This expansion underscores the growing influence of the multipolar world order while signalling a weakening of Western hegemony.

    The US and the West’s determination to preserve unilateral dominance

    The United States and Western powers are resolutely clinging to the concept of unilateralism. At the forefront of global leadership, the United States, in particular, is determined to maintain its dominance across military, political, economic, cultural, and ideological realms. This ongoing pursuit of unipolarity stands as the central contradiction of our era, marked by the intensifying struggle between unipolarity and multipolarity.

    Within this context, it is imperative to examine the key conflicts and developments in global politics, notably the efforts to undermine Russia as it reasserts its sovereignty and presence as an independent pole. This dynamic helps elucidate the persistent conflict in Ukraine.

    The Western world’s support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is driven, in large part, by the desire to prevent Russia from reemerging as an autonomous global actor—an aspiration championed by President Vladimir Putin throughout his tenure.

    Putin has bolstered the political sovereignty of the Russian Federation and progressively emphasised Russia’s status as an independent civilisation that not only opposes Western hegemony but also rejects its value system.

    Russia has unambiguously affirmed its commitment to traditional values while firmly rebuffing Western liberalism, including its promotion of the gay rights agenda and other Western ideological standards, which Russia perceives as aberrations and deviations.

    In response, the West actively supported the 2014 coup in Kyiv, provided extensive military aid to Ukraine, fostered the dissemination of neo-Nazi ideology within the country, and provoked Russia into initiating an extraordinary military operation.

    Without Putin’s intervention, Kyiv would likely have taken similar actions independently, leading to the opening of the first front in the fierce struggle between multipolarity and unipolarity in Ukraine.

    Simultaneously, Russia, under Putin’s leadership, recognises that it cannot be one of just two poles in this world, as was the case during the Soviet Union era.

    New civilisations are on the rise, including Chinese, Islamic, Indian, African, and Latin American. Russia sees them as potential allies and partners in a genuine and equitable multipolar order—a perspective not yet widely acknowledged by the rest of the world.



    Burkina Faso’s Capt. Ibrahim Traore, left, and Russian President Vladimir Putin shake hands before an official ceremony to welcome the leaders of delegations to the Russia Africa Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, July 27, 2023

    However, there is a gradual and strengthening awareness of the concept of multipolarity, exemplified by the situation regarding Taiwan, which has been spared from becoming the next flashpoint in the confrontation between unipolarity and multipolarity, particularly in the Pacific region.

    New civilisations are on the rise, including Chinese, Islamic, Indian, African, and Latin American. Russia sees them as potential allies and partners in a genuine and equitable multipolar order—a perspective not yet widely acknowledged by the rest of the world.

    Israel’s war on Gaza points to broader confrontation

    The events in Israel and the Gaza Strip are closely linked to this issue. Two tragic incidents occurred in rapid succession. Firstly, there was a Hamas attack on Israel, resulting in a significant number of civilian casualties and the abduction of hostages.

    Subsequently, Israel launched retaliatory strikes on the Gaza Strip, characterised by a high degree of brutality and a substantial number of civilian casualties, especially among women and children. These actions unequivocally constitute violations of human rights and crimes against humanity, and they lack any justifiable rationale.

    But at the same time, Israel’s application of the principles of “lex talionis” (a principle that developed at the beginning of Babylonian law and stipulated that a punishment inflicted should correspond in degree and kind to the offence of the wrongdoer, as an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth) resulted in what is described as a widespread genocide and brutal living conditions for Gaza residents.

    Both Hamas’s attack and Israel’s response are characterised as actions outside the framework of accepted humanitarian methods to resolve political conflicts.

    Subsequently, the geopolitical landscape comes into play, and while the magnitude of Israel’s actions is significantly larger, the evaluation of the situation in the Gaza Strip is not solely contingent on that; rather, it hinges on underlying geopolitical trends.

    The events in Israel, including the Hamas attack and Israel’s response, have led to a broader confrontation between the West and the Islamic world. This confrontation stems from what is seen as unconditional and unilateral support for Israel despite the explicit nature of the crimes committed against the civilian population in Gaza.

    The Islamic world is portrayed as a distinct pole facing Israel’s actions in Gaza and the broader Palestinian territories while considering the injustices faced by Palestinians who were displaced from their land to live in poor and isolated areas.



    People gather around a huge Palestinian flag during a protest against Israel in Istanbul on October 20, 2023.

    The unity of the Islamic world has become undeniable, with the Palestinian issue serving as a unifying force that brings together Sunnis, Shiites, Turks, and Iranians, as well as factions involved in internal conflicts in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Libya.

    This matter holds direct relevance for countries such as Pakistan, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Bangladesh.

    Furthermore, Muslims residing in the United States of America, Europe, Russia, and Africa cannot remain indifferent. Notably, despite their political disparities, Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, and the Jordan River region are joined in a collective effort to safeguard their dignity.

    The unity of the Islamic world has become undeniable, with the Palestinian issue serving as a unifying force that brings together Sunnis, Shiites, Turks, and Iranians, as well as factions involved in internal conflicts in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Libya.

    The Palestinian cause and the United States

    In recent decades, the United States has been successful in preventing Muslims from uniting around the Palestinian issue and encouraging them to normalise relations with Israel.

    But such attempts are no longer successful. All these efforts have proven futile in recent weeks as the unequivocal support for Israel continues. Israel’s mass slaughter of civilians in Gaza, witnessed by the entire global community, is compelling the Islamic world to set aside internal differences and contemplate direct confrontation with the West.

    Israel, much like Ukraine, serves as nothing more than an instrument of the overbearing and ruthless Western hegemony. It does not shy away from criminal deeds or racist rhetoric and actions.

    However, the root of the problem lies not in Israel itself but rather in its role as a geopolitical tool within the framework of a unipolar world. This aligns precisely with what President Vladimir Putin recently articulated when he referred to the web of hostility and conflicts being woven by “spiders,” a metaphor for globalists employing colonialist tactics based on the “divide and rule” principle.

    To effectively counter those desperately striving to preserve the unipolar world and Western dominance, it is crucial to comprehend the essence of their strategy. Armed with this understanding, we can consciously construct an alternative model to confront this agenda, move forward confidently and unite towards establishing a multipolar world.

    The ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip and Palestine as a whole poses a direct challenge not only to specific groups or even Arabs in general but to the entire Islamic world and Islamic civilisation. It’s increasingly evident that the West has engaged in a confrontation with Islam itself, a reality now acknowledged by many.

    Collective need to defend Muslim nations from mistreatement

    From nations such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan to regions spanning Tunisia to Bahrain, from Salafists to Sunnis and Sufis, and encompassing various political factions within Palestine, Syria, Libya, Lebanon, as well as the division between Shiites and Sunnis, there is a collective need to defend the dignity of Islamic civilisation. It asserts itself as a sovereign, independent civilisation that rejects any mistreatment.

    Erdogan’s mention of jihad as a response to the conflict serves as a reminder of the historical Crusades, yet this analogy doesn’t fully capture the essence of the present situation. Modern Western globalisation has diverged significantly from Christian civilisation, having severed many connections with Christian culture in favour of materialism, atheism, and individualism.

    Christianity has little to do with the material sciences or the socio-economic system primarily driven by profit, and it certainly doesn’t endorse the legalisation of deviations or the embrace of pathology as the norm, nor the inclination towards a post-human existence—a concept enthusiastically promoted by Israeli post-humanist philosopher Yuval Harari.

    The West, in its contemporary form, represents an anti-Christian phenomenon, lacking any connection to the values of Christianity or the embrace of the Christian cross. It’s essential to recognise that when the Islamic world clashes with the West, it is not engaging in a conflict with the civilisation of Christ but rather with an anti-Christian civilisation, which can be termed the civilisation of the Antichrist.

    Russia, as a significant global player, is actively engaged in a war with the West on the soil of Ukraine.



    Russian recruits take a train at a railway station in Prudboi, in Russia’s Volgograd region, Thursday, Sept. 29, 2022. President Vladimir Putin announced a partial mobilization, the first since World War II, amid the war in Ukraine.

    Unfortunately, due to the influence of Western propaganda, many Islamic countries have not fully grasped the underlying reasons, objectives, and nature of this conflict, often perceiving it as a mere regional dispute. However, as globalisation directly impacts Muslims worldwide, Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine takes on a vastly different significance.

    Ultimately, it signifies a clash between a multipolar world and a unipolar one, i.e., this war serves the interests not only of Russia as a global pole but indirectly, or even directly, of all such poles. China is well-equipped to comprehend this, and within the Islamic world, Iran is among those that can grasp this perspective.

    Notably, geopolitical awareness has been rapidly on the rise in other Islamic societies, including in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan, and Indonesia. This has led to initiatives like the reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and Iran and Turkey’s pursuit of a sovereign policy.

    Israel’s mass slaughter of civilians in Gaza, witnessed by the entire global community, is compelling the Islamic world to set aside internal differences and contemplate direct confrontation with the West.

    Russian motives and spectre of WWIII

    As the Islamic world increasingly recognises itself as a prominent pole and a unified civilisation, the motives behind Russian actions become more apparent and understandable.

    President Vladimir Putin has already gained international renown and enjoys significant popularity worldwide, particularly in non-Western countries. This popularity lends precise meaning and clear justification to his strategic decisions.

    In essence, Russia is vigorously combating unipolarity, which translates to a broader struggle against globalisation and the Western hegemonic influence. Today, we witness the West, often seen as operating through its proxy, Israel, targeting the Islamic world and subjecting Palestinians to genocide.



    A Palestinian carries the body of a child killed in an Israeli raid on the Jabalia Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, on November 1.

    This means that the moment of Islam is coming amid this war between Muslims and Western hegemony that could erupt at any moment. Drawing from my knowledge of the Israelis, there is no doubt that they will not stop until they eliminate the Palestinians.

    “The war now appears to be truly comprehensive on a board scale.” In this case, first and foremost, the Islamic world has objective allies, such as Russia as well as China, which has the Taiwan problem to solve soon. Additional fronts will probably gradually emerge over time.

    The question that arises here is whether this could lead to the outbreak of a third world war. It appears highly likely, and in a sense, it is already underway.

    For the war to escalate globally, a critical mass of unresolved contradictions necessitating military resolution is imperative. This condition has been met. The Western powers exhibit no inclination to surrender their dominion voluntarily, and the new poles, emerging independent civilisations, and extensive regions no longer wish to accept this dominance and tolerate it.

    Moreover, the failure of the United States and the broader collective West to be the leaders of humanity without abandoning policies that incite and fuel new conflicts and wars has been proven.

    The inevitable war must be won.

    Today, we witness the West, often seen as operating through its proxy, Israel, targeting the Islamic world and subjecting Palestinian Arabs to genocide. This means that the moment of Islam is coming, amid this war between Muslims and Western hegemony that could erupt at any moment.

    Trump v Biden

    Ultimately, what role does former US President Donald Trump play in the escalating confrontations between Islam and the West? President Joe Biden staunchly advocates for globalisation, opposes Russia, and fervently supports unipolarity.

    This precisely explains his unwavering backing of the new Nazi regime in Kyiv and his complete exoneration of Israel from its actions, including direct genocide.

    Trump’s position, however, is different. He embodies a classic nationalist perspective, prioritising the interests of the United States as a nation over hasty plans for global dominance.

    Concerning relations with Russia, Trump displays indifference, focusing more on matters of trade and economic competition with China. Nonetheless, he is concurrently subject to and wholly influenced by the potent Zionist lobby within the United States.



    Trump and Biden

    Therefore, the imminent war between the West and Islam should not be met with complacency, not only from the Western perspective but also from Republicans at large.

    In this context, if Trump were to reassume the presidency, it could potentially diminish support for Ukraine, a crucial concern for Russia. However, he might adopt an even more stringent approach towards Muslims and Palestinians, conceivably surpassing the severity of Biden’s policies.

    Realism is imperative, and we must prepare for a challenging, serious, and protracted conflict on the horizon.

    It is important to realise that this is not a religious conflict but rather a materialistic, atheistic imposter’s war against all traditional religions. This means that the moment for the ultimate battle might be upon us.

    Biden staunchly advocates for globalisation, opposes Russia, and fervently supports unipolarity. Trump’s position, however, is different. He embodies a classic nationalist perspective, prioritising the interests of the United States as a nation over hasty plans for global dominance.

    Spectre of nuclear war and death of unipolar system

    Is the imminent conflict moving toward a nuclear war? This prospect cannot be dismissed, especially considering the potential use of tactical nuclear weapons.

    It is improbable that nations possessing strategic nuclear capabilities, such as Russia and NATO countries, would resort to their use, given the catastrophic implications for humanity.

    However, considering the possession of nuclear weapons by Israel, Pakistan, and possibly Iran, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that they could be utilised in localised contexts.

    What will the configuration of the world order during this impending confrontation be like?

    There is no ready answer to such a question. However, one thing can be definitively ruled out, and that is the establishment of a robust, stable, and unipolar global system — a concept fervently championed by proponents of globalisation.

    Regardless of the specific circumstances, a unipolar world is an impossibility. The world will either be multipolar or non-existent. The stronger the West’s resolve to uphold its dominance, the fiercer the ensuing battle is likely to be, potentially escalating into a third world war.

    Multipolarity will not transpire spontaneously. Now, there is a crucial process of reassembly underway within the Islamic world. If Muslims can unify against a shared formidable adversary, the rise of an Islamic power pole becomes viable.

    In my view, the reinstatement of Baghdad and its pivotal role in Iraq could present an ideal resolution. Iraq serves as the convergence point for various major strands of Islamic civilisation, including Arabs, Sunnis, Shiites, Sufis, Salafis, Indo-Europeans, Kurds, and Turks. Baghdad, in particular, has historically been a hub where sciences, religious education, philosophy, and spiritual movements thrived.

    Nevertheless, this proposition remains speculative. Nonetheless, it is evident that the Islamic world will require a unifying foundation or common ground.

    Baghdad could potentially serve as this platform or as the balance point. However, for this vision to materialise, Iraq must first be liberated from the presence of American forces.



    US soldiers play American football before leaving Camp Adder on the outskirts of the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah on December 17, 2011, marking the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq.

    It appears that each power pole must affirm its right to existence through conflict. Russia, upon securing victory in Ukraine, will become a fully sovereign pole. Similarly, once the Taiwan issue is resolved, China will establish itself as a significant pole.

    The Islamic world, meanwhile, insists on a fair resolution to the Palestinian problem.

    The developments will not halt there; eventually, the roles of India, Africa, and Latin America, which are currently increasingly facing the new forces of colonisation, will also become significant.

    Consequently, all the poles in the multipolar world will have to navigate their unique challenges and trials.

    Eventually, the roles of India, Africa, and Latin America, which are currently increasingly facing the new forces of colonisation, will also become significant. Consequently, all the poles in the multipolar world will have to navigate their unique challenges and trials.

    Multipolarism is probable

    Afterwards, we may witness a partial return to the global order that prevailed before Christopher Columbus, where various empires coexisted alongside Western Europe.

    These empires included the Chinese, Indian, Russian, Ottoman, and Persian, along with robust independent states in South Asia, Africa, Latin America, and even Oceania. Each of these entities had its distinct political and social systems, which Europeans later equated with barbarism and savagery.

    Consequently, multipolarism is entirely plausible, which was the case for humanity before the emergence of Western global imperial politics in the modern era.

    This does not imply an immediate establishment of global peace; however, such a multipolar world system would inherently be more just and balanced.

    All conflicts would be approached based on a fair and collective stance, in which humanity would be protected from racial injustices akin to those witnessed in Nazi Germany, contemporary Israel, or the aggressive dominance of the global West.

    Source: https://en.majalla.com

    *Translated and coordinated by Ramia Yahia

    Read More
    Alexander Dugin: My Vision For The New World Order, And Gaza War – Alexander Dugin Kolozeg27/10/2023 Posted on : 09/11/2023 Alexander Dugin: My Vision For The New World Order, And Gaza War – Alexander Dugin New civilisations are on the rise, including Chinese, Islamic, Indian, African, and Latin American. Russia sees them as potential allies and partners in a genuine and equitable multipolar order, says Aleksandr Dugin. The current global order appears to be in a state of transition. What we are witnessing is a shift away from a unipolar world, which emerged following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the disintegration of the Soviet bloc, towards a multipolar world. The foundations of this multipolar world are becoming increasingly evident, with key players including Russia, China, the Islamic world, India, and potentially Africa and Latin America. These entities represent distinct civilisations, many of which are united within the BRICS group. Notably, after the 2023 Johannesburg summit, this group expanded to include significant countries from the Islamic world, such as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Iran, and Egypt, as well as Ethiopia, bolstering the African perspective, and Argentina, further solidifying the presence of South American nations. Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud attends a meeting during the 2023 BRICS Summit at the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg Thursday, Aug. 24, 2023. This expansion underscores the growing influence of the multipolar world order while signalling a weakening of Western hegemony. The US and the West’s determination to preserve unilateral dominance The United States and Western powers are resolutely clinging to the concept of unilateralism. At the forefront of global leadership, the United States, in particular, is determined to maintain its dominance across military, political, economic, cultural, and ideological realms. This ongoing pursuit of unipolarity stands as the central contradiction of our era, marked by the intensifying struggle between unipolarity and multipolarity. Within this context, it is imperative to examine the key conflicts and developments in global politics, notably the efforts to undermine Russia as it reasserts its sovereignty and presence as an independent pole. This dynamic helps elucidate the persistent conflict in Ukraine. The Western world’s support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is driven, in large part, by the desire to prevent Russia from reemerging as an autonomous global actor—an aspiration championed by President Vladimir Putin throughout his tenure. Putin has bolstered the political sovereignty of the Russian Federation and progressively emphasised Russia’s status as an independent civilisation that not only opposes Western hegemony but also rejects its value system. Russia has unambiguously affirmed its commitment to traditional values while firmly rebuffing Western liberalism, including its promotion of the gay rights agenda and other Western ideological standards, which Russia perceives as aberrations and deviations. In response, the West actively supported the 2014 coup in Kyiv, provided extensive military aid to Ukraine, fostered the dissemination of neo-Nazi ideology within the country, and provoked Russia into initiating an extraordinary military operation. Without Putin’s intervention, Kyiv would likely have taken similar actions independently, leading to the opening of the first front in the fierce struggle between multipolarity and unipolarity in Ukraine. Simultaneously, Russia, under Putin’s leadership, recognises that it cannot be one of just two poles in this world, as was the case during the Soviet Union era. New civilisations are on the rise, including Chinese, Islamic, Indian, African, and Latin American. Russia sees them as potential allies and partners in a genuine and equitable multipolar order—a perspective not yet widely acknowledged by the rest of the world. Burkina Faso’s Capt. Ibrahim Traore, left, and Russian President Vladimir Putin shake hands before an official ceremony to welcome the leaders of delegations to the Russia Africa Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, July 27, 2023 However, there is a gradual and strengthening awareness of the concept of multipolarity, exemplified by the situation regarding Taiwan, which has been spared from becoming the next flashpoint in the confrontation between unipolarity and multipolarity, particularly in the Pacific region. New civilisations are on the rise, including Chinese, Islamic, Indian, African, and Latin American. Russia sees them as potential allies and partners in a genuine and equitable multipolar order—a perspective not yet widely acknowledged by the rest of the world. Israel’s war on Gaza points to broader confrontation The events in Israel and the Gaza Strip are closely linked to this issue. Two tragic incidents occurred in rapid succession. Firstly, there was a Hamas attack on Israel, resulting in a significant number of civilian casualties and the abduction of hostages. Subsequently, Israel launched retaliatory strikes on the Gaza Strip, characterised by a high degree of brutality and a substantial number of civilian casualties, especially among women and children. These actions unequivocally constitute violations of human rights and crimes against humanity, and they lack any justifiable rationale. But at the same time, Israel’s application of the principles of “lex talionis” (a principle that developed at the beginning of Babylonian law and stipulated that a punishment inflicted should correspond in degree and kind to the offence of the wrongdoer, as an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth) resulted in what is described as a widespread genocide and brutal living conditions for Gaza residents. Both Hamas’s attack and Israel’s response are characterised as actions outside the framework of accepted humanitarian methods to resolve political conflicts. Subsequently, the geopolitical landscape comes into play, and while the magnitude of Israel’s actions is significantly larger, the evaluation of the situation in the Gaza Strip is not solely contingent on that; rather, it hinges on underlying geopolitical trends. The events in Israel, including the Hamas attack and Israel’s response, have led to a broader confrontation between the West and the Islamic world. This confrontation stems from what is seen as unconditional and unilateral support for Israel despite the explicit nature of the crimes committed against the civilian population in Gaza. The Islamic world is portrayed as a distinct pole facing Israel’s actions in Gaza and the broader Palestinian territories while considering the injustices faced by Palestinians who were displaced from their land to live in poor and isolated areas. People gather around a huge Palestinian flag during a protest against Israel in Istanbul on October 20, 2023. The unity of the Islamic world has become undeniable, with the Palestinian issue serving as a unifying force that brings together Sunnis, Shiites, Turks, and Iranians, as well as factions involved in internal conflicts in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Libya. This matter holds direct relevance for countries such as Pakistan, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Bangladesh. Furthermore, Muslims residing in the United States of America, Europe, Russia, and Africa cannot remain indifferent. Notably, despite their political disparities, Palestinians in Gaza, the West Bank, and the Jordan River region are joined in a collective effort to safeguard their dignity. The unity of the Islamic world has become undeniable, with the Palestinian issue serving as a unifying force that brings together Sunnis, Shiites, Turks, and Iranians, as well as factions involved in internal conflicts in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Libya. The Palestinian cause and the United States In recent decades, the United States has been successful in preventing Muslims from uniting around the Palestinian issue and encouraging them to normalise relations with Israel. But such attempts are no longer successful. All these efforts have proven futile in recent weeks as the unequivocal support for Israel continues. Israel’s mass slaughter of civilians in Gaza, witnessed by the entire global community, is compelling the Islamic world to set aside internal differences and contemplate direct confrontation with the West. Israel, much like Ukraine, serves as nothing more than an instrument of the overbearing and ruthless Western hegemony. It does not shy away from criminal deeds or racist rhetoric and actions. However, the root of the problem lies not in Israel itself but rather in its role as a geopolitical tool within the framework of a unipolar world. This aligns precisely with what President Vladimir Putin recently articulated when he referred to the web of hostility and conflicts being woven by “spiders,” a metaphor for globalists employing colonialist tactics based on the “divide and rule” principle. To effectively counter those desperately striving to preserve the unipolar world and Western dominance, it is crucial to comprehend the essence of their strategy. Armed with this understanding, we can consciously construct an alternative model to confront this agenda, move forward confidently and unite towards establishing a multipolar world. The ongoing conflict in the Gaza Strip and Palestine as a whole poses a direct challenge not only to specific groups or even Arabs in general but to the entire Islamic world and Islamic civilisation. It’s increasingly evident that the West has engaged in a confrontation with Islam itself, a reality now acknowledged by many. Collective need to defend Muslim nations from mistreatement From nations such as Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan to regions spanning Tunisia to Bahrain, from Salafists to Sunnis and Sufis, and encompassing various political factions within Palestine, Syria, Libya, Lebanon, as well as the division between Shiites and Sunnis, there is a collective need to defend the dignity of Islamic civilisation. It asserts itself as a sovereign, independent civilisation that rejects any mistreatment. Erdogan’s mention of jihad as a response to the conflict serves as a reminder of the historical Crusades, yet this analogy doesn’t fully capture the essence of the present situation. Modern Western globalisation has diverged significantly from Christian civilisation, having severed many connections with Christian culture in favour of materialism, atheism, and individualism. Christianity has little to do with the material sciences or the socio-economic system primarily driven by profit, and it certainly doesn’t endorse the legalisation of deviations or the embrace of pathology as the norm, nor the inclination towards a post-human existence—a concept enthusiastically promoted by Israeli post-humanist philosopher Yuval Harari. The West, in its contemporary form, represents an anti-Christian phenomenon, lacking any connection to the values of Christianity or the embrace of the Christian cross. It’s essential to recognise that when the Islamic world clashes with the West, it is not engaging in a conflict with the civilisation of Christ but rather with an anti-Christian civilisation, which can be termed the civilisation of the Antichrist. Russia, as a significant global player, is actively engaged in a war with the West on the soil of Ukraine. Russian recruits take a train at a railway station in Prudboi, in Russia’s Volgograd region, Thursday, Sept. 29, 2022. President Vladimir Putin announced a partial mobilization, the first since World War II, amid the war in Ukraine. Unfortunately, due to the influence of Western propaganda, many Islamic countries have not fully grasped the underlying reasons, objectives, and nature of this conflict, often perceiving it as a mere regional dispute. However, as globalisation directly impacts Muslims worldwide, Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine takes on a vastly different significance. Ultimately, it signifies a clash between a multipolar world and a unipolar one, i.e., this war serves the interests not only of Russia as a global pole but indirectly, or even directly, of all such poles. China is well-equipped to comprehend this, and within the Islamic world, Iran is among those that can grasp this perspective. Notably, geopolitical awareness has been rapidly on the rise in other Islamic societies, including in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Turkey, Pakistan, and Indonesia. This has led to initiatives like the reconciliation between Saudi Arabia and Iran and Turkey’s pursuit of a sovereign policy. Israel’s mass slaughter of civilians in Gaza, witnessed by the entire global community, is compelling the Islamic world to set aside internal differences and contemplate direct confrontation with the West. Russian motives and spectre of WWIII As the Islamic world increasingly recognises itself as a prominent pole and a unified civilisation, the motives behind Russian actions become more apparent and understandable. President Vladimir Putin has already gained international renown and enjoys significant popularity worldwide, particularly in non-Western countries. This popularity lends precise meaning and clear justification to his strategic decisions. In essence, Russia is vigorously combating unipolarity, which translates to a broader struggle against globalisation and the Western hegemonic influence. Today, we witness the West, often seen as operating through its proxy, Israel, targeting the Islamic world and subjecting Palestinians to genocide. A Palestinian carries the body of a child killed in an Israeli raid on the Jabalia Palestinian refugee camp in the Gaza Strip, on November 1. This means that the moment of Islam is coming amid this war between Muslims and Western hegemony that could erupt at any moment. Drawing from my knowledge of the Israelis, there is no doubt that they will not stop until they eliminate the Palestinians. “The war now appears to be truly comprehensive on a board scale.” In this case, first and foremost, the Islamic world has objective allies, such as Russia as well as China, which has the Taiwan problem to solve soon. Additional fronts will probably gradually emerge over time. The question that arises here is whether this could lead to the outbreak of a third world war. It appears highly likely, and in a sense, it is already underway. For the war to escalate globally, a critical mass of unresolved contradictions necessitating military resolution is imperative. This condition has been met. The Western powers exhibit no inclination to surrender their dominion voluntarily, and the new poles, emerging independent civilisations, and extensive regions no longer wish to accept this dominance and tolerate it. Moreover, the failure of the United States and the broader collective West to be the leaders of humanity without abandoning policies that incite and fuel new conflicts and wars has been proven. The inevitable war must be won. Today, we witness the West, often seen as operating through its proxy, Israel, targeting the Islamic world and subjecting Palestinian Arabs to genocide. This means that the moment of Islam is coming, amid this war between Muslims and Western hegemony that could erupt at any moment. Trump v Biden Ultimately, what role does former US President Donald Trump play in the escalating confrontations between Islam and the West? President Joe Biden staunchly advocates for globalisation, opposes Russia, and fervently supports unipolarity. This precisely explains his unwavering backing of the new Nazi regime in Kyiv and his complete exoneration of Israel from its actions, including direct genocide. Trump’s position, however, is different. He embodies a classic nationalist perspective, prioritising the interests of the United States as a nation over hasty plans for global dominance. Concerning relations with Russia, Trump displays indifference, focusing more on matters of trade and economic competition with China. Nonetheless, he is concurrently subject to and wholly influenced by the potent Zionist lobby within the United States. Trump and Biden Therefore, the imminent war between the West and Islam should not be met with complacency, not only from the Western perspective but also from Republicans at large. In this context, if Trump were to reassume the presidency, it could potentially diminish support for Ukraine, a crucial concern for Russia. However, he might adopt an even more stringent approach towards Muslims and Palestinians, conceivably surpassing the severity of Biden’s policies. Realism is imperative, and we must prepare for a challenging, serious, and protracted conflict on the horizon. It is important to realise that this is not a religious conflict but rather a materialistic, atheistic imposter’s war against all traditional religions. This means that the moment for the ultimate battle might be upon us. Biden staunchly advocates for globalisation, opposes Russia, and fervently supports unipolarity. Trump’s position, however, is different. He embodies a classic nationalist perspective, prioritising the interests of the United States as a nation over hasty plans for global dominance. Spectre of nuclear war and death of unipolar system Is the imminent conflict moving toward a nuclear war? This prospect cannot be dismissed, especially considering the potential use of tactical nuclear weapons. It is improbable that nations possessing strategic nuclear capabilities, such as Russia and NATO countries, would resort to their use, given the catastrophic implications for humanity. However, considering the possession of nuclear weapons by Israel, Pakistan, and possibly Iran, it is not beyond the realm of possibility that they could be utilised in localised contexts. What will the configuration of the world order during this impending confrontation be like? There is no ready answer to such a question. However, one thing can be definitively ruled out, and that is the establishment of a robust, stable, and unipolar global system — a concept fervently championed by proponents of globalisation. Regardless of the specific circumstances, a unipolar world is an impossibility. The world will either be multipolar or non-existent. The stronger the West’s resolve to uphold its dominance, the fiercer the ensuing battle is likely to be, potentially escalating into a third world war. Multipolarity will not transpire spontaneously. Now, there is a crucial process of reassembly underway within the Islamic world. If Muslims can unify against a shared formidable adversary, the rise of an Islamic power pole becomes viable. In my view, the reinstatement of Baghdad and its pivotal role in Iraq could present an ideal resolution. Iraq serves as the convergence point for various major strands of Islamic civilisation, including Arabs, Sunnis, Shiites, Sufis, Salafis, Indo-Europeans, Kurds, and Turks. Baghdad, in particular, has historically been a hub where sciences, religious education, philosophy, and spiritual movements thrived. Nevertheless, this proposition remains speculative. Nonetheless, it is evident that the Islamic world will require a unifying foundation or common ground. Baghdad could potentially serve as this platform or as the balance point. However, for this vision to materialise, Iraq must first be liberated from the presence of American forces. US soldiers play American football before leaving Camp Adder on the outskirts of the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah on December 17, 2011, marking the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq. It appears that each power pole must affirm its right to existence through conflict. Russia, upon securing victory in Ukraine, will become a fully sovereign pole. Similarly, once the Taiwan issue is resolved, China will establish itself as a significant pole. The Islamic world, meanwhile, insists on a fair resolution to the Palestinian problem. The developments will not halt there; eventually, the roles of India, Africa, and Latin America, which are currently increasingly facing the new forces of colonisation, will also become significant. Consequently, all the poles in the multipolar world will have to navigate their unique challenges and trials. Eventually, the roles of India, Africa, and Latin America, which are currently increasingly facing the new forces of colonisation, will also become significant. Consequently, all the poles in the multipolar world will have to navigate their unique challenges and trials. Multipolarism is probable Afterwards, we may witness a partial return to the global order that prevailed before Christopher Columbus, where various empires coexisted alongside Western Europe. These empires included the Chinese, Indian, Russian, Ottoman, and Persian, along with robust independent states in South Asia, Africa, Latin America, and even Oceania. Each of these entities had its distinct political and social systems, which Europeans later equated with barbarism and savagery. Consequently, multipolarism is entirely plausible, which was the case for humanity before the emergence of Western global imperial politics in the modern era. This does not imply an immediate establishment of global peace; however, such a multipolar world system would inherently be more just and balanced. All conflicts would be approached based on a fair and collective stance, in which humanity would be protected from racial injustices akin to those witnessed in Nazi Germany, contemporary Israel, or the aggressive dominance of the global West. Source: https://en.majalla.com *Translated and coordinated by Ramia Yahia Read More
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  • Britain’s Special SAS Forces in Gaza. The ICC Must Investigate British Politicians for Gaza War Crimes.

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    The UK military and intelligence services may be aiding Israel’s attack on Gaza in at least seven ways. It is vital the International Criminal Court question Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly and Grant Shapps about this support.

    The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the only permanent global court to have jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putinover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

    Karim Khan, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has said the court has “active investigations ongoing” in relation to Gaza and the West Bank going back to 2014.

    During its current campaign against Gaza, Israel has violated Article 31 of the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilians by imposing collective punishment on 2.3m people by withdrawing all water, food and electricity. 

    By targeting civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and schools, Israel has also violated the same convention. Amnesty International has referred to Israel’s “killing of civilians on a mass scale” and documented “indiscriminate” attacks on civilians. 

    A team of UN experts has said Israel’s campaign in Gaza involves “crimes against humanity”.

    The ICC prosecutes individuals and any cases brought over Gaza should look at Israel’s international accomplices. British prime minister Rishi Sunak, foreign secretary James Cleverly – who oversees the UK’s foreign intelligence services – and defence secretary Grant Shapps – who oversees the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – could all be vulnerable to prosecution. 

    British ministers have provided strong diplomatic support for Israel’s military operations, including vetoing a resolution calling for a ceasefire at the UN Security Council. 

    Sunak has defended in parliament Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and its evacuation order to move over a million people from the north of the territory. He said the latter was “absolutely right”, claiming this was about protecting civilians.

    But the UK’s support goes further and should concern the ICC. Britain may be more directly participating in Israel’s crimes in Gaza with its military and intelligence assets.  

    However, the British military and intelligence relationship with Israel remains shrouded in secrecy. ICC investigators may be interested to investigate seven areas of potential UK support to Israel. 

    1. RAF in Eastern Mediterranean

    The UK announced it was sending military assets to the eastern Mediterranean on 13 October to “support Israel” as it bombed Gaza.  

    This included maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft whose tasks include looking for covert transfers of weapons to Palestinian militant groups. A Royal Navy task group was also moved to the eastern Mediterranean.

    The military package also includes two Royal Navy ships, three helicopters and a company of Royal Marines, who will “be on standby to deliver practical support to Israel and partners in the region”.

    The UK has a huge air base at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus, 230 miles from Gaza. In recent years the base has had seven Typhoon fighter jetsstationed there. It has also been central to the British war in Yemen. 

    BAE Systems-operated flights stopping at Akrotiri provide logistics support for UK-supplied aircraft and bombs used by the Saudi Air Force to strike Yemen. 

    The ICC would want to investigate the precise role that these UK military assets have played in Israel’s Gaza campaign. 

    2. Secret Agreement 

    In December 2020, a military cooperation agreement was signed by Britain and Israel. Despite the UK MoD describing it as an “important piece of defence diplomacy” which “strengthens” military ties, the British parliament and public has never seen what is in it. 

    The MoD has refused to publish it and has only briefly mentioned it in parliament once, in a response to a direct question from an MP.

    The agreement was signed by then chief of the defence staff Sir Nick Carter and his Israeli counterpart chief of general staff, Aviv Kohavi. 

    It was described as an “organising mechanism for our relationship” which “formalises our defence relationship”. It provides “a mechanism for planning our joint activity, allowing collaboration on a number of areas”.

    It is suspicious that the agreement is being kept at a high security classification. It is possible the accord “strengthens” the relationship between the two militaries to the degree that it places some obligations on the UK to defend Israel, through the provision of information, intelligence or material support.

    The ICC should want to see a copy of the agreement to assess the UK’s military role in Israel’s campaign in Gaza. 

    3. GCHQ in Cyprus

    Britain’s so-called Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) in Cyprus are home to important sites for the UK largest spy agency GCHQ. Its communication interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern SBA, Dhekelia, hoovers up calls, texts, and emails from across the Middle East, and sits 220 miles from Gaza. 

    GCHQ has a central role in UK warwaging and has explicitly said that “wherever and whenever the military have deployed over the years, we have supported them”. 

    GCHQ also has a close relationship with Israel. Documents revealed by US whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 showed the US National Security Agency was providing data to its counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU), which monitors and targets Palestinians.

    A key partner of the NSA and ISNU was GCHQ, which fed the Israelis selected communications data it collected. In 2009, during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that left nearly 1,400 people dead, including 344 children, this involved sharing information on Palestinians, the documents showed.

    The then director of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, said in 2017 that his organisation had a “strong partnership with our Israeli counterparts in signals intelligence” and that “we are building on an excellent cyber relationship with a range of Israeli bodies”.

    It is unclear what this amounts to. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a 2017 BBC interview that there was “intense cooperation between our security intelligence agencies” which “has saved many lives”. 

    The ICC would want to assess the degree of GCHQ intelligence sharing with Israeli counterparts as part of its current Gaza campaign. 

    4. SAS in Gaza

    The Sun reported on 27 October that Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS), an elite special forces unit which is completely outside of democratic oversight, is now on “standby” in Cyprus to – it was claimed – rescue British hostages held captive by Hamas and Britons who are trapped in Gaza.

    The leak of this information is likely to have come from the UK military, which carefully manages its media profile. It is possible, however, that the SAS may also have an advisory military, or even combat, role in the region, in support of Israel. 

    British covert forces recently operated with Saudi Arabia in a secret war in Yemen. 

    The UK military’s “D-Notice” committee, which seeks to stop the media publishing information it claims would damage national security, requested on 28 October all media editors to not publish information relating to SAS operations in Gaza.

    The only media outlet which publicised and defied the D-Notice was Socialist Worker, a small weekly newspaper. It is assumed the rest of the British media has acceded to withholding information related to UK special forces’ involvement in Gaza. 

    The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the role played by its special forces in Gaza and the immediate region. 

    5. US Spy Force on British Cyprus

    The US Air Force has had a base on British territory on Cyprus for nearly half a century, but its size was long kept secret from the public on both sides of the Atlantic. 

    Declassified recently revealed that the US is expanding its deployment on RAF Akrotiri to 129 airmen and building a new 147-room installation across 1.5 acres to house its personnel.

    Declassified also revealed that a US spy force, the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron (ERS), is permanently deployed at the British base despite Pentagon claims it only has one airman on Cyprus. 

    This squadron is the US military’s oldest flying unit and responsible for training all high-altitude intelligence and reconnaissance aircrew for the U-2 spy plane, which wasoriginally operated by the CIA. 

    The ERS, which is headquartered at Beale Air Force Base in California, also flies 2,400 hours of “combat support” missions annually with the RQ-4 Global Hawk, a surveillance drone manufactured by US arms company Northrop Grumman.

    This US squadron is based 230 miles from Gaza and could be supplying intelligence and “combat support” to aid Israeli military operations, given the US is Israel’s most important military ally. 

    The UK MoD refuses to disclose the number of US military personnel on British territory. A Cypriot working on the UK base area told us last year: “There is a big US presence, I don’t know how that works or why.”

    The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the potential role of this US spy force operating on British territory in the Gaza campaign. 

    6. NSA in Cyprus

    Edward Snowden’s leaks in 2013 revealed the extensive US National Security Agency (NSA) presence across the British territories on Cyprus. A top secret GCHQ document noted: “Cyprus hosts a wide range of UK and US intelligence facilities”.

    These facilities were said to include the communications interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern base, Dhekelia, which also hosts a measurement and signatures intelligence, or MASINT, component. This highly technical field detects and describes the specific characteristics of target objects and sources.

    Two more MASINT locations operating in partnership with the US are found on the Western base, including an unmanned facility at Cape Gata, just up from RAF Akrotiri.

    At RAF Troodos, a British “retained site” near the border with northern Cyprus, the US operates another listening post, which utilises covert electronic intelligence gathering. The Troodos site, GCHQ noted, “has long been regarded as a ‘Jewel in the Crown’ by NSA as it offers unique access to the Levant, North Africa, and Turkey”.

    The document added: “Weapons-related collection from Troodos is used to support technical [signal intelligence] analysts in the US and UK.”

    The ICC would want to investigate whether the NSA on British Cyprus is sharing intelligence with the Israelis regarding their campaign in Gaza. 

    7. UK military in Israel and West Bank

    The UK government has said it has threepermanent military personnel in Israel, all based in the British embassy in Tel Aviv. The MoD has said they “carry out key activities in defence engagement and diplomacy”. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has five personnel on duty in Britain for liaison and training purposes, according to the MoD. 

    The MoD is also a key player in a multimillion pound British aid project in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – called the Middle East Peace Process Programme – to develop “more capable” Palestinian security forces who can prevent the “potential overspill of violence into Israel”.

    The project is funded through the £1.3bn Conflict, Security and Stability Fund, which a parliamentary committee has compared to a “slush fund” for financing projects that do not “meet the needs of UK national security”.

    A funding breakdown of the programme shows the MoD received £2.3m in 2017-18 for the “British Support Team” based in Ramallah in the West Bank, through which the training of Palestinian forces is organised.

    The MoD has refused to disclose the location and numbers of these UK military personnel for security reasons.

    But Declassified has revealed the team consists of seven British military personnel drawn from the army and air force and is led by a brigadier.

    The ICC would want to investigate what role the UK military personnel in Tel Aviv and Ramallah play in Israeli operations. 

    *

    Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.

    Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt

    Mark Curtis is the editor of Declassified UK, and the author of five books and many articles on UK foreign policy. 

    Featured image is from Craig Murray
    Britain’s Special SAS Forces in Gaza. The ICC Must Investigate British Politicians for Gaza War Crimes. All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name. To receive Global Research’s Daily Newsletter (selected articles), click here. Click the share button above to email/forward this article to your friends and colleagues. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles. *** The UK military and intelligence services may be aiding Israel’s attack on Gaza in at least seven ways. It is vital the International Criminal Court question Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly and Grant Shapps about this support. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the only permanent global court to have jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putinover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  Karim Khan, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has said the court has “active investigations ongoing” in relation to Gaza and the West Bank going back to 2014. During its current campaign against Gaza, Israel has violated Article 31 of the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilians by imposing collective punishment on 2.3m people by withdrawing all water, food and electricity.  By targeting civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and schools, Israel has also violated the same convention. Amnesty International has referred to Israel’s “killing of civilians on a mass scale” and documented “indiscriminate” attacks on civilians.  A team of UN experts has said Israel’s campaign in Gaza involves “crimes against humanity”. The ICC prosecutes individuals and any cases brought over Gaza should look at Israel’s international accomplices. British prime minister Rishi Sunak, foreign secretary James Cleverly – who oversees the UK’s foreign intelligence services – and defence secretary Grant Shapps – who oversees the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – could all be vulnerable to prosecution.  British ministers have provided strong diplomatic support for Israel’s military operations, including vetoing a resolution calling for a ceasefire at the UN Security Council.  Sunak has defended in parliament Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and its evacuation order to move over a million people from the north of the territory. He said the latter was “absolutely right”, claiming this was about protecting civilians. But the UK’s support goes further and should concern the ICC. Britain may be more directly participating in Israel’s crimes in Gaza with its military and intelligence assets.   However, the British military and intelligence relationship with Israel remains shrouded in secrecy. ICC investigators may be interested to investigate seven areas of potential UK support to Israel.  1. RAF in Eastern Mediterranean The UK announced it was sending military assets to the eastern Mediterranean on 13 October to “support Israel” as it bombed Gaza.   This included maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft whose tasks include looking for covert transfers of weapons to Palestinian militant groups. A Royal Navy task group was also moved to the eastern Mediterranean. The military package also includes two Royal Navy ships, three helicopters and a company of Royal Marines, who will “be on standby to deliver practical support to Israel and partners in the region”. The UK has a huge air base at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus, 230 miles from Gaza. In recent years the base has had seven Typhoon fighter jetsstationed there. It has also been central to the British war in Yemen.  BAE Systems-operated flights stopping at Akrotiri provide logistics support for UK-supplied aircraft and bombs used by the Saudi Air Force to strike Yemen.  The ICC would want to investigate the precise role that these UK military assets have played in Israel’s Gaza campaign.  2. Secret Agreement  In December 2020, a military cooperation agreement was signed by Britain and Israel. Despite the UK MoD describing it as an “important piece of defence diplomacy” which “strengthens” military ties, the British parliament and public has never seen what is in it.  The MoD has refused to publish it and has only briefly mentioned it in parliament once, in a response to a direct question from an MP. The agreement was signed by then chief of the defence staff Sir Nick Carter and his Israeli counterpart chief of general staff, Aviv Kohavi.  It was described as an “organising mechanism for our relationship” which “formalises our defence relationship”. It provides “a mechanism for planning our joint activity, allowing collaboration on a number of areas”. It is suspicious that the agreement is being kept at a high security classification. It is possible the accord “strengthens” the relationship between the two militaries to the degree that it places some obligations on the UK to defend Israel, through the provision of information, intelligence or material support. The ICC should want to see a copy of the agreement to assess the UK’s military role in Israel’s campaign in Gaza.  3. GCHQ in Cyprus Britain’s so-called Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) in Cyprus are home to important sites for the UK largest spy agency GCHQ. Its communication interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern SBA, Dhekelia, hoovers up calls, texts, and emails from across the Middle East, and sits 220 miles from Gaza.  GCHQ has a central role in UK warwaging and has explicitly said that “wherever and whenever the military have deployed over the years, we have supported them”.  GCHQ also has a close relationship with Israel. Documents revealed by US whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 showed the US National Security Agency was providing data to its counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU), which monitors and targets Palestinians. A key partner of the NSA and ISNU was GCHQ, which fed the Israelis selected communications data it collected. In 2009, during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that left nearly 1,400 people dead, including 344 children, this involved sharing information on Palestinians, the documents showed. The then director of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, said in 2017 that his organisation had a “strong partnership with our Israeli counterparts in signals intelligence” and that “we are building on an excellent cyber relationship with a range of Israeli bodies”. It is unclear what this amounts to. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a 2017 BBC interview that there was “intense cooperation between our security intelligence agencies” which “has saved many lives”.  The ICC would want to assess the degree of GCHQ intelligence sharing with Israeli counterparts as part of its current Gaza campaign.  4. SAS in Gaza The Sun reported on 27 October that Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS), an elite special forces unit which is completely outside of democratic oversight, is now on “standby” in Cyprus to – it was claimed – rescue British hostages held captive by Hamas and Britons who are trapped in Gaza. The leak of this information is likely to have come from the UK military, which carefully manages its media profile. It is possible, however, that the SAS may also have an advisory military, or even combat, role in the region, in support of Israel.  British covert forces recently operated with Saudi Arabia in a secret war in Yemen.  The UK military’s “D-Notice” committee, which seeks to stop the media publishing information it claims would damage national security, requested on 28 October all media editors to not publish information relating to SAS operations in Gaza. The only media outlet which publicised and defied the D-Notice was Socialist Worker, a small weekly newspaper. It is assumed the rest of the British media has acceded to withholding information related to UK special forces’ involvement in Gaza.  The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the role played by its special forces in Gaza and the immediate region.  5. US Spy Force on British Cyprus The US Air Force has had a base on British territory on Cyprus for nearly half a century, but its size was long kept secret from the public on both sides of the Atlantic.  Declassified recently revealed that the US is expanding its deployment on RAF Akrotiri to 129 airmen and building a new 147-room installation across 1.5 acres to house its personnel. Declassified also revealed that a US spy force, the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron (ERS), is permanently deployed at the British base despite Pentagon claims it only has one airman on Cyprus.  This squadron is the US military’s oldest flying unit and responsible for training all high-altitude intelligence and reconnaissance aircrew for the U-2 spy plane, which wasoriginally operated by the CIA.  The ERS, which is headquartered at Beale Air Force Base in California, also flies 2,400 hours of “combat support” missions annually with the RQ-4 Global Hawk, a surveillance drone manufactured by US arms company Northrop Grumman. This US squadron is based 230 miles from Gaza and could be supplying intelligence and “combat support” to aid Israeli military operations, given the US is Israel’s most important military ally.  The UK MoD refuses to disclose the number of US military personnel on British territory. A Cypriot working on the UK base area told us last year: “There is a big US presence, I don’t know how that works or why.” The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the potential role of this US spy force operating on British territory in the Gaza campaign.  6. NSA in Cyprus Edward Snowden’s leaks in 2013 revealed the extensive US National Security Agency (NSA) presence across the British territories on Cyprus. A top secret GCHQ document noted: “Cyprus hosts a wide range of UK and US intelligence facilities”. These facilities were said to include the communications interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern base, Dhekelia, which also hosts a measurement and signatures intelligence, or MASINT, component. This highly technical field detects and describes the specific characteristics of target objects and sources. Two more MASINT locations operating in partnership with the US are found on the Western base, including an unmanned facility at Cape Gata, just up from RAF Akrotiri. At RAF Troodos, a British “retained site” near the border with northern Cyprus, the US operates another listening post, which utilises covert electronic intelligence gathering. The Troodos site, GCHQ noted, “has long been regarded as a ‘Jewel in the Crown’ by NSA as it offers unique access to the Levant, North Africa, and Turkey”. The document added: “Weapons-related collection from Troodos is used to support technical [signal intelligence] analysts in the US and UK.” The ICC would want to investigate whether the NSA on British Cyprus is sharing intelligence with the Israelis regarding their campaign in Gaza.  7. UK military in Israel and West Bank The UK government has said it has threepermanent military personnel in Israel, all based in the British embassy in Tel Aviv. The MoD has said they “carry out key activities in defence engagement and diplomacy”. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has five personnel on duty in Britain for liaison and training purposes, according to the MoD.  The MoD is also a key player in a multimillion pound British aid project in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – called the Middle East Peace Process Programme – to develop “more capable” Palestinian security forces who can prevent the “potential overspill of violence into Israel”. The project is funded through the £1.3bn Conflict, Security and Stability Fund, which a parliamentary committee has compared to a “slush fund” for financing projects that do not “meet the needs of UK national security”. A funding breakdown of the programme shows the MoD received £2.3m in 2017-18 for the “British Support Team” based in Ramallah in the West Bank, through which the training of Palestinian forces is organised. The MoD has refused to disclose the location and numbers of these UK military personnel for security reasons. But Declassified has revealed the team consists of seven British military personnel drawn from the army and air force and is led by a brigadier. The ICC would want to investigate what role the UK military personnel in Tel Aviv and Ramallah play in Israeli operations.  * Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles. Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt Mark Curtis is the editor of Declassified UK, and the author of five books and many articles on UK foreign policy.  Featured image is from Craig Murray
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  • Britain’s Special SAS Forces in Gaza. The ICC Must Investigate British Politicians for Gaza War Crimes.

    All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name.

    To receive Global Research’s Daily Newsletter (selected articles), click here.

    Click the share button above to email/forward this article to your friends and colleagues. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.

    ***

    The UK military and intelligence services may be aiding Israel’s attack on Gaza in at least seven ways. It is vital the International Criminal Court question Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly and Grant Shapps about this support.

    The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the only permanent global court to have jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putinover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 

    Karim Khan, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has said the court has “active investigations ongoing” in relation to Gaza and the West Bank going back to 2014.

    During its current campaign against Gaza, Israel has violated Article 31 of the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilians by imposing collective punishment on 2.3m people by withdrawing all water, food and electricity. 

    By targeting civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and schools, Israel has also violated the same convention. Amnesty International has referred to Israel’s “killing of civilians on a mass scale” and documented “indiscriminate” attacks on civilians. 

    A team of UN experts has said Israel’s campaign in Gaza involves “crimes against humanity”.

    The ICC prosecutes individuals and any cases brought over Gaza should look at Israel’s international accomplices. British prime minister Rishi Sunak, foreign secretary James Cleverly – who oversees the UK’s foreign intelligence services – and defence secretary Grant Shapps – who oversees the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – could all be vulnerable to prosecution. 

    British ministers have provided strong diplomatic support for Israel’s military operations, including vetoing a resolution calling for a ceasefire at the UN Security Council. 

    Sunak has defended in parliament Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and its evacuation order to move over a million people from the north of the territory. He said the latter was “absolutely right”, claiming this was about protecting civilians.

    But the UK’s support goes further and should concern the ICC. Britain may be more directly participating in Israel’s crimes in Gaza with its military and intelligence assets.  

    However, the British military and intelligence relationship with Israel remains shrouded in secrecy. ICC investigators may be interested to investigate seven areas of potential UK support to Israel. 

    1. RAF in Eastern Mediterranean

    The UK announced it was sending military assets to the eastern Mediterranean on 13 October to “support Israel” as it bombed Gaza.  

    This included maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft whose tasks include looking for covert transfers of weapons to Palestinian militant groups. A Royal Navy task group was also moved to the eastern Mediterranean.

    The military package also includes two Royal Navy ships, three helicopters and a company of Royal Marines, who will “be on standby to deliver practical support to Israel and partners in the region”.

    The UK has a huge air base at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus, 230 miles from Gaza. In recent years the base has had seven Typhoon fighter jetsstationed there. It has also been central to the British war in Yemen. 

    BAE Systems-operated flights stopping at Akrotiri provide logistics support for UK-supplied aircraft and bombs used by the Saudi Air Force to strike Yemen. 

    The ICC would want to investigate the precise role that these UK military assets have played in Israel’s Gaza campaign. 

    2. Secret Agreement 

    In December 2020, a military cooperation agreement was signed by Britain and Israel. Despite the UK MoD describing it as an “important piece of defence diplomacy” which “strengthens” military ties, the British parliament and public has never seen what is in it. 

    The MoD has refused to publish it and has only briefly mentioned it in parliament once, in a response to a direct question from an MP.

    The agreement was signed by then chief of the defence staff Sir Nick Carter and his Israeli counterpart chief of general staff, Aviv Kohavi. 

    It was described as an “organising mechanism for our relationship” which “formalises our defence relationship”. It provides “a mechanism for planning our joint activity, allowing collaboration on a number of areas”.

    It is suspicious that the agreement is being kept at a high security classification. It is possible the accord “strengthens” the relationship between the two militaries to the degree that it places some obligations on the UK to defend Israel, through the provision of information, intelligence or material support.

    The ICC should want to see a copy of the agreement to assess the UK’s military role in Israel’s campaign in Gaza. 

    3. GCHQ in Cyprus

    Britain’s so-called Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) in Cyprus are home to important sites for the UK largest spy agency GCHQ. Its communication interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern SBA, Dhekelia, hoovers up calls, texts, and emails from across the Middle East, and sits 220 miles from Gaza. 

    GCHQ has a central role in UK warwaging and has explicitly said that “wherever and whenever the military have deployed over the years, we have supported them”. 

    GCHQ also has a close relationship with Israel. Documents revealed by US whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 showed the US National Security Agency was providing data to its counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU), which monitors and targets Palestinians.

    A key partner of the NSA and ISNU was GCHQ, which fed the Israelis selected communications data it collected. In 2009, during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that left nearly 1,400 people dead, including 344 children, this involved sharing information on Palestinians, the documents showed.

    The then director of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, said in 2017 that his organisation had a “strong partnership with our Israeli counterparts in signals intelligence” and that “we are building on an excellent cyber relationship with a range of Israeli bodies”.

    It is unclear what this amounts to. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a 2017 BBC interview that there was “intense cooperation between our security intelligence agencies” which “has saved many lives”. 

    The ICC would want to assess the degree of GCHQ intelligence sharing with Israeli counterparts as part of its current Gaza campaign. 

    4. SAS in Gaza

    The Sun reported on 27 October that Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS), an elite special forces unit which is completely outside of democratic oversight, is now on “standby” in Cyprus to – it was claimed – rescue British hostages held captive by Hamas and Britons who are trapped in Gaza.

    The leak of this information is likely to have come from the UK military, which carefully manages its media profile. It is possible, however, that the SAS may also have an advisory military, or even combat, role in the region, in support of Israel. 

    British covert forces recently operated with Saudi Arabia in a secret war in Yemen. 

    The UK military’s “D-Notice” committee, which seeks to stop the media publishing information it claims would damage national security, requested on 28 October all media editors to not publish information relating to SAS operations in Gaza.

    The only media outlet which publicised and defied the D-Notice was Socialist Worker, a small weekly newspaper. It is assumed the rest of the British media has acceded to withholding information related to UK special forces’ involvement in Gaza. 

    The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the role played by its special forces in Gaza and the immediate region. 

    5. US Spy Force on British Cyprus

    The US Air Force has had a base on British territory on Cyprus for nearly half a century, but its size was long kept secret from the public on both sides of the Atlantic. 

    Declassified recently revealed that the US is expanding its deployment on RAF Akrotiri to 129 airmen and building a new 147-room installation across 1.5 acres to house its personnel.

    Declassified also revealed that a US spy force, the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron (ERS), is permanently deployed at the British base despite Pentagon claims it only has one airman on Cyprus. 

    This squadron is the US military’s oldest flying unit and responsible for training all high-altitude intelligence and reconnaissance aircrew for the U-2 spy plane, which wasoriginally operated by the CIA. 

    The ERS, which is headquartered at Beale Air Force Base in California, also flies 2,400 hours of “combat support” missions annually with the RQ-4 Global Hawk, a surveillance drone manufactured by US arms company Northrop Grumman.

    This US squadron is based 230 miles from Gaza and could be supplying intelligence and “combat support” to aid Israeli military operations, given the US is Israel’s most important military ally. 

    The UK MoD refuses to disclose the number of US military personnel on British territory. A Cypriot working on the UK base area told us last year: “There is a big US presence, I don’t know how that works or why.”

    The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the potential role of this US spy force operating on British territory in the Gaza campaign. 

    6. NSA in Cyprus

    Edward Snowden’s leaks in 2013 revealed the extensive US National Security Agency (NSA) presence across the British territories on Cyprus. A top secret GCHQ document noted: “Cyprus hosts a wide range of UK and US intelligence facilities”.

    These facilities were said to include the communications interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern base, Dhekelia, which also hosts a measurement and signatures intelligence, or MASINT, component. This highly technical field detects and describes the specific characteristics of target objects and sources.

    Two more MASINT locations operating in partnership with the US are found on the Western base, including an unmanned facility at Cape Gata, just up from RAF Akrotiri.

    At RAF Troodos, a British “retained site” near the border with northern Cyprus, the US operates another listening post, which utilises covert electronic intelligence gathering. The Troodos site, GCHQ noted, “has long been regarded as a ‘Jewel in the Crown’ by NSA as it offers unique access to the Levant, North Africa, and Turkey”.

    The document added: “Weapons-related collection from Troodos is used to support technical [signal intelligence] analysts in the US and UK.”

    The ICC would want to investigate whether the NSA on British Cyprus is sharing intelligence with the Israelis regarding their campaign in Gaza. 

    7. UK military in Israel and West Bank

    The UK government has said it has threepermanent military personnel in Israel, all based in the British embassy in Tel Aviv. The MoD has said they “carry out key activities in defence engagement and diplomacy”. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has five personnel on duty in Britain for liaison and training purposes, according to the MoD. 

    The MoD is also a key player in a multimillion pound British aid project in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – called the Middle East Peace Process Programme – to develop “more capable” Palestinian security forces who can prevent the “potential overspill of violence into Israel”.

    The project is funded through the £1.3bn Conflict, Security and Stability Fund, which a parliamentary committee has compared to a “slush fund” for financing projects that do not “meet the needs of UK national security”.

    A funding breakdown of the programme shows the MoD received £2.3m in 2017-18 for the “British Support Team” based in Ramallah in the West Bank, through which the training of Palestinian forces is organised.

    The MoD has refused to disclose the location and numbers of these UK military personnel for security reasons.

    But Declassified has revealed the team consists of seven British military personnel drawn from the army and air force and is led by a brigadier.

    The ICC would want to investigate what role the UK military personnel in Tel Aviv and Ramallah play in Israeli operations. 

    *

    Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.

    Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt

    Mark Curtis is the editor of Declassified UK, and the author of five books and many articles on UK foreign policy. 

    Featured image is from Craig Murray
    Britain’s Special SAS Forces in Gaza. The ICC Must Investigate British Politicians for Gaza War Crimes. All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name. To receive Global Research’s Daily Newsletter (selected articles), click here. Click the share button above to email/forward this article to your friends and colleagues. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles. *** The UK military and intelligence services may be aiding Israel’s attack on Gaza in at least seven ways. It is vital the International Criminal Court question Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly and Grant Shapps about this support. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the only permanent global court to have jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putinover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  Karim Khan, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has said the court has “active investigations ongoing” in relation to Gaza and the West Bank going back to 2014. During its current campaign against Gaza, Israel has violated Article 31 of the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilians by imposing collective punishment on 2.3m people by withdrawing all water, food and electricity.  By targeting civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and schools, Israel has also violated the same convention. Amnesty International has referred to Israel’s “killing of civilians on a mass scale” and documented “indiscriminate” attacks on civilians.  A team of UN experts has said Israel’s campaign in Gaza involves “crimes against humanity”. The ICC prosecutes individuals and any cases brought over Gaza should look at Israel’s international accomplices. British prime minister Rishi Sunak, foreign secretary James Cleverly – who oversees the UK’s foreign intelligence services – and defence secretary Grant Shapps – who oversees the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – could all be vulnerable to prosecution.  British ministers have provided strong diplomatic support for Israel’s military operations, including vetoing a resolution calling for a ceasefire at the UN Security Council.  Sunak has defended in parliament Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and its evacuation order to move over a million people from the north of the territory. He said the latter was “absolutely right”, claiming this was about protecting civilians. But the UK’s support goes further and should concern the ICC. Britain may be more directly participating in Israel’s crimes in Gaza with its military and intelligence assets.   However, the British military and intelligence relationship with Israel remains shrouded in secrecy. ICC investigators may be interested to investigate seven areas of potential UK support to Israel.  1. RAF in Eastern Mediterranean The UK announced it was sending military assets to the eastern Mediterranean on 13 October to “support Israel” as it bombed Gaza.   This included maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft whose tasks include looking for covert transfers of weapons to Palestinian militant groups. A Royal Navy task group was also moved to the eastern Mediterranean. The military package also includes two Royal Navy ships, three helicopters and a company of Royal Marines, who will “be on standby to deliver practical support to Israel and partners in the region”. The UK has a huge air base at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus, 230 miles from Gaza. In recent years the base has had seven Typhoon fighter jetsstationed there. It has also been central to the British war in Yemen.  BAE Systems-operated flights stopping at Akrotiri provide logistics support for UK-supplied aircraft and bombs used by the Saudi Air Force to strike Yemen.  The ICC would want to investigate the precise role that these UK military assets have played in Israel’s Gaza campaign.  2. Secret Agreement  In December 2020, a military cooperation agreement was signed by Britain and Israel. Despite the UK MoD describing it as an “important piece of defence diplomacy” which “strengthens” military ties, the British parliament and public has never seen what is in it.  The MoD has refused to publish it and has only briefly mentioned it in parliament once, in a response to a direct question from an MP. The agreement was signed by then chief of the defence staff Sir Nick Carter and his Israeli counterpart chief of general staff, Aviv Kohavi.  It was described as an “organising mechanism for our relationship” which “formalises our defence relationship”. It provides “a mechanism for planning our joint activity, allowing collaboration on a number of areas”. It is suspicious that the agreement is being kept at a high security classification. It is possible the accord “strengthens” the relationship between the two militaries to the degree that it places some obligations on the UK to defend Israel, through the provision of information, intelligence or material support. The ICC should want to see a copy of the agreement to assess the UK’s military role in Israel’s campaign in Gaza.  3. GCHQ in Cyprus Britain’s so-called Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) in Cyprus are home to important sites for the UK largest spy agency GCHQ. Its communication interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern SBA, Dhekelia, hoovers up calls, texts, and emails from across the Middle East, and sits 220 miles from Gaza.  GCHQ has a central role in UK warwaging and has explicitly said that “wherever and whenever the military have deployed over the years, we have supported them”.  GCHQ also has a close relationship with Israel. Documents revealed by US whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 showed the US National Security Agency was providing data to its counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU), which monitors and targets Palestinians. A key partner of the NSA and ISNU was GCHQ, which fed the Israelis selected communications data it collected. In 2009, during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that left nearly 1,400 people dead, including 344 children, this involved sharing information on Palestinians, the documents showed. The then director of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, said in 2017 that his organisation had a “strong partnership with our Israeli counterparts in signals intelligence” and that “we are building on an excellent cyber relationship with a range of Israeli bodies”. It is unclear what this amounts to. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a 2017 BBC interview that there was “intense cooperation between our security intelligence agencies” which “has saved many lives”.  The ICC would want to assess the degree of GCHQ intelligence sharing with Israeli counterparts as part of its current Gaza campaign.  4. SAS in Gaza The Sun reported on 27 October that Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS), an elite special forces unit which is completely outside of democratic oversight, is now on “standby” in Cyprus to – it was claimed – rescue British hostages held captive by Hamas and Britons who are trapped in Gaza. The leak of this information is likely to have come from the UK military, which carefully manages its media profile. It is possible, however, that the SAS may also have an advisory military, or even combat, role in the region, in support of Israel.  British covert forces recently operated with Saudi Arabia in a secret war in Yemen.  The UK military’s “D-Notice” committee, which seeks to stop the media publishing information it claims would damage national security, requested on 28 October all media editors to not publish information relating to SAS operations in Gaza. The only media outlet which publicised and defied the D-Notice was Socialist Worker, a small weekly newspaper. It is assumed the rest of the British media has acceded to withholding information related to UK special forces’ involvement in Gaza.  The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the role played by its special forces in Gaza and the immediate region.  5. US Spy Force on British Cyprus The US Air Force has had a base on British territory on Cyprus for nearly half a century, but its size was long kept secret from the public on both sides of the Atlantic.  Declassified recently revealed that the US is expanding its deployment on RAF Akrotiri to 129 airmen and building a new 147-room installation across 1.5 acres to house its personnel. Declassified also revealed that a US spy force, the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron (ERS), is permanently deployed at the British base despite Pentagon claims it only has one airman on Cyprus.  This squadron is the US military’s oldest flying unit and responsible for training all high-altitude intelligence and reconnaissance aircrew for the U-2 spy plane, which wasoriginally operated by the CIA.  The ERS, which is headquartered at Beale Air Force Base in California, also flies 2,400 hours of “combat support” missions annually with the RQ-4 Global Hawk, a surveillance drone manufactured by US arms company Northrop Grumman. This US squadron is based 230 miles from Gaza and could be supplying intelligence and “combat support” to aid Israeli military operations, given the US is Israel’s most important military ally.  The UK MoD refuses to disclose the number of US military personnel on British territory. A Cypriot working on the UK base area told us last year: “There is a big US presence, I don’t know how that works or why.” The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the potential role of this US spy force operating on British territory in the Gaza campaign.  6. NSA in Cyprus Edward Snowden’s leaks in 2013 revealed the extensive US National Security Agency (NSA) presence across the British territories on Cyprus. A top secret GCHQ document noted: “Cyprus hosts a wide range of UK and US intelligence facilities”. These facilities were said to include the communications interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern base, Dhekelia, which also hosts a measurement and signatures intelligence, or MASINT, component. This highly technical field detects and describes the specific characteristics of target objects and sources. Two more MASINT locations operating in partnership with the US are found on the Western base, including an unmanned facility at Cape Gata, just up from RAF Akrotiri. At RAF Troodos, a British “retained site” near the border with northern Cyprus, the US operates another listening post, which utilises covert electronic intelligence gathering. The Troodos site, GCHQ noted, “has long been regarded as a ‘Jewel in the Crown’ by NSA as it offers unique access to the Levant, North Africa, and Turkey”. The document added: “Weapons-related collection from Troodos is used to support technical [signal intelligence] analysts in the US and UK.” The ICC would want to investigate whether the NSA on British Cyprus is sharing intelligence with the Israelis regarding their campaign in Gaza.  7. UK military in Israel and West Bank The UK government has said it has threepermanent military personnel in Israel, all based in the British embassy in Tel Aviv. The MoD has said they “carry out key activities in defence engagement and diplomacy”. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has five personnel on duty in Britain for liaison and training purposes, according to the MoD.  The MoD is also a key player in a multimillion pound British aid project in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – called the Middle East Peace Process Programme – to develop “more capable” Palestinian security forces who can prevent the “potential overspill of violence into Israel”. The project is funded through the £1.3bn Conflict, Security and Stability Fund, which a parliamentary committee has compared to a “slush fund” for financing projects that do not “meet the needs of UK national security”. A funding breakdown of the programme shows the MoD received £2.3m in 2017-18 for the “British Support Team” based in Ramallah in the West Bank, through which the training of Palestinian forces is organised. The MoD has refused to disclose the location and numbers of these UK military personnel for security reasons. But Declassified has revealed the team consists of seven British military personnel drawn from the army and air force and is led by a brigadier. The ICC would want to investigate what role the UK military personnel in Tel Aviv and Ramallah play in Israeli operations.  * Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles. Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt Mark Curtis is the editor of Declassified UK, and the author of five books and many articles on UK foreign policy.  Featured image is from Craig Murray
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  • Britain’s Special SAS Forces in Gaza. The ICC Must Investigate British Politicians for Gaza War Crimes.
    All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name.
    To receive Global Research’s Daily Newsletter (selected articles), click here.
    Click the share button above to email/forward this article to your friends and colleagues. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.
    ***
    The UK military and intelligence services may be aiding Israel’s attack on Gaza in at least seven ways. It is vital the International Criminal Court question Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly and Grant Shapps about this support.
    The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the only permanent global court to have jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putinover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. 
    Karim Khan, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has said the court has “active investigations ongoing” in relation to Gaza and the West Bank going back to 2014.
    During its current campaign against Gaza, Israel has violated Article 31 of the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilians by imposing collective punishment on 2.3m people by withdrawing all water, food and electricity. 
    By targeting civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and schools, Israel has also violated the same convention. Amnesty International has referred to Israel’s “killing of civilians on a mass scale” and documented “indiscriminate” attacks on civilians. 
    A team of UN experts has said Israel’s campaign in Gaza involves “crimes against humanity”.
    The ICC prosecutes individuals and any cases brought over Gaza should look at Israel’s international accomplices. British prime minister Rishi Sunak, foreign secretary James Cleverly – who oversees the UK’s foreign intelligence services – and defence secretary Grant Shapps – who oversees the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – could all be vulnerable to prosecution. 
    British ministers have provided strong diplomatic support for Israel’s military operations, including vetoing a resolution calling for a ceasefire at the UN Security Council. 
    Sunak has defended in parliament Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and its evacuation order to move over a million people from the north of the territory. He said the latter was “absolutely right”, claiming this was about protecting civilians.
    But the UK’s support goes further and should concern the ICC. Britain may be more directly participating in Israel’s crimes in Gaza with its military and intelligence assets.  
    However, the British military and intelligence relationship with Israel remains shrouded in secrecy. ICC investigators may be interested to investigate seven areas of potential UK support to Israel. 
    1. RAF in Eastern Mediterranean
    The UK announced it was sending military assets to the eastern Mediterranean on 13 October to “support Israel” as it bombed Gaza.  
    This included maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft whose tasks include looking for covert transfers of weapons to Palestinian militant groups. A Royal Navy task group was also moved to the eastern Mediterranean.
    The military package also includes two Royal Navy ships, three helicopters and a company of Royal Marines, who will “be on standby to deliver practical support to Israel and partners in the region”.
    The UK has a huge air base at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus, 230 miles from Gaza. In recent years the base has had seven Typhoon fighter jetsstationed there. It has also been central to the British war in Yemen. 
    BAE Systems-operated flights stopping at Akrotiri provide logistics support for UK-supplied aircraft and bombs used by the Saudi Air Force to strike Yemen. 
    The ICC would want to investigate the precise role that these UK military assets have played in Israel’s Gaza campaign. 
    2. Secret Agreement 
    In December 2020, a military cooperation agreement was signed by Britain and Israel. Despite the UK MoD describing it as an “important piece of defence diplomacy” which “strengthens” military ties, the British parliament and public has never seen what is in it. 
    The MoD has refused to publish it and has only briefly mentioned it in parliament once, in a response to a direct question from an MP.
    The agreement was signed by then chief of the defence staff Sir Nick Carter and his Israeli counterpart chief of general staff, Aviv Kohavi. 
    It was described as an “organising mechanism for our relationship” which “formalises our defence relationship”. It provides “a mechanism for planning our joint activity, allowing collaboration on a number of areas”.
    It is suspicious that the agreement is being kept at a high security classification. It is possible the accord “strengthens” the relationship between the two militaries to the degree that it places some obligations on the UK to defend Israel, through the provision of information, intelligence or material support.
    The ICC should want to see a copy of the agreement to assess the UK’s military role in Israel’s campaign in Gaza. 
    3. GCHQ in Cyprus
    Britain’s so-called Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) in Cyprus are home to important sites for the UK largest spy agency GCHQ. Its communication interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern SBA, Dhekelia, hoovers up calls, texts, and emails from across the Middle East, and sits 220 miles from Gaza. 
    GCHQ has a central role in UK warwaging and has explicitly said that “wherever and whenever the military have deployed over the years, we have supported them”. 
    GCHQ also has a close relationship with Israel. Documents revealed by US whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 showed the US National Security Agency was providing data to its counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU), which monitors and targets Palestinians.
    A key partner of the NSA and ISNU was GCHQ, which fed the Israelis selected communications data it collected. In 2009, during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that left nearly 1,400 people dead, including 344 children, this involved sharing information on Palestinians, the documents showed.
    The then director of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, said in 2017 that his organisation had a “strong partnership with our Israeli counterparts in signals intelligence” and that “we are building on an excellent cyber relationship with a range of Israeli bodies”.
    It is unclear what this amounts to. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a 2017 BBC interview that there was “intense cooperation between our security intelligence agencies” which “has saved many lives”. 
    The ICC would want to assess the degree of GCHQ intelligence sharing with Israeli counterparts as part of its current Gaza campaign. 
    4. SAS in Gaza
    The Sun reported on 27 October that Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS), an elite special forces unit which is completely outside of democratic oversight, is now on “standby” in Cyprus to – it was claimed – rescue British hostages held captive by Hamas and Britons who are trapped in Gaza.
    The leak of this information is likely to have come from the UK military, which carefully manages its media profile. It is possible, however, that the SAS may also have an advisory military, or even combat, role in the region, in support of Israel. 
    British covert forces recently operated with Saudi Arabia in a secret war in Yemen. 
    The UK military’s “D-Notice” committee, which seeks to stop the media publishing information it claims would damage national security, requested on 28 October all media editors to not publish information relating to SAS operations in Gaza.
    The only media outlet which publicised and defied the D-Notice was Socialist Worker, a small weekly newspaper. It is assumed the rest of the British media has acceded to withholding information related to UK special forces’ involvement in Gaza. 
    The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the role played by its special forces in Gaza and the immediate region. 
    5. US Spy Force on British Cyprus
    The US Air Force has had a base on British territory on Cyprus for nearly half a century, but its size was long kept secret from the public on both sides of the Atlantic. 
    Declassified recently revealed that the US is expanding its deployment on RAF Akrotiri to 129 airmen and building a new 147-room installation across 1.5 acres to house its personnel.
    Declassified also revealed that a US spy force, the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron (ERS), is permanently deployed at the British base despite Pentagon claims it only has one airman on Cyprus. 
    This squadron is the US military’s oldest flying unit and responsible for training all high-altitude intelligence and reconnaissance aircrew for the U-2 spy plane, which wasoriginally operated by the CIA. 
    The ERS, which is headquartered at Beale Air Force Base in California, also flies 2,400 hours of “combat support” missions annually with the RQ-4 Global Hawk, a surveillance drone manufactured by US arms company Northrop Grumman.
    This US squadron is based 230 miles from Gaza and could be supplying intelligence and “combat support” to aid Israeli military operations, given the US is Israel’s most important military ally. 
    The UK MoD refuses to disclose the number of US military personnel on British territory. A Cypriot working on the UK base area told us last year: “There is a big US presence, I don’t know how that works or why.”
    The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the potential role of this US spy force operating on British territory in the Gaza campaign. 
    6. NSA in Cyprus
    Edward Snowden’s leaks in 2013 revealed the extensive US National Security Agency (NSA) presence across the British territories on Cyprus. A top secret GCHQ document noted: “Cyprus hosts a wide range of UK and US intelligence facilities”.
    These facilities were said to include the communications interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern base, Dhekelia, which also hosts a measurement and signatures intelligence, or MASINT, component. This highly technical field detects and describes the specific characteristics of target objects and sources.
    Two more MASINT locations operating in partnership with the US are found on the Western base, including an unmanned facility at Cape Gata, just up from RAF Akrotiri.
    At RAF Troodos, a British “retained site” near the border with northern Cyprus, the US operates another listening post, which utilises covert electronic intelligence gathering. The Troodos site, GCHQ noted, “has long been regarded as a ‘Jewel in the Crown’ by NSA as it offers unique access to the Levant, North Africa, and Turkey”.
    The document added: “Weapons-related collection from Troodos is used to support technical [signal intelligence] analysts in the US and UK.”
    The ICC would want to investigate whether the NSA on British Cyprus is sharing intelligence with the Israelis regarding their campaign in Gaza. 
    7. UK military in Israel and West Bank
    The UK government has said it has threepermanent military personnel in Israel, all based in the British embassy in Tel Aviv. The MoD has said they “carry out key activities in defence engagement and diplomacy”. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has five personnel on duty in Britain for liaison and training purposes, according to the MoD. 
    The MoD is also a key player in a multimillion pound British aid project in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – called the Middle East Peace Process Programme – to develop “more capable” Palestinian security forces who can prevent the “potential overspill of violence into Israel”.
    The project is funded through the £1.3bn Conflict, Security and Stability Fund, which a parliamentary committee has compared to a “slush fund” for financing projects that do not “meet the needs of UK national security”.
    A funding breakdown of the programme shows the MoD received £2.3m in 2017-18 for the “British Support Team” based in Ramallah in the West Bank, through which the training of Palestinian forces is organised.
    The MoD has refused to disclose the location and numbers of these UK military personnel for security reasons.
    But Declassified has revealed the team consists of seven British military personnel drawn from the army and air force and is led by a brigadier.
    The ICC would want to investigate what role the UK military personnel in Tel Aviv and Ramallah play in Israeli operations. 
    *
    Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.
    Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt
    Mark Curtis is the editor of Declassified UK, and the author of five books and many articles on UK foreign policy. 
    Featured image is from Craig Murray
    Britain’s Special SAS Forces in Gaza. The ICC Must Investigate British Politicians for Gaza War Crimes. All Global Research articles can be read in 51 languages by activating the Translate Website button below the author’s name. To receive Global Research’s Daily Newsletter (selected articles), click here. Click the share button above to email/forward this article to your friends and colleagues. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles. *** The UK military and intelligence services may be aiding Israel’s attack on Gaza in at least seven ways. It is vital the International Criminal Court question Rishi Sunak, James Cleverly and Grant Shapps about this support. The International Criminal Court (ICC) is the only permanent global court to have jurisdiction to prosecute individuals for the international crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes. It recently issued an arrest warrant for Vladimir Putinover Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  Karim Khan, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, has said the court has “active investigations ongoing” in relation to Gaza and the West Bank going back to 2014. During its current campaign against Gaza, Israel has violated Article 31 of the Geneva Convention on Protection of Civilians by imposing collective punishment on 2.3m people by withdrawing all water, food and electricity.  By targeting civilian infrastructure such as hospitals and schools, Israel has also violated the same convention. Amnesty International has referred to Israel’s “killing of civilians on a mass scale” and documented “indiscriminate” attacks on civilians.  A team of UN experts has said Israel’s campaign in Gaza involves “crimes against humanity”. The ICC prosecutes individuals and any cases brought over Gaza should look at Israel’s international accomplices. British prime minister Rishi Sunak, foreign secretary James Cleverly – who oversees the UK’s foreign intelligence services – and defence secretary Grant Shapps – who oversees the Ministry of Defence (MoD) – could all be vulnerable to prosecution.  British ministers have provided strong diplomatic support for Israel’s military operations, including vetoing a resolution calling for a ceasefire at the UN Security Council.  Sunak has defended in parliament Israel’s collective punishment of Gaza and its evacuation order to move over a million people from the north of the territory. He said the latter was “absolutely right”, claiming this was about protecting civilians. But the UK’s support goes further and should concern the ICC. Britain may be more directly participating in Israel’s crimes in Gaza with its military and intelligence assets.   However, the British military and intelligence relationship with Israel remains shrouded in secrecy. ICC investigators may be interested to investigate seven areas of potential UK support to Israel.  1. RAF in Eastern Mediterranean The UK announced it was sending military assets to the eastern Mediterranean on 13 October to “support Israel” as it bombed Gaza.   This included maritime patrol and surveillance aircraft whose tasks include looking for covert transfers of weapons to Palestinian militant groups. A Royal Navy task group was also moved to the eastern Mediterranean. The military package also includes two Royal Navy ships, three helicopters and a company of Royal Marines, who will “be on standby to deliver practical support to Israel and partners in the region”. The UK has a huge air base at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus, 230 miles from Gaza. In recent years the base has had seven Typhoon fighter jetsstationed there. It has also been central to the British war in Yemen.  BAE Systems-operated flights stopping at Akrotiri provide logistics support for UK-supplied aircraft and bombs used by the Saudi Air Force to strike Yemen.  The ICC would want to investigate the precise role that these UK military assets have played in Israel’s Gaza campaign.  2. Secret Agreement  In December 2020, a military cooperation agreement was signed by Britain and Israel. Despite the UK MoD describing it as an “important piece of defence diplomacy” which “strengthens” military ties, the British parliament and public has never seen what is in it.  The MoD has refused to publish it and has only briefly mentioned it in parliament once, in a response to a direct question from an MP. The agreement was signed by then chief of the defence staff Sir Nick Carter and his Israeli counterpart chief of general staff, Aviv Kohavi.  It was described as an “organising mechanism for our relationship” which “formalises our defence relationship”. It provides “a mechanism for planning our joint activity, allowing collaboration on a number of areas”. It is suspicious that the agreement is being kept at a high security classification. It is possible the accord “strengthens” the relationship between the two militaries to the degree that it places some obligations on the UK to defend Israel, through the provision of information, intelligence or material support. The ICC should want to see a copy of the agreement to assess the UK’s military role in Israel’s campaign in Gaza.  3. GCHQ in Cyprus Britain’s so-called Sovereign Base Areas (SBA) in Cyprus are home to important sites for the UK largest spy agency GCHQ. Its communication interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern SBA, Dhekelia, hoovers up calls, texts, and emails from across the Middle East, and sits 220 miles from Gaza.  GCHQ has a central role in UK warwaging and has explicitly said that “wherever and whenever the military have deployed over the years, we have supported them”.  GCHQ also has a close relationship with Israel. Documents revealed by US whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 showed the US National Security Agency was providing data to its counterpart, the Israeli SIGINT National Unit (ISNU), which monitors and targets Palestinians. A key partner of the NSA and ISNU was GCHQ, which fed the Israelis selected communications data it collected. In 2009, during Israel’s Operation Cast Lead in Gaza that left nearly 1,400 people dead, including 344 children, this involved sharing information on Palestinians, the documents showed. The then director of GCHQ, Robert Hannigan, said in 2017 that his organisation had a “strong partnership with our Israeli counterparts in signals intelligence” and that “we are building on an excellent cyber relationship with a range of Israeli bodies”. It is unclear what this amounts to. Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a 2017 BBC interview that there was “intense cooperation between our security intelligence agencies” which “has saved many lives”.  The ICC would want to assess the degree of GCHQ intelligence sharing with Israeli counterparts as part of its current Gaza campaign.  4. SAS in Gaza The Sun reported on 27 October that Britain’s Special Air Service (SAS), an elite special forces unit which is completely outside of democratic oversight, is now on “standby” in Cyprus to – it was claimed – rescue British hostages held captive by Hamas and Britons who are trapped in Gaza. The leak of this information is likely to have come from the UK military, which carefully manages its media profile. It is possible, however, that the SAS may also have an advisory military, or even combat, role in the region, in support of Israel.  British covert forces recently operated with Saudi Arabia in a secret war in Yemen.  The UK military’s “D-Notice” committee, which seeks to stop the media publishing information it claims would damage national security, requested on 28 October all media editors to not publish information relating to SAS operations in Gaza. The only media outlet which publicised and defied the D-Notice was Socialist Worker, a small weekly newspaper. It is assumed the rest of the British media has acceded to withholding information related to UK special forces’ involvement in Gaza.  The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the role played by its special forces in Gaza and the immediate region.  5. US Spy Force on British Cyprus The US Air Force has had a base on British territory on Cyprus for nearly half a century, but its size was long kept secret from the public on both sides of the Atlantic.  Declassified recently revealed that the US is expanding its deployment on RAF Akrotiri to 129 airmen and building a new 147-room installation across 1.5 acres to house its personnel. Declassified also revealed that a US spy force, the 1st Expeditionary Reconnaissance Squadron (ERS), is permanently deployed at the British base despite Pentagon claims it only has one airman on Cyprus.  This squadron is the US military’s oldest flying unit and responsible for training all high-altitude intelligence and reconnaissance aircrew for the U-2 spy plane, which wasoriginally operated by the CIA.  The ERS, which is headquartered at Beale Air Force Base in California, also flies 2,400 hours of “combat support” missions annually with the RQ-4 Global Hawk, a surveillance drone manufactured by US arms company Northrop Grumman. This US squadron is based 230 miles from Gaza and could be supplying intelligence and “combat support” to aid Israeli military operations, given the US is Israel’s most important military ally.  The UK MoD refuses to disclose the number of US military personnel on British territory. A Cypriot working on the UK base area told us last year: “There is a big US presence, I don’t know how that works or why.” The ICC would want to request information from the British government about the potential role of this US spy force operating on British territory in the Gaza campaign.  6. NSA in Cyprus Edward Snowden’s leaks in 2013 revealed the extensive US National Security Agency (NSA) presence across the British territories on Cyprus. A top secret GCHQ document noted: “Cyprus hosts a wide range of UK and US intelligence facilities”. These facilities were said to include the communications interception facility at Ayios Nikolaos in the Eastern base, Dhekelia, which also hosts a measurement and signatures intelligence, or MASINT, component. This highly technical field detects and describes the specific characteristics of target objects and sources. Two more MASINT locations operating in partnership with the US are found on the Western base, including an unmanned facility at Cape Gata, just up from RAF Akrotiri. At RAF Troodos, a British “retained site” near the border with northern Cyprus, the US operates another listening post, which utilises covert electronic intelligence gathering. The Troodos site, GCHQ noted, “has long been regarded as a ‘Jewel in the Crown’ by NSA as it offers unique access to the Levant, North Africa, and Turkey”. The document added: “Weapons-related collection from Troodos is used to support technical [signal intelligence] analysts in the US and UK.” The ICC would want to investigate whether the NSA on British Cyprus is sharing intelligence with the Israelis regarding their campaign in Gaza.  7. UK military in Israel and West Bank The UK government has said it has threepermanent military personnel in Israel, all based in the British embassy in Tel Aviv. The MoD has said they “carry out key activities in defence engagement and diplomacy”. Meanwhile, the Israeli military has five personnel on duty in Britain for liaison and training purposes, according to the MoD.  The MoD is also a key player in a multimillion pound British aid project in the Israeli-occupied West Bank – called the Middle East Peace Process Programme – to develop “more capable” Palestinian security forces who can prevent the “potential overspill of violence into Israel”. The project is funded through the £1.3bn Conflict, Security and Stability Fund, which a parliamentary committee has compared to a “slush fund” for financing projects that do not “meet the needs of UK national security”. A funding breakdown of the programme shows the MoD received £2.3m in 2017-18 for the “British Support Team” based in Ramallah in the West Bank, through which the training of Palestinian forces is organised. The MoD has refused to disclose the location and numbers of these UK military personnel for security reasons. But Declassified has revealed the team consists of seven British military personnel drawn from the army and air force and is led by a brigadier. The ICC would want to investigate what role the UK military personnel in Tel Aviv and Ramallah play in Israeli operations.  * Note to readers: Please click the share button above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles. Matt Kennard is chief investigator at Declassified UK. He was a fellow and then director at the Centre for Investigative Journalism in London. Follow him on Twitter @kennardmatt Mark Curtis is the editor of Declassified UK, and the author of five books and many articles on UK foreign policy.  Featured image is from Craig Murray
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