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Instead of making a real effort to find out the truth of what actually happened to the Syrian aid convoy the Western media preferred to repeat whatever the US and the Jihadis told them as if it was true.

I thought about that March night as the election results rolled in, as the New York Times forecast showed Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the presidency plummet from about 80% to less than 5%, while Trump’s fortunes skyrocketed by the minute. As Clinton’s future in the Oval Office evaporated, leaving only a whiff of her stale dreams, I saw all the foreign-policy certainties, all the hawkish policies and military interventions, all the would-be bin Laden raids and drone strikes she’d preside over as commander-in-chief similarly vanish into the ether. With her failed candidacy went the no-fly escalation in Syria that she was sure to pursue as president with the vigor she had applied to the disastrous Libyan intervention of 2011 while secretary of state.  So, too, went her continued pursuit of the now-nameless war on terror, the attendant “gray-zone” conflicts — marked by small contingents of U.S. troops, drone strikes, and bombing campaigns — and all those munitions she would ship to Saudi Arabia for its war in Yemen. As the life drained from Clinton’s candidacy, I saw her rabid pursuit of a new Cold War start to wither and Russo-phobic comparisons of Putin’s rickety Russian petro-state to Stalin’s Soviet Union begin to die.  I saw the end, too, of her Iron Curtain-clouded vision of NATO, of her blind faith in an alliance more in line with 1957 than 2017. As Clinton’s political fortunes collapsed, so did her Israel-Palestine policy — rooted in the fiction that American and Israeli security interests overlap — and her commitment to what was clearly an unworkable “peace process.”  Just as, for domestic considerations, she would blindly support that Middle Eastern nuclear power, so was she likely to follow President Obama’s trillion-dollarpath to modernizing America’s nuclear arsenal.  All that, along with her sure-to-be-gargantuan military budget requests, were scattered to the winds by her ringing defeat.

Clinton’s foreign policy future had been a certainty.  Trump’s was another story entirely.  He had, for instance, called for a raft of military spending: growing the Army and Marines to a ridiculous size, building a Navy to reach a seemingly arbitrary and budget-busting number of ships, creating a mammoth air armada of fighter jets, pouring money into a missile defense boondoggle, and recruiting a legion of (presumably overweight) hackers to wage cyber war.  All of it to be paid for by cutting unnamed waste, ending unspecified “federal programs,” or somehow conjuring up dollars from hither and yon.  But was any of it serious?  Was any of it true?  Would President Trump actually make good on the promises of candidate Trump?  Or would he simply bark “Wrong!” when somebody accused him of pledging to field an army of 540,000 active duty soldiers or build a Navy of 350 ships. Would Trump actually attempt to implement his plan to defeat ISIS — that is, “bomb the shit out of them” and then “take the oil” of Iraq?  Or was that just the bellicose bluster of the campaign trail?  Would he be the reckless hawk Clinton promised to be, waging wars like the Libyan intervention?  Or would he follow the dictum of candidate Trump who said, “The current strategy of toppling regimes, with no plan for what to do the day after, only produces power vacuums that are filled by terrorists.” Outgoing representative Randy Forbes of Virginia, a contender to be secretary of the Navy in the new administration, recently said that the president elect would employ “an international defense strategy that is driven by the Pentagon and not by the political National Security Council… Because if you look around the globe, over the last eight years, the National Security Council has been writing that. And find one country anywhere that we are better off than we were eight years [ago], you cannot find it.”

Such a plan might actually blunt armed adventurism, since it was war-weary military officials who reportedly pushed back against President Obama’s plans to escalate Iraq War 3.0.  According to some Pentagon-watchers, a potentially hostile bureaucracy might also put the brakes on even fielding a national security team in a timely fashion. While Wall Street investors seemed convinced that the president elect would be good for defense industry giants like Lockheed Martin and General Dynamics, whose stocks surged in the wake of Trump’s win, it’s unclear whether that indicates a belief in more armed conflicts or simply more bloated military spending. Under President Obama, the U.S. has waged war in or carried out attacks on at least eight nations — Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, Somalia, Yemen, Libya, and Syria.  A Clinton presidency promised more, perhaps markedly more, of the same — an attitude summed up in her infamous comment about the late Libyan autocrat Muammar Gaddafi: “We came, we saw, he died.”  Trump advisor Senator Jeff Sessions said, “Trump does not believe in war. He sees war as bad, destructive, death and a wealth destruction.”  Of course, Trump himself said he favors committing war crimes like torture and murder.  He’s also suggested that he would risk war over the sort of naval provocations — like Iranian ships sailing close to U.S. vessels — that are currently met with nothing graver than warning shots. So there’s good reason to assume Trump will be a Clintonesque hawk or even worse, but some reason to believe — due to his propensity for lies, bluster, and backing down — that he could also turn out to be less bellicose.

It's 2016 going on 1984. The UK has just passed a massive expansion in surveillance powers, which critics have called "terrifying" and "dangerous".

The new law, dubbed the "snoopers' charter", was introduced by then-home secretary Theresa May in 2012, and took two attempts to get passed into law following breakdowns in the previous coalition government. Four years and a general election later -- May is now prime minister -- the bill was finalized and passed on Wednesday by both parliamentary houses. But civil liberties groups have long criticized the bill, with some arguing that the law will let the UK government "document everything we do online". It's no wonder, because it basically does. The law will force internet providers to record every internet customer's top-level web history in real-time for up to a year, which can be accessed by numerous government departments; force companies to decrypt data on demand -- though the government has never been that clear on exactly how it forces foreign firms to do that that; and even disclose any new security features in products before they launch.

Not only that, the law also gives the intelligence agencies the power to hack into computers and devices of citizens (known as equipment interference), although some protected professions -- such as journalists and medical staff -- are layered with marginally better protections. In other words, it's the "most extreme surveillance law ever passed in a democracy," according to Jim Killock, director of the Open Rights Group. The bill was opposed by representatives of the United Nations, all major UK and many leading global privacy and rights groups, and a host of Silicon Valley tech companies alike. Even the parliamentary committee tasked with scrutinizing the bill called some of its provisions "vague".

Turkey’s leftist HDP announced that the party will boycott a parliamentary vote on constitutional change that would introduce an executive presidential system in the country. Turkey’s CHP also opposes the constitutional change.

If adopted by parliament, an executive presidential system will gradually be introduced in Turkey. The constitutional change proposed by Turkey’s Islamist, governing AKP and supported by the MHP, would concentrate political power in the hands of the presidency. Moreover, it would turn parliament into a virtually powerless “rubbe stamp” institution comparable to the parliament in the Islamic Republic of Iran. On Tuesday parliament voted to press on with the debate about a constitutional reform package. The initial vote, seen as an early indicator of support for the bill, was passed with 338 votes. However, the result also showed that some MPs from the ruling AKP and the nationalist opposition MHP, had not voted in favor. Ayhan Bilgen, MP and spokesman for the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), said on Twitter late Monday: “We will not use our vote for this illegitimate reform while our deputies are unjustly under arrest and prevented from carrying out their duties.”  Eleven HDP MPs are currently in prison for alleged links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is listed as a “terrorist” organisation by Turkey, the US and the EU. On Monday Turkey’s parliament began debating the draft for the new constitution. A final vote is expected within two weeks.  If the draft is approved by parliament, a referendum is expected to take place within 60 days, indicating a date in late March or early April.

Selahattin Demirtas, one of the HDP’s co-leaders, on Monday criticized the debates from behind bars. Demirtas said “the arrest of 11 members of the party had stripped them of their chance to challenge the draft constitution and “makes the debate and the vote controversial from the very start”. On November 4, 2016, 12 Kurdish HDP MPs, including the two co-leaders, Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yüksekdag, were arrested on charges of links to the PKK. They deny the charges. The HDP drew unwanted attention from Turkey’s ruling AKP and “security services” after it criticized the AKP government for unilaterally ending the ceasefire and peace talks with the PKK in 2015. In May 2016, parliament voted to strip lawmakers of their legal immunity, paving the way for the HDP legislators’ arrests. The HDP was increasingly targeted after the “failed” military coup on July 15,  2016, even though the coup was blamed on Gülenists. Thousands of officials from the HDP have been detained since 2015. Turkey detained over 200 HDP members in December 2016. The AKP needs more than 330 votes a three fifths majority for the bill to be submitted to a referendum for voters’ approval. The opposition CHP also opposes the introduction of a presidential system, although it won’t boycott the vote. The launch of the talks prompted protests, despite the fact that the country still is governed by emergency laws introduced on July 20, 2016, after the “failed” military coup on July 15. Others stress that the introduction of the executive presidential system render the parliament virtually powerless and transforms it into a “rubber stamp assembly” comparable to the parliament in the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The outgoing U.S. director of national intelligence has extended an olive branch of sorts to Donald Trump — denouncing media leaks, casting skepticism on a report that Russia has damaging material on the president-elect, and assuring Trump that America's spies stand ready to serve him. In an unusual statement, James Clapper said he had spoken Wednesday evening with Trump, five days after the spy chief and some of his counterparts met with the incoming president to discuss U.S. intelligence assessments that Russia tried to interfere in the 2016 election, possibly to help him win.Story Continued Below The assessment has badly aggravated existing tensions between the intelligence community and Trump. On Tuesday, CNN, BuzzFeed and other media outlets reported that, during Friday’s briefing, the intelligence officials told Trump about an unsubstantiated private report that detailed how Russia's government allegedly had salacious information about him. In addition, BuzzFeed published the apparent dossier, which Trump has since denounced as “fake news.” "I expressed my profound dismay at the leaks that have been appearing in the press, and we both agreed that they are extremely corrosive and damaging to our national security," Clapper said of the information that has come out since last week's intelligence briefing.

Clapper’s statement represented a dramatic turn of events only 24 hours after initial leaks about the intelligence leaders having told Trump of the dossier. And while Clapper’s statement indirectly confirmed the media reports of the briefing, it also could be viewed as a concession of sorts from an intelligence community that has come under repeated, direct fire from the president-elect. Trump had compared the leak from his briefing to “Nazi Germany” on Twitter on Wednesday morning, writing, “Intelligence agencies should never have allowed this fake news to "leak" into the public. One last shot at me. Are we living in Nazi Germany?” In a news conference, also held Wednesday, Trump defended the comparison and elaborated further, saying, “A thing like that should have never been written, it should never have been had, and it certainly should never have been released.” Clapper, however, said he did not believe the leaks to the press came from the intelligence community. At the same time, he indicated that the intelligence community decided to share the material with Trump because its mere existence was important for the incoming president to know about.

As far as the "private security company document," Clapper said, "I emphasized that this document is not a U.S. Intelligence Community product and that I do not believe the leaks came from within the IC. The IC has not made any judgment that the information in this document is reliable, and we did not rely upon it in any way for our conclusions."

President-elect Donald Trump laid out a U.S. military policy on Tuesday that would avoid interventions in foreign conflicts and instead focus heavily on defeating the Islamic State militancy.In the latest stop on a "thank you" tour of states critical to his Nov. 8 election win, Trump introduced his choice for defense secretary, General James Mattis, to a large crowd in this city near the Fort Bragg military base, which has deployed soldiers to 90 countries around the world."We will stop racing to topple foreign regimes that we know nothing about, that we shouldn't be involved with," Trump said. "Instead, our focus must be on defeating terrorism and destroying ISIS, and we will."Trump's rhetoric was similar to what he said during the election campaign when he railed against the war in Iraq.In Fayetteville, he vowed a strong rebuilding of the U.S. military, which he suggested has been stretched too thin. Instead of investing in wars, he said, he would spend money to build up America's aging roads, bridges and airports.

Even so, Trump said he wants to boost spending on the military. To help pay for his buildup, Trump pledged to seek congressional approval for lifting caps on defense spending that were part of "sequestration" legislation that imposed cut spending across the board."We don't want to have a depleted military because we’re all over the place fighting in areas that we shouldn't be fighting in. It's not going to be depleted any longer," he said.Trump said any nation that shares these goals will be considered a U.S. partner. "We don't forget. We want to strengthen old friendships and seek out new friendships," he said. He said the policy of "intervention and chaos" must come to an end.While U.S. armed forces are deployed in far-flung places around the globe, they are only involved currently in active combat in the Middle East, specifically Iraq and Syria for the most part."We will build up our military not as an act of aggression, but as an act of prevention," he said. "In short, we seek peace through strength."

Trump described Mattis as the right person for the job and urged Congress to approve a waiver to let him take on the civilian position. Under U.S. law a military leader must be retired for seven years before becoming eligible to become defense secretary.Speaking to the crowed, Mattis said, "I look forward to being the civilian leader as long as the Congress gives me the waiver and the Senate votes to consent.""We're going to get you that waiver," Trump said, returning to the microphone. "If you don’t get that waiver there are going to be a lot of angry people."

Al-Qaeda in Syria (aka Jaish Fateh al-Sham aka Nusra Front) did attack several local groups, raided their headquarters and confiscated their CIA supplied weapon and ammunition caches. One major alliance of local groups, the Army of Mujaheddin, was eliminated. Other local groups took refuge by joining Ahrar al-Sham: SOHR was informed that the factions of Soqor al-Sham, alMOjahdin Army, Eqtasim Kama Amart grouping, al-Islam Army in Idlib and the Shamia front in western Aleppo, joined Ahrar al-Sham Islamic faction against Fateh al_Sham front It seem that the plan for now is to keep Ahrar al-Sham as a "moderate" front group for al-Qaeda while eliminating all other "moderate" forces on the ground. Parts of Ahrar al-Sham take part in the Turkish "Euphrates Shield" operation against the Islamic State while al-Qaeda in Syria is no longer openly supported by the Turkish state. The ruse of the claimed fight between Ahrar and al-Qaeda is used to uphold a distinction between these groups even when hardly any exists. Ahrar al-Sham was, like al-Qaeda in Syria, founded by a senior member of al-Qaeda central under command of the al-Qaeda's central leader Ayman al-Zawahiri.

There once were components within Ahrar that argued for a less radical course. But other significant parts had argued for officially joining al-Qaeda. The middle ground found now is to cooperated with al-Qaeda as a means for absorbing all other "rebel" groups on the ground while keeping up good relations with Turkey. Some (minor) ideological differences between Ahrar and al-Qaeda in Syria still exist. It is expected that a fight for primacy will indeed start between (parts of) these two groups in the not so distant future. But that will only happen after all weaker groups on the ground are eliminated and after Ahrar is exposed and can no longer act as a Turkish supported intermediary for weapons and other supplies.

The news that Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the son of the assassinated leader of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Muammar Gaddafi, has been released from captivity is one of the most significant developments in Libya in some time. For while the Western corporate media would like people to believe that the Gaddafi name is dead and buried, the fact remains that Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, and the surviving members of the Gaddafi family, are seen as heroes by many in Libya. Moreover, Saif’s release has the potential to transform the political situation in the country.

Although details are few and far between, what we do know is that according to his lawyer at the International Criminal Court (ICC), Saif Gaddafi “was given his liberty on April 12, 2016.” Indeed official documents (which remain unverified) seem to support the assertion that Saif has, in fact, been released. Considering the statements from his attorneys that Saif is “well and safe and in Libya,” the political ramifications of this development should not be underestimated. Not only is Saif Gaddafi the second eldest and most prominent of Col. Gaddafi’s sons, he is also the one seen as the inheritor of his father’s legacy of independent peaceful development and the maintenance of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya. This last point is of critical importance as his release is a clear signal to many Libyans that the resistance to the NATO-imposed chaos and war is alive and well. And while there have been isolated upsurges of pro-Gaddafi sentiments at various times in the last five years, they mostly remained underground. Perhaps it might soon be time for the resistance to once again become united as it moves to drive out the terrorists and opportunists who have torn the jewel of Africa apart these last five years.

It is against this dizzying political backdrop that one must examine the significance of a potential return for Saif al-Islam Gaddafi. Saif remains a hero to many Libyans who see in him the inheritor of the independent spirit of his father, a man whose education and erudition, and most importantly wartime experience, make him a natural leader. It should be remembered that Saif was the main advocate of the rapprochement between Libya and the West in the early 2000s, spearheading the campaign for Libya’s disarmament of its nuclear and long-range ballistic missiles program. However, by 2011 and the US-NATO illegal war on Libya, Saif had changed his tune, regretting terribly his having taken western leaders at their word. In a now infamous interview with RT conducted in the midst of the NATO war, Saif stated: “Many countries, Iran and North Korea are among them, told us it was our mistake to give up, to have stopped developing long-range missiles and to become friendly with the West. Our example means one should never trust the West and should always be on alert – for them it is fine to change their mind overnight and start bombing Libya…One of our biggest mistakes was that we delayed buying new weapons, especially from Russia, and delayed building a strong army. We thought Europeans were our friends; our mistake was to be tolerant with our enemies.”

The national security subcommittee of the GOP platform committee today approved a plank that calls for the declassification of 28 pages that are said to link the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to the 9/11 hijackers. The plank was introduced by Maine state senator Eric Brakey, who contacted 28Pages.org director Brian McGlinchey last week after hearing his interview on The Tom Woods Show. McGlinchey helped Brakey draft the plank’s language.

Planks are official expressions of the party’s opinions on various issues. To be incorporated in the final platform, the 28 pages plank must first be approved on Tuesday by a majority of the full, 112-member platform committee. Then, along with all the other proposed planks, it must be approved by the full body of next week’s GOP convention in Cleveland. If adopted, the plank would represent an important new endorsement of the release of the 28 pages. Supporters of declassification already include more than 70 Democratic and Republican members of Congress, former members of the 9/11 Commission and the editorial boards of many of the nation’s most prominent newspapers, including The New York Times and USA Today.

Brakey’s 28 pages plank reads: Delivering Transparency on Foreign Government Ties to 9/11 As the nation continues to confront terrorism at home and abroad, the American people are being denied access to information that can provide vital insight into the funding of Islamic extremism: 28 classified pages from a 2002 joint congressional intelligence inquiry into the September 11 attacks. A former senator who co-chaired the inquiry says the pages “point a very strong finger at Saudi Arabia as being the principal financier” of the 9/11 attacks and that, by shielding the kingdom from consequences for its actions, the redaction has encouraged its continued sponsorship of extremism and paved the way for the rise of ISIS. President Obama twice promised 9/11 family members he would release the pages, which could be invaluable in their pursuit of justice in the courtroom. However, his administration has refused to declassify them, even in the face of bipartisan support for their release that includes former 9/11 Commission members and 73 current representatives and senators. These pages must be released. As Thomas Jefferson said, “An enlightened citizenry is indispensable for the proper functioning of a republic. Self-government is not possible unless the citizens are educated sufficiently to enable them to exercise oversight.”

Retired U.S. Air Force Gen. Philip Breedlove, until recently the supreme commander of NATO forces in Europe, plotted in private to overcome President Barack Obama’s reluctance to escalate military tensions with Russia over the war in Ukraine in 2014, according to apparently hacked emails from Breedlove’s Gmail account that were posted on a new website called DC Leaks. Obama defied political pressure from hawks in Congress and the military to provide lethal assistance to the Ukrainian government, fearing that doing so would increase the bloodshed and provide Russian President Vladimir Putin with the justification for deeper incursions into the country. Breedlove, during briefings to Congress, notably contradicted the Obama administration regarding the situation in Ukraine, leading to news stories about conflict between the general and Obama. But the leaked emails provide an even more dramatic picture of the intense back-channel lobbying for the Obama administration to begin a proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. In a series of messages in 2014, Breedlove sought meetings with former Secretary of State Colin Powell, asking for advice on how to pressure the Obama administration to take a more aggressive posture toward Russia.

Breedlove attempted to influence the administration through several channels, emailing academics and retired military officials, including former NATO supreme commander Wesley Clark, for assistance in building his case for supplying military assistance to Ukrainian forces battling Russian-backed separatists.

Breedlove did not respond to a request for comment. He stepped down from his NATO leadership position in May and retired from service on Friday, July 1. Breedlove was a four-star Air Force general and served as the 17th Supreme Allied Commander of NATO forces in Europe starting on May 10, 2013. Phillip Karber, an academic who corresponded regularly with Breedlove — providing him with advice and intelligence on the Ukrainian crisis —  verified the authenticity of several of the emails in the leaked cache. He also told The Intercept that Breedlove confirmed to him that the general’s Gmail account was hacked and that the incident had been reported to the government.

      A lawsuit filed Monday in the D.C. federal district court challenges U.S. foreign aid to Israel. 

The U.S. is finalizing a ten-year memorandum of understanding which will reportedly boost aid to $4-5 billion per year. Grant F. Smith, Director of the Institute for Research: Middle Eastern Policy (IRmep), in the suit challenges the authority of the president and U.S. federal agencies to deliver such foreign aid to Israel. Such aid violates longstanding bans on aid to non-signatories to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) with nuclear weapons programs. Since the bans went into effect, U.S. foreign aid to Israel is estimated to be $234 billion.

The lawsuit reveals how in the mid-1970s during investigations into the illegal diversion of weapons-grade uranium from U.S. contractor NUMEC to Israel, Senators Stuart Symington and John Glenn amended the 1961 Foreign Assistance Act to ban any aid to clandestine nuclear powers that were not NPT signatories. Symington clarified the legislative intent of the amendments: “…if you wish to take the dangerous and costly steps necessary to achieve a nuclear weapons option, you cannot expect the United States to help underwrite that effort indirectly or directly.” The Obama administration follows precedents established since the Ford administration by ignoring internal agency and public domain information that should trigger Symington & Glenn cutoffs and waiver provisions governing foreign aid. The administration has gone further in criminalizing the flow of such information from the federal government to the public. In 2012 the Department of Energy under U.S. State Department authority passed a secret gag law called “Guidance on Release of Information relating to the Potential for an Israeli Nuclear Capability.” The gag law and related measures promote a “nuclear ambiguity” policy toward Israel. The primary purpose of the gag law is to unlawfully subvert Symington & Glenn arms export controls, the suit alleges.

A man with a kid in arm runs towards the camera. The kid's face is heavily colored, but it looks otherwise fine. On the lower left we see the back of a man with a "White Helmets" logo on his vest. Dust in the background. Always dust or smoke. A bunch of men looking very busy but are they actually doing anything? That would be a lucky by-chance photo shot for any normal photographer. Even in country where rubble from a fresh bombing may be around some near corner. But this is a typical "White Helmets rescue kid" propaganda picture. The photo above is, except for maybe the old rubble, likely completely staged. There the 43 similar pictures below the fold to demonstrate that. Just ask yourself: Could all these very similar by-chance pics, taken within about a year, be real? Really?

The pictures above all look astonishingly similar: rubble, dust or rather haze from a smoke grenade in the background, dusted/greasepaint bloody kids who have no visible trauma, the rescuer with the kid moving towards the camera. Dramatic, high quality scenes which do get distributed by news agencies and published again and again by major "western" media. Isn't it an amazing fortune that so many kids get rescued alive by the "White Helmets", without any serious wounds visible, just moments after bomb impacts? This week after week? With all the same attributes in each picture? No photo editor at any of the big media ever wondered about that? These staged photos are part of the war propaganda against the Syrian people and their government. The "White Helmets" take and distribute these photos. They also distribute lots of "kids rescued from rubble" videos. We wrote about those a month ago: Other typical features of these movies, see this one, are smoke (grenades) in the streets, dramatic but small open fires nearby, dust or some red color on the children's face or arms. The camera is often used in a hectic, intentionally amateurish first person view, a style extensively developed in the 1999 horror clip Blair Witch Project. Sometimes sounds of additional "bomb impact" bangs or screaming/wailing women are added. The "White Helmets" are part of the (anti-)Syria Campaign. "Kid rescued from rubble" is their standard shtick. They are financed with some $60+ million from your taxes by the U.S., the UK and other governments. Such money will buy a lot of good cameras and props and will pay for many actors and extras.

The Syria Campaign was created by Purpose Campaigns LLC. The company fabricates and runs for you any world-wide "grass root" movement you would like. With Purpose LLC or other such companies involved, big dollars will buy you big effects. How about an automated Twitter campaign to spread anti-Shia sectarianism? Someone paid for it and here it is. The "White Helmets" campaign demonstrates the amazing manipulation potential such companies and their high paying customers have.

Mexico has denied Donald Trump threatened to send American soldiers into the country during a telephone conversation with his counterpart, President Enrique Peña Nieto. Such a threat “did not happen during that call,” the Mexican government said in a statement, released on Twitter on Wednesday night.   “I know it with absolute certainty, there was no threat,” a spokesman for Mr Peña Nieto, Eduardo Sanchez, said in a radio interview. “The things that have been said are nonsense and a downright lie.”

      Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in danger of being brought down, possibly soon, over what initially appears to be little more than an imprudent taste for Cuban cigars and pink champagne. In truth, however, the allegations ensnaring Netanyahu reveal far more than his personal flaws or an infatuation with the high life. They shine a rare light on the corrupt nexus between Israel’s business, political and media worlds, compounded by the perverse influence of overseas Jewish money. Of the two police investigations Netanyahu faces (there are more in the wings), the one known as Case 1000, concerning gifts from businessmen worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, is most likely to lead to his downfall. But it is the second investigation, Case 2000, and the still-murky relationship between the two cases, that more fully exposes the rot at the heart of Israel’s political system. This latter case hinges on a tape recording in which Netanyahu plots with an Israeli newspaper tycoon to rig media coverage in his favor. Leads from both cases suggest that Netanyahu may have been further meddling, together with his billionaire friends, in the shadowy world of international espionage.

Netanyahu’s appetite for a free lunch has been common knowledge in Israel since his first term as prime minister in the late 1990s. Then, he was twice investigated for fraud, though controversially charges were not brought in either case. Police discovered along the way that he and his wife, Sara, had horded many of the gifts he received during state visits. More than 100 were never recovered. The clarifications that were issued more than 15 years ago, as a result of those investigations, make it hard for Netanyahu to claim now that he did not understand the rules. According to justice ministry advice in 2001, government and state officials cannot keep gifts worth more than $100 without risking violating Israeli law. The gifts Netanyahu received from one of the Israeli businessmen involved in Case 1000, Hollywood film producer Arnon Milchan, amounted to as much as $180,000. Netanyahu has argued that these presents, ranging from cigars to jewelry, were expressions of a close friendship rather than bribes to him in his capacity as prime minister. The problem, however, is that Netanyahu appears to have reciprocated by using his position as head of the Israeli government to lobby John Kerry, the then U.S. secretary of state, to gain Milchan a 10-year U.S. residency visa. He may have done more.

Also being investigated are his family’s ties to a friend of Milchan’s, Australian billionaire James Packer, who made his fortune in the media and gambling industries. Packer has similarly lavished gifts on the Netanyahu family, especially Yair, Netanyahu’s eldest son. At the same time, Packer, now a neighbor of the Netanyahus in the coastal town of Caesarea, has been seeking permanent residency and the enormous benefits that would accrue with tax status in Israel. As a non-Jew, Packer should have no hope of being awarded residency. There are suspicions that Netanyahu may have been trying to pull strings on the Australian’s behalf. Many of these gifts were apparently not given freely. The Netanyahus asked for them. Indicating that Netanyahu knew there might be legal concerns, he used code words – “leaves” for cigars and “pinks” for champagne – to disguise his orders to Milchan. Police are reported to be confident, after questioning Netanyahu three times, that they have enough evidence to indict him. If they do, Netanyahu will be under heavy pressure to resign.

"Israel has just opened the 'floodgates', and crossed a 'very, very thick red line'." These were the words of Nickolay Mladenov, United Nations' Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process, in response to the passing of a bill at the Israeli Knesset on February 7 that retroactively legalises thousands of illegal settler homes, built on stolen Palestinian land. Mladenov's job title has grown so irrelevant in recent years that it merely delineates a reference to a bygone era: a "peace process" that has ensured the further destruction of whatever remained of the Palestinian homeland. Israeli politicians' approval of the bill is indeed an end of an era. We have reached the point where we can openly declare that the so-called peace process was an illusion from the start, for Israel had no intentions of ever conceding the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem to the Palestinians. In response to the passing of the bill, many news reports alluded to the fact that the arrival of Donald Trump in the White House, riding a wave of right-wing populism, was the inspiration needed by equally right-wing Israeli politicians to cross that "very, very thick red line". There is truth to that, of course. But it is hardly the whole story.

The political map of the world is vastly changing. Just weeks before Trump made his way to the Oval Office, the international community strongly condemned Israel's illegal settlements on Palestinian land occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem.

That date, Trump's inauguration was the holy grail for Israel's right-wing politicians, who mobilised immediately after Trump's rise to power. Israel's intentions received additional impetus from Britain's Conservative Prime Minister, Theresa May. Despite her government vote to condemn Israeli settlements at the UN, she too ranted against the US for its censure of Israel.

The British government can tap into the cables carrying the world’s web traffic at will and spy on what people are doing on some of the world’s most popular social media sites, including YouTube, all without the knowledge or consent of the companies.Documents taken from the National Security Agency by Edward Snowden and obtained by NBC News detail how British cyber spies demonstrated a pilot program to their U.S. partners in 2012 in which they were able to monitor YouTube in real time and collect addresses from the billions of videos watched daily, as well as some user information, for analysis. At the time the documents were printed, they were also able to spy on Facebook and Twitter.

Called “Psychology A New Kind of SIGDEV" (Signals Development), the presentation includes a section that spells out “Broad real-time monitoring of online activity” of YouTube videos, URLs “liked” on Facebook, and Blogspot/Blogger visits. The monitoring program is called “Squeaky Dolphin.”Experts told NBC News the documents show the British had to have been either physically able to tap the cables carrying the world’s web traffic or able to use a third party to gain physical access to the massive stream of data, and would be able to extract some key data about specific users as well.

ritish spies have developed “dirty tricks” for use against nations, hackers, terror groups, suspected criminals and arms dealers that include releasing computer viruses, spying on journalists and diplomats, jamming phones and computers, and using sex to lure targets into “honey traps.”Documents taken from the National Security Agency by Edward Snowden and exclusively obtained by NBC News describe techniques developed by a secret British spy unit called the Joint Threat Research and Intelligence Group (JTRIG) as part of a growing mission to go on offense and attack adversaries ranging from Iran to the hacktivists of Anonymous. According to the documents, which come from presentations prepped in 2010 and 2012 for NSA cyber spy conferences, the agency’s goal was to “destroy, deny, degrade [and] disrupt” enemies by “discrediting” them, planting misinformation and shutting down their communications. advertisement Both PowerPoint presentations describe “Effects” campaigns that are broadly divided into two categories: cyber attacks and propaganda operations. The propaganda campaigns use deception, mass messaging and “pushing stories” via Twitter, Flickr, Facebook and YouTube. JTRIG also uses “false flag” operations, in which British agents carry out online actions that are designed to look like they were performed by one of Britain’s adversaries.

ritish spies have developed “dirty tricks” for use against nations, hackers, terror groups, suspected criminals and arms dealers that include releasing computer viruses, spying on journalists and diplomats, jamming phones and computers, and using sex to lure targets into “honey traps.”Documents taken from the National Security Agency by Edward Snowden and exclusively obtained by NBC News describe techniques developed by a secret British spy unit called the Joint Threat Research and Intelligence Group (JTRIG) as part of a growing mission to go on offense and attack adversaries ranging from Iran to the hacktivists of Anonymous. According to the documents, which come from presentations prepped in 2010 and 2012 for NSA cyber spy conferences, the agency’s goal was to “destroy, deny, degrade [and] disrupt” enemies by “discrediting” them, planting misinformation and shutting down their communications.

In connection with this report, NBC is publishing documents that Edward Snowden took from the NSA before fleeing the U.S., which can be viewed by clicking here and here. The documents are being published with minimal redactions.

A leaked phone conversation between Victoria Nuland, assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, and Geoffrey Pyatt, the US ambassador to Ukraine, has exposed the anti-democratic and colonialist character of the Obama administration’s intervention in the former Soviet republic. The discussion between the two officials includes a detailed review of which right-wing opposition figures Washington is working to install in office, and how it is using the United Nations to rubber-stamp the operation. While Germany and other European powers have worked closely with the Obama administration in promoting the violent protests against President Viktor Yanukovych, the leaked phone call reveals tensions between the imperialist powers. At one point Nuland tells Pyatt, “Fuck the EU.”

Nuland continues: “Yats [Yatsenyuk] is the guy that who’s got the economic experience, the governing experience.” Pyatt later warns Nuland that “Klitschko has been the top dog” within the opposition, and that she will need to “move fast on all this stuff” and speak with the UDAR leader as part of their “personality management” of the opposition leadership. The utter criminality of Washington’s drive to install a pliant regime in Kiev sharply emerges in Nuland and Pyatt’s discussion of Oleh Tyahnybok, the leader of the neo-fascist All-Ukrainian Union (Svoboda) party. Nuland describes Tyahnybok as one of the “big three” within the opposition leadership. The State Department operative goes on to tell Pyatt that “what [Yatsenyuk] needs [after he is installed in office] is Klitsch and Tyahnybok on the outside—he needs to be talking to them four times a week.” These remarks confirm that there is no confusion whatsoever within the Obama administration that it is working in partnership with fascist movements in Ukraine.

Tyahnybok is the leader of the Svoboda party, which was initially called the Social-National Party of Ukraine and featured a neo-Nazi logo. In 2004, Tyahnybok praised right-wing Ukrainian partisans in World War II, who, he declared, “did not fear, but took up their automatic rifles, going into the woods to fight Muscovites, Germans, Jewry and other filth.” He added that Ukraine still had to be liberated from a “Moscow-Jewish mafia.” In 2005, Tyahnybok signed an open letter to Ukrainian leaders demanding a halt to the “criminal activities” of “organised Jewry,” which, he declared, was attempting to commit “genocide” against the Ukrainian people. This is one of the “big three” figures with whom the Obama administration is working to install a client regime in Ukraine. Yesterday, Nuland met with several opposition figures, among them Oleh Tyahnybok. No details of the discussion have been made public, but Ambassador Pyatt released via Twitter a photo of a smiling Nuland posing next to the pro-Nazi leader and his colleagues.

Ukraine’s protest standoff came dangerously close to becoming a direct confrontation between Russia and the United States on Thursday as shockingly unguarded words from Washington and Moscow officials reached public ears, either voluntarily or otherwise.A recording of a phone conversation between two senior U.S. diplomatic officials, in which they discussed their efforts to influence the membership of the Ukrainian government that would be formed to replace the one dismissed under protester pressure by President Viktor Yanukovych, was leaked to the public – almost certainly by an intelligence agency – just as one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s top aides issued a direct threat to the United States over its involvement in Ukrainian affairs.

Mr. Yanukovych’s explicitly pro-Russian government has long been accused of being a puppet of Mr. Putin – especially after it abandoned a European Union open-borders treaty in November to instead endorse a trade-and-aid deal with Russia, a move that angered many Ukrainians and provoked the protests that have convulsed the nation for two months.But now, with the leak of the apparently bugged State Department call, the Kremlin and Mr. Yanukovych have new ammunition with which it can accuse the protesters of being puppets of U.S. and European agendas.

The call, if it is genuine, was posted on YouTube by an anonymous source on Tuesday under the headline “puppets of Maidan,” a reference to the protests in Kiev’s central square. It was then linked on Twitter by Russian government officials on Thursday – exactly as U.S. and European Union officials were descending on Kiev to try to broker a resignation, a new election and a constitutional change from Mr. Yanukovych.The voices the audio resemble those of Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and Geoffrey Pyatt, the U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. They appear to be talking about their preference of political party leaders to form a new Ukrainian government, and about their efforts, including several phone calls to Mr. Yanukovych by Vice President Joe Biden, to influence that outcome. The EU was prepared to begin negotiating government-opposition talks toward a new government on Friday.Much of the call is devoted to efforts to keep Ukrainian liberal parties in government, and to prevent right-wing ultranationalist parties, which have been prominent in the protest movement, from gaining influence.

(Reuters) - Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said he replaced ten cabinet ministers, half of his total roster, after three ministers resigned over a high-level graft inquiry on Wednesday. The replaced ministers included EU Minister Egemen Bagis, who was allegedly named in the corruption probe but had not resigned yet, and key positions such as the Economy and justice ministers.