Hezbollah Secretary General Sayyed Hasan Nasrallah delivered a speech Tuesday in front of crowds participating in the procession of Ashura (Tenth Day of Muharram) in the Southern Suburb of Beirut.
After offering condolences to mourners for the martyrdom of the grandson of the prophet, he expressed gratitude for the large participation through the last 10 nights of Ashura and saluted the Lebanese Army, General Security and contributes for the successful security measures throughout these nights.
His eminence noted that “Imam Hussein will be looking at your faithfulness and response to his call with pride, as he sees that his message from Ashura has been received and all our deeds emerge from the school of Ashura”.
Thus, Sayyed Nasrallah assured that “Ashura is the day of reformation in the nation of Prophet Mohammad, Imam Hussein sacrificed his life for the sake of this nation”.
In this context, he pointed out that a country in this nation being occupied is not a passing issue, hence Palestine is our central cause.
Palestine
Hezbollah SG said: “Starting with our central cause, Palestine, we reassure its people that liberation can only be achieved through resistance and stress our continuous commitment to the Palestinian cause. It is the basic pillar in the face of the American-Israeli plot, and the Palestinian people will protect their cause and sanctities. We are with the Palestinian people and their resistance in the West Bank and Gaza. We stand with their prisoners and all their resistance fighters in one team and one battle. Additionally, we reassure our recognition to the rights of the Palestinian refugees to live and work with dignity in Lebanon until they can return to their land.”
He further denounced the Israelis’, specifically Netanyahu’s, actions against the Holy Al-Aqsa Mosque dubbing Zionist PM Benjamin Netanyahu as malicious.
Yemen
Moving on to Yemen, Sayyed Nasrallah said: “Yemen today is another Ashura… and its people are still standing strong in the face of the outrageous war in which crimes against humanity are taking place yet the whole world is watching silently”.
He added: “A US-British alignment is killing women and children in Yemen only for the sake of selling weapons and armory… and Saudi Arabia’s ongoing assault will only bring it eternal defeat, humiliation and shame in this life and torture in the afterlife. All the goals and slogans they put to justify their war have fallen. It is time for the Yemeni people to be aware of the Saudi/Emeriti goals and unite in their face. Today, we renew our call to stop war on Yemen and its people”.
Bahrain
On another level, his eminence said: “Another year passes and the Bahraini people are still suffering as the Bahrain regime is going far with its normalization with the Zionist enemy and its support for the Zionist Assaults on Palestine, Lebanon and Syria”.
“We tell the Bahraini people that with your peaceful revolution and your firm screams you are performing the big Jihad for the sake of Allah, and this will definitely fruit because this is the promise of Allah. Today, we stand by your side and reassure our faith in your right, truthfulness and firmness”.
US Sanctions
Concerning the US sanctions on Iran, Syria and resistance movements in Palestine, Lebanon and Iraq, his eminence considered that “this is an aggression that the US administration is waging to make economic and financial pressure after all its wars against the resistance movements in Lebanon, Palestine and Iraq have failed. This aggression has expanded to also target banks and businesses in Lebanon that are not related to Hezbollah in anyway, and this must be approached and dealt with in a different way”.
“The Lebanese government must defend and protect the Lebanese people and not rush to implement the US resolutions and desires. This file must be opened because the Lebanese economy is being targeted through that,” he added.
Lebanon
On the security level, Sayyed Nasrallah assured that “the Lebanese have toppled Israel’s latest attempt to change the rules of engagement. There are thousands of Israeli violations but after all there are red lines.
The latest violation in the Southern Suburb of Beirut, sending explosive-laden drones for assassination is a significant aggression on us. The resistance’s response came through the borders and by later destroying the Israeli drone yesterday in the sky of the southern village of Ramiyah”.
“Despite all the intimidation, we insist on enhancing our deterrent force which protects our country,” he added.
Israel, Hollywood Army
Sayyed Nasrallah said that “the Israeli Army has turned into a Hollywood Army, and its use of puppets to fool Hezbollah reveals its weakness”.
“You are a Hollywood Army and we learned a lesson from the show you performed. It is that in our future responses, instead of hitting one vehicle we will hit more, an instead of hitting one target we will hit more, and let’s see how many shows you can perform,” Hezbollah SG addressed the Israelis saying.
His eminence reassured Hezbollah’s respect to 1701 resolution which the Israeli is not sticking to and affirmed its right to respond to any attack against Lebanon, considering that there will be no red lines from now on.
“Lebanon has imposed itself on the whole world. Everyone called the Lebanese government after the latest Israeli violation trying to stop us from responding to the attack. Lebanon must know that it is strong with its army, people and resistance equation,” he added.
Lebanon, Economic File
On the economic situation, Sayyed Nasrallah indicated that “there could be a solution for the deteriorating economic situation in Lebanon, and the government must hold its responsibility of controlling corruption and financial waste…”
He further assured that “we refuse to fix the situation by raising taxes on the poor. Instead, the government must regain its stolen money from the rich who have stolen.”
“I call on the officials to make efforts to regain the trust of people, or else they would feel that every tax paid is not helping in solving the economic situation, so why pay it? Instead, if people had trust in their government, they would admire it and be part of reformation, this is the natural equation, just like people were ready to sacrifice for the sake of Hezbollah because they had faith in its leadership,” his eminence added.
Iran
“We reassure our rejection to any war on Iran because this war will destroy the region. It will be a war on the entire resistance axis and its goal would be to destroy any hope of regaining Palestine. Thus, on this day, as part of the resistance axis, we state that we will not take a neutral stance in the battle of right against wrong and in the battle of Hussein against Yazid. This supposed war will be an end to Israel and to the US domination in the region,” Sayyed Nasrallah stated.
“Our Imam and leader and the “Hussein” of this era is Imam Ali Khamenei. He is the leader of the axis of resistance and Iran is its center and basic pillar,” he added, vowing: “O leader and Imam, if we were to be killed and burned 1000 times, we will never leave you o son of Hussein… Do we stay after you? May Allah never show us that! In the axis of resistance, we have only seen victories, hope for the oppressed, dignity, and preservation of sanctities,” he stressed.
is the fact that it is very successful in evoking manifestations of the ultimate forms of Jewish power.
NY Governor Andrew Cuomo declared this week:
“If you boycott against Israel, New York will boycott you.”
New York’s governor is putting all companies and individuals that support the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement on a blacklist. But what led the Catholic governor to pander so shamelessly to Israel and its lobbies?
This is exactly the question BDS leaders would prefer to avoid.
BDS was formed to bring the occupation of Palestine to an end. It mistakenly contends that Israel is an ordinary (colonial) state that can be forced to change its policies by a few insignificant boycotts.
The BDS movement has consistently ignored the fact that Israel defines itself as the ‘Jewish State.’ It is supported by the vast majority of Jews and enjoys the total support of pretty much every Jewish institution worldwide.
The BDS leadership has tried to ignore the fact that pro Israel Jewish lobbies (AIPAC, CRIF, CFI, LFI etc.) are dominating Western foreign affairs pushing for global wars (Iraq, Syria, Libya, Iran). The BDS seems to forget that it is Jewish oligarchs that dominate media, Hollywood and finance. Israel is far from being either alone or an ordinary state.
Since Israel is the Jewish State, one would expect BDS to boycott all Jewish institutions and businesses throughout the world that are linked with the Jewish State and its crimes. One would expect, for instance, BDS to boycott George Soros who invests in Israel and in the occupied territories. This is obviously a bit problematic because Soros’ Open Society Institute also supports BDS directly and indirectly.*
One may wonder how is it possible that after so many decades of Israeli brutality, the Palestinian solidarity movement is still struggling to grasp the most fundamental fact about the oppressor: Israel doesn’t define itself as the Zionist state.’ It calls itself ‘the Jewish state.’ It is the face of world Jewry and it carries the flag most Jews around the globe identify with.
The Palestinian solidarity movement in its current form is dominated by Jewish activists. It is, in essence, a Jewish project designed to divert attention from the ‘J’ to the ‘Z.’
In recent years we have seen JVP, Mondoweiss and BDS running relentlessly vicious campaigns against the best and most significant voices around (Allison Weir, George Galloway, Ken O’Keefe, Greta Berlin, Norman Finkelstein and many others.)
But, I think BDS is perhaps unintentionallyserving its purpose- – it unites the Jews. Both Zionist and the so called ‘anti.’ It provokes the Jewish world to expose its might. It reminds the rest of us of what we are up against.
* When BDS realised that Soros is invested in SodaStream it didn’t call to boycott George Soros, it instead called Soros to withdraw his investment…
[Ed. note – Yesterday I posted an article about an upcoming Hollywood film entitled “War Dogs,” about Pentagon weapons dealing and the selling of arms to militias the US has supported in Iraq and Afghanistan–and specifically about two Jews who got involved in such operations. Now Paul Craig Roberts informs us of another movie–“Patriot’s Day,” about the Boston Marathon bombing. It looks like Hollywood is becoming more and more a propaganda arm of the US government. If you look at old films like “Casablanca,” you can see that it always performed something of this sort of role. Casablanca, released, I believe, in 1942, was basically made to promote the US war effort against Germany. But the Patriots Day movie–if we perhaps envision what the final cut might look like–could end up bolstering the official government version of what many believe to have been a false flag attack. If so, it would be carrying propaganda a step further than anything we ever saw produced back in the 1940s or 50s.
Roberts points out that Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was convicted and sentenced to death on some very dubious evidence, and that given the US government’s track record on lying about things like weapons of mass destruction, there is absolutely no reason to believe any of the prosecutorial claims in the Tsarnaev case. And then he offers the following comment: “One wonders how much the Boston Marathon Bombing movie makers have been paid for setting the official story in stone.”
He also shares with us a very interesting statement by John Remington Graham, an American attorney who, at the request of Tsarnaev’s aunt in Russia, submitted an amicus curiae brief in the case. Graham believes Tsarnaev is not guilty and that US officials are deliberately carrying out a miscarriage of justice. ]
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Update on the Boston Marathon Bomb Case–Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is Not Guilty
Movies are used to set official stories in stone, and a movie is going to be made about the heroic capture of a badly wounded 19 year old kid, not old enough to buy a beer, who, despite being shot up and severely wounded, is alleged to have written a confession in the dark on the side of a boat under which he was hiding to escape execution. Apparently, the 10,000 troops who violated the US Constitution and searched the houses of a shutdown Boston without warrants are going to be credited for “saving America from terrorism.”
I find it difficult to believe that a shot-up kid, who had to be put into intensive care when he was discovered, who was hiding from execution under an upturned boat, spent what little energy and life force he had left writing a confession in the dark on the inside of a boat. What convenient instrument to write with did he happen to have on hand?
From Ukraine to North Africa to the Middle East, and most recently in the Caucasus with the outbreak of hostilities between Azerbaijan and Armenia, death and destruction are on the prowl in multiple wars, while at the same time international laws governing armed conflict are rapidly being cast onto the rubbish heap.
Many of these wars have been instigated by powers outside the countries in which they are being fought, and the tide of violence threatening to engulf the world now is unprecedented in history. You would think that at such a time, Hollywood would have better taste than to make a movie glorifying the arms trade.
But of course, you would be wrong.
Scheduled for release in August, “War Dogs” is based on the real life story of Efraim Diveroli and David Packouz, two twenty-something Jews who got involved in the arms trade and ended up bidding on Pentagon contracts, in the process scoring deals to supply weapons, ammo, and other military equipment to forces the US was arming in both Iraq and Afghanistan.
Their story was told in a 2011 Rolling Stone article which detailed their passion for money-making, recreational drug use, and their predilection for shady business dealings. “Packouz and Diveroli met at Beth Israel Congregation, the largest Orthodox synagogue in Miami Beach,” the story informs us, and then goes on to describe how they landed some lucrative contracts, including one worth $300 million, all while operating a small company known as AEY, a shell company Diveroli’s father had set up. All of this was in the years 2005-2007.
For decades, weapons had been stockpiled in warehouses throughout the Balkans and Eastern Europe for the threat of war against the West, but now arms dealers were selling them off to the highest bidder. The Pentagon needed access to this new aftermarket to arm the militias it was creating in Iraq and Afghanistan. The trouble was, it couldn’t go into such a murky underworld on its own. It needed proxies to do its dirty work — companies like AEY. The result was a new era of lawlessness…
One evening, Diveroli picked Packouz up in his Mercedes, and the two headed to a party at a local rabbi’s house, lured by the promise of free booze and pretty girls. Diveroli was excited about a deal he had just completed, a $15 million contract to sell old Russian-manufactured rifles to the Pentagon to supply the Iraqi army. He regaled Packouz with the tale of how he had won the contract, how much money he was making and how much more there was to be made….
Diveroli, by the way, is the nephew of celebrity rabbi Shmuley Boteach, a staunch supporter of Israel and author of several books, including one entitled “Kosher Sex”–a book in which he “breaks down sexual taboos” while pioneering “a revolutionary approach to sex, marriage, and personal relationships, drawing on traditional Jewish wisdom.” Boteach has also run inflammatory ads in the New York Times defending Israel, and in 2012 was bankrolled by Las Vegas casino magnate Sheldon Adelson in an unsuccessful campaign for Congress.
So in other words, while Boteach was doing the TV talk show circuit advising Americans how to improve their sex lives, his nephew Diveroli was finding his niche in the “murkey underworld” of arms trafficking.
Above all, Diveroli cared about the bottom line. “Efraim was a Republican because they started more wars,” Packouz says. “When the United States invaded Iraq, he was thrilled. He said to me, ‘Do I think George Bush did the right thing for the country by invading Iraq? No. But am I happy about it? Absofuckinglutely.’ He hoped we would invade more countries because it was good for business.”
The big $300 million deal they landed found them purchasing stocks of Chinese-made ammunition in the Balkans and transporting them to Afghanistan, but a US embargo against Chinese weapons meant the whole thing had to be carried out clandestinely. The ammo was repackaged in cardboard boxes with no Chinese lettering. But some of the ammo was quite old, a number of the crates were infested with termites, and the two ended up being indicted for fraud and pleading guilty. And now we have a forthcoming Hollywood movie about their endogamic escapades.
It’s tempting to dismiss “War Dogs” as just another piece of Hollywood trash, but of course it comes as millions are coping with the destruction of homes and lives in the bogus war on terror and as whole nations are being torn apart. In Syria, the US has aligned itself with so-called “moderate” rebels, equipping them with vast stocks of weapons, many of which have ended up in the hands of ISIS, while in Yemen, we have assisted Saudi Arabia in an air campaign which, as of January 2016, had resulted in 2,795 killed and 5,324 wounded. At least 62 civilians were killed by coalition airstrikes in December alone, reports the UN, which was more than twice the number killed in the previous month. Many others have been left homeless.
A girl drinks from a broken street pipe in Yemen, where millions are without regular access to drinking water
But this hasn’t stopped the US from continuing to fuel the fire, so to speak. According to Defense News, the State Department has facilitated $33 billion worth of weapons sales to its Arab Gulf allies since May of 2015. The weapons–including anti-armor missiles, attack helicopters, and ballistic missile defense capabilities–have been sold to the six countries that make up the Gulf Cooperation Council, or GCC. These would of course be some of the same countries that have been supplying arms to ISIS while also carrying out war crimes in Yemen.
“In addition, the U.S. government and industry also delivered 4,500 precision-guided munitions to the GCC countries in 2015, including 1,500 taken directly from U.S. military stocks — a significant action given our military’s own needs,” said David McKeeby, a spokesman with the State Department’s Bureau of Political-Military Affairs.
How much of this ordnance may have ended up in the hands of not-so-moderate terrorists is unclear, but in December of 2015, Amnesty International published a report entitled “Taking Stock: The Arming of the Islamic State,” which found that the terrorist army “now deploys a substantial arsenal of arms and ammunition, designed or manufactured in more than 25 countries.”
A lot of this was looted or captured from poorly secured Iraqi military stocks, says the report, but illicit weapons transactions also seem to have played a considerable role in building up the ISIS arsenal–and some of the “chain of custody” evidence cited in the report, including a cache of weapons transferred from Croatia to the Free Syrian Army, sounds almost eerily similar to the sort of shady weapons trafficking operation run by Packouz and Diveroli.
Of course there is the old adage about art imitating life, and, on some level the fact that Hollywood would make a film about two Jews and then go on to entitle it “War Dogs” is perhaps not surprising. This, keep in mind, coming at a time when evidence of Israel’s support for terrorists in Syria is as clear as the hand in front of your face. And of course who could forget the lovable Victoria Nuland and her famous “f**k-the-EU” comment, mouthed off at a time when her State Department was busy engineering a coup in Ukraine?
In fact, efforts by Zionist Jews to create instability and instigate wars are getting to be about as common as fireflies on a summer night. They’re not always easy to spot, but you know they’re out there because they occasionally involuntarily light up, as when someone like Nuland gets caught in a taped phone conversation.
And now it looks like certain fireflies have moved into the Caucasus where they seem to be taking advantage of a long-simmering dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the region of Nagorno-Karabakh. On April 2, intense fighting broke out followed by a series of charges, countercharges, claims and counterclaims, made by both sides. According to the Armenians, it started with an offensive launched by Azerbaijani troops using tanks and artillery. Azerbaijan, on the other hand, insists it was responding to large-caliber weapons fire from inside the ethnic Armenian-controlled Nagorno-Karabakh area. So who is telling the truth? Or are both sides lying?
Hard to say for sure, but a couple of knowns are worth mentioning: A) Armenia is closely allied with Russia, and, B) Azerbaijan, too, has ties, including trade ties, with Russia, but it also is closely aligned with Turkey and maintains extensivetrade relations with Israel. And the trade with Israel has been especially heavy in the area of military procurement.
Israeli drones, anti-aircraft and missile defense systems have been supplied to Azerbaijan in the wake of a $1.6 billion agreement struck between the two countries in 2012. Israeli companies are also active in the Azerbaijani telecommunications, agriculture, water supply medical technology, and energy sectors. That makes for a lot of sayanim on the ground inside inside a relatively small country.
Perhaps no surprise, then, that Armenian forces shot down an Israeli drone on April 2–the very day hostilities broke out.
The ThunderB drone is known for its light weight, 62 pounds, and its long flying time–25.5 hours–on a single tank of fuel. It is made by an Israeli company known as BlueBird, which reportedly may be about to be purchased by Elbit Systems.
And then on Tuesday came news of yet another Israeli drone spotted over Nagorno-Karabakh–this one believed to be a Harop drone, made by Israeli Aerospace Industries. The Harop is also known as a “suicide drone” in that rather than firing a missile at a target it simply becomes the missile itself, ramming the target and destroying it.
According to Gordon Duff, senior editor at Veterans Today, the key tounderstanding the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict is to recognize “that Azerbaijan is a client state of Israel and the CIA.” He adds that Azerbaijan has as well become “the regional operating center for Google Idea Groups,” which he refers to as the “shadow CIA.”
Google Ideas was formed in 2010. At that time Google CEO Eric Schmidt tapped the State Department’s Jared Cohen to direct the new venture, dubbed as a “think/do tank.” In late 2015, Google was reorganized under a parent company called Alphabet, Inc., and in February of this year Google Ideas was rebranded as “Jigsaw”–although it is still run by Cohen and still affiliated with Google.
Cohen, by the way, is also an adjunct senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, and during his years with the State Department (2006-2010) he worked closely with Condoleezza Rice and Hillary Clinton, and became a strategic advisor in US policy toward Iran. Jigsaw’s mission is to “use technology to tackle the toughest geopolitical challenges, from countering violent extremism to thwarting online censorship to mitigating the threats associated with digital attacks,” says Schmidt.
Sounds nice, but a purview of Jigsaw’s website–fittingly kind of creepy and dark-looking–suggests that virtually all of the “activists” it has provided support to seem to be from countries with governments the US seeks to overthrow. And indeed, in 2012 Wikileaks released a cache of emails concerning Cohen’s activities in the Middle East, including one, apparently written by Cohen himself, in which he discusses efforts to stir up trouble in Iran:
I wanted to follow-up and get a sense of your latest thinking on the proposed March trip to UAE, Azerbaijan, and Turkey. The purpose of this trip is to exclusively engage the Iranian community to better understand the challenges faced by Iranians as part of one of our Google Ideas groups on repressive societies. Here is what we are thinking: Drive to Azerbaijan/Iranian border and engage the Iranian communities closer to the border (this is important because we need the Azeri Iranian perspective).
So here, it seems, we have Cohen basically setting up shop on the Iran-Azerbaijan border. It should be noted that both Azerbaijan and Armenia border Iran, while Azerbaijan also shares a border with Russia. A conflict breaking out in this region could easily spill over into Russia or Iran–both of which have called for the two warring parties to adhere to a 1994 ceasefire agreement.
But of course, such a spillover would advance certain geopolitical interests. For one thing, it would pose a dilemma for Russia at a time when it is engaged in Syria. Sergei Zheleznyak, vice speaker of the Russian state Duma, has voiced the view that a “third force” is behind developments in Nagorno-Karabakh. According to the Russian News Agency Tass:
“It is clear that the force that continues to fan the flames of war in the Middle East, Central Asia and the Caucasus dissatisfied with the peacekeeping and counter-terror success of Russia and our allies in Syria is interested in the speedy exacerbation of the protracted conflict in the Nagorno-Karabakh region,” the parliamentarian wrote on his Facebook page on Saturday.
According to Zheleznyak, “neither Azerbaijan nor Armenia essentially need this exacerbation now.” He noted that “there is every likelihood that this provocation has been organized by a third force,” adding that “information on its presence is beginning to leak out.” In view of this, he drew attention to the fact that “at night in the mountains it is enough to have a few trained armed persons who know the opposing sides’ balance of forces to provoke them to open reciprocal ‘reprisal’ fire.”
Most people probably assumed Zheleznyak, in talking about a “third force,” was referring to Turkey–and certainly Turkey’s downing of a Russian jet in Syria factors into the equation. But another element that perhaps figures even more prominently is the “clash of civilizations” that hardcore Zionists have long salivated over the thought of.
We might theorize that ISIS was created with a two-fold objective: one was to break apart Syria and bring about the overthrow of Bashar Assad, while the other was to jockey into existence a clash of civilizations between Christians and Muslims. In both of these objectives it has failed. Assad is still standing, and while the rise of ISIS certainly inflamed anti-Muslim sentiments in the West, it has not resulted in the all-out war between Christianity and Islam that would have played so well into the hands of the Jewish state.
But where the ISIS plan failed, the conflict in the Caucasus could well succeed. Armenia is predominantly a Christian state, while Azerbaijan is mostly Muslim. A war between these two could galvanize public opinion in the region along religious lines. Regional political alignments and the history of the Armenian genocide are also to be considered. Turkey, though sharing a border with Armenia, has openly sided with Azerbaijan. Russia, on the other hand, has remained officially neutral. However, an RT report filed April 5 shows journalist Murad Gazdiev reporting from inside Armenian Karabakh trenches.
Armenian genocide
So where is Israel in all of this? Officially it doesn’t seem to be saying much about it, but in May of 2015, the Jewish Daily Forward published an article entitled, “Why Israel’s Alliance with Azerbaijan is so Shortsighted.” The writer, Christopher Atamian, takes the Jewish state to task over its refusal to recognize the Armenian genocide as well as for its lucrative arms contract with Azerbaijan, a country he refers to as an “authoritarian regime that is fueling regional conflict.”
“This is the same country that attempted to wipe out the entire Armenian population of Nagorno Karabakh in 1991 before losing a bloody war against the Armenians,” he adds.
What he leaves unspoken, of course, is that Israel’s refusal to recognize the Armenian genocide is tantamount to holocaust denial. More than 1.5 million Armenians were massacred from the years 1915 to 1922, and the Jewish state’s silence on the matter became a particularly hot-button issue last year on the genocide’s 100th anniversary.
Zheleznyak, the Duma vice speaker, seems for his own part to be offering sage advice to both parties in the current conflict, noting that Russia’s president as well as its government agencies “urge Armenia and Azerbaijan to cease fire and not to allow to draw them into someone else’s insidious game, as long as it is still possible.”
“As long as it’s still possible” is of course the key question. The more people die, the further recede the possibilities of the regional players not getting trapped or caught up in the “insidious game”–and the greater grow the chances of the conflict’s becoming the parabolic curve that ignites World War III.
Should that come to pass, maybe Diveroli and Packouz will vie for ringside seats–although it doesn’t appear they’ll especially want to sit next to each other. According to the article in Rolling Stone, the two had a major falling out.
“Listen, dude, if you f**k me, I’m going to f**k you,” one of them warned during an argument over money.
“Whatever,” replied the other.
One wonders why they didn’t name the movie “War Pigs” rather than “War Dogs.” Perhaps it wouldn’t have been kosher enough.
In the past year in Israel we’ve seen an arson attack on a Palestinian home which left a mother, father and their 18-month-old baby dead; we have seen a video of Jewish settlers dancing and celebrating the attack by stabbing a photo of the baby; we have observed continued expropriation of Palestinian land in the West Bank, including one of the biggest land grabs in recent years–579 acres near the Dead Sea; and more recently we have seen a second video showing an Israeli soldier executing a wounded Palestinian with a gunshot to the head.
The execution video showed Israeli soldier Elior Azaria pump a bullet into the head of 21-year-old Abdul Fattah Sharif, as he lay on the ground wounded and barely moving. The murder took place on Purim, the Jewish holiday which celebrates the massacre of thousands of Gentiles, as told of in the Book of Esther. The next holiday on the Jewish calendar is Passover, coming up on April 22-23. The significance of Passover is laid out in twelfth chapter of Exodus:
On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn–both men and animals–and I will bring judgement on all the gods of Egypt. I am the Lord. The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are; and when I see the blood I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.
This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord–a lasting ordinance…And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’ then tell them, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians.’
It seems that both Purim and Passover are in essence celebrations of the deaths of non-Jews. Suppose Gentiles observed holidays each year in which we celebratedJewish deaths? What do you suppose would be said of it?
Whatever one’s views of Judaism may be (there are some admirable sentiments expressed in the Old Testament as well as some repellent ones), Zionism has morphed from the simple idea of a homeland for a specific group of people into a supremacist ideology that has had appalling consequences–not only for its victims but also even for its adherents, dehumanizing them to a degree never thought imaginable.
Zionism is the great Passover feast that has become a celebration of war.
In this NYC talk I suggest that Jewish dissent is, in practice, a controlled opposition apparatus. This talk will help you to connect the dots and to grasp your own responsibility.
A leaked video showing staged ISIS execution video has gone viral recently on social media network.
The video was hacked by a group of Russian hackers called “Cyber Berkut”. The group claimed to have stolen the footage from an electronic device reportedly belonging to one on US senator John McCain’s staffer.
The authenticity of the video has not been verified yet.
In the footage which was taken inside a film studio, two actors play the executioner and the prisoner in orange jumpsuit, mimicking the sickening execution videos frequently published by the terror group.
Miraculously enough, all ISIS prisoners are shown calm, composed and almost satisfied with their fate. This has repeatedly raised the eyebrows of many internet viewers around the world about the authenticity of these videos.
The celebration of Purim is a yearly ritual and is enacted and carried out in the Judaic tradition in the last days of winter before spring arrives.
A brief synopsis of the story behind Purim:
As a young child Esther was orphaned and adopted by Mordecai. When she came of age he sold her into the King’s Harem. Eventually the King became so enamoured with Esther that he made her his Queen. Due to Esther’s influence over the King, Mordecai was given permission to slaughter his enemies, every man woman and child. Not only were the people responsible for plotting to kill the Jews murdered, but also whole families, the innocent, who had been caught up in this political disaster.
We see the same thing happening in the West Bank and on the Gaza Strip today. The innocent are murdered, their homes are destroyed, their olive trees are cut down and their land is taken from them in yet another “holocaust,” reminiscent of Purim.
The celebration of Purim is the celebration of the holocaust that took place when the Jews in Persia, during the Babylonian exile, laid waste to almost 100,000 people thanks to an edict granted to them by King Ahasuerus and made possible due to Esther’s position in the King’s palace.
The Middle East for thousands of years, even in the 21st Century, regards women as commodities. Young girls are sold into slavery, prostitution or both. Many young girls who are exceptionally beautiful and “comely,” a rather censored word used in Biblical passages for “sexy,”are often part of trade and political agreements and are “sold off” in marriage.
Orphans are particularly vulnerable and susceptible, often “adopted” by older men, who nurture them and depending on how pretty, beautiful or “comely” they are, sell them off, either as slaves or in marriage, as one would sell off a prized piece of art in exchange for some other thing of value.
In this story we see Mordecai gaining power and influence through a young girl who he has nurtured and adopted. These young women were also often used as spies, the lure of their charms was encouraged from a young age and adapted for the purposes of espionage and political influence. Their beauty and their sexual prowess was imperative in order for them to fulfil their obligations to their “adopted” father figure. Esther in all cases fits the profile. She is the ultimate Jewish spy and concubine of the Middle East in Judaic culture.
Not only does Esther fit the spy/concubine role, she also fits the profile of the sacred whore and the Goddess Ishtar. Most of the symbols associated with her, including her name, have been plagiarised and adapted from Sumerian belief into a Judaic myth of… “Biblical proportions. ”
Esther is called “Hadassah,” which means “Myrtle” in Hebrew. The myrtle flower was sacred to Venus, Aphrodite and Ishtar. It was also considered to be a powerful aphrodisiac. We are told that Esther was born Hadassah, which could be read in the context that she was a born aphrodisiac. Many things over time either get lost in translation or are slightly altered from their original form. The word “hadassah” is almost similar to the word “kadeshah,” which was a sacred prostitute.
If we look at the story of Esther, her upbringing, her eventual position in the King’s harem and her later rise to power, she most definitely fits the definition of “kadeshah.” She also fits the definition of the Japanese concubine and the many women in European history known openly as “The King’s Mistress.” Trained for service both physically and intellectually in order to spy on and be of influence in the highest escutcheons of power. As such she is given “Goddess” status.
Ishtar is the Goddess of love, war , fertility and sexuality. The town of Uruk in Babylonia was known as the “town of the sacred courtesans.” She is also referred to as the “courtesan of the gods”.
ISHTAR
Ishtar is a concubine, courtesan and a second wife to the King/God. This is a polygamous relationship.
The monarchy at the time regarded themselves as “Gods,” King Ahasuerus was seen as the son of the Gods, Esther as his courtesan and concubine, is a courtesan of the “God.”
Ishtar is often associated with Isis. But these two “Goddess” figures come from two different nations and represent completely different aspects of women.
ISIS
Isis is a Goddess in her own right and the only wife of Osiris. This is a monogamous relationship.
Isis in cosmology is the star Sirius. Isis is the Goddess of fertility, her star Sirius, rising at the annual flooding of the Nile River which brought fertile silt giving abundance to the whole of Egypt. Isis is the mother figure, of the God King Horus.
SEKHMET
A comparative study of Egyptian Goddesses would rather place Ishtar and in turn Esther, on a similar level to Lioness Goddess, Sekhmet, the “alter” of the Goddess Hathor. Ishtar was also associated with Lions.
In her negative aspect as Sekhmet, she is the Goddess of war and destruction. Also known as the destructive “eye” of the sun. Or the “eye of Ra.” In her positive aspect she turned into Hathor, the goddess of love. Much in the same way Esther is the concubine and lover of the God/King, but is also the engineer of the holocaust and the total destruction of Mordecai’s enemies. The tribe of Judah is associated with lions, Genesis 49:9 “Judah is a lion’s whelp: from the prey, my son, thou art gone up: he stooped down, he couched as a lion, and as an old lion; who shall rouse him up?”
Hollywood seems to have adopted this duality of Ishtar, through mind control and creating “alters.” The “kitten” training, the violence and the blatant promiscuity, coupled with duel personality types very often leading to mental breakdown and often suicide. A full in depth study on this subject can be found at:Vigilante Citizen.
In closing, the story of Esther is not part of the original Torah reading. It is a story that has been adapted from Sumerian myths, the Babylonian exile and the story of one tribe, being the Jews, descendants of Judah. Whether there was an Esther or not, whether this holocaust actually took place or not, is debatable. The whole rendering of the story of Esther could be plagiarised from Babylonian history and religion.The Samaritans, the descendants of Joseph and his sons, Ephraim and Mannasheh, do not celebrate Purim. They only mark the holidays set by the Pentateuch, whilst in Genesis 49: 24 Israel calls Joseph ” the shepherd, the stone of Israel.”
The Book of Esther was not found amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Posted on February 13, 2015 by uprootedpalestinians
The Grand Entry Western Store advertises ‘Chris Kyle’ hats for sale on their street sign February 11, 2015 in Stephenville, Texas. AFP/Brandon Wade/Getty Images
“American Sniper” has become the second highest grossing R-rated film of all time on the domestic US film market. The financial and critical success of the film shows how startlingly normal it has become to dehumanize and vilify Arabs and Muslims in American fiction. This ultimately seeps into reality, as it did in the cold-blooded execution of three Arab Muslim students in their homes by a white atheist terrorist, or the incineration of a 13-year-old boy by a US drone strike.
The citizens of the United States have spoken. They have done so in the most democratic way possible within the American context — through their wallets.
Today, “American Sniper” is the second highest grossing R-rated film domestically, earning almost $283 million since its nationwide release on January 16.
The average cost of a movie ticket in the US is estimated to be around $8.12. Given that average, we can roughly estimate that around 34.85 million people — almost 10 percent of the total American population, or around 27 percent of Americans who voted in 2012 — paid to watch “American Sniper.”
(Yes, this is slightly reductionist and glosses over factors like repeated viewings, IMAX prices, the massive marketing behind the film or other pesky issues… I guess I’m just momentarily inspired by the low standards prevalent in articles, books, and analysis published in the West by ‘experts’ on Arabs, Muslims, the West Asian region, and indeed the rest of the non-Western region).
That’s quite a feat for an R-rated movie, considering that the rating restricts, in theory, individuals below the age of 17 to freely watch the movie (without legal guardians). And yet, “American Sniper,” at the moment, is the highest grossing war film of all time in America.
Why do I bring up “American Sniper” long after other, much more refined writers have tackled the film? Allow me a moment to explain.
I am a proponent of the idea that the consumption of fiction (what is being consumed and how it is consumed) can be a useful indication of the sociological sentiments of a populace. On that basis, we can deduce a few things about the American public from the success of “American Sniper.”
Americans love worshipping their heroes, particularly if their heroes are affiliated with a military entity, and even more if said heroes are killing nefarious Arabs.
The fact that “American Sniper” is loosely based on the biography of Chris Kyle, a routine liar and notorious bigot, who relished in the killing of ‘savage Arabs,’ inviting no hesitation from the film’s producers, director, and actors, speaks volumes about how valuable Arab lives are to the average American mind.
Clint Eastwood, who directed the movie, laughably argued that “American Sniper” was inherently an anti-war movie. He argued that the film made, “the biggest anti-war statement any film can make.” Then again, Eastwood once ranted against an empty chair during a Republican National Conference in 2012 so we can excuse him for any deluded statements he makes.
The film itself is such a fantastical distortion of reality that it shrugged aside and white-washed everything regarding Kyle, especially in terms of what he thought about war.
Kyle was never anti-war. He loved war. He wrote that he wished he could have killed more Arabs, and saw the killing as part of doing God’s work. This was exactly who he was. He wrote this clearly in black and white in his book, the book that was adapted into “American Sniper.”
Yet, after being run through that magical processing plant that is Hollywood, Kyle has been transformed into a larger-than-life tragic hero, and the apologist myths surrounding the brutal Anglo-American invasion of Iraq are once again perpetuated, enhanced, and absorbed.
Much can be gleaned from the fact that “American Sniper” was showered with award nominations, despite the fact that the film is not original, is not a technical masterpiece, and is neither ground-breaking or thought-provoking.
The accolades desperately flung at it from so-called ‘critics’ and ‘award judges’ are simply a repetition of the blind support thrown at other pro-war films in recent history like “Zero Dark Thirty” (Katheryn Bigelow’s celebration of torture) or “The Hurt Locker” (another terrible film, also by Bigelow, in which an American soldier deals with his superficial guilt over the Iraq war), or the countless war movies that solely present the American military perspective, oblivious to the sentiments and perspectives of the non-American victims of war.
There is an almost prescribed holiness to “American Sniper,” where in effect the movie has become a de facto litmus test for American patriotism. Its stellar financial and critical success shows how mainstream and absolutely lucrative it is to be anti-Arab and anti-Muslim in America. The vehement (and arguably pathetic) defense of the film is extraordinary, to the point that even the US First Lady Michelle Obama felt the need to defend “American Sniper.”
How incredible. A film, based on the life of a bigoted liar, who relished killing Arabs, is embraced and elevated. It is human. Emotional. Brimming with pain. Oh, how sad it is that this bigot was killed by another American veteran. What a brave man he was. Hark. Sob…. and scene.
This is only one tiny aspect of the colossal “Military-Entertainment Complex” that permeates Hollywood, the video gaming industry, comic books, television, and other forms of US entertainment, which, as documented by American academic Jack Shaheen, has a special, long history with regards to Arabs and Muslims.
This state of American storytelling bleeds into reality.
One can point to the recent case of the Chapel Hill murders in North Carolina, in which a 46-year-old white atheist man went into his neighbor’s apartment and shot three American Muslims — Deah Shaddy Barakat (23), his wife Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha (21), and her sister Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha (19) — in the head, one after the other.
Not only did the American media take their sweet time to report the story — and only after there was a massive social media campaign that forced them to pay attention — but also no mainstream media institutions used the words, “terrorism” or “terrorist” in their analyses. We all know that if a 46-year-old American Muslim executed three white atheists, it would have automatically resulted in the ubiquitous use of the word “TERROR” in every headline from New York to Los Angeles, and London to Tel Aviv.
And that brings us to the extraordinary audacity of the local police, who announced that they are considering a “parking dispute” as the motive behind the execution, despite the fact that the white atheist terrorist’s Facebook page, and statements by the victims’ families, indicate otherwise.
(If the Chapel Hill murders were due to a ‘parking dispute’, then surely we should consider the notion that Zionists are ethnically cleansed Palestinians over a ‘landscaping dispute’, or that the Charlie Hebdo attackers killed people because of ‘artistic differences’).
Underlying the devastating terror in Chapel Hill is a mammothian system of harassment, vilification, and abuse directed towards Arabs and Muslims — as well as the many other non-white communities — within US borders and elsewhere.
Let’s be viciously honest here: in American mythology and reality, the only good Arab or Muslim is either dead or blindly submissive to the political, sociological, and economic narratives advanced by the American state.
This is the blunt truth today, a truth that was once eloquently articulated by a 13-year-old Yemeni boy, Mohammed Tuaiman al-Jahmi, thousands of miles away.
He said: “In their eyes, we don’t deserve to live like people in the rest of the world and we don’t have feelings or emotions or cry or feel pain like all the other humans around the world.”
Yazan is a senior writer for Al-Akhbar English. Follow him on Twitter:@WhySadeye
The views expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect Al-Akhbar English’s editorial policy. If you would like to submit a thoughtful response to one of our opinion pieces, send your contribution to our submissions editor.
There is “another West” in South America that is producing a new culture and political modalities with a different view on the world than the one we have been accustomed to in Europe and North America. Al-Akhbarwill be publishing a series of articles depicting observations and impressions about South America, and its transformations.
The United States won the war against Mexico in 1847 and seized California. Soon, the colonizers of North America started expanding westward during the era known as the California Gold Rush.
Gold mines were being discovered in the western deserts and mining became a source of wealth that tempted European newcomers.
The saying “go West, young man” soon became a part of North America’s folklore. The phrase reflected the “American dream” which was represented by gold at the time.
However, the saying “gold does not lose its luster’ was obviously a lie. With time, gold did indeed lose its luster and turned black as greedy [colonizers] headed to the Arab deserts on a quest to find it.
The renowned pairs of jeans, now one of the most popular garments worn around the world, were in fact first created in the [American Old West] to accommodate for the work conditions of miners and factory workers.
This growing popularity of workers’ garments was matched by a prevailing concept that considered gold mining an economic pillar. Once a gold mine was exhausted, people quickly moved on to search for a new one.
The “go West, young man” system emerged as a prevailing international economic pattern with world governments – backed by parallel organizations – devising schemes on how to exploit natural resources. Soon, politics and wars revolved around controlling and consuming natural resources. Under this economic system, humanity’s role was reduced to serving these resources that have been buried in the bottom of the earth since ancient geological eras.
After the gold rush, coal and oil became the new obsession of the world economy, turning modern humans into mere servants of the fossils of dinosaurs and ancient creatures that roamed the earth some thousands of years ago before ending up as oil beneath its surface.
It is the same economy that is now driving the planet in the East and in the West. East Asia has exploited the consumption-based Western pattern to create jobs, but these jobs still serve this insatiable system. The Iphone-philia that recurs every autumn is a clear example of this consumption model that can only be described as pathological.
The World Bank and its partner organizations are the ultimate guards of this economic model. Since the end of the Cold War, no one has ever voluntarily infringed on the system, and the few who have dared to break out were punished like a troublemaking student forced to stand in the corner by his teacher.
Today, we are living through a horror movie brought to life by none other than Hollywood, which was itself built on the remains of the West’s gold.
However, the dead have resurrected from the bottom of the earth, but they are not zombies but coal and fossil fuel. And the invention that surpassed the human brain which invented it, is not a rebellious robot like sci-fi pioneer Isaac Asimov imagined, but the invisible hand of Adam Smith. Thus, once again, the narrative of divine religions is proven correct; we are all now the sons of Adam, praise the lord!
But do not fall into despair, like in all Hollywood movies the American hero is coming to the rescue. He will save humans in the face of zombies and robots, and he will be armed by an economy that puts “people first.” This mighty hero will replace the slogan “I want more gold” with “I want more life.”
This American still believes that enough is “enough” and that it is possible to feel full without seeking satiety. But do not waste your time searching for this hero in the northern part of the continent.
If you wish to find the humanity we lost… go south, young man!
The views expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect Al-Akhbar English’s editorial policy. If you would like to submit a thoughtful response to one of our opinion pieces, send your contribution to our submissions editor.
This article is an edited translation from the Arabic Edition.
UPROOTED PALESTINIANS: SALAM ALQUDS ALAYKUM 