Palestinian Artist Paints Mural on Apartheid Wall for Autistic Man Shot Dead by Israeli Police (VIDEO)

Source

June 16, 2020

Mural of Palestinian Iyad Hallaq on the Aparthied wall in Bethlehem. (Photo: via Twitter)

A Palestinian artist memorialized Palestinian autistic man Iyad Hallaq, 32, who was shot dead by Israeli police in Jerusalem on May 30.

A few days ago, Palestinian artist Taqieddin Sabatin painted a mural commemorating African American man George Floyd, who was killed by US police officers in Minneapolis, Minnesota, on May 25.



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Sabatin painted the Floyd and Hallaq murals on the concrete wall built by Israel to separate Bethlehem from Jerusalem in order to commemorate both victims of police brutality.

Hallaq, a 32-year-old man with the mental age of an 8-year-old child, was executed by Israeli forces while crouching behind his teacher near his special needs school in the Old City of Jerusalem.

His murder in cold blood brought to mind the killing in Minneapolis days earlier of George Floyd and made parallels of police brutality in the US against African Americans and in Palestine against Palestinian Arabs.

(Palestine Chronicle, WAFA, Social Media)

The other side of darkness: Towards an understanding of the roots of the Western right-wing politics

The other side of darkness: Towards an understanding of the roots of the Western right-wing politics

By Ken Leslie for The Saker Blog

1. A bit more on the protests

Again, I’d like to thank the Saker for publishing my essay. I also want to thank the commenters—criticisms inspire me and encouragement inspires me even more! I think we both agree that the public needs to be better informed about the roots and antecedents of the current US protests which have spread to most of the world. In a sense, this is a continuation of my previous polemic which received mainly negative reactions. Although I had anticipated this, I was still puzzled. Not only is the case for protests solid but all the counter-arguments (George was a criminal, Soros is funding the dreaded Antifa etc.) sounded hollow and contrived. The reasons for supporting the uprising (however ephemeral it might turn out to be) are overwhelming. If you empathise with the predicament of the Black Americans, you will see this as a genuine cri de coeur and demand for change (see recent pronouncements by Angela Davis, Cornel West, Black Agenda Report and Spike Lee). If you don’t and have been on the receiving end of the Empire’s benevolence for the last 70 years, you will appreciate the irony and the sight of the mighty Exceptionalistan (with apologies to Mr Escobar) stumbling around, riven to the bone by internal strife and hatred, for once focussed on its own misery and less able to inflict pain on the rest of the world. In the immortal words of Nancy Pelosi, “it is a wonderful sight to behold”.

So, why are most of the alternative media (with the honourable exception of Caitlin Johnstone and Saker) completely silent about such a momentous event. Moreover, media such as RT are actively engaged in smearing the protesters and bolstering the official right-wing narrative (in contrast to the Russian officials who have criticised the US posture). Is it possible that all the years of anti-imperial “struggle” have been a propaganda sham? It felt like I woke up inside a bad-ish dream in which the people around me turn into strangers. How could I be so disconnected from my friends and people I’ve been following and cheering on for years? Have I turned into a SJW overnight or have they all become raging racists? After a few days of pondering the strange situation, it occurred to me that neither interpretation was correct. Rather, the strange reaction that caused such a surprise was due to something else.

This is about reassuring the frightened white people that their status will not be threatened by the unruly unwashed masses. Everywhere, I see unproductive and uncreative white people hiding behind great inventions and works of art a la: What have the blacks invented/written/etc. Well, the black people have never done me any wrong and their music has enriched my life beyond measure. It was the white imperialists, racists and supremacists who have destroyed countless lives and nations. I feel no allegiance to these soulless people and am siding with the younger generation, black and white, which is tired of hypocrisy and psychopathy of power. In the meantime, several black men were ruthlessly killed by the police—and no, they were not career criminals.

To my Soros-hating friends: If you think that Soros is capable of organising and co-ordinating mass protests around the world so skilfully that none have been drowned in blood thus far, I sincerely believe that you are mistaken. By accusing Soros and the Illuminati of controlling the universal call for the end to neoliberal dictatorship, you are removing all sense of agency from a large proportion of humanity. You think they are stupid and incapable of recognising injustice. You in turn are condemned forever to bend your knee before brute force and false idols of the West. We live in a world governed by three unproductive parasite businesses whose profits dwarf GDPs of large states. Soros is targeting your democracy? Look at the state of the Western media – it is much worse than it was in the reviled Soviet Union. Your “culture”? Again, the USSR and the socialist block countries’ culture and education are still the envy of the world. The West did everything in its power, including pretending to be democratic, in order to destroy them. Forgive me if I don’t cry bitter tears over the legacy of slave owners and murderers. You are so afraid of change and so wedded to the rotten system that you are prepared to suffer countless indignities in order to feel superior to less fortunate human beings.

2. Ideological roots of US conservatism

This part will seem only tangentially relevant to the above section. Yet, I believe it is crucial for a better understanding of the current crisis in the United States. With the gradual revival of the right-wing politics in the West, there was some expectation that the nationalist politicians in Europe and the US would gradually defuse and dismantle the neoliberal order advanced by the United States and Great Britain ever since the 1980s. The fact that during this period both countries have been ruled by reactionary right-wing regimes leveraging patriotism and profit in order to squash any dissent or attempt at improving economic and social justice (and no, the Catholic convert war criminal Tony Blair does not count as a leftist).[1] You heard it right – it was the great anti-communist “patriot” Ronald Reagan who launched the United States on the road to perdition. A B-list Irish-American actor of questionable cognitive abilities, he was also one of the spiritual fathers of the alt-right. The irony must not be allowed to escape us—neoliberalism came from the right which has now morphed into fake “new nationalism” and anti-liberalism. That was the same Ronald Reagan who named April 10th (the founding of the Independent State of Croatia) a national holiday in California and laid flowers on the graves of SS butchers at Bitburg.

I am starting to believe that the exaggerated focus on and demonisation of Soros and his fake-left initiatives is a plan hatched by the fascist right aimed at hiding its dark purposes. This is not to say that Soros is innocent or God forbid—good. It simply means that in order to understand the current situation, we must reach beyond the platitudes served by people whose nefarious plans affect the entire world.

The topic I am trying to introduce here is vast and fascinating. It requires thousands of pages and it is utterly impossible to do it justice within a couple of thousand words. Yet, try I must. And although the subject matter is somewhat removed from the current focus on race, its understanding is crucial for a full appreciation of the roots of the current predicament of the US empire. The thesis I wish to develop is that far from being some kind of benign force whose aim is to liberate people from the yoke of evil Zionist Marxists, the Western right in all its forms is a reactionary, fascist, criminal cabal whose Drang was briefly interrupted in 1945 by the victorious Soviet army. This criminal enterprise which transformed the United States into the most powerful empire in history has many faces and hides behind many guises—anti-communism, conservatism (I consider myself a conservative with a small “c”), struggle for “freedom”, traditional family etc. None of these ideals is wrong in itself but is doubly invalidated if touted by liars, murderers, paedophiles and supremacists.

This is precisely what happened to the right in the West after 1945. It was hijacked by the Vatican and its agents. Their unctuous pronouncements on the sanctity of the family and nation hid unmentionable crimes against individuals and nations. My understanding of the pernicious role of the Roman Catholicism in world politics is so far removed from the current “Marxist Pope” alt-right blabber that I feel compelled to say something—and pronto. By the way, Jesuit Francisco Bergoglio was deeply involved in the dirty war in Argentina in which tens of thousands of innocent people were tortured and disappeared by the bloodthirsty fascist regime. So please, think twice before repeating the “Marxist Pope” trope. His “traditionalist” predecessor beat that by joining Hitler Youth. And what about his predecessor (the “holy” one)? There is evidence that he worked as a salesman for IG Farben, selling Zyklon B to the Nazis. And what about his predecessor? By all accounts a good and caring man intent on exposing the Vatican’s banking empire, pope John Paul I was dispatched after only 33 days on the throne. In this context, perhaps Pope Francis IS a raving Marxist.

It is important to state here that I do not wish to bash Roman Catholics, many of whom try to follow the teachings of Christ as best they can and many of whom have fought valiantly on the side of good. On the contrary, I am aiming to expose the nefarious role of the Vatican in the creation of the post-war quasi-fascist “West”, the role which has disgraced it forever and condemned it to increasing irrelevance. Nor am I trying to say that no other denominations/ethnicities have contributed to the rise of the US empire. I am simply shedding some light on a topic that has been largely neglected by Washington watchers in their blind focus on the “Jewish peril”. I see my essay as a belated attempt at “glasnost” and “perestroika” sorely needed by the West. It is a kind of catharsis that has been long time a-coming but like in the case of the USSR, it might have come too late.

Of course, here, I can only offer a brief sketch of how Roman Catholic networks underpin the current “Anglo-Saxon” hegemony. It was said by many that Adolf Hitler’s government was the most Catholic in German history (Himmler, Goebbels, Hitler and many others). It is interesting that the “patriotic” governments of Ronald Reagan were the most Catholic in the US history. Some of the RCs employed by Reagan (all Irish-American) included William Casey (Director of the CIA), Richard Allen (National Security Advisor), Judge William P. Clarke (National Security Advisor), Robert McFarlane (National Security Advisor), Alexander Haig (Secretary of State), Vernon Walters (Ambassador-at-Large), William Wilson (Ambassador to the Vatican State), Donald Regan (Secretary of the Treasury), Raymond Donovan (Secretary of Labour), Margaret Mary Heckler (Health and Human Services secretary), Joseph Biden (Subcommittee on European affairs), Daniel P. Moynihan (Near Eastern and South Asian Affairs), John Kerry, Terrorism (Narcotics, and International Communications), Christopher Dodd (Western Hemisphere and Peace Corps Affairs). Note the presence in the sub-fascist Reagan regime of two fake RC democrats—Biden and Kerry. This is just a further illustration of the point I made earlier that the “Democrats” are nothing but Repub light. The two faces of (the Roman god) Janus might disagree on abortion but never on the need to expand the empire and subdue/cleanse/convert the heathens. Why then would people anywhere in the world support either option is beyond me.

Thus, the ruling elites of the two most powerful empire states in the modern history were stuffed full of Roman Catholics at the point at which the destruction of the Soviet Union was on the cards. Of course, as shown on Saker’s website, the Roman Catholic hatred of Orthodox (and Protestant) Christianity goes back centuries and has little to do with stopping communism. The best proof of this is the fact that the cardinals in the Vatican jumped with joy on the news that the Orthodox Empire was overthrown (see works of Hansjakob Stehle). For a decade, they tried to co-opt the Bolshevik regime into giving the Church the religious primacy within the new state. When the Bolsheviks refused to play along, The Vatican suddenly discovered “the men of destiny” Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler, both of whom bent over backwards to please the Church. Here, president Putin explains once and for all who has been the principal enemy of Russia (he did not go as far back as the times of Alexander Nevsky).https://www.youtube.com/embed/F0g07j4HohU?feature=oembed

The question arises here—why has Donald Trump (himself a Jesuit pupil) surrounded himself with Roman Catholics? Many people are so obsessed with the Jews (the Zionist half of the Anglo-Zionist equation) that they are blind to the massive revival of political Catholicism under Trump. Given the predominance of (mainly Jewish) neocons in the previous governments and the synchronised attack on the paedophilia in the Catholic Church, Trump’s victory could be viewed as a mini Reconquista—return to the acme of late 1940s and early 1950s when under the guidance of Cardinal Spelman and Jesuit geopolitician Edmund Walsh, Joseph McCarthy hunted down (mainly Jewish) leftists. That was the time when the Catholic James Forrestal who had funded and co-ordinated the political cleansing of Italy jumped from a hospital window in a bout of anti-communist paranoia. That very same creature funded the Uniate Ukrainian Nazi rebellion inside the Soviet Union. The Vatican’s freedom fighters called their unit “Nightingale” after the notorious Ukrainian Nazi extermination battalion Nachtigall. Look no further if you wish to understand the current tragedy of the fake (Vatican-created) Ukrainian nation.

This was the golden time when the icon of Mary was taken from the Vatican to the US Embassy in Moscow to inspire the fight against “godless communism” and the Catholic fanatic Secretary of the Navy Francis Matthews advocated a nuclear first strike against the Soviets. It was the time when the Roman Catholic dictator Ngo Dinh Diem ruled South Vietnam with an iron fist, working hard to extinguish the Vietnamese Buddhists (almost 90% of the population) in a manner similar to that employed by Ante Pavelic in his Civitas Dei called the Independent State of Croatia. It was also a wonderful time when the Roman Catholic zealot William Donovan created the CIA and began work on the creation of the (Roman Catholic) EU. Those were the halcyon days of Jim Crow and the Nazi-loving Dulles brothers.

What has this got to do with Trump, you’ll ask? Well, the warmongering Russophobe Spellman’s private secretary was one Roy Cohn, a despicable “communist hunter” of McCarthy infamy and the prosecutor at the trial of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. As a Jew, Cohn worked very hard to ingratiate himself with the fascist Catholic underbelly of America which became equated with American “patriotism” mainly thanks to a clever propaganda campaign by the Church (remember hundreds of maudlin Hollywood renditions of Father Donovans, sergeant Kowalskis and constable O’Haras). Cohn leveraged his pathological anti-communism to become one of the great “power brokers” of US politics (both closeted gays and homophobes, Spellman and Cohn hid their true preferences behind a macho, patriotic façade). He was a popular guest at the court of Ronald Reagan and mentored a number of young conservative politicians before cosmic justice reasserted itself by granting him a painful death in 1986. One of Cohn’s mentees was young Donald Trump whose stellar rise to fame and power owed much to the machinations of a Roman Catholic fixer and Cohn’s protégé, Roger Stone.

The second “fixer” whose work was crucial in engineering the unlikely electoral victory for Trump is Steven Bannon. Although self-evidently Irish and RC, Bannon has flown below the pope-dar. All that most people remember about Bannon is his dissolute appearance and the fact that he used to work for Goldman-Sachs. And yet, Bannon is as close to an ideologue/geostrategic thinker as it is possible to get in the modern US. Bannon is the inheritor of the Roman Catholic geopolitical line which sees the United States as the bastion of Christianity that has to assert complete dominance over the world in order to defend the “civilisation” against the onslaught of socialist or more generally, non-Catholic powers. The progenitor of the “Christian” geopolitical school was Fr. Edmund Walsh, an Irish Jesuit whose views on the role of the United States in world affairs were and remain very influential. The (Jesuit) Georgetown University has a School of Diplomacy bearing Walsh’s name. This elite school sets the tone for the US global supremacist doctrine and has been the home to a number of RC war criminals including Kurt Waldheim (the patron of the Austrian-born “gobernator” of California Arnold S.), Lev Dobriansky and Madalene Albright.

Walsh’s co-religionist and successor, Zbigniew Brzezinski was instrumental in co-ordinating the joint Vatican-US offensive on the USSR which resulted in a decade of untold misery for the peoples of the USSR and Eastern Europe. He also played a critical role in the (s)election of Karol Wojtyla to the papal throne by (again) co-ordinating the work of US, Polish and German cardinals under the auspices of the CIA and US government. Compared with such “achievements”, Brzezinski’s role in fomenting the war in Afghanistan hardly deserves a mention.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, the geopolitical situation changed drastically and a dying Russia ceased to be seen as the primary enemy for a while. Focussing on Israel’s geopolitical needs, the ex-Trotskyite neocons schemed to destroy the possibility of a thriving and progressive Middle East. Like their RC patron Brzezinski, they zeroed in on the Islamist infrastructure and used it to destroy the region. Although this strategy seemed unconnected with Russia, it was conceived as a way of surrounding Russia with US Islamist proxies and weakening China by putting pressure on its western Muslim-inhabited regions. This strategy failed ignominiously with the entry of Russia into the war in Syria. At the same time, the economic slide of the United States accelerated and despite fake stock market interventions, Trump was faced with a difficult choice. Instead of fulfilling his anti-imperialist election promises, he tried to distract his supporters by blaming China for all America’s ills. This “last-chance saloon” strategy required an ideological firebrand who would provide necessary ammunition.

From Haaretz (2018): “Stephen Kevin Bannon was the third of five children in a Catholic family of Irish descent, born in 1953. His mother was a homemaker and his father a telephone technician. They sent young Steve to a Benedictine-Catholic military high school for boys. It was in Richmond, Virginia, the former capital of the Confederacy. There he received a classical education.”

Bannon’s rise was funded by among others Robert Mercer, the tech billionaire, who has a penchant for supporting right-wing Catholic politicians (Ted Cruz, Kellyanne Conway etc.). The symbiosis between right-wing WASPS and Roman Catholics in American political life is nothing new. A more interesting question is—how did Bannon manage to smuggle his right-wing Catholicism past the ever-vigilant Jewish-owned “liberal” media? By calling himself a Christian Zionist and a defender of the “Judeo-Christian” civilisation, Bannon skilfully shifted the US geopolitical doctrine from the failed neocon PNAC to the Antemurale Christianitatis (the bulwark of Christendom) model. This narrative sees the US in the same way that the above-mentioned RC fascists of the Eisenhower era viewed it—as a Panzerfaust of Western civilisation whose primary task is to destroy its (non-Catholic) enemies. In Bannon’s case, these enemies are Shia Islam and Communist China. This time around, the Jews are viewed as equals (at least for the time being). This shift from targeting Russia might be baffling but is easily explainable—again from Haaretz:

What the U.S. needs to do, he believes, is avoid pushing the Russians into the arms of the Chinese (which is critical for Israel with regard to the Iranian problem, where Russo-Chinese collusion could prove very problematic). Just as Henry Kissinger and Richard Nixon wanted to improve relations with China in order to isolate Russia, Bannon wants to improve relations with Russia in order to isolate China. That’s something Trump understands deeply, he says.

So, part of the reason why Russia-friendly commenters are reluctant to criticise Bannon and Trump is because ostensibly, the dynamic duo are treating Russia as an equal—a potential partner in a new Yalta-like carve-up of the world. This of course is a complete sham—a cheap and incredibly arrogant red herring. US politicians and experts understand very well that American empire is fading fast and that in order to maintain its grasp on the world, it must split its enemies and attack the more dangerous one first. By focussing on Russia, Bannon would have had to shed the mantle of a freedom fighter and concede that the underlying reason for American belligerence is a Crusade against non-Catholics. In the eyes of the Vatican, Orthodox Christians remain heathen barbarians. Hence the sanctions, murders of Russian diplomats and soldiers, theft of diplomatic property, ramped up threat of a nuclear attack, the ripping up of all nuclear agreements—all under Trump. At the same time, China, that last bastion of freedom from Roman Catholic imperialism, is thus a natural target for Bannon and Trump. Not only would Its destruction inject some badly-needed blood into the weakening body of the empire, it would also guarantee an instantaneous revival of Roman Catholicism as the most powerful religion in the world. The Vatican employed the same tactic against the Russian Empire and Soviet Union and its struggle for world domination continues apace. Bannon is simply their plausibly deniable pawn.

Attacking China is easy, especially for an RC ideologue. China is one of three countries that does not have formal relations with the Vatican (the United States succumbed under Ronald Reagan). China is “godless”, communist and authoritarian—all the tired tropes once used against the Soviet Union have been taken out of the closet only to be wielded by the bibulous Crusader knight to little effect. No mention of the Vatican’s genocides (at least three in the 20th Century), of the destruction of three Slav federations and the reunification of Germany under an RC camarilla (Kohl, Genscher, Kinkel etc.), the bloody concentration camp called Latin America—Roman Catholicism, even though completely discredited as a political force, is the last hope of the dying empire. Placing any false hope in the benevolence of this arch-criminal institution is dangerous and self-defeating. Russia and China must work together for a new world purged from imperialism and supremacism.

As can be seen from the actions and pronouncements of the Russian government, Russia is well aware of the Bannonite trap and is highly unlikely to fall for it. Why? Simply because Trump’s actions have been as anti-Russian as those taken any one of his hard-line predecessors. Instead of elaborating on this, I wish briefly to outline the mechanism behind the Bannon-inspired Hong Kong riots. The British (and the French) have been very adept at using religion in order to maintain their imperial possessions. The last governor of Hong Kong was Chris Patten—a zealous Roman Catholic who distinguished himself not only as a sworn enemy of the PRC but also as a notorious Serbo- and Russophobe. Although he ruled Hong Kong as an outpost of the empire, after the handover he became inordinately interested in the state of “democracy” there. In the shorthand of RC imperialism, “democracy” equals the takeover of institutions and media by the RC-friendly agents who then actively undermine the state’s ability to fight CIA-orchestrated colour revolutions. The principal RC agent in Hong Kong has been Cardinal Joseph Zen who has been fighting the “godless” communists for half a century. Patten ensured that a large number of RC-friendly agents remained embedded in the Hong Kong apparatus of government and that many West-friendly oligarchs were supported in their piratical activities.

The Patten-Zen nexus was behind the British involvement in the “umbrella revolution” of 2013 as well as the more recent unsuccessful protests. Hiding behind religion is an old imperialist ruse and the Chinese government had to be careful in order not to trigger a manufactured global outrage. The fact that they succeeded in dealing with the protests suggests that they are very much aware of the above points. Patten’s dark scheming received a significant boost with the election of Trump. To many of us, it was strange to see giant posters of Pepe the frog and US flags all over Hong Kong. The explanation was simple—the protests were directed by CIA cut-outs (e.g. NED) through RC (but not only RC) churches, institutes and schools. Bannon’s incendiary rhetoric was complemented by the conspicuous (shamelessly so) presence of right-wing RC senators (Cruz, Rubio etc.), US “diplomats” and “charity workers” who directed the riots convinced that the Chinese government would fold and admit defeat. Consequently, there was no attempt to hide the orchestrators’ symbols.

For his failure to sever Hong Kong from China and for thwarting the BBC Jimmy Saville enquiry, Patten was rewarded with a chancellorship of the University of Oxford. His last media appearance was a couple of days ago when he criticised the protesters who were trying to topple the statue of the notorious colonial buccaneer and racist, Cecil Rhodes. Bannon on the other hand has doubled down on replacing the EU with a slew of “nationalist” fiefdoms subservient to the US and trying to topple the government of the PRC by lobbying for an exile ex-football player(?) billionaire who is supposed to rule the great nation on behalf of Bannon’s masters. Hopefully, this will distract from the renewed attempts to weaponise Roman Catholicism in order to overthrow popular governments in Bolivia, Venezuela and Cuba. The greatest irony of all (and the subject is replete with them) is that a rabid exponent of the most universalist, globalist and imperialist religious ideology has been trying to sell himself as a nationalist and nativist patriot.

On a personal note, I must state that like many anti-imperialists, I supported Trump against Hillary Clinton. Although hugely disappointed with his actions I don’t believe that Trump is a racist in the sense in which the warmongering fake left aims to portray him. At the same time, he is presiding over the most massive blowback in US history. Having leveraged US power in order to stem the bleeding, he is living a nightmare predicted by many—a United States eating itself from within thanks to massive class and racial inequalities. My humble submission is just a small part of a complex mosaic which can nevertheless help explain why despite the attempts by Soros and various others to co-opt the cause of racial, social and international justice, we must not uncritically run to right-wing politicians and ideologues as potential saviours.

  1. It is interesting and not inconsequential that Tony Blair was converted by the same priest who later converted Bannon’s right-hand man, the Englishman Benjamin Harnwell. The priest’s name is Michael Seed. 

هل يتحرّر لبنان… خاصة من الاستعمار الاقتصاديّ الأميركيّ؟

العميد د. أمين محمد حطيط

تنظر أميركا إلى لبنان باعتباره الحلقة الأضعف في محور المقاومة، ونظرتها هذه ليست من باب القدرات القتالية للمقاومة وهي قدرات حققت الكثير مما أزعج أميركا وأقلقها، بل من باب البنية اللبنانية والوهن البنوي في تركيبته السياسية والديمغرافية والاقتصادية وقدرتها أيّ قدرة أميركا على تجنيد من يلزم فيه لتنفيذ المهامّ التي تخدم سياستها لا بل تمارس عبره عدوانها المستمرّ على المنطقة.

ففي لبنان تجد أميركا سياسيين يجاهرون بمواقفهم التي تصبّ في خدمة المصالح الأميركية على حساب المصالح اللبنانية، وتجد موظفين كباراً يمارسون مهامّ وظائفهم بمنظور وفهم أميركي بحت حتى وبأفضل مما تقوم به أميركا نفسها، وتجد أحزاباً وهيئات وتنظيمات تعمل في خدمة هذا المشروع الأميركي الاستعماري بجدية والتزام وحرص على النجاح يفوق ما تطلب أو تتمنى الإدارة الأميركية.

والأدهى من كلّ ذلك نجد انّ أميركا التي تتلقى السهام الجارحة في داخلها لا بل تثخن بالجراح اليوم من باب جائحة كورونا والاضطرابات الشعبية التي اندلعت تحت عنوان رفض «التمييز العنصري» في الداخل الأميركي، أميركا التي أخفقت في سياساتها تجاه الصين وروسيا، واضطرت للتعامل بواقعية بعيدة عن التهديد العسكري الجدّي مع كلّ من إيران وكوريا الشمالية، أميركا التي تآكلت هيبتها العسكرية وضاع حلمها بالأحادية القطبية في النظام العالمي المنهار، أميركا التي لا يتوقع عاقل أنها ستعود وسترمّم هذه الأحادية مهما كانت نتائج المواجهة العالمية القائمة حالياً؛ الأدهى في الأمر أنّ أميركا هذه تجد في لبنان من يتعبّد لها ويأسر نفسه في حبائل مشاريعها الكيدية والاستعماريّة والعدوانيّة، ويرى فيها الملاذ والملجأ والحصن الذي يلجأ إليه لمعاقبة شركائه في الوطن بعد أن يجنّد نفسه عندها مخبراً محرّضاً أو جاسوساً عميلاً أو مأجوراً في خدمتها.

لقد شكلت أميركا ممن يتبعها أو ينصاع لها أو يأتمر بأوامرها ما يمكن وصفه بـ «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» التي يتوزع أعضاؤها الأدوار ويتساندون في ما بينهم بحيث يحمي بعضهم بعضاً في أيّ موقع كان لأنّ تلك المواقع التي يشغلها من يحمل الهوية اللبنانية تستفيد منها أو تخدم السياسة الأميركية فيكون واجباً عليهم حمايتها. لأنهم يرون فيها محميات يمنع المسّ بها ويسلّط السيف الأميركي على رقبة كلّ مَن يفكر بهذا الأمر. وعليه نرى انّ مهامّ أعضاء «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» نوعان… الأول المهامّ الأصلية المباشرة التي تخدم تلك السياسة، والثانية مهامّ احتياطية فرعية تمارس من أجل حماية الأعضاء بعضهم لبعض في مواقع الدولة. وفي ممارسة مهامهم الأصلية يطالب أعضاء «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» بما يلي:

1

ـ نزع سلاح المقاومة الذي هو مصدر قوة رئيسي للبنان للدفاع عنه أرضاً وشعباً وثروة وكياناً، وهو مصدر قلق عميق لـ «إسرائيل» وأميركا يهدّد مطامعهما خاصة في الأرض والثروة، وانّ نزعه يسهّل لأميركا وضع يدها على كامل المفاصل اللبنانية ويمكّنها من تعديل الحدود ورسم حدود بحرية وإنهاء ملف مزارع شبعا خدمة لـ «إسرائيل»، كما جاء في رؤية ترامب.

2

ـ الابتعاد عن سورية من أجل إحكام الحصار عليها خدمة لسياسة العقوبات الأميركية التي تسعّر اليوم مع بدء تطبيق قانون قيصر الأميركي الكيدي الإجرامي. يريدون سدّ الرئة اللبنانية التي تتنفس منها سورية يريدون ذلك رغم انّ علاقة لبنان بسورية هي من طبيعة تجعلها مسألة حياة أو موت للبنان هذا قبل أن ينص عليها في وثيقة الاتفاق الوطني في الطائف بأنها علاقات مميّزة وقبل أن تصاغ تلك العلاقات في 22 اتفاقية متنوّعة المواضيع لتفعليها.

3

ـ رفض إقامة أيّ علاقة اقتصادية مع العمق المشرقي للبنان من سورية إلى الصين مروراً بإيران وروسيا، ويصرّون على تضييع الفرص عن لبنان من أجل ان يبقى تحت الاستعمار الاقتصادي الأميركي الذي فرض عليه نهجاً اقتصادياً حوّل اقتصاده إلى اقتصاد ريعي وحرمه من الخدمات الأساسية ومنعه من إقامة بنية تحتية تناسب تطوّر العصر وأغرقه بالديون… كلّ ذلك خدمة لاستراتيجية أميركية تقوم في جوهرها على إفقار التابع المستعمر من أجل إبقائه تحت السيطرة على أساس «جوّعه يتبعك».

لقد نجحت «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» في تحقيق ما طلب ويطلب منها في مسألة العلاقة مع سورية والمسألة الاقتصادية وفشلت في مسألة سلاح المقاومة، وسبب فشلها هنا عائد إلى انّ للسلاح قوة تمسكه وتحميه لا تخضع للدولة بشكل كلي بل تنسق معها ضمن مفهوم «التنسيق السلبي» الذي تفرضه الرغبة في عدم التصادم والاحتكاك، من دون أن يصل هذا التنسيق إلى حدّ الخضوع التامّ للقرار الرسمي اللبناني، الخضوع الذي لو حصل لتعطل دور السلاح ولكان لبنان اليوم من غير مقاومة ومن غير سلاح مقاوم، وبالمناسبة نذكر بأنّ أحد الأسباب الجوهرية التي تحول دون وضع سلاح المقاومة بأمرة الدولة هو هذا الخطر، حيث إنّ وضعه بيدها يعني حتماً تعطيل استعماله لأنه يجعل قرار الاستعمال بيد جهة رسمية يكون فيها بعض من «جبهة أميركا في لبنان»، وأن حصول ذلك يعني زوال معادلة الردع الاستراتيجي التي فرضتها المقاومة على «إسرائيل» وبها حمت لبنان ومنعت الحرب عليه.

لقد نجحت «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» في تحقيق أغراض أميركا من مسائل العلاقة مع سورية والمسألة الاقتصادية، لأنّ هذا الأمر يتطلب قراراً رسمياً ويتوزّع من بيدهم سلطة القرار أو صلاحيته بين فئات أربع: الأول خاضع مباشر للقرار الأميركي بوصفه عضواً في «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» والثاني خائف على مصالحه من ردّة الفعل الأميركي عليه انْ خالف الإيحاء الأميركي ثم يغلف خوفه على مصالحه الشخصية بالادّعاء بانه خائف على المصالح الوطنية اللبنانية، والثالث عاجز بمفرده لا يملك صلاحية اتخاذ القرار المناسب وحده. ورابع غير مكترث للصراع بذاته أو لنتائجه قادر على التكيّف مع تلك النتائج كيفما كانت. وفي هذا التصنيف يكمن مأزق لبنان، المأزق الذي يضيّق فسحة الأمل بالتحرّر من الاستعمار الأميركي الفعلي المفروض عليه والذي يصل أحياناً إلى حدّ ظهور سفير أميركا في لبنان وكأنه الحاكم الفعلي فيه.

بيد أنّ الغريب في الشأن هو فجور «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» في توصيفها لواقع لبنان حيث تقلب هذه الحقيقة وتدّعي وجود عكسها في أبشع عملية تزوير وتقليب للحقائق، فبدل الإقرار بهذا الاستعمار تطلق مقولة «الدويلة التي تحكم الدولة»، وتقصد دويلة حزب الله التي هي وهم في رؤوس أعضاء «جبهة أميركا في لبنان»، يصرحون به ليخفوا حقيقة الاستعمار الأميركي الذي هم في خدمته، ويطلقون مقولة «حكومة حزب الله» التي لو كانت حقيقة قائمة لذهبت إلى سورية بكلّ ثقة بالنفس ولفتحت الطريق للبنان للانتظام في الاقتصاد المشرقيّ وكسرت الاحتكار الأميركي لسوقه. أما الدرجة الأعلى من الفجور فتتمثل في مطالبة أميركا وجبهتها في لبنان بالإصلاح وتضع الإصلاحات شرطاً للمساعدات. وطبعاً لا يمكن لعاقل إلا أن يؤيد هذا الشرط لا بل يجعله هدفاً رئيسياً من أهداف سياسته، بيد انّ سلوك أميركا وأتباعها يخالف الطلب اللفظي، حيث إنّ النسبة الكبرى من منظومة الفساد في لبنان وناهبي المال العام هم أعضاء في «جبهة أميركا في لبنان» وتمنع أميركا المسّ بهم وتضع الخطوط الحمر التي تحميهم ويتطوّع أعضاء الجبهة كلّ في موقعه من أجل حمايتهم.

هذا هو مشهد لبنان ومأساته، ومجريات الصراع فيه، صراع شرس بين مَن يريد أن يستكمل استعماره وإحكام السيطرة عليه بنزع سلاح المقاومة، ومن يريد أن يستكمل التحرير الذي بدأ في العام 2000 بتحرير الجنوب وتصاعد في إرساء منظومة الردع الاستراتيجي بوجه العدو، ويعمل لتحرير لبنان اقتصادياً من الاستعمار الأميركي وليطهره من الفساد الداخلي الذي يرعاه هذا الاستعمار.

صراع ليس بالأمر السهل خاصة أنه دخل اليوم إلى لقمة عيش المواطن التي أقحمتها أميركا في الصراع من باب الحصار والعقوبات وقانون قيصر والتلاعب بالنقد الوطني، لكن رغم ذلك ليس الفوز فيه مستحيلاً بالنسبة للمقاومة خاصة أنّ الطرف المناهض لها عاجز كلياً، مهما حشد من طاقات ومهما ابتدع من أساليب، عاجز عن نزع سلاحها، يبقى عليها هي ان تعمل بالمتاح والمتوفر من أجل خوض معركة التحرير الاقتصادي والإصلاح في أهمّ حرب يواجهها لبنان الحديث. وهنا يبرز دور الشعب الذي عليه تقع الأعباء التي لا يستهان بها.

أستاذ جامعي – خبير استراتيجي.

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Politicisation of Great Lockdown result of ‘TINA’ economic ignorance & censorship

Politicisation of Great Lockdown result of ‘TINA’ economic ignorance & censorship

June 14, 2020

by Ramin Mazaheri for the Saker Blog

In the United States questioning liberal economic ideology is not tolerated, so when the latest inevitable economic bust in capitalism occurs it is little wonder that their society talks about everything except economic ideology. They spend their time inventing and discussing non-economic solutions to economic catastrophes, which is precisely how their fundamental weaknesses and inequalities only get worse and worse.

Now we are talking about the murder of George Floyd, police brutality and White supremacy – these are old but still important issues, but they are also certainly issues which will not lead to systematically redistributing one cent towards governmentally-abandoned African-American areas.

The fall of the USSR and the triumphant parades led by banners bearing TINA – There Is No Alternative (to neoliberalism and neo-imperialism) – encouraged Americans to throw away their textbooks on the “dismal science” of economics. “Yeah,” they said, “Marx might have been interesting in his day, but it’s all over now – get with the times: it’s the economy, stupid! (whisper) But seriously – don’t openly question liberal economic ideology.”

For those of us following the data it has become quite clear: “Everything Bubble 2” is a great pica-saving handle to describe the 2020 Western economy, but it gives the wrong impression that what’s going on is just a repeat of 2008 (when Everything Bubble 1 popped) – it’s actually much worse. Nobody expected Everything Bubble 2 to be popped by something as economically-suicidal as a Great Lockdown, but we now have no choice but to add the effects of the two together, so… wow… we just cannot say that this is like 2008, or 2001, or 1929, or any other era.

But in the US you can’t say anything about ideological economic direction, of course. This leads us to two realisations about their society which are now obvious to all:

1) By abandoning economic ideological debate for three decades Americans can only politically snipe each other to death in 2020 because they simply cannot intelligently discuss economics, much to the glee of the 1%. 2) By censoring ideological debate the US is unable to devise new solutions to the latest capitalist bust, so in order to end this very atypical capitalist bust they are vainly reapplying previous solutions: hyper-partisanship, militarism and economic ideological totalitarianism.

Combine these two realisations and it’s clear that the American solution to their 2020 economic crisis is militarist in nature: Militarism against those who disagree with the Mainstream, militarism to guide the economic way out, and militarism towards the Covid-19 germ as well. As a result of the George Floyd murder we may even add a fourth militarism – though one which will surely end after the November presidential election – militarism against anti-Black racism.

Why would this “solution” of militarism be a surprise to anyone?

Removing economics from politics creates stupid politics, but also hyper-partisanship

Americans today have only one solution for domestic or international failure – declare war on the other guy, even if he is a fellow citizen.

This economic crisis is so bad for the already-weakened West that one would think the economic debate for its solutions would have never become partisan. (Considering that both mainstream parties agree on TINA – what was there to argue about economically, anyway?) Georgia, Florida and Texas have cities just as dense as Illinois, Michigan, California, New York and New Jersey, but it can’t be a coincidence that this latter camp of blue-states remain economically closed with a severity and duration seemingly unparalleled in the world.

It is as if working with the other side – even for the good of the nation – implies risking a deadly (moral) contagion? It’s as if doing a single thing Trump did, suggested or supported makes one an irredeemable “deplorable”? It’s as if losing an election this November is a bigger catastrophe in the minds of politically-involved Republican and Democrat citizens than the unprecedented capitalist catastrophe of having over 40 million unemployed people?

All I can say is: LOL you can’t possibly run a nation that way. I am as political as anybody, but if unemployment was 25% my primary motivation would not be getting credit at the polling booth!

So it’s an amazing proof of how undesirable the American cultural-political-economic model truly is when we observe how the re-opening of their economy has become such a politically-polarised issue.

That may or may not be old news to many, but here is something which is never discussed: This seeming “militarisation of political partisanship” is predicted on confining mainstream political discussion solely to exactly that – the alleged importance of political partisanship. Western culture’s proclamation of TINA, the chucking out of economic textbooks and censoring “time-wasting” economic debate has thus given two-party political affiliations an entirely outsized place in US culture.

And TINA was always going to be especially fatal for heterogenous Western societies: In a country like Iran, which is 90% Shia, or homogenous & self-segregated Japan it’s perhaps not necessarily economics which can hold the title of “champion of societal unification”, but in the very heterogeneous West economic class clearly provides the broadest basis for life-saving and nation-saving unity. (The West’s White supremacists will sputter that, “It didn’t used to be this way here!” Who cares? It is this way now for your children, and it was only ever not “this way” because of massive segregation.) National unification may be rejected by Trotskyists, but not everyone wants to see the nation founder in response to every serious crisis.

But by rejecting discussion of economic unity (a.k.a. class warfare against the 1%) the West could only logically choose to emphasise other factors in its place, i.e. political, cultural, ethnic, sexual, gender and religious factors, all of which (for their heterogeneous societies) are inherently less unifying and even quite controversial. In a crisis this disunity is not just readily apparent but leads to tangible disaster – certainly the West is currently burning in crisis.

The problem goes deeper than their facile blaming of only the political and media classes: there are many everyday American citizens who clearly want to increase the stranglehold of this economic crisis in order to oust Trump or just their local incumbent. In 2020, because they are not in power, it’s logical to agree that Democrats are acting the most desperately and power-hungrily. However, it’s not as if Republicans are promoting consensus, unity and high ideals – of course they are using the economic crisis to achieve the neoliberal tenet of slashing government ranks down to just cops and fire departments.

It is not an exaggeration to say that by removing economics from the discussion US political culture has become not “militant” – which has positive connotations of ideological purity – but “militarist”: Democrats and Republicans are going on the war path to stoke problems instead of focusing on societal unity amid this unprecedented crisis.

You couldn’t honestly talk about imperialism with an American in 2019, and it’s not like they want to hear about it now; nor can you honestly talk about capitalism with an American despite its current epic fail; in June 2020 they want to talk only about how their political party is superior, and how corona is the new Black Plague, and now they’ve added a new problem they’ve recently discovered: police brutality against Blacks.

The problem of this faux-militancy, which has such a gaping intellectual void (the lack of an economic component), is similarly and glaring obvious in the centuries-old militarisation of imperialist US culture: War on Indians, war for/against slavery, war on socialism, war on Soviet-led communism, war on poverty, war on drugs, war on Muslims – the US solution of “war on corona” is thus not at all unique for them.

The new – and probably temporary – “war on police brutality” is certainly necessary but cannot possibly reach the halls of power nor the ears of the US vanguard party of bankers.

The solution in US corporate fascism is always war, but conquering corona yields no booty

The real economic ideology of the US is – of course – corporate fascism, which is why their military-industrial complex had a ready solution to the 2001 Y2K/dot.com bust via declaring war on the Muslim world. Very profitable indeed, and it allowed their Pentagon-planned economy (the Pentagon is the world’s largest employer) to continue organising the very unequal US economic redistribution.

There was no new war to be had in 2008 – Obama could only double down on the existing wars (after accepting his Nobel Peace Prize) and double down on the status quo economic ideology as well: QE dropped helicopter money at the problem and hoped the problem was resolved. It was resolved very satisfactorily indeed, but only for the 1% and their asset classes.

In 2020 Everything Bubble 2 was popped by the Great Lockdown and a new war was declared: against corona. As if Red men with tomahawks had amassed just outside the picket-topped fort, Americans threw themselves wholeheartedly into this battle for self-survival. Now, as the stock market has been boosted with taxpayer QE money back to pre-crisis levels, Americans are (kind of) throwing themselves into a battle against police brutality as well.

Declaring war is what American culture does, period.

What does war do? It rallies around the flag – for countries who were not inspired by 1917 it is truly the “champion of societal unification” – but there is no booty to be had this time: no new frontiers to provide cheap land; no new resources to allow Western manufactures to be made more cheaply; no oil; not even any way to use US taxpayer money to pay mercenaries in order to boost the stock prices of Pentagon-linked corporations.

Americans need to realise that “keep-capitalism-alive-through-jingoism” is a primary pillar of imperialism, and that true patriotism is never allowed in neoliberal capitalism – thus their hyper-partisanship today. War also provides a useful distraction from endemic economic inequality, which is why this “endless war” ruse has been going on across the anti-socialist West ever since WWI.

The West has thrown themselves into the war on the corona germ, but their lower classes are screaming that this war is economic suicide. Once the war on corona is over – even if the West extends past the “surge” this fall or even into 2021 – economic ideology will finally have to be discussed.

But the West doesn’t ever have to do that intelligently – they were the economic ideological winners, right?

*********************************

Corona contrarianism? How about some corona common sense? Here is my list of articles published regarding the corona crisis.

Capitalist-imperialist West stays home over corona – they grew a conscience? – March 22, 2020

Corona meds in every pot & a People’s QE: the Trumpian populism they hoped for? – March 23, 2020

A day’s diary from a US CEO during the Corona crisis (satire) March 23, 2020

MSNBC: Chicago price gouging up 9,000% & the sports-journalization of US media – March 25, 2020

Tough times need vanguard parties – are ‘social media users’ the West’s? – March 26, 2020

If Germany rejects Corona bonds they must quit the Eurozone – March 30, 2020

Landlord class: Waive or donate rent-profits now or fear the Cultural Revolution – March 31, 2020

Corona repeating 9/11 & Y2K hysterias? Both saw huge economic overreactions – April 1, 2020

(A Soviet?) Superman: Red Son – the new socialist film to watch on lockdown – April 2, 2020

Corona rewrites capitalist bust-chronology & proves: It’s the nation-state, stupid – April 3, 2020

Condensing the data leaves no doubt: Fear corona-economy more than the virus – April 5, 2020

‘We’re Going Wrong’: The West’s middling, middle-class corona response – April 10, 2020

Why does the UK have an ‘army’ of volunteers but the US has a shortage? – April 12, 2020

No buybacks allowed or dared? Then wave goodbye to Western stock market gains – April 13, 2020

Pity post-corona Millennials… if they don’t openly push socialism – April 14, 2020

No, the dollar will only strengthen post-corona, as usual: it’s a crisis, after all – April 16, 2020

Same 2008 QE playbook, but the Eurozone will kick off Western chaos not the US – April 18, 2020

We’re giving up our civil liberties. Fine, but to which type of state? – April 20,

2020

Coronavirus – Macron’s savior. A ‘united Europe’ – France’s murderer – April 22, 2020

Iran’s ‘resistance economy’: the post-corona wish of the West’s silent majority (1/2) – April 23, 2020

The same 12-year itch: Will banks loan down QE money this time? – April 26,

2020

The end of globalisation won’t be televised, despite the hopes of the Western 99% (2/2) – April 27, 2020

What would it take for proponents to say: ‘The Great Lockdown was wrong’? – April 28, 2020

ZeroHedge, a response to Mr. Littlejohn & the future of dollar dominance – April 30, 2020

Given Western history, is it the ‘Great Segregation’ and not the ‘Great Lockdown’? – May 2, 2020

The Western 1% colluded to start WWI – is the Great Lockdown also a conspiracy? – May 4, 2020

May 17: The date the Great Lockdown must end or Everything Bubble 2 pops – May 6, 2020

Reading Piketty: Does corona delay the Greens’ fake-leftist, sure-to-fail victory? – May 8, 2020

Picturing the media campaign needed to get the US back to work – May 11, 2020

Scarce jobs + revenue desperation = sure Western stagflation post-corona – May 13, 2020

France’s nurses march – are they now deplorable Michiganders to fake-leftists? – May 15, 2020

Why haven’t we called it ‘QE 5’ yet? And why we must call it ‘QE 2.1’ instead – May 16, 2020

‘Take your stinking paws off me, you damned, dirty public servant!’ That’s Orwell? – May 17, 2021

The Great Lockdown: The political apex of US single Moms & Western matriarchy? May 21, 2021

I was wrong on corona – by not pushing for a US Cultural Revolution immediately – May 25, 2021

August 1: when the unemployment runs out and a new era of US labor battles begin – May 28, 2021

Corona proving the loser of the Cold War was both the USSR & the USA – May 30, 2021

Rebellions across the US: Why worry? Just ask Dr. Fauci to tell us what to do – June 2, 2021

Protesting, corona-conscience, a good dole: the US is doing things it can’t & it’s chaos – June 3, 2021

Why do Westerners assume all African-Americans are leftists? – June 5, 2020

The US as Sal’s Pizzeria: When to ‘Do The Right Thing’ is looting – June 6, 2020

The problem with the various ‘Fiat is all the problem!’ (FIATP) crowds – June 9, 2020


Ramin Mazaheri is the chief correspondent in Paris for Press TV and has lived in France since 2009. He has been a daily newspaper reporter in the US, and has reported from Iran, Cuba, Egypt, Tunisia, South Korea and elsewhere. He is the author of the books Ill Ruin Everything You Are: Ending Western Propaganda on Red China’ and the NEW Socialisms Ignored Success: Iranian Islamic Socialism.

The Anti Slavery Mural is Back, Hopefully Forever.

 BY GILAD ATZMON

Screen Shot 2020-06-13 at 16.46.30.jpg

By Gilad Atzmon

Hip Hop legend Ice Cube came under fire last week for posting an anti- racist image on Twitter in support of Black Lives Matter.  The image was widely panned as ‘anti-Semitic’ by those who work hard to conceal images of slavery, oppression and abuse as soon as they gather that a member of their ethnic group may be complicit in such immoralities.  

Following the killing of George Floyd, Ice Cube uploaded an image of a group of bankers sitting around a game board that rests on the bowed, naked backs of black slaves.  “All we have to do is stand up and their little game is over” is the accompanying text.




23.5K people are talking about this

This anti slavery image isn’t new. It first appeared as a mural by artist Mear One in London’s East End back in 2012 when it sparked a controversy.  Some local Jews were offended and, of course, the  local Labour council of the London borough of Tower Hamlets was quick to react. It called in the police and reportedly gave the owner of the property 28 days to remove it.

Jeremy Corbyn, supposedly an ‘anti racist’  initially voiced support for the mural and the artist behind it. Later, following pressure from Jewish groups, Corbyn reversed himself and apologized. The Guardian,  once a respected Left leaning paper was also quick to cry foul  and located the anti racist mural within the Elders of Zion-Nazi propaganda spectrum. Even the ultra Left Morning Star turned against the pro black/anti capitalist  art “Bad Art and Bad Politics” is how our most dedicated ‘socialist’ paper referred to Mear One’s mural.

At the time Artist Mear One stated, loud and clear, that his “mural is about class and privilege…The banker group is made up of Jewish and white Anglos. For some reason they are saying I am anti-Semitic. This I am most definitely not… What I am against is class.”

It was also ­­­­revealed at the time that out of the six bankers figures depicted in the  mural (Lord Rothschild, John D. Rockefeller, J. P. Morgan, Aleister Crowley, Andrew Carnegie and Paul Warburg) – only two (Rothschild and Warburg) were Jewish. But none of that helped, our socialists, progressives and ‘Left’ icons left the black slaves to rot under the monopoly game board and stood firmly against Mear One’s art just because two of the bankers he depicted were Jewish.   

What I want to understand today is how it is possible that the Labour council of Tower Hamlets, the ‘anti racist’ Jeremy Corbyn, the presumably multicultural ‘progressive’ Guardian, the ultra left Morning Star, or shall we say the entire Left/progressive  spectrum all fell into the same trap, they turned their backs on Blacks and  slavery and committed to the defence of the most horrendous abusive bankers known to man just because two of them were  gifted (artistically)  with a well endowed nose.  One may wonder whether White Privilege is a valid notion as it becomes clear that Hooked Nose is by far the ultimate privilege. It literally allows for  total impunity. You even get away with slavery, at least in the ‘Left’ realm.

Time to admit it publicly – in the face of Jewish sensitivities, the Left seems to collapse. Its solidarity with oppressed minorities evaporates. Indeed, if there is one thing the Left is really good at, it is betraying its core supporters. The Left has repeatedly betrayed the working class. Instead it adopted Identitarian politics that were set to break the working class into biologically oriented fragments (defined by skin colour, gender, sexual orientation, etc.). The Left even betrayed its own ideology dismantling its own philosophy of class politics that initially united us regardless of our gender, race or ethnicity. Embracing biologically oriented identification is, in practice, an adoption of Hitlerian ideology. Corbyn had been anti- banker, but he has often been very forgiving towards Jewish financiers  such as the Rothschilds and George Soros. “Really important video which spells out the vile and destructive nature of antisemitic conspiracy theories,” is how Corbyn, as a  Labour leader, described a horrendous  video that presented the Rothschilds and George Soros as mere victims. Rothschild according to the video wasn’t even that  rich.  


Really important video which spells out the vile and destructive nature of antisemitic conspiracy theories.


3,286 people are talking about this

For the Left, I am sorry to say it, the Blacks are a solidarity pets. So are the Palestinians and other oppressed groups and minorities. I am afraid that this  shameful divisive parade is not going to stop anytime soon. But Black community leaders have started to wake up.  

Yesterday, members of African American Council were BOOED as they told protesters in Seattle’s ‘autonomous zone’ that they had  ‘hijacked’ the Black Lives Matter movement by pushing other causes.

And there is  some  good news in this mural saga: 1. By now we know that art, like books, can be physically burned, it can be erased from walls, removed from exhibition: but beauty like the truth unveils itself against all odds. Mear One’s mural is with us forever and so is the memory of Corbyn/Guardian/Morning Star betrayal of the Blacks and their history. 

 2. Despite horrendous harassment from Jewish pressure bodies, the American Hip Hop star stood firm. Unlike Corbyn, Ice Cube answered his critics tweeting “what If I was just pro-Black?… I’ve been telling my truth.” I have always wondered why Corbyn didn’t answer his critics: ‘what if I were pro Palestinian rather than anti Jewish?’ The brainless veteran Labour leader couldn’t even figure this out.  

Our world would look far better if our politicians in general and Left ones in particular had been just slightly more committed to truth. It would help if they had as much guts in their entire bodies as artists like Ice Cube have between their toes.

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Senior US Military Official Apologizes for Role in Trump Photo Op: I Shouldn’t Have Been Thereh

Senior US Military Official Apologizes for Role in Trump Photo Op: I Shouldn’t Have Been There

By Staff, NYT

The United States’ top military official apologized on Thursday for taking part in US President Donald Trump’s walk across Lafayette Square for a photo op after the authorities used tear gas and rubber bullets to clear the area of peaceful protesters.

“I should not have been there,” Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said in a prerecorded video commencement address to National Defense University.

“My presence in that moment and in that environment created a perception of the military involved in domestic politics.”

General Milley’s first public remarks since Trump’s photo op, in which federal authorities attacked peaceful protesters so that the president could hold up a Bible in front of St. John’s Church, are certain to anger the White House. Trump has spent the days since the killing of George Floyd in police custody in Minneapolis taking increasingly tougher stances against the growing movement for change across the country.

Meanwhile, the back-and-forth between Mr. Trump and the Pentagon in recent days is evidence of the deepest civil-military divide since the Vietnam War — except this time, military leaders, after halting steps in the beginning, are positioning themselves firmly with those calling for change.

Relatively, associates of General Milley said he considered resigning, but he decided not to.

On Wednesday, Trump picked another fight with the military, slapping down the Pentagon for considering renaming Army bases named after Confederate officers who fought against the Union in the Civil War.

The Marine Corps has banned display of the Confederate battle flag, and leaders of both the Army and the Navy have in recent days expressed a willingness to move forward with renaming installations.

At the same time, the Senate Armed Services Committee, with bipartisan support, voted to require the Pentagon to strip military bases of Confederate names, setting up a possible election-year clash with the president.

Trump’s walk across Lafayette Square, current and former military leaders said, has started a critical moment of reckoning in the military. General Milley addressed the issue head-on.

“As a commissioned uniformed officer, it was a mistake that I have learned from,” General Milley said. He said he had been angry about “the senseless and brutal killing of George Floyd” and repeated his opposition to Trump’s suggestions that federal troops be deployed nationwide to quell protests.

General Milley’s friends said that for the past 10 days, he had agonized about appearing — in the combat fatigues he wears every day to work — behind Trump during the walk, an act that critics said gave a stamp of military approval to the hardline tactics used to clear the protesters.

During his speech on Thursday, Milley, after expressing his disgust over the video of the killing of Floyd, spoke at length about the issue of race, both in the military and in civilian society.

“The protests that have ensued not only speak to his killing, but also to the centuries of injustice toward African-Americans,” he said. “What we are seeing is the long shadow of our original sin in Jamestown 401 years ago, liberated by the Civil War, but not equal in the eyes of the law until 100 years later in 1965.”

He also called on the military to address issues of systemic racism in the armed forces, where 43 percent of the enlisted troops are people of color, but only a tiny handful are in the ranks of senior leadership.

The implications of declining U.S. leadership

By Mahmood Monshipouri

June 5, 2020 – 20:14

The Trump administration’s ongoing policy of withdrawal from international institutions—including the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, the 2016 Paris Climate Change Accord, the Open Skies Treaty, and now the World Health Organization (WHO) in the middle of the greatest global health crisis—demonstrates the declining U.S. leadership ever since the post-World War II order was created.  This latest move is made at a time when the world relies heavily on the WHO’s leadership to steer the COVID-19 pandemic response.  

While as recently as two months ago praising China in the hope of salvaging bilateral trade ties between the two countries, Trump has now turned against China and the WHO.  The latter has been instrumental in managing and treating the worldwide spread of malaria, tuberculosis, SARS, HIV-AIDS, and other infectious and non-communicable diseases.  Trump’s recent announcement (May 29, 2020) to permanently end the U.S. contribution to the WHO, and even to withdraw U.S. membership, is yet another attempt to distract the public from his mishandling of the current coronavirus crisis—a move that will lead to further global U.S. isolation, ironically putting China in a much stronger position to influence that organization’s  policies.
      “Trump’s policies have been consistently unsuccessful both at home and abroad.”     
Over its more than seventy-year life, since its inception in 1948 within the UN framework, the WHO has had major achievements, such as eradicating smallpox, and failures, such as its sluggish reaction to the Ebola outbreak in 2014.  On balance, however, the World Health Organization’s raison d’être has never been called into question.  The significance of the organization will be amplified when and if a second wave of the coronavirus returns, again posing an existential threat to all the countries around the world.   Second waves have a history of striking back even harder than the initial outbreak, as was the case for the 1918 Spanish flue pandemic.
What does the U.S. withdrawal from this organization mean?  It means, among other things, that the United States is retreating from its global leadership role—morally and from the standpoint of its soft power.  On both accounts, the Trump administration’s unilateral approach has dramatically undercut the ability of the United States to influence the behavior of other states through the attractiveness of its culture and the persuasiveness of its policies.  The U.S. withdrawal from the WHO will further accelerate the ongoing decline in the perceived competence of the United States to effectively address new global challenges.  Most ominously, however, this development is likely to fuel a great-power discord between China and the United States, dehumanizing the former while damaging the long-term relationship between the two countries.
To fully understand the implication of the U.S. withdrawal from the WHO, one needs to note that the WHO relies on assessed and voluntary contributions from its member states.  In 2019, according to one study, the United States provided the WHO an estimated $419 million, representing roughly 15 percent of the World Health Organization’s total revenue over its current two-year budget period.  This move will most likely delay the discovery phase as well as clinical trials necessary to develop a global vaccine.  Perhaps, more importantly, this decision will weaken the effectiveness of the organization and the broader cooperation among countries to stem the spread of COVID-19 pandemic around the word.
“Instead of healing the wounds of racial and systemic discrimination and police brutality, Trump’s rhetoric, tweets, and public gestures have deepened the divides in an already polarized nation, significantly diminishing trust in his leadership skills and damaging his populist image beyond repair. “
Trump has ceaselessly harkened back to his outdated notions of building walls and imposing travel bans in pursuit of his populist policies at a time when the stakes have never been higher.  All of this flies in the face of the clear lesson to be learned from the COVID-19 crisis that the virus knows no boundaries and that walls and borders cannot separate one nation’s public health and safety from those of others.  Needless to say that a virus anywhere is potentially a virus everywhere in a world that has become increasingly globalized, hence the need for collaborative, multilateral governance.  Trump’s claim that virus is “going away very soon” runs counter to the growing spike in confirmed cases around the world.
Furthermore, Trump’s disregard for the detrimental effects of climate change, as well as his policies reversing pollution standards, have exacerbated the deleterious effects not only on environmental sustainability but also, more subtly, on human sustainability.  Earth scientists remind us that humans are altering the environment at a much quicker pace than at any other time in history, a fact that has contributed to the evolution, the mutation, and the spread of all types of viruses.  Human encroachment into animal habitats—consider, for example, how deforestation and forest degradation have contributed to global warming—has created further contact between humans and animals, rendering disease transmission more likely than ever before.At home, Trump’s mishandling of nationwide and global protests over the death of George Floyd—an African-American man who died at the hands of a white police officer while still in custody—was on vivid display on the Internet, as captured on several bystanders’ smartphones.  The incident has dramatically weakened Trump’s presidency, is likely to defang his entourage, and could possibly demoralize the riot police in the face of widespread national and global protests.  The nationwide and racially diverse protests, dominated by youth and vibrant civil society movements, have captured the world’s imagination, while posing the most serious challenge to the Trump administration.  Instead of healing the wounds of racial and systemic discrimination and police brutality, Trump’s rhetoric, tweets, and public gestures have deepened the divides in an already polarized nation, significantly diminishing trust in his leadership skills and damaging his populist image beyond repair.  The result has been obvious: Trump’s policies have been consistently unsuccessful both at home and abroad.           

Mahmood Monshipouri, Ph.D., is a professor of international relations at San Francisco State University and a lecturer at UC-Berkeley. He is the editor, most recently, of Why Human Rights Still Matter in Contemporary Global Affairs. (mmonship@sfsu.edu and mmonship@berkeley.edu) 

Palestine Bleeds: Execution of Autistic Man is Not an Exception but the Norm

June 10, 2020

Source

The mother of Iyad Hallaq, an autistic Palestinian man who was killed by Israeli forces in Jerusalem. (Photo: via Social Media)

By Ramzy Baroud

A 32-year-old man with the mental age of an 8-year-old child was executed by Israeli soldiers on May 30, while crouching behind his teacher near his special needs school in the Old City of Jerusalem.

The cold-blooded murder of Iyad Hallaq might not have received much attention if it were not for the fact that it took place five days following the similarly heartbreaking murder of a 46-year-old black man, George Floyd, in Minneapolis, at the hands of American police.

The two crimes converge, not only in their repugnancy and the moral decadence of their perpetrators but also because countless American police officers have been trained in Israel, by the very Israeli ‘security forces’ that killed Hallaq. The practice of killing civilians, with efficiency and callousness, is now a burgeoning market. Israel is the biggest contributor to this market; the US is the world’s largest client.

When thousands of people rushed to the streets in Palestine, including hundreds of Palestinian and Israeli Jewish activists in Jerusalem, chanting “Justice for Iyad, justice for George”, their cry for justice was a spontaneous and heartfelt reaction to injustice so great, so blatant.

Hallaq’s story might appear particularly unique, as the ‘suspected terrorist’ was killed while merely walking in King Faisal Street in Jerusalem, on his way to take out the trash. He was afraid of soldiers and terrified of blood.

“He was also afraid of the armed police officers who stood along the route to the special needs center he went to, where he participated in a vocational training program,” the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz, reported.

Hallaq’s many fears, which may have appeared exaggerated by his family, turned out to be true. Even an autistic person in Palestine is not safe from the vengeance of soldiers.

But Iyad Hallaq did not need to die for Israel to maintain its pathological sense of ‘security’. The fact that he was already shot and wounded, and found bleeding in a roofless garbage room in Jerusalem’s Old City, was not enough to spare him that horrific fate. The fact that the man screamed in agony while hiding behind his caregiver, who pleaded with the soldiers, begging them to stop puncturing his already bleeding body with more bullets, was also not enough.

Still, the soldiers stepped forward, and from a very close range, fired three bullets into Hallaq’s midsection as he lay wounded on his back. Instantly, the young man, the ‘apple of the eyes of his parents’, ceased breathing.

“He was our mother’s love, her entire life,” Iyad’s sister, Diana said in an interview with +972 magazine., adding:

“She would hold his hand like he was a baby, and he would walk with her to the market, or the mosque or the clothing store. He was like her shadow. She worried about him and whether other kids would bother or hurt him.”

Caught off guard by the grisly nature of the murder and the mental state of the victim, Israel’s spin doctors moved quickly to contain the damage, initially spreading lies that Hallaq was carrying a toy gun at the time of the shooting, then backing off, promising an investigation.

But what is there to investigate? In recent years, the Israeli army has upgraded its code of conduct, adopting a shoot-to-kill policy of any Palestinian they suspect of attempting to harm Israeli occupation soldiers, even when the alleged Palestinian ‘attacker’ is no longer posing a threat.

In the case of Gaza, where protesters are separated from Israeli snipers by barbed wire and nearly a mile-long empty space, the Israeli military issued orders, as of June 2019, to shoot and kill ‘key instigators’ of the mass protests even while ‘at rest’. Hundreds of people have been killed in Gaza’s Great March of Return in this way, and the ‘key instigators’ included medics, journalists, young boys, and girls.

Indeed, the killing of Palestinian civilians is a regular occurrence. It is the devastating routine with which Palestinians have been forced to co-exist for many years and for which Israel was never ever held accountable.

Only one day before Hallaq was murdered, Fadi Samara Qaad, 37, was killed by Israeli occupation soldiers while driving his car near the Palestinian village of Nabi Saleh, west of Ramallah.

The Israeli military immediately claimed that Qaad “tried to ram his car into a group of soldiers” before they opened fire, killing him on the spot.

This is the go-to Israeli military pretense that is often offered when a Palestinian driver is shot and killed by Israeli soldiers. Otherwise, the Palestinian victim, whether a man, a woman, or a child, is often accused of carrying a ‘sharp object’.

Hallaq’s mental disability might have spared him, in the eyes of some, from being that archetypical ‘terrorist’, although the Israeli army immediately raided his house, looking for ‘evidence’ that would implicate him and be useful in their sinister propaganda.

In the case of Qaad, a Palestinian worker, on his way to join his wife in a nearby town to celebrate the Muslim Eid holiday, the Israeli army statement suffices, no questions asked.

This is the same stifling logic that has prevailed in Palestine for so many years, and counting. Children are killed for throwing stones at men with guns, who have invaded their homes and villages; pregnant women are gunned down at Israeli army checkpoints; men with amputated legs on wheelchairs shot by snipers while protesting and demanding their freedom.

All of this is taking place in the complete absence of any promising political horizon. Even the protracted and ultimately useless ‘peace process’ has been halted in favor of greater American backing of Israel and of the Israeli government’s mad rush to expand illegal Jewish settlements.

To secure his colonial accomplishments – read: land theft – Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is about to reveal the crown jewel of his legacy, as he prepares for the expansion of Israel’s borders through the annexation of yet more Palestinian land.

Inspired by the common struggle that ties them with their African-American brethren, Palestinians are now left only with their cries for justice: Palestinian lives matter, hoping, for once, the world may hear and echo their screams and, perhaps, do something.

– Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is “These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim University (IZU). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net

The Systemic Collapse of the US Society Has Begun

THE SAKER • JUNE 4, 2020 


Cops in DC

I have lived in the United States for a total of 24 years and I have witnessed many crises over this long period, but what is taking place today is truly unique and much more serious than any previous crisis I can recall. And to explain my point, I would like to begin by saying what I believe the riots we are seeing taking place in hundreds of US cities are not about. They are not about:

  1. Racism or “White privilege”
  2. Police violence
  3. Social alienation and despair
  4. Poverty
  5. Trump
  6. The liberals pouring fuel on social fires
  7. The infighting of the US elites/deep state

They are not about any of these because they encompass all of these issues, and more.

It is important to always keep in mind the distinction between the concepts of “cause” and “pretext”. And while it is true that all the factors listed above are real (at least to some degree, and without looking at the distinction between cause and effect), none of them are the true cause of what we are witnessing. At most, the above are pretexts, triggers if you want, but the real cause of what is taking place today is the systemic collapse of the US society.

The next thing which we must also keep in mind is that evidence of correlation is not evidence of causality. Take, for example, this article from CNN entitled “US black-white inequality in 6 stark charts” which completely conflates the two concepts and which includes the following sentence (stress added) “Those disparities exist because of a long history of policies that excluded and exploited black Americans, said Valerie Wilson, director of the program on race, ethnicity and the economy at the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning group.” The word “because” clearly point to a causality, yet absolutely nothing in the article or data support this. The US media is chock-full of such conflations of correlation and causality, yet it is rarely denounced.

For a society, any society, to function a number of factors that make up the social contract need to be present. The exact list that make up these factors will depend on each individual country, but they would typically include some kind of social consensus, the acceptance by most people of the legitimacy of the government and its institutions, often a unifying ideology or, at least, common values, the presence of a stable middle-class, the reasonable hope for a functioning “social life”, educational institutions etc. Finally, and cynically, it always helps the ruling elites if they can provide enough circuses (TV) and bread (food) to most citizens. This is even true of so-called authoritarian/totalitarian societies which, contrary to the liberal myth, typically do enjoy the support of a large segment of the population (if only because these regimes are often more capable of providing for the basic needs of society).

Right now, I would argue that the US government has almost completely lost its ability to deliver any of those factors, or act to repair the broken social contract. In fact, what we can observe is the exact opposite: the US society is highly divided, as is the US ruling class (which is even more important). Not only that, but ever since the election of Trump, all the vociferous Trump-haters have been undermining the legitimacy not only of Trump himself, but of the political system which made his election possible. I have been saying that for years: by saying “not my President” the Trump-haters have de-legitimized not only Trump personally, but also de-legitimized the Executive branch as such.

This is an absolutely amazing phenomenon: while for almost four years Trump has been destroying the US Empire externally, Trump-haters spent the same four years destroying the US from the inside! If we look past the (largely fictional) differences between the Republicrats and the Demolicans we can see that they operate like a demolition tag-team of sorts and while they hate each other with a passion, they both contribute to bringing down both the Empire and the United States. For anybody who has studied dialectics this would be very predictable but, alas, dialectics are not taught anymore, hence the stunned “deer in the headlights” look on the faces of most people today.

Finally, it is pretty clear that for all its disclaimers about supporting only the “peaceful protestors” and its condemnation of the “out of town looters”, most of the US media (as well as the alt media) is completely unable to give a moral/ethical evaluation of what is taking place. What I mean by this is the following:

By repeating mantras about how “Black anger is legitimate” the US liberal media is basically placing a seal of approval on the violence and looting. After all, if Black “anger” is legitimate, and if “White privilege” is real, then it is quite “understandable” that this “anger” “sometimes” “boils over” and leads to “regrettable” “excesses”. Just take a look at this image of Biden kneeling down before a Black demonstrator:

Of course, Biden and his supporters will claim that Biden was only kneeling before a cute little girl and her peacefully protesting father, but when combined with the attacks against Trump’s “law and order” rhetoric by Biden and his supporters (including four former US Presidents!), I believe that these kinds of photo-ops are sending a very different message: keep “protesting” as we are on your side which, coming from a guy like Biden, the ultimate symbol of the 1%er elites and a perfect example of “White privilege”, just goes to show that the hypocrisy of US politicians really knows no bounds or limits.

I have to note here that these riots also represent a potential danger for both factions of the Uniparty in power: for the Demolicans the riots probably represent the very last chance to prevent a Trump-reelection, but if the Demolicans are too obvious in support of the riots, then it could backfire against them and turn all the frightened “law and order” types against them. But if they do not support the riots, then the Demolicans will alienate their core constituency (a hodgepodge of various “minorities” pushing their narrow identity-politics agenda). Likewise, for Trump this is an opportunity to show his “law and order” credentials and promise the White people and the relatively fewer Blacks of his base that he will protect them. However, if he is too direct about this and if Trump orders what might be seen by many as unfair or excessive force (of which there has been a lot almost everywhere), then he risks pushing many moderate Republicrats over the edge and side with the Demolicans (or, at least, withhold their vote). In other words, both factions of the Uniparty feel that the riots are both an opportunity and a threat and this is why neither faction can come out and speak truthfully about the real causes of the riots.

The exact same message of weakness and even submissive impotence is, I believe, sent every time a cop kneels when confronting even peaceful demonstrators like on this photo. While this might be intended as a message of compassion, and maybe even an apology, the only thing the rioters will see here is a powerful sign of surrender of the local authorities and I find that extremely dangerous.

Yes, there are plenty of racist, violent and otherwise incompetent cops in the USA. And yes, many of my Black friends reported feeling singled out and treated rudely by cops. But having extensively traveled the world, I want to assure you that the US most definitely does not have the worst cops out there. In fact, I believe that most US cops are decent people. Much more importantly, these cops are the “thin blue line” which protects society against criminals. And while I do believe that US policemen ought to be better educated, better trained, better led and better supervised, I also realize that there is also no short term alternative to them. It is all very fine to dream about educated, peaceful and non-racist cops, but if you remove the existing police force from the equation, there are no other alternatives (the national guard or the regular armed forces do not qualify and don’t have the correct training to deal with civilians anyway), especially in those states which have successfully killed the 2nd Amendment by means of what I call “death by a thousand regulatory cuts” (including NY and NJ).

Then there is what Solzhenitsyn called the “decline of courage” in the West: the vast majority US politicians have basically lost the ability to criticize Blacks, even when it is quite obvious that many of the current problems of the Black population of the US are created by Blacks themselves: I think of the truly vulgar, obscene and overall disgusting “rap culture” with which most Black youth are now “educated” in since early childhood or how many Black youth have been brainwashed into considering gang members and street prostitutes as the measure of what “looking cool” looks like in terms of clothes, language and overall behavior. I believe that it is pretty obvious to any person who lived in the US that Blacks are very often (mostly?) the cause of their own misery: I can tell you that my Jamaican and Sub-Saharan African friends (who live in the USA) have told me many times that a) they think that US Blacks have opportunities which they would never have in Africa or Jamaica and that b) local Blacks often resent Africans and Jamaican Blacks because the latter do so much better in the US society. I can also testify to the fact that I have seen a lot of anti-Latino feelings from US Blacks. As for how Blacks often feel about Asians, all we need to do is remember the LA riots in 1992. Finally, I do believe that many (most?) people in the US know that the strongest and most frequent form of racism in the US will be anti-White, especially from politically engaged Blacks.

I can personally attest that there is plenty of anti-White racism in the USA. Not only did I experience it myself (I lived in Washington, DC from 1986-1991), but it has been amply documented by people like Colin Flaherty whose books “White Girl Bleed A Lot: The Return of Racial Violence to America and How the Media Ignore It” and “Knockout Game a Lie?: Awww, Hell No!” are excellent primers on Black on White violence and racism. Yet, anybody daring to suggest that US Blacks themselves are at least partially responsible for their own plight will immediately be labeled a “racist”.

To those of you who live outside the USA, I would recommend this simple thought experiment: just take 20-30 minutes and watch the footage of BOTH the “peaceful protests” AND “the violent riots” and look carefully not only at what the folks you see in the footage are wearing, but also how they speak, how they act, what they say and how they say it and ask yourself a simple question: would you want to hire any of these guys and pay them a decent salary? I very much doubt that many of you would. Frankly, most of these rioters are unhirable, and “racism” has nothing to do with this.

The fact is that what is sometimes called the “MTV culture” is, in reality, nothing else than a systematic glorification of criminal mayhem. Forget about rap hits like the famous “Fuk Da Police” or “Kill d’White People“, I would argue that 99% of rap is a glorification of all the worst problems of Black communities in the US (drugs, violence, promiscuous sex, objectification of women, alcoholism, glorification of criminal behavior in the streets and in prisons, etc.). Yet most US politicians seem to be paralyzed and feel the need to pretend like they are absolutely charmed by this so-called “Black culture”. But it is even worse than that.

Combine an emasculated ruling polity which does not dare to call a stone a stone and which promotes a (pretend) “culture” which glorifies violence and hatred against all non-criminals, including law abiding Black who are called “Toms” and who are also singled out as in this “beautiful” rap which includes the following “verses”: “Then you got niggas that’s blacker then the night, Running around town saying their best friends are white, Niggas like that are gonna hang up from a tree, And burn them up alive and let everybody see” (check out this “beautiful” rap here and for the full lyrics, a truly fascinating read, here). Next, throw in a completely dysfunctional state which is owned and operated by a tiny gang of obscenely rich narcissistic bastards (of all races, very much including Blacks), add to it a total absence of any real social opportunities, then toss in the COVID pandemic and the worst recession in US history with record high levels of unemployment even among those who would be employable (folks with dropped down pants, excessive tattoos, past felony convictions and a comprehensively non-professional attitude would not even get a job even if the economy was booming). Then, you get a relatively localized “spark” (like the murder of George Floyd by a gang of arrogant imbeciles in uniform) to start a fire which will instantly spread throughout the entire country, especially since there are so many other groups besides Blacks who want to “piggyback” their personal agenda on top of the one of Black Lives Matter or Antifa (I am, of course, referring to the real cornucopia of Trump-haters which never accepted his election).

Conclusion 1: this is not the US version of the Gilets Jaunes!

Some might be tempted to say that what we are seeing in the US is a US version of the French Gilets Jaunes. I assure you that it is not. For one thing, the Gilets Jaunes had a pretty clear political program. US rioters do not. Next, the Gilets Jaunes were mostly peaceful and much of the violence was instigated by the French police forces (including the use of fake rioters). While there are definitely peaceful protesters in the USA, neither BLM or AntiFa have truly denounced the riots (and why should they when the US media and politicians don’t have the courage to do that either?). Finally, the French ruling classes and media did not show the kind of “understanding” of the riots which did take place although Macron did pose with two “gangstas” in an effort to look “cool” (which failed):

Not only Biden, in Europe too…

Not only Biden, in Europe too…

Conclusion 2: this is not a revolution or a civil war

Some are now fantasizing that what we are witnessing today is either a revolution or a civil war. I believe that this is neither.

For a revolution to take place there must be a force capable of changing not the person(s) in power, but fundamentally change the regime, the polity, itself and replacing it with another one. Declaring that “Black lives matter” or looting stores or even demanding that the police be defunded, does not have this kind of potential capability.

For a civil war to take place you need at least two sides, each with a clearly identifiable political agenda. Since the real power in the US is hidden from the public awareness, there is no potential for a “the people vs the rulers” kind of civil war in the US. A “Right/Conservative vs Left/Liberal” civil war is also not possible, because both the US Right and the US Left are, in reality controlled by a deep state which is neither liberal nor conservative. Finally, a “rematch” between North and South is not possible either because the modern US is not really split along North/South lines anymore. In terms of geography, there is somewhat of a “Big cities vs rural USA” split, but it takes place in both the north and the south of the country. Instead, what we do observe is a social breakup of the US into “zones” some of which will be doing much better than others (big cities with a strong Black population fare the worst, mostly White small towns fare best; that is even true within the same state). In some of these zones, we will see more of this kind of acts of self-protection:

This kind of confrontations, even if they are not violent, are yet another illustration of the state being simply unable to take charge and protect the people.

Conclusion 3: this is an insurrection which has initiated the systemic collapse of the US society

I call what is happening today an insurrection: a violent revolt or rebellion against the authorities as such. When you burn a police precinct you do not “protest” against the actions of a few cops, no, what you are doing is expelling the cops from your neighborhood (I know that personally. In Argentina I lived in a suburb of Buenos-Aires in which the police station was attacked so often that it closed and was never rebuilt). And since in a civilized society the state should have the monopoly on the (legal) use of force, you are basically rejecting the authority and legitimacy of the state which operates the police force. This insurrection is most unlikely to remove Trump from office (hence it is not a coup or a revolution), but the anti-Trump faction of the ruling elites have now clearly adopted the strategy of “worse is better” simply because they realize that these riots are probably their last chance to blame it all on Trump (and Russia, why not?!) and maybe, just maybe, defeat him in November.

Right now all we see can only be called a mob-rule (technically referred to as an “ochlocracy“). But mobs, no matter how violent, rarely succeed in achieving tangible political results as they act ‘against something’ and not ‘for something’. This is why the real (behind-the-scenes) ruling classes need to instrumentalize this mob-induced insurrection to their political advantage. So far, I would say that neither the Demolicans nor the Republicrats have succeeded in this. But there is a very long and potentially extremely dangerous summer ahead and this might well change.

Irrespective of whether either faction will succeed in instrumentalizing the riots, what we are seeing today is a systemic collapse of the US society. That is not to say that the US will disappear, not at all. But just like it took the Soviet Union a decade or more to fully collapse (roughly from 1983-1993), it will take the US many years to fully crash. And just like a New Russia eventually began taking form in 1999, there will be a New US coming out of the current collapse. Total and final collapses are very rare, mostly they just initiate a lengthy and potentially very dangerous transformation process, the outcome of which is almost impossible to predict.

However, just as the Russian people had to stop kidding themselves with silly dreams about “democracy” and had to tackle the real problems of Russia, so will the people of the US have to find the courage to deal with their real problems, frontally and deliberately. If they fail to do that, the country will most likely simple further disintegrate into numerous and mutually hostile entities.

Time will tell.

The Hybrid War Of Terror On America Was Decades In The Making

Source

5 JUNE 2020

The Hybrid War Of Terror On America Was Decades In The Making

The spree of urban terrorism that’s exploded in the US over the past week wasn’t a spontaneous outburst of unrest but part of the decades-long Hybrid War of Terror on America that finally turned kinetic in the run-up to Trump’s possible re-election, and an analysis of the origins and gradual development of this conflict could provide a clearer picture of the course that it might take in the coming months.

A Review Of Recent Events

Subversive forces inside the US are waging a Hybrid War of Terror on America, one that’s been decades in the making but finally turned kinetic in the run-up to Trump’s prospective re-election. For those readers who aren’t familiar with the author’s earlier work on this topic, they’re requested to read or at least skim through the following articles in order to obtain an understanding of his interpretation of contemporary events that will frame the present analysis about their origins and their prospective development across the course of this year:

* 1 June: “Mayhem In America: Masks Off, Molotovs Out!

* 2 June: “America Has The Right To Protect Itself From Urban Terrorism

* 3 June: “What Comes After America’s Nationwide Anti-Terrorist Operation?

* 4 June: “Antifa Wants To Lead African-Americans To Their Slaughter To Spark A Race War

To oversimplify, domestic terrorist groups led on the ground primarily by the largely decentralized Antifa network are doing everything they can to encourage angry African-Americans to carry out a nationwide crime wave together with acts of urban terrorism so as to increase the likelihood of them getting killed en masse by the police, National Guard, and/or military as the next step in provoking a “race race”, the resultant chaos of which could then be exploited to advance their ideological agenda of “revolution”.

Education Or Indoctrination?

What’s happening in America today took decades to get to this point since ordinary Americans wouldn’t otherwise react the way that many of them regrettably are unless they were truly enraged at something so intensely to put others’ lives and their own in danger through wanton acts of urban terrorism. Their worldview wasn’t shaped in a day, but over decades, and that initially began in the educational system which was gradually subverted by left-wing radicals to the point where almost all college professors today identify with this ideology or one of its variants. They indoctrinated several generations of Americans “across the color spectrum” into believing that their country is a “racist dictatorship” profiting off of “economic injustice”. There’s definitely some truth to the general point that America is imperfect like all countries are, with its own particular systemic challenges that have made life difficult for some categories of folks more so in the past than in the present day, but that truth has been manipulated in order to radicalize the population according to certain triggers that most directly affect each identity demographic (e.g. racism and the criminal justice system for African-Americans, “reverse-racism” for Caucasians, feminism for women, corruption for the vast majority of the people, etc.).

Trotskyist Terror

This observation makes it relevant to discuss the influence of Trotskyist thought, which in this context simply refers to the concept of a so-called “permanent revolution“. There’s nothing wrong with the idea of continual improvement, but it’s been exploited by radical left-wing ideologies in order to promote the Machiavellian mantra that “the ends justify the means”. That said end is what its adherents truly believe (whether on their own or due to mental manipulation by “vanguard” elements of “the movement”) to be a “better world” for everyone, hence why they think that morality has no place when it comes to means. Thus, even acts of urban terrorism and the tricking of “useful idiots” into being slaughtered are “acceptable”. “The movement” does everything in its power to ensure that “the cause” is always on everyone’s minds so that nobody ever forgets about it but is instead always incited into becoming ever more radicalized so that their anger can then be “constructively” (or rather, destructively) channeled in the direction of their greater goal. Saul Alinsky’s “Rules For Radicals“, which he dedicated to “the first radical” Lucifer (Satan) in order to emphasize the amorality of his Machiavellian methods, provides perfect insight into the typical “revolutionary’s” mindset.

Relativism & Deconstructivism

One of the ways through which the educational establishment has indoctrinated Americans has been to have them relativize and deconstruct their society, though not in a purely objective manner (if one can even be applied in theory), but along the lines of whatever will portray “the movement’s” “cause” as “good/legitimate” and the existing system/establishment/everything else as “bad/illegitimate”. That’s not to say that relativism and deconstructivism aren’t useful to practice, but just to point out that they’re one of the more popular means through which generations have been manipulated, with the effects cumulatively building to the point where each generation becomes more radicalized than their predecessors. This is made possible not only by the “perfecting” of such “perception management” techniques, but also by indoctrinated parents forcing their children to believe the same things that they do, thus giving them an “ideological boost” from an early age that they themselves didn’t have and which could make them radicalize faster and more intensely than they ever did. Convinced of the validity of their worldview and the supposed “necessity” of “revolution”, these mass-produced “foot soldiers” then demand maximalist outcomes and unconditional surrenders.

“The Long March Through The Institutions”

The next factor to focus on is the concept of “the long march through the institutions” which seeks to embed “revolutionaries” and their “fellow travelers” (ideological sympathizers who might not be as radicalized as the first-mentioned) into various institutions beyond just the educational one. In practice, this most often takes the form of embedding them in influential places like the church, the media, and “Big Tech”, to say nothing of all levels of government: local/state/federal and executive/legislative/judicial. The purpose is to slowly take control of the state and society without arousing too much suspicion, but as the infiltration begins to succeed, certain signs become visible once these individuals feel comfortable enough in their positions to start actively shaping the country through relevant policies. This also sometimes takes the form of “politically flamboyant” personalities becoming popular in society for their outspoken views such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the rest of “the squad” alongside their “fellow travelers” in “Big Tech” like Twitter’s Jack Dorsey among others for example. The end result is that society realizes that influential people harbor what had previously (and rightly) been considered to be radical ideologies, which contributes to gradually changing the national culture.

Gramsci’s “Cultural Hegemony”

Interwar Italian Marxist theorist Antonio Gramsci is credited with pioneering the concept of “cultural hegemony” whereby he basically asserted that “revolutions” can increase their chance of success by capturing the national culture through various means. Nowadays this is seen not only in the public faces of some people who have completed “the long march through the institutions” (especially in the media), but also especially among celebrities. The outcome is that a certain so-called “political correctness” creeps in which pressures individuals to censor themselves from expressing any beliefs that don’t conform with what’s wrongly presented to be the “majority consensus” even though it’s more often than not still only the view of the radical but influential minority. This doesn’t always relate to the purely economic foundations of leftism either but increasingly takes the form of what critics have described as “Cultural Marxism“, or the attempted application of leftism’s common denominator of “equality” into the cultural sphere, which purely economic leftists decry as ideological heresy that discredits their ideas. Consequently, they refuse to associate with that term and those that use it despite many “Cultural Marxists” proudly espousing leftist economic views as well.

“Ideological Subversion”

In parallel with these previously mentioned processes is what KGB defector Yuri Bezmenov described during a 1985 interview as “ideological subversion”. It’s unimportant that he attributed this strategy to the USSR (whether rightly or wrongly) since it can be applied by any ideologically motivated network irrespective of partisanship that doesn’t necessarily have to be state-backed. The four phases of “ideological subversion” are demoralization (making the majority skeptical of the status quo and feeling seemingly powerless to resist the “revolutionaries”), destabilization (a series of incidents that radicalize people and precondition the population to expect a crisis), crisis (the “trigger event” for catalyzing the most active and usually violent part of the campaign), and normalization (“the new normal” once the “revolutionaries” seize complete power even if they don’t officially proclaim victory in the event that they succeeded in secret). As everything that’s been discussed thus far in the analysis unfolds, the “Overton Window” shifts whereby what was previously considered radical is now seen as “normal” and the “old normal” becomes the “new radical” that’s then presented by the “drivers of change” as the “dangerous fringe” that society must continue moving away from.

From Destabilization To Crisis

The phased transition from destabilization to crisis is facilitated by structural preconditioning such as the deliberate mental and economic hardships brought about by the Democrat Governors’ decisions to impose strict COVID-19 lockdowns and the propagandizing of provocative narratives throughout society via the media such as the viral videos of police brutality against African-Americans. The first-mentioned makes the population more desperate and therefore increasingly likely to directly participate in the physical manifestation of the “revolution” even if they were previously having second doubts and preferred to only be “fellow travelers” (passive supporters). The second, meanwhile, incites the “revolutionary vanguard” (the role of which some participants such as criminally inclined African-Americans today aren’t even conscious that they’re playing) into a rage that triggers their prior amoral programming by reminding them that “the ends justify the means” even if it’s only to opportunistically take advantage of the forthcoming crisis for selfish reasons like looting. Taken together, this further the “conscious vanguard’s” cause of chaos that’ll enter into effect upon the commencement of the crisis.

Color Revolution Chaos

The ongoing kinetic phase of the Hybrid War of Terror on America couldn’t have been possible had it not been for the uncontrollable proliferation of the same Color Revolution tactics and strategies that the US government invented over nearly the past two decades then subsequently spread across the internet. It was therefore only a matter of time before “revolutionaries” at home began to apply the same methods against the US government itself in a completely expected twist of fate. The author’s work from half a decade ago about “The Color Revolution Model: An Exposé Of The Core Mechanics” explains these processes at length, while his book from around the same time about “Hybrid Wars: The Indirect Adaptive Approach To Regime Change” explains the phased transition from Color Revolutions (weaponized protests) to Unconventional Wars (terrorism). In short, the terrorist phase begins to emerge after the security services’ reaction to violent protests is caught on camera but deceptively decontextualized and misportrayed. The edited footage is then propagated throughout society to escalate the self-sustaining cycle of unrest by delegitimizing the said security services and their government, which further radicalizes the population into passively or actively supporting terrorism.

Strategic Escalations

The kinetic (physical, violent) phase of the decades-long Hybrid War of Terror on America is greatly aided by the “fellow travelers” who completed their “long march through the institutions” of government, specifically the Democrats in charge of local municipalities and various states. Many of them refuse to order the police and National Guard respectively to properly respond to the Color Revolution for two primary reasons. The first is to radicalize the majority of the population that’s against this destruction so as to precondition them into expecting a “race war”, while the second is to then reinforce the perception of Trump as a “fascist dictator” to the already radicalized “revolutionaries” and their “fellow travelers” once he’s forced to take control of the National Guard and/or dispatch the military with the authority to use lethal force at their discretion to quell the unrest. That seemingly inevitable development will lead to the previously described decontextualization of such a response through edited footage that would become more “credible” to many if the “fellow traveling” peaceful protesters voluntarily use themselves as “human shields” to protect the urban terrorists among them, thus sacrificing themselves for “the cause” as “martyrs” whose deaths will be blamed on Trump personally.

Insubordination & Defection

“The long march through the institutions” also seeks to infiltrate the security services even though they’re typically the most resilient, but the “sleeper cells” among them and their media allies can attempt to get their “moderate” colleagues to seriously consider refusing to fulfill their professional duty to restore law and order, especially if they’re pressured not to “kill their own people” (an oft-abused phrase regularly employed by the US government to delegitimize those foreign governments targeted by its history of Hybrid Wars and which lethally respond to these external provocations in self-defense). “Dog whistles” are already being blown in this respect by former Defense Secretary Mattis and Espers the incumbent one who have both contradicted the President to different degrees regarding his plans to reestablish law and order. This increases the likelihood that the aforesaid “sleeper cells” can deploy other bespoke information warfare narratives against their “fellow” members of the security services such as imploring them to “obey the Constitution and not the fascist dictator who’s ordering the illegal use of force against peaceful protesters out of self-interested political desperation to prevent his inevitable toppling by the people”. If successful, then the result this devious information warfare operation could be game-changing.

Electoral Context

It’s impossible to ignore the fact that the ongoing Hybrid War of Terror on America is occurring in the run-up to the November elections. The Minneapolis “trigger event” (which might be one of many up the seemingly never-ending escalation ladder) wasn’t planned but something of the sort might have been had that not happened in order to catalyze the current chaos. The timing is extremely strategic because it’s intended to totally destabilize the country ahead of its pivotal vote that might prospectively hand Trump his final term, after which he’d be completely “unchained” without any future electoral considerations whatsoever to pursue his own promised “revolutionary” agenda that threatens to reverse the leftists’ “march through the institution” (“draining the swamp”/”fighting the deep state”) in as radical of a manner as he’d want. To stop him, they hope to “hack” the election by exploiting this chaos to convince more people to vote Democrat, but as an “insurance policy”, they also plan to use mail-in ballots in order to steal the election. Should they fail to do that and he’s not overthrown beforehand in a military coup, then they’ll likely intensify their Hybrid War on the basis that he supposedly “stole the election” following the narrative that the US itself used against so many targets abroad over the years.

Global Importance

The whole world is watching what happens because of the global importance that the outcome of this conflict will undoubtedly have. It shouldn’t be forgotten that it’s occurring in the midst of what the author previously described as World War C, which refers to the full-spectrum paradigm-changing processes unfolding as a result of every government’s response to the COVID-19 global pandemic that readers can learn more about herehere, and here. In accordance with the precepts of Stephen Mann’s “Chaos Theory And Strategic Thought“, the initial conditions at the onset of any complex process will disproportionately influence their outcome (“the butterfly effect”), so even Trump’s possible victory might only be a Pyrrhic one when it comes to America’s global standing in the emerging Multipolar World Order depending on how much damage is done domestically during the course of this conflict. Another point to keep in mind is that he’s also the leader of the worldwide nationalist/anti-globalism movement so the onset of the kinetic phase of this Hybrid War sends a strong message to other like-minded leaders that something similar could also happen to them at any time too unless they were more successful than the US was in stopping “the long march through the institutions”.

Concluding Thoughts

The ongoing phase of the Hybrid War of Terror on America can be conceptualized as the explosion of a long-ticking time bomb similar in effect to what happened a generation ago in the USSR after US-backed nationalist “revolutionaries” there succeeded in destroying it from within using almost identical means. This observation speaks to the fact that such methods aren’t exclusive to any given ideology but vary depending upon the targeted state’s unique socio-economic and political characteristics, which could in the future be more easily identified and tracked using the strategic insight obtained by “Big Data” operations such as the one that Cambridge Analytica was notoriously accused of.

Considering that this is a conflict that was decades in the making, it won’t be resolved anytime soon, especially since the “revolutionary” side is convinced that “the ends justify the means”, which makes the use of terrorism against their “fellow” Americans “acceptable” to them. Although every government in the world officially condemns this method of warfare which doesn’t have any ideology, race, religion, nationality, or borders, many of them and their compatriots are more than happy to watch the havoc that this Hybrid War will wreak for purely ideological reasons pertaining to their hatred for the American government (irrespective of whether or not that hatred is justified) even though the majority of victims will likely be innocent people of all “colors”.

This hypocritical position is explained by the fact that those abroad sense that this conflict is an “historical opportunity” to knock the US “out of the game” once and for all, and by none other than its own Hybrid War means that it so eagerly used to employ against almost everyone else in one way or another. For this self-interested reason, they might even intensify their information warfare against the US in order to embolden the “revolutionaries” and “demoralize” the average American that’s against this reign of terror by trying to convince them that they “deserve” all of this because they pay taxes to “fund the evil empire” for what it does overseas in their name without their knowledge or permission. Some of these average Americans will almost certainly submit, but tens of millions of others probably won’t go down without a fight, even if it’s to the death.

By Andrew Korybko

American political analyst

US Protests: Why the uneasy silence?

US Protests: Why the uneasy silence?

June 04, 2020

by Ken Leslie for The Saker Blog

Note: I appreciate that some will find the essay controversial or even uncomfortable reading. I hope though that it can destroy the paralysing trope of Soros bad – everybody else good.

I’d very much like to thank The Saker for deeming this essay good enough to publish. Like many others, I have been engrossed in the mayhem unfolding in the United States over the last week or so. I have felt a sense of relief and hope in what I see as the beginning of the end of the United States as a fundamentally fascist quasi-empire whose criminal record in terms of destruction of innocent lives and countries after 1945 is unparalleled (according to some estimates, 30 million people and 56 countries respectively—highly likely more). More important, I have been heartened by the sense that a new, different America might be possible.

This is not the place to elaborate on why and how the USA arrived at a point at which, many people sense, a restoration of its former power and status is impossible. Here, I want to address something that I have found quite strange, namely, the muted if not completely inimical reaction in many alternative (particularly pro-Russian) media to this momentous event. Here, I will briefly comment on some of the relevant points but will avoid dealing with political and tactical reasons for such a reaction.

1. Why destroy a great country over one dead black man—he was passing a fake cheque!

The country as it is needs to end and be replaced by something else—hopefully better. It was built on a massive genocide of the indigenous human and buffalo populations (despite what some revisionists claim). It was built on the sweat of the black, Chinese and other sources of slave or near-slave labour. It achieved its acme at a time when the rest of the world was laid low by the ravages of war. Since the end of WWII, it has leveraged the disgusting, anti-Christian and anti-human myth of exceptionality to loot, pillage, destroy, and bully innumerable countries and retard progress towards a more equitable and just society. This is not even contentious.

Drunk on anti-communism, Russophobia and a completely undeserved superiority complex, successive US governments have also used this pernicious myth (remember the CIA cut-out Obama?) to anaesthetise their population to the fact that the Potemkin village of American supremacy was starting to crumble as early as 1968. The anaesthetic started to wear off in the early 2000s and now we are finally witnessing the moment of full awakening. The ultimate irony of the situation lies in the fact that great American “patriots” strutting on Twitter are quiet about the fact that their own cherished City on the Hill was born from a bloody rebellion, rioting and destruction—of continental proportions.

This is the main reason for the current confusion—people as thoroughly zombified as an average adult American are utterly incapable of comprehending their predicament and reflecting critically in order to affect positive change. Sure, there will be token gestures of “taking a knee” with protesters, sops to the black community etc. None of this however can reverse the rapid descent into Hades of a country built on iniquity. The pain of the black American is real. Still inchoate despite a number of attempts to articulate it intellectually, it reflects a genuine sense of grievance and desperation. The experience of slavery to one side, it is the constant and uninterrupted campaign by the right-wing whites to behead the black leadership and strangle any genuine attempts by the black community to advance—politically, economically or culturally—that has found its expression in an emotive call to protest.

Sadly, some people think of the black Americans as the lowest of the low. According to this view, they are hardly human and their low caste status is justified because of their low IQ, inherent laziness, affinity for violence, promiscuity etc. Never once do these superior human beings stop to consider that the causality might be reversed—that it is precisely because of the inhuman treatment, cruel uprooting and universal contempt of generations of African Americans that have given rise to the criminality. If I were treated by the police and white people the way that many black Americans are treated, I would rob, loot and kill too. This is not to say that white people are irredeemably racist. As the protests demonstrate, younger generations will not stand for racism of any kind.

It is unthinkable for me to view anybody, let alone an African-American, as a sub-human precisely because my people were enslaved for 400 years and as recently as 1940s, my “race” was considered Untermenschen, not worthy of life or any human consideration. In addition, I do believe in the precepts of Jesus Christ. This makes it easy for me to empathise with black Americans despite the constant poisoning of the well by various COINTELPRO machinations. Until now, there has often been more white outrage on the internet over the abuse of animals than over the deaths of black people. The narratives such as “they shouldn’t have resisted arrest” are no longer allowable and rightly so. This is the end of that argument, no ifs, no buts. Unless we are able to recognise our own exceptionalism, we can never claim to be fully human (or Christian). If you were ever thought of as “lower”, you have no right to look down. And especially if you weren’t! You can’t serve God and Mammon both. I am no better than anybody else, just aware of my own darkness.

2. Raise the bridge, Soros at the gates!

Apart from racial insensitivity, that insidious poison of the mind, another reason for the muted reaction must be the fear conditioned by the alt-right that Soros, Illuminati, freemasons, satanic Bolsheviks, Antifa, Frankfurt School etc. are behind the riots. The reticence is understandable—the malevolent speculator Soros is indeed one of the major criminals of the modern era and it is possible that some of this activity is being sponsored by his organisation. However, this has no bearing on the proper understanding of the situation. Even if all of this were true, and it isn’t, so what? Does it mean that we are prepared indefinitely to endure the whims of a belligerent right-wing regime which has taken the world to the brink of a world war (see e.g. the demented pencil-necked Tom Cotton baying for Chinese and black blood)? If nothing else, the protests have taken away what little domestic and international credibility America had and have crippled its soft power beyond repair. Is this such a bad thing?

The hypocrisy of the current US’s position is delightful. After accusing and sanctioning Russia and China for a long list of non-existent crimes, it has exposed itself for what it is—a shaky plywood fortress built on a land cursed by its extinguished owners. Why not celebrate? If Soros is funding the “left”, do you know who is funding the “right”, namely the ultramontane Bannonites, the crazed Evangelicals and assorted right-wing Zionist cabals? What about Jabba the Hutt Adelson? Has Trump’s election fund of over $100 million dollars (five times larger than Obama’s) come solely from the contributions of patriotic Americans? Perhaps, but I wouldn’t bet on it. The idea that the alt-right regime is in any sense “good” is beyond naïve.

Does the fact that nefarious agents always co-opt any meaningful human activity mean that we must forego the fight against obvious injustice? What’s wrong with giving America a taste of the Bolshevik medicine? If the “patriots” are anything like the fat, bearded or steroid-soaked rednecks with AR-15s I see daily on the internet, more power to Soros (and I have been following his criminal activity since the mid-90s). It could be argued that the alt-right has turned Soros into the ultimate scarecrow that successfully distracts from their own evil. If the reason for silence has to do with Russia, again, what is the problem? Russia has gone through three West-inspired tragedies in less than 100 years. If it has not learned the lessons of history, our support for Trump will not help much.

Before I continue, let me emphasise that US Democrats are as far from a true “left” as it is possible to get. The Overton window of the American political discourse has shifted to the right so much that known warmongering murderers and racists such as Hillary Clinton (“black super thugs”) are considered to be of the left. As discussed on this site ad nauseam, the US political scene is a parasitical corporatist duopoly. I am not interested in the flavour of this travesty (patronisingly liberal or patriotic and God-fearing) because both are massive cons specifically promulgated to give the plebs a sense of hope. This is now unravelling and with it, the capacity of the dark empire to harm the world. Why are we not raising a glass? Does anybody here think that the narcissistic racketeer Trump who has sanctioned Russia and China to death, incited a war against Iran and Venezuela, and is now threatening to move nuclear weapons to Poland, A MAN OF PEACE? The time has come to shed such illusions and acknowledge that we were wrong. The most charitable explanation for his failure is that compelled to renege on his campaign promises by the advanced imperial decay, Trump has accelerated the destruction of the fabric of the US society (some say deliberately) and exposed its dark racist and imperialist underbelly. Which brings me to the next point.

4. We must all cheer for Team Murrica!

The fact that the majority of US citizens are completely in thrall of the grand lie, I take for granted. What is more puzzling and troubling is the sense that the desperate and dirty struggle of the US regime to save itself from the justifiable wrath of its own people is somehow our struggle. For over 70 years we have been conditioned to think of America as a unique and irreplaceable Shangri-La whose destiny touches us all. We have spent a large amount of time and best years of our youth in that America of the mind that includes many great things but is ultimately a chimera built on lies with a single intent—to perpetuate the empire without having to resort to the force of arms.

Those living in the USA will say—oh, but it’s not like that, this place is really great. To that I reply—it might have been once and briefly but the unresolved internal contradictions (hello Karl) have sucked out its elan vital, destroyed its cohesion and sense of purpose. Wake up! The world is tired of the bullying, killing and racketeering perpetrated by the trillionaire parasites infesting the Wall Street, the Silicon Valley and the military-industrial-intelligence complex—the three fasciae.

Whether their chosen puppet is Trump or Biden is less important, if at all. For the United States to have any future as a coherent entity, it must first renounce its evil imperialist present and revisit some of the more humane and peaceful modes of existence based on peaceful co-existence. The first people that spring to mind here are Franklin Roosevelt and Henry Wallace (so hated by the “patriots”) but also a number of black intellectuals who have pondered this difficult question. The first step though is the eradication of the deep systemic racism which still blights the landscape. I have no doubt that African Americans deserve better—and this does not mean money but genuine respect. And, what is equally important, in the coming together of the young people of different races, I see a germ of a more hopeful future. Which leads to…

5. Those soy-fed white SJWs have no idea how privileged they are!

A typical reaction to the unprecedented participation of white youth in the protests is met with a lazy alt-right trope: pampered middle-class millenials and Generation Xers are playing at class struggle blah blah. Yet, the response has been so overwhelming that it cannot be explained away by empty generalisations. The young generation in America and the West feels cheated. Decades of lies and empty promises have left most young people helpless and hopeless. They are drowning in student loan debt and mostly have no hope of owning a home or holding a steady job. The typical right-wing injunctions to “get on your bike” or “learn to code” are largely meaningless when you realise that few privileged hustlers who produce nothing useful hold around 70% of the country’s wealth.

Why should a young person work their entire life for slightly more than a pittance in order to increase the profits of a malignant corporation? Why enter the corporate rat race when one can be happy with very little provided the society is based on humane values? Why should they spend years learning a skill or getting a degree only to be immediately removed from the queue and replaced by the cheaper H1b import? I would argue that the young are much smarter than we old f***s give them credit for. They understand the fundamental injustice of the present system and refuse to perpetuate it. Rather than a sign of stupidity, it is a mature and largely rational estimate of the situation. They cannot be lulled into obedience by the slimy appeals to freedom, family and second amendment issued daily by warmongering lechers and paedophiles hiding behind God and homeland.

It is this sense of hopelessness that has awakened empathy for the suffering of others. Yes, some might be selfish and deluded but even in their awkward attempts to embrace their black brothers and sisters, they are saying a loud NO to the system that has betrayed them all. They reject the divisive rhetoric of the fake left (race before class) and fascist right (implicit segregation, racial inequality). Instead of criticising them, it might be a good idea for us to move aside and hope that they are capable of rectifying the errors of their ancestors.

Oh, and FBI has just stated that there has been no Antifa presence at the protests so far.

Ken Leslie is an independent researcher based in the UK with some experience in post WWII history and geopolitics

Liberating the American People

 BY GILAD ATZMON

liberating the American ppl.jpg

by Gilad Atzmon 

I am a jazz artist, I have dedicated my entire adult life to the study of Black American music and culture. Jazz is certainly the most important and maybe, the only significant American contribution to world culture. And the next question is, where is Black American jazz now? Why did Black Americans lose interest in their own fantastic creation?

One answer is that Jazz was born out of resistance. It was fuelled by defiance of the ‘American dream’: instead of seeking mammon, wealth and power, our Black artistic founding fathers sacrificed their lives for the sake of beauty. They literally killed themselves searching for new voices, sounds, colours. They left us with a great legacy but their offspring moved on to new artistic domains such as Hip Hop and Rap.  

For the people who made Jazz into an art form, music was a revolutionary spirit. For Bird, Now’s the Time meant that time was ripe for social change.  For John Coltrane, Alabama was the appropriate answer to the KKK’s Baptist Church bombing that killed four African-American girls.

When Jazz meant something it wasn’t a language of victimhood. Quite the opposite, Jazz was a message of defiance: everything you can do, we, the Black people, can do better. And that is the truth, no one has managed to do it better than Trane, Bird, Miles, Elvin, Sonny, Blakey, Duke, Ella and many others. These artists did  not  beg for Wall Street funding, they didn’t ask for others to join their struggle: instead, they made the rest of us beg for their beauty, their art and their spirit to illuminate and liberate us. It didn’t take long before America’s elite realised that Jazz was the best Ambassador for America around the world. And all of this happened while Black Americans were subject to apartheid, especially in the South. It would be reasonable to believe that it was Jazz’s  transformation into the ‘Voice of America’ that became a major factor in the liberation of the Black south.

 Sadly, Jazz lost its soul a decade or two ago. It went from the voice of resistance to what has gradually been reduced into an ‘academic matter,’ a ‘system of knowledge.’ Nowadays, many young jazz musicians are ‘music college graduates.’ They may be very fast and sophisticated but have very little to say and, in most cases, they prefer not to say anything. Some may believe that saying something defies their ‘artistic objectives’ as it blurs the distinction between art and politics. I am afraid that they are wrong. For Jazz to be a meaningful art form, it better be revolutionary to the core. Jazz is, before anything else, the sound of freedom.

 For a while, we have witnessed contemporary Jazz deteriorate into a meaningless  technical exercise. Jazz, basically, died on us. Did this artistic demise anticipate the collapse of American civilization and America’s self-image  as a ‘free society?’

 Why did  Jazz die? Because Black Americans lost interest in their original art form.  Why did they lose interest? Largely because their art, like every other aspect of the American culture, finance, media, spirit and dream has been occupied.

 Along with other Jazz artists and humanists, I hate racism in all forms. Yet, I want to see people celebrating their symptoms. I am one of those guys who want to see Germans writing philosophy and composing symphonies again. I want to see people celebrating their own unique cultures as long as they don’t do it at the expense of others.  More than anything else, I want Black people proud of what they are. I wish that they will, once again, lead us back to the path of beauty that they, more than any other people, introduced to us all. I hope Black America will give us a young Trane, a fresh upcoming Bird, the next  Sarah Vaughan, a Miles character.   I want to see Black Americans hypnotising us with their talents, celebrating their greatness. I want  them to be the American Ambassadors they once were  rather than victims of America’s abuse. I guess that instead of sending American soldiers to liberate other people in criminal neocon wars the time is ripe for America to liberate itself.

 Watch me Liberating the American People


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US Activist: Internal Crises Overwhelming Racist US, People Will Not Retreat

US Activist: Internal Crises Overwhelming Racist US, People Will Not Retreat 

By Elham Hashemi

The latest riots and looting in the United States of America were triggered by the cold-blooded killing of the US citizen George Floyd. The entire planet knows the sad story of Floyd no need to mention in it here.

But this story is only the tip of the iceberg. For those who think that Floyd’s killing is the real reason that made streets of different US states and regions flood with protestors and rioters, you are mistaken. Underneath the tip of the iceberg is what has been accumulating for long years.

If you know the US well, you must know by now that there is no universal healthcare, there are starvation wages, there exists mass incarceration, the US has a long history of police brutality, there is a lack of opportunities, racist politicians are everywhere, a racist justice system exists, there are no reparations and there is no access to affordable education.

With the coming of Covid-19 and the state of chaos across the country, and the sad crime of killing Floyd, it seems that was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

Thanks to alternative and social media networks, nothing is hidden; information flows in specs of a second through fiber optic technology to reach millions across the world.

News activist and analyst Sam G. from the city of Michigan told al-Ahed news that “Information is not monopolistic anymore. People across the world have become news junkies contributing to the multiplicity of informative voices as well as provide information on first-hand experience and what is happening in each country.”

Sam told al-Ahed “Corona, the pandemic which probably should be thanked at a certain point, revealed the spirit of each country, that is, those who are interested in giving more importance to the economy, as is the case of the United States, while other countries such as Iran carried out a coronavirus control policy where the health of its people was given more importance despite being financially sanctioned by the United States where its people are suffering from the individualistic policies of their government.

“The difference is clear, economy versus health, money versus life and here are the countries that suffer the most that are setting the example.”

The activist noted “The United States has loads of internal crises that it needs to overcome. The political crisis has extended to reach US President Donald Trump; his own officials who can no longer support his statements and poor decisions.”

“We are talking about a government that is racist towards its people. It is a country that is sinking in problems and complex issues and has a government that is sort of living in a state of denial. The US suffers an economic crisis where unconventional oil companies declared bankruptcy and the state had to go out to subsidize them while people continue to die for not being able to access the health system that is private and segregating.” 

This, according to Sam, “leads to an unprecedented social crisis that proves once again that the Trump administration has no intention of improving its own country.”

According to Sam, this is only the beginning of change in the US as well as the world and its order. The activist thinks that people are not willing to retreat or stop protesting until they see the arrest of all officers involved in the killing of Floyd and see action in terms of protecting the rights of African Americans at least.

In many parts of the world, the death of yet another black man at the hands of the police in the United States set off mass protests against police brutality. For many activists and community organizers, Floyd’s death under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer was a blunt reminder of Chicago’s racial divide and history of police brutality against African Americans.

Between 2013 and 2019, police in the United States killed 7,666 people, according to data compiled by Mapping Police Violence, a research and advocacy group. In 2019 alone, more than 1,000 people were killed by police, according to Mapping Police Violence, a research group.

Several states have called in National Guard troops to help quell the protests, some of which have turned violent. Cities nationwide have also implemented curfews, but protesters appear undeterred.

The US has even failed in ensuring the right of citizens to protest, which is the simplest form of freedom of expression and human rights in the so-called land of democracies and freedoms. According to the human rights group Amnesty International, police tactics used so far can trigger escalating violence. “Equipping officers in a manner more appropriate for a battlefield may put them in the mindset that confrontation and conflict are inevitable,” read the statement, adding that police “should demilitarize their approach and engage in dialogue with protest organizers”.

AMERICA FAILS PANDEMIC STRESS TEST

05.06.2020 

South Front

America Fails Pandemic Stress Test

Written by J.Hawk exclusively for SouthFront

It is well established in scholarly literature on international conflict that whenever a country behaves in an erratic, aggressive manner, it is nearly always a reflection of deep-seated internal social, political, and economic problems which the country’s leadership is unable or unwilling to address. United States is an example of what happens when that country is a superpower facing not only international decline, but also internal decay. Zbigniew Brzezinski infamously described the Soviet Union as “Upper Volta with rockets”. That was never a fair comparison, since USSR lacked the massive pockets of poverty, social exclusion, and downright police repression that the United States boasts. Likewise the Soviet health care system could have coped with a pandemic better than the US one or even the current Russian Federation one. Today’s America, however, is that country Brzezinski spoke about. Expanding its global influence through direct, proxy, and hybrid wars became the most attractive policy tool intended to restore the health of the US economy which, since the end of the Cold War, was kept alive mainly by extremely permissive monetary policies of the US Federal Reserve which in the end inflated several stock market bubbles. Even today the Federal Reserve’s main concern is keeping the Dow Jones rally going, because a collapse on the markets would permanently cripple the US economy.

This is Philly around 5:30 today. There is just no defense for this behavior. At all.


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However, at risk of mixing metaphors, an economy built on equity bubbles is a house of card that will collapse at the slightest shock. COVID-19 proved to be that shock, a “Black Swan” event that has been predicted for many years  that would precipitate a radical transformation of domestic political systems and of the balance of power in the international system. The pandemic became a test of not just public health systems, but of the strength of each country’s economy, the cohesion of its society, and the ability of its government to govern. Even though we are still in the early stages of the crisis, we can already see that some states are passing the test (so far) with flying colors, while others are being wracked by internal turmoil. To quote Warren Buffett, when the tide recedes you see who has been swimming naked. The United States has been revealed to be quite wardrobe-challenged in this instance.

America Fails Pandemic Stress Test

The callous slow-motion torture and murder of George Floyd in the Democratic Party stronghold of Minneapolis by four police officers with long histories of brutality against ethnic minorities was the spark that ignited the powder keg of US race relations. It certainly did not help that the United States created forty million new unemployed and failed to provide them with adequate financial support, due to the infamously miserly US social safety net. And just as COVID-19 is disproportionately lethal to US ethnic minorities who suffer from a higher level of underlying medical conditions due to poverty, malnutrition, and stress, so did the job losses disproportionately affect African Americans. The average black worker does not “work from home” on his laptop computer. Rather, the average black worker is employed in food service, hospitality, and retail, all of which have been crushed by the pandemic and, especially, the lockdown measures. It is no wonder that the conservatives wanted to “re-open” the economy as quickly as possible. Chasing millions of African Americans back to their menial jobs, even when it involved them facing greater risk of infection and death, would at least deprive them of the free time they have available to protest.


Just about an hour ago, police officers shove man in Niagara Square to the ground (WARNING: Graphic). Video from: @MikeDesmondWBFO


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The Fuel

The speed with which the protests spread across the country, affecting every state and most large cities, is a reflection of the universality of the problem that the events in Minneapolis revealed. In the face of slow-motion economic collapse and the destruction of the American middle class, the US political system at both state and federal levels has subtly but effectively sought to shift the economic pain to the minorities, in order to preserve the standard of living of the white middle class on whose support the legitimacy of the US political and economic system still rests. The armed white militias that protested at several state legislatures only a month earlier are an expression of that fear. The “don’t tread on me” Gadsden Flags quite clearly express who is to be tread upon, and who is not. They are a warning that should US elites attempt to economically marginalize the white middle class, they may expect a forceful response. The weak police response to law-breaking perpetrated by armed white militias was not lost on most commentators, either. But these politics of “economic triage” where the pain is shifted to the communities of color also implies the need for heavy-handed police repression which US police forces are all too happy to deliver. US law enforcement should not be seen as a collection of politically-neutral guardians of law and order. Rather, it skews heavily toward the right, even the far-right, and it is no surprise that Donald Trump enjoys the overwhelming support of American police unions and organizations. While these trends were evident for the last decade at least, since the 2008 crisis to which the US government never found an adequate response, the pandemic accelerated it to the point of the tensions and grievances finally boiling over.

The Firehose

Whenever a fire breaks out, it is ultimately either put out or burns itself out due to lack of fuel. It is doubtful this is going to burn itself out on its own, given that the US law enforcement is now providing more provocation with its heavy-handed tactics on daily basis, and moreover neither the pandemic nor the economic crisis are going anywhere any time soon. Since the United States is now in the throes of domestic unrest not seen since the days of Vietnam War, it raises the question of what is to be done about it? Which leaders, which policies, might definitively address the grievances of the masses?

We can safely say Donald Trump will not be the one, because to the extent he is wielding a fire hose, it seems to be mostly spraying gasoline on the fire. Literally every action, every statement, every tweet, has served to polarize and exacerbate the problems. It may be Trump is doing this deliberately, hoping to replicate Richard Nixon’s “silent majority” strategy, an idea that is supported by Trump himself tweeting these words. Yes, the riots polarize, but the hope is that, when the smoke clears, Trump’s half is the bigger of the two and, like Nixon, he secures his re-election. Richard Nixon won his re-election by a landslide, even though after the fact almost nobody admitted ever voting for him. However, few things motivate voting for conservatives in the US more than the sight of black rioters and looters.

Of course, the problem Trump faces here is that Joe Biden has impeccable “law and order” credentials, complete with the ability to “dog whistle” to white conservatives. Biden, after all, is the politician who said in the 1970s he did not want his children to “grow up in a racial jungle”, and his support of anti-crime legislation which led to the mass incarceration of African-Americans in the last few decades suggests he is willing to put his money where his mouth is. Thanks to his role as Obama’s vice president, he also has certain sway among the African American community that has served him well in the primaries and obscured his previous racist record. But in the end Biden is no Obama, whose combination of personality and politics was just enough to keep America from blowing up. Biden does not have the same combination, and moreover he is presiding over an economic catastrophe that will not be as easy to rectify by throwing money at banks the way the 2008 crisis was.

The one politician who correctly identifies both problems and solutions and who also commands considerable popular support, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders, has been effectively sidelined by the Democratic Party which is utterly uninterested in adopting policies of economic and social justice. It means that, in the longer term, America will move toward greater police repression which will be far more easily accepted by the white public when it is done during a Biden presidency. Given that neither Biden’s nor Obama’s public appearances were effective at demobilizing the protests, it means the United States is facing the prospect of its own Yellow Vest-style uprising, namely a continuous low-level anti-government uprising that will ebb and flow but never entirely disappear.

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توازن العالم في عين العاصفة أميركا بين الوجود واللا وجود

محمد صادق الحسيني

ماذا يجري في دهاليز السياسة الأميركية، على خلفية مقتل المواطن الأميركي ذي البشرة السوداء جورج فلويد خنقاً..!؟

ماذا يحضّر لمستقبل أميركا خلف الستار على عتبة استحقاق الانتخابات الرئاسية..!؟

هل يحضّر أمرٌ ما لن تظهره الشاشات الآن بسبب غبار معارك الشوارع بين الـ «انتيفا» والقوى الخفية ذات اليد العسكرية الطولى التي تخرج من بين عسكر أميركا..!؟

هل يخرج ترامب بطلاً قومياً من هذه المعارك ليعود العسكر فارضين شروطهم عليه ليتخلى عن شعاراته الانتخابية في العام 2016 أم يُطاح به ليتسلّم العسكر الحكم مباشرة وتتحوّل أميركا الى جمهورية موز، ومن ثم تبدأ رحلة تفكّك الفيدرالية والانقسام والحرب الأهلية وزوال القوة العظمى الأميركية على وقع تغريدات وخطوات «أبو ترامب البغدادي» العنصرية والمتوحشة، فيكون ترامب غورباتشوف أميركا في قرن أفولها وانقراضها..!؟

هذه الأسباب وغيرها في القراءة التالية:

اياً تكن أسباب تفجر المظاهرات الاحتجاجية، منذ ما يقارب الأسبوع، في الولايات المتحدة، وبغضّ النظر عن السبب المأساوي المباشر لذلك، أيّ مقتل الشاب الأسود جورج فلويد، وبنظرة موضوعية لا بدّ من التأكيد على ما يلي:

أولا ـ هناك قوى عميقة (ليست الدولة العميقة بالضرورة)، تحكم الولايات المتحدة، لها مصلحة في تصعيد المظاهرات وتسعير الصدامات والعمل على تحويل المواجهات الى مواجهات مسلحة.

ثانيا ـ لا يعني هذا الكلام تعارضاً مع الحقوق المشروعة، والمكفولة في الدستور الأميركي، لهؤلاء الأميركيين بالتظاهر والتعبير السلمي عن مطالبهم العادلة، لا بل الدستورية. ونعني بالدستورية هنا حق المواطن الأميركي من اصول افريقية في المساواة الكاملة والشاملة مع المواطنين البيض في البلاد.

ثالثا ـ وعليه فإن مطالب المتظاهرين الحاليّة، اي المطالبة بالعدالة، لا ترتقي الى مستوى حقوقهم الدستورية. تلك الحقوق (المساواة العملية بين الابيض والاسود) التي تجب المطالبة بتغيير أسس النظام الحاكم من أجل تحقيقها على ارض الواقع. وهذا يعني ضرورة إنهاء التقاسم الحزبي، بين الجمهوريين والديمقراطيين، للحكم في أميركا من دون إجراء اي تغييرات تذكر في مجال حقوق الانسان. اذ لا مساواة في ظل الطائفية السياسية السائدة في الولايات المتحدة والتي تشكل الضمانة الموضوعية لسيطرة العرق الأبيض على كل مفاصل الدولة وتفاصيلها.

رابعا ـ لكن مأزق القوى أو الطبقات المسحوقة في الولايات المتحدة، المواطنون من أصول افريقية وجنوب أميركية، يتمثل في عدم وجود تنظيم سياسي او حزب سياسي، يمثلهم ويقود نضالهم. وهذا يعود لما ذكرناه آنفاً، من الدكتاتورية السياسية، التي يفرضها الحزبان الجمهوري والديمقراطي، والتي هي أقرب ما تكون الى ديكتاتورية الطوائف التي نعرفها في بعض دول العالم الثالث وفي المملكة المتحدة (حكم البروتستانت ضد كاثوليك أيرلندا).

خامسا ـ خاصة انّ ما يتصدّر الاخبار والمعلومات المتداولة، حول القوى التي تحرك هذه الاحتجاجات، هو الحديث عن منظمة انتيفاAntifa ، والتي أعلنها الرئيس ترامب منظمة إرهابية، ما يثير الانطباع بأنها منظمة ثورية تحمل برنامجاً سياسياً يهدف الى إحداث تغيير جذري في الولايات المتحدة. بينما الحقيقة هي غير ذلك تماماً.

سادساـ لذا فإنّ توضيح ماهية هذا المسمّى ضروري جداً، من اجل فهم خلفياته وآفاقه وقدراته، وحتى إرادته في التغيير. فهذا المسمّى ليس حزباً سياسياً ولا منظمة سياسية عسكرية، كالجيش الجمهوري الأيرلندي مثلاً، بل انها مجموعة من التنظيمات الشبابية والطلابية الصغيرة المبعثرة على كل اتجاه سياسي، من أقصى اليسار الى أقصى اليمين، والتي لا تملك لا عقيدة موحدةً ولا برنامجاً سياسياً موحداً ولا خطط عمليات موحدة.

سايعا ـ وهي تنظيمات منتشرة في اوروبا وأميركا بشكل خاص، ومنذ بداية عشرينيات القرن العشرين، إثر استيلاء بيتينو موسوليني وحزبه الفاشي على الحكم في إيطاليا سنة 1922، وما تلا ذلك من محاولات لصعود القوى اليمينية المتطرفة في اوروبا الى الحكم، كمثل أدولف هتلر الذي حاول تدبير انقلاب عسكري للاستيلاء على الحكم في المانيا، وكذلك تحرك الجنرال فرانكو لقيادة القوى الفاشية في اسبانيا والجنرال سالازار في البرتغال…

كل ذلك دفع الى نشأة هذه الحركة، التي رفعت شعارات معاداة الفاشية والتطرف والنازية، وكانت لها فروع ونشاطات في فلسطين، الواقعة تحت الانتداب البريطاني آنذاك. ولكن ما كان يجمعها بالتنظيمات الموجودة في اوروبا هو شعار «التضامن مع إسرائيل» والتي لم تكن موجودة في تلك الحقبة.

ثامنا ـ إذن فما يطلق عليه اسم «أنتيفا» حالياً ما هو الا مظلة لمجموعات، تسمّي نفسها يسارية، تموّلها وتحركها، في حقيقة الأمر حالياً، القوى الخفية التي تحكم الولايات المتحدة الأميركية. وهي لا تزال ترفع شعار التضامن مع «إسرائيل» وتعتبرها «البقرة المقدّسة»، التي تجب رعايتها وتسمينها.

تاسعا ـ أما عن علاقة ذلك بما يدور حالياً من احتجاجات في الولايات المتحدة فتتمثل في أن القوى الخفية، التي تحكم هناك، وبرغم عدم ظهور أي دور واضح لها، الا انها تعمل على استغلال هذه التحركات الجماهيرية العادلة لمصلحة ممثله (القوى الخفية) الجالس في البيت الابيض، وذلك من خلال حملة التصعيد التي ينفذها ترامب والهادفة الى عسكرة المواجهات بهدف:

أ) إظهار نفسه كرئيس قوي، قادر على ضبط النظام والوقوف في وجه «المنظمات اليسارية» التي تعمل ضدّ مصالح الولايات المتحدة، حسب رأيه، وذلك في محاولة لإعادة تحشيد انصاره، من العنصريين البيض، بعد الأضرار التي لحقت بصورته بسبب فشله في ادارة ازمة كورونا داخلياً وفشله في ادارة التوتر مع الصين خارجياً، مما جعل جمهوره من المزارعين يتعرضون لأضرار وخسائر كبيرة، اثر قيام الصين بإلغاء العديد من صفقات المنتجات الزراعية التي كانت ستستوردها من الولايات المتحدة.

ب) تأجيج الصدام الداخلي، بشكل يوصله الى الصدام المسلح، وذلك بهدف تأجيل الانتخابات الرئاسية القادمة، اذا ما اتضح لترامب والقوى الخفية التي تدعمه انه لن يفوز في هذه الانتخابات.

وهذا يعني أن خطابه العنصري وتصرفاته الرعناء مدروسةً بعناية ومخطط لها بدقة وتهدف الى خلق الظروف المناسبة لإعادة انتخاب ترامب، وتحويله الى اداةٍ في ايدي تلك القوى الخفية، من أجل استغلاله لتنفيذ مشاريعهم العدوانية العسكرية، سواءً ضد الصين وروسيا او ضد إيران ومحور المقاومة. خاصة أنّ هذه القوى هي من المتطرفين الإنجيليين، المحافظين الجدد، الذين تربطهم مصالح عقائدية ومالية كبيرة مع الدوائر اليهودية التي تدعم نتن ياهو في الولايات المتحدة، والتي لا تتوانى عن إشعال الحروب، خدمة لمصالح تجمع الصناعات العسكرية الأميركية.

عاشرا ـ وفِي اطار التصعيد الكلامي والعملي، من قبل ترامب، والمُشار إليه أعلاه، فإنّ مرافقة رئيس هيئة الاركان العامة للجيوش الأميركية، الجنرال مارك اليكساندر ميللي للرئيس الأميركي، في زيارته البائسة لكنيسة يوحنا بولص الثاني، في واشنطن، وإن لم يظهر الجنرال ميللي في الصور إلا انّ آلاف الأميركيين قد شاهدوه هناك بالعين المجردة. وبالتالي فإنّ وجود الجنرال ميللي مع ترامب قد أجّجَ موجة الغضب العارمة، التي اجتاحت الاوساط الأميركية، رفضاً واستنكاراً لاستغلال ترامب للدين والمشاعر الدينية الإنسانية للمواطنين الأميركيين، لما لذلك من معانٍ، لا يمكن التستر عليها.

ومن بين أهمّ معاني حضور هذا الجنرال، الرفيع المنصب، ما يلي:

ـ تهديد رئاسي مباشر للمواطنين، الذين تمّ اجلاؤهم بالقوة من محيط الكنيسة، باستخدام القوة العسكرية للجيش الأميركي لقمعهم بإحباط تحركاتهم ومنعهم من ممارسة حقهم الدستوري في التعبير عن الرأي، ما يعتبر تعدياً على الدستور وحقوق الانسان يستوجب محاسبة مرتكب هذه الجريمة ومن تواطأ معه في ارتكابها (الجنرال ميللي) وتقديمهم للمحاكمة، حسب ما تنص عليه القوانين الأميركية.

ـ تحريض الرئيس ترامب، من قبل القوى الخفية الحاكمة في واشنطن، على اتخاذ المزيد من خطوات التصعيد ضد المتظاهرين، وذلك عبر الإيحاء له وللرأي العام الأميركي، بان الجيش يساند ترامب، في ما يتخذه من اجراءات قادت البلاد الى حالة غير مسبوقة من الانقسام والحقت أضراراً كبيرة بمصالح الولايات المتحدة وسمعتها الدولية وأظهرتها كدولة دكتاتورية تمارس أقسى درجات العنف ضد مواطنيها من دون أي مبرر لذلك.

وهو الأمر الذي يظهر نفاق الإدارة الأميركية الصارخ، اذ انها تتهم كل دول العالم تقريباً، بعدم احترام حقوق التعبير عن الرأي وتطالبها باحترام تلك الحقوق. ولكن شرطة ترامب «التي تحترم حقوق الإنسان»، قد داست رقبة المواطن الأميركي حتى قتلته خنقاً، مع ما يرافق ذلك من ألم وتعذيب لا يمكن تخيّل شدته. وهذه جريمة إضافية يجب ان يحاكم الرئيس الأميركي على ارتكابها، ليس فقط بصفته رأس الدولة، وانما بصفته مقصّراً في اتخاذ الإجراءات الإدارية والقانونية اللازمة، التي كان يجب ان تحول دون وقوع جريمةً مروعة كهذه.

من الآن حتى عشية الانتخابات الأميركية المرتقبة في تشرين الثاني/ نوفمبر المقبل، ستظلّ عيون العالم شاخصة الى واشنطن عاصمة الدولة الأعظم في العالم سابقاً والقوى الخفية التي تحاول الانتقام لهزيمة أميركا على أبواب بلاد الشام وبلاد الرافدين وأسوار صنعاء وتخوم إيران الثورة والاسلام ورجال الله في فلسطين ولبنان من معالوت الى إيلات ومن الجولان الى الجليل الى غزة وكل شبر من الضفة الغربية التي ساهم أهلها الصابرون والمحتسبون إلى جانب بحر أهلهم العرب والمسلمين في تهشيم وتقزيم جسم الإمبريالية الأميركية وتحويلها الى نمر من ورق..!

حتى ذلك اليوم نقول:

‏من كان يعبد أميركا وجبروتها فإنّ أميركا في حالة احتضار

‏ومن كان مخزّناً دولارات عليه أن يستبدلها بالتومان ‏أو الروبل أو اليوان…

‏هو الله الحيّ الذي لا يموت.

‏ويبقى وجه ربك ذو الجلال والإكرام.

‏بعدنا طيّبين قولوا الله…

U.S. Urban Rebellions Revisited

An Analysis (31 May 2020) by Lawrence Davidson

Author - American Herald Tribune

What follows is an updated essay on the “perennial nature of U.S. urban riots” which I wrote a little over five years ago. The original version appeared on my blog on 9 May 2015 following racial rioting in the city of Baltimore. The murder of George Floyd, an African American, by police in Minneapolis on 25 May 2020, coming as it did within days of the killing of two other African Americans, largely replays events of 2015.

In those five years, despite having elected the nation’s first African American president in 2008, the U.S. is still a largely segregated society full of racist anger. Indeed, it would seem that with the culture wars of the past 30 years and the 2016 election of Donald Trump as president, things are getting worse rather than better. We are slipping back into a more primitive, angrily divided time.  

Part I – Unrest That is Almost Normal

If one goes to Wikipedia under the subject of “mass racial violence in the United States,” one will find a “timeline of events” running from 1829 to 2015. There are so many race-related riots listed for these 186 years that, from a historical point of view, rioting appears almost normal. Prior to World War II these outbreaks mostly involved ethnic, racial or religious groups going after each other: Germans, Italians, Poles, Jews, Hispanics, African-Americans, Chinese, Catholics, Protestants were all involved in these set-tos. Often the causes were economic with a territorial overtone – one group moving into the neighborhood of another group and/or taking their jobs. When the violence came, it was group against group. 

In the post-World War II era, the nature of the still numerous instances of rioting changed. The group-versus-group scenario gave way to group-versus-state. Most of the groups listed above had successfully assimilated under the heading “caucasian,” and religious affiliations no longer seemed worth bloody murder. As our present reactionary president has shown, immigrants can still instill anger in obtuse citizens who mistake foreigners for the cause of problems they themselves have caused, but in this case the result is state oppression. 

Actually, in the present era, the cause of rioting has mostly been African American resentment over prevailing inequality exemplified by frequent police brutality. It is a continuing fact that American society still places on most African Americans an economic handicap and segregation. Thus all too many African Americans, particularly men, have little opportunity for a decent life, while simultaneously having every opportunity to end up in confrontations with the police and then land in prison. It is these ubiquitous confrontations with agents of the state that are now the standard trigger to the phenomenon  of modern American rioting.

Part II – The Inadequacies of the Civil Rights Acts

The ongoing phenomenon of urban riots involving African Americans suggests that the civil rights acts that followed the widespread unrest of the mid-1960s have proved inadequate. In part this is so because their enforcement, such as it has been, was restricted to the public realm. That is, the effort to do away with discrimination went no further than areas serving the public: public schools and housing, restaurants, hotels, theaters, and the like. There were other aspects to the civil rights acts – grants to minority businesses, for instance – but they all just scratched the surface. As a result the number of African Americans made upwardly mobile by this legislation was less than optimal. A black middle class did emerge, but it was small relative to the numbers who needed help.

To say that the civil rights acts proved inadequate in the fight against nationwide discrimination points to the fact that they proved unable to reorient America’s discriminatory cultural mindset. That mindset was the product of, among other things, nearly three hundred years of institutional racism. To change things was going to take the consistent reinforcement of the idea of racial equality over at least three or four generations. This would have to be done mainly through the educational system, yet no specific efforts were made to this end. Indeed, even attempting to integrate the public school systems could provoke their own riots, as the “Boston busing crisis” of1974 proved.

Another sign of this problematic cultural mindset is that, as far as I know, there is nowhere amongst the vast, mostly white, population of the American suburbs, where one can find serious empathy for the fate of the inner cities. For instance, in the wake of the April 2015 riots in Baltimore, then mayor of Philadelphia, Michael Nutter, commented, “local government cannot itself fix problems of violence and unemployment.” This is absolutely true, but Nutter, and mayors who have followed him, have looked in vain for any meaningful help from a state legislature controlled by a hinterland of conservative whites who may not feel they belong to the same species, much less the same broader community, as those in the inner cities. The suggestion that they should send their tax money to help the residents of Philadelphia appears to be beyond their understanding. I doubt very much if it is different elsewhere in the country.

Part III – The Police

The police, of course, cannot stand outside the general discriminatory orientation of the culture. So the limited impact of the civil rights acts meant that the police were not reeducated to the new standards of public behavior. To do so would have required more than simply increasing the number of black officers to at least match the racial demographics of American cities. It would have required extensive retraining and testing of those who sought to be part of law enforcement. 

There is an entire industry out there to train and test people to safely drive cars. I know of nothing beyond piecemeal efforts to train police to act in an equable and lawful manner toward all the different sorts of people they come into contact with (plus to handle other problems that seem to affect the police as a group, such as stress and anger management). Nor are standardized ways of testing candidates applied so as to make sure that only those capable of impartiality and reasonable restraint are on the street. Because we do not do this, we guarantee having some police who themselves act in a criminal manner toward economically disadvantaged classes, thus expressing discrimination in a way that is violent enough to trigger mass unrest.  

Indeed, as of now the preferred personality type for the position of police officer seems to be the same as that for professional soldier, which may be why it has been so easy to “militarize” American police forces. This effort, along with the “home security” business, has become a multibillion-dollar industry (major players in which are Israel companies, which now train an increasing number of U.S. police departments in techniques developed while enforcing the illegal occupation of Palestine). Police departments and their suppliers have teamed up to lobby cash-poor municipalities for all manner of lethal gewgaws ranging from automatic weapons to armored cars. Military grade riot-control equipment is now de rigueur for most large police departments. So great is the demand for these deadly devices that the Defense Department now has a committee appointed by the president to look into what constitutes appropriate equipment to hand out to the cop on the beat.  

Part IV -The Need for Re-education

What this sad story tells us is that the United States has a very big problem of discrimination and exploitation of the urban poor that goes beyond the ideologically induced greed of a capitalist class. That is not to say that the capitalist structure of the American economy hasn’t played havoc with the aspirations of poor blacks seeking to get out of poverty. There is a very good essay by Richard Rothstein of the Economic Policy Institute that provides insight into the government’s role in this aspect of the problem.

However, it is wrong to believe that after three hundred years of racist acculturation, the problem of endemic discrimination would disappear if, however unlikely, the nation was to move in another economic direction. Americans would still have to retrain themselves in order to overcome the racist cultural addictions acquired over their history. 

It is relatively easy to write down some of the things that would have to be done to break these addictions. For instance:

(1) Tolerance and an attitude of community inclusiveness has to be taught to American children and done so consistently for multiple generations. In other words, this program must be a matter of national priority and not interpreted by the political efforts of those who believe teaching kids tolerance of other racial, ethnic and religious groups is somehow usurping parental prerogatives.

(2) The educational opportunities (including affirmative action programs), job training and meaningful low-cost housing programs that have been implemented piecemeal for the last fifty years have to be seriously revived, and seriously funded by taxing the wealthy upper 20% of the population. Alternatively, the money can be taken from the bloated defense budget. 

(3) No one should become a police officer (and while we are at it, a prison guard) without undergoing rigorous screening. And that screening should look to eliminate all those who have authoritarian personalities underlain with problems of impulsive anger. This is such a no-brainer that one wonders why it is not already being done. Perhaps part of the problem is that, in most cases, the police set their own criteria for admission into what has become a trade organization with the characteristics of an out-of-control college fraternity.  

Part V – Conclusion 

The rebellions of 2020 have now spread across the urban landscape of the United States. The governor of Minnesota, who has “fully mobilized” the states’ national guard to suppress the unrest has decided that the protests are no longer “about George’s death, this is about chaos being caused.” He is right that the the protests are no longer just about the murder of one African American. They are now about the inability of the justice system to deliver justice within an interminably unjust America. That system no longer has any legitimacy in the eyes of most African Americans and that view is spreading to other groups as well. When the state loses legitimacy in the eyes of citizens all that is left is the violence of mass suppression. And that is a one way road to hell for all us no matter what our race.

About Lawrence Davidson

Lawrence Davidson is professor of history emeritus at West Chester University in Pennsylvania. He has been publishing his analyses of topics in U.S. domestic and foreign policy, international and humanitarian law and Israel/Zionist practices and policies since 2010.