Going Underground Special: John Pilger on Paris, ISIS and Media Propaganda

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Going Underground Special: John Pilger on Paris, ISIS and Media Propaganda

4/12/15 00.25 GMT Pilger: “That’s a ludicrous argument”. Do both of them share knowledge – probably like all real journalists that it’s ludicrous, er, perhaps like a ludicrous diversion?

From Pol Pot to ISIS: “Anything that flies on everything that moves”

by John Pilger

(on 2014-11-02)

 …

Last year, the former French Foreign Minister Roland Dumas revealed that “two years before the Arab spring”, he was told in London that a war on Syria was planned. “I am going to tell you something,” he said in an interview with the French TV channel LPC, “I was in England two years before the violence in Syria on other business. I met top British officials, who confessed to me that they were preparing something in Syria… Britain was organising an invasion of rebels into Syria. They even asked me, although I was no longer Minister for Foreign Affairs, if I would like to participate… This operation goes way back. It was prepared, preconceived and planned.”

READ a 2007 State Department cable published by WikiLeaks about the 2006 declaration of the “Islamic State of Iraq”, the forerunner organisation of ISIS.

READ two US Congressional Research Reports on the emergence of the Islamic State of Iraq under the leadership of Abu Omar al-Baghdadi (the predecessor of ISIS’ Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi), following the death of the leader of Al Qaeda in Iraq, Abu Musab al Zarqawi, in 2006. See here and here.

READ a 2007 cable showing Islamic State presence in Iraq during 2007, and how demographic shifts in response to sectarian Shia-Sunni tensions, directly provoked by the US invasion and installation of a Shia-dominated government, were already playing into the hands of the group.

VIEW 113 Iraq War Logs documenting US forces encountering ISI in Iraq from 2007 onwards.

BROWSE nearly 3,000 documents published by WikiLeaks which mention the Islamic State of Iraq.

READ three US Congressional Research Report on the history of the US-backed “Sons of Iraq” Sunni militias, formed to oppose Al Qaeda and the Islamic State. The failure by the US-backed Shia government to integrate the Sunni militias into the Iraq army later led to many “Sons of Iraq” returning to the jihadi insurgency, swelling the ranks of modern-day ISIS. See here, here and here.

READ a 2009 cable on AQI/ISI in Mosul.

READ in a 2010 State Department cable how Syria’s head of intelligence Ali Mamlouk discussed with US diplomats the migration of foreign “takfiri” fighters, such as the Islamic State, into Syria from war-torn Iraq, and offered the US a military and intelligence partnership to address them. Declining, the US later lent support to jihadi groups as Syria’s “opposition” during the Syrian civil war.

READ a leaked 2010 STRATFOR email containing a private intelligence product documenting the transition of Islamic State leadership to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, after the killing of former-ISI leader, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi in 2010.

 

4/12/15 00.45 about the Guardian newspaper

http://off-guardian.org/about-2/#comment-5091

reinertorheit

I understand the anger and frustration many people have voiced here – and I think that it would be worth posting an explanation of what has actually happened at The Guardian.

In 2013, The Guardian filed some of the worst financial accounts in the newspaper’s history. The publishers were clearly in deep financial trouble, and were forced to sell-off some of their assets, simply to avoid immediately bankruptcy. The financial outlook appeared very grim.

But ‘hope’ was around the corner… although it was a vile kind of ‘hope’ indeed.

The Guardian was (quietly) relaunched, positioning itself primarily in the USA and Australia – whilst aiming to retain as much as possiible from its former days as a left-wing newspaper in Britain. New and mysterious ‘backers’ appeared, who were now controlling the political content of the newspaper. Alan Rusbridger was quickly removed and thrown on the rubbish-heap – the usual nonsense about wanting to develop his career (in retirement?).

It was a very simple idea – “buy up the opposition to neoconservative American ideas – and neatralise it with a daily diet of pro-Pentagon, pro-Washington, shabby indoctrination”. Unwanted old left-wingers were quietly pushed aside. Ambitious Americans like Hadley Freeman were shoved forwards. New right-wing writers were hired, such as “Rafael Behr” (who he?). The screaming voices of the lunatic right, such as TImothy Garbage-Trash, suddenly become Leader Writers..

Let’s just explain what “neoconservative” actually means. It means following right-wing policies and ideas under the apparently acceptable cloak of being socialists, in order to secure public support for these extreme right-wing policies. Tony Blair is the perfect example… a man who found himself in perfect accord with George Bush – a god-bothering war-mongering racist fascist psychopath with the brain of a mollusc.

But it gets worse. The Guardian is now not really written by Guardian journalists any longer. Instead, coverage of all “sensitive” topics has been franchised out to American rightwing organisations. Now we get articles and editorial which have been “sponsored by the John D Rockefeller Foundation” (an extremist rightwing organisation), whose authorship and views chime perfectly with American hard-line exceptionalist Christian white right. Sometimes the sourcing is hidden more carefully… for example, the “Calvert Journal” – an American-funded pile of rightwing trash based in Calvert Street in London…. trailed as an “expert source” on Russia, but actually ghost-written in Washington. A few down-at-heel Russian emigres were hired as the ostensible “authors” of this crap. So now the Guardian’s Russia coverage is written by spooks in Washington under the guise of being written by “Russian opposition voices cowering from Putin in London”. I’ve met these filth – they are pathetic users who are happy to take Washington’s dollars to fund their empty-headed glamorous lifestyles in London. This comes under the heading of “New East”, headed by a new rightwing extremist at the Guardian called Maeve Sheerlaw… a cheap hack who has never been to Moscow in her life, yet was made an Overnight Expert to parrot the opinions of filth like Andrew McFaul, failed American Ambassador to Moscow.

Then there are all the articles ‘syndicated’ from the Moscow Times – another fake newspaper funded by American rightwingers in Washington, via a chain of anonymous holding companies in the Netherlands and Scandinavia. Don’t be fooled by that “Moscow Times” title – it was one they picked on purpose, to make it sound like a serious newspaper. In fact it’s staffed by a team of cheap American journalism students, and there are no Russians working there at all. A few Russian names appear as columnists… but – surprise! – they are all Russian runaways, living in Miami or Brighton Beach, and delighted to have Washington’s cash in exchange for some bitter hatred penned during a drunken lunch-hour.

In summary, then – The Guardian which readers remember from the 1980s and 1990s no longer exists at all. Its exterior appearance and readership has been bought for cash by American fascist organisations… but covertly, so that readers “believe” they are still reading The Guardian. Surprised? You shouldn’t be, because it’s how Tony Blair came to power in Britain – the most Tory leader Britain has ever had. And where are his ‘socialist’ allies? Peter Mandelson, a penniless journalist, is now Lord Mandelson, with a two-million pound house and a seat in the House of Lords. Socialism, my arse.

The Guardian is now more right-wing than the Daily Telegraph. It features articles from Timmy Garbage-Trash saying how Britain should go to war against Russia, to save those jolly, plucky, Right Sector genocidal fascists in Ukraine.

None of this has ever been mentioned in the Guardian itself, of course. You are all still clinging to this rabid pro-American sheet of garbage until the moment they actually write it on the front page. That day will never come. Yet you still think the Guardian is a ‘socialist’ newspaper.

Continue ReadingGoing Underground Special: John Pilger on Paris, ISIS and Media Propaganda

Syria and Daesh/Isil – What the UK parliament daren’t discuss

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The UK government is today discussing joining the Western alliance bombing Syria.

After doing an evening’s research last night I almost feel like an expert on Syria and Daesh/ISIL. I also get regular updates from Juan Cole’s Informed Comment which is an excellent resource. It’s important to check internet sources since there are some misleading accounts out there.

There’s the Neo-Conservative ‘Clean Break’ document published in 1996 proposing an aggressive policy in reshaping the Middle East so that Israel is able to “transend” the Arab-Israeli conflict.

We have a 2012 document 2012 Defense Intelligence Agency Document:
West Will Facilitate Rise of Islamic State “in Order to Isolate the Syrian Regime”
. This document shows that Daesh/ISIS/ISIL was created and maintained by Western powers.

It is only since Russia recently commenced air strikes supporting Syria that Daesh/ISIS/ISIL’s illicit oil trading business has been targeted. Russia accuses Turkey of facilitating and profiting from this illicit trade while also supporting Daesh/ISIS/ISIL militants. There are accounts of strange deaths of journalists in Turkey and associated support of the Daesh/ISIS/ISIL militants by Turkey’s MIT secret service.

That it is only recently that Daesh/ISIS/ISIL financing has been targeted by Russia suggests that it was accepted by the coalition allegedly fighting Daesh/ISIS/ISIL i.e. Daesh was tolerated as it attacked the Syrian regime.

ed: Aren’t those who engage in terrorism terrorists?

 

3/12/15 3.40pm I’ve found that Dr Nafeez Ahmed has also considered the2012 Defense Intelligence Agency Document:
West Will Facilitate Rise of Islamic State “in Order to Isolate the Syrian Regime”
document and reached similar conclusions that Western governments were creating, supporting and maintaining extremist terrorists while claiming the opposite. As an aside I notice that Daesh was not mentioned in this document and wonder whether the ‘new’ ISIS is to move on from ISIS/ISIL/ISI.

It follows that those that accuse others of being “terrorist sympathisers” are actual, literal terrorists … while – of course – hiding and pointing the finger at others.

Pentagon report predicted West’s support for Islamist rebels would create ISIS

Anti-ISIS coalition knowingly sponsored violent extremists to ‘isolate’ Assad, rollback ‘Shia expansion’

by Nafeez Ahmed

Image of Western sponsored terrorists ISIS ISIL ISI Daesh

A declassified secret US government document obtained by the conservative public interest law firm, Judicial Watch, shows that Western governments deliberately allied with al-Qaeda and other Islamist extremist groups to topple Syrian dictator Bashir al-Assad.

The document reveals that in coordination with the Gulf states and Turkey, the West intentionally sponsored violent Islamist groups to destabilize Assad, and that these “supporting powers” desired the emergence of a “Salafist Principality” in Syria to “isolate the Syrian regime.”

According to the newly declassified US document, the Pentagon foresaw the likely rise of the ‘Islamic State’ as a direct consequence of this strategy, and warned that it could destabilize Iraq. Despite anticipating that Western, Gulf state and Turkish support for the “Syrian opposition” — which included al-Qaeda in Iraq — could lead to the emergence of an ‘Islamic State’ in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the document provides no indication of any decision to reverse the policy of support to the Syrian rebels. On the contrary, the emergence of an al-Qaeda affiliated “Salafist Principality” as a result is described as a strategic opportunity to isolate Assad.

The newly declassified DIA document from 2012 confirms that the main component of the anti-Assad rebel forces by this time comprised Islamist insurgents affiliated to groups that would lead to the emergence of ISIS. Despite this, these groups were to continue receiving support from Western militaries and their regional allies.

Noting that “the Salafist [sic], the Muslim Brotherhood, and AQI [al-Qaeda in Iraq] are the major forces driving the insurgency in Syria,” the document states that “the West, Gulf countries, and Turkey support the opposition,” while Russia, China and Iran “support the [Assad] regime.”

The 7-page DIA document states that al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), the precursor to the ‘Islamic State in Iraq,’ (ISI) which became the ‘Islamic State in Iraq and Syria,’ “supported the Syrian opposition from the beginning, both ideologically and through the media.”

The formerly secret Pentagon report notes that the “rise of the insurgency in Syria” has increasingly taken a “sectarian direction,” attracting diverse support from Sunni “religious and tribal powers” across the region.

In a section titled ‘The Future Assumptions of the Crisis,’ the DIA report predicts that while Assad’s regime will survive, retaining control over Syrian territory, the crisis will continue to escalate “into proxy war.”

The document also recommends the creation of “safe havens under international sheltering, similar to what transpired in Libya when Benghazi was chosen as the command centre for the temporary government.”

The conventional wisdom is that the US government did not retain sufficient oversight on the funding to anti-Assad rebel groups, which was supposed to be monitored and vetted to ensure that only ‘moderate’ groups were supported.

However, the newly declassified Pentagon report proves unambiguously that years before ISIS launched its concerted offensive against Iraq, the US intelligence community was fully aware that Islamist militants constituted the core of Syria’s sectarian insurgency.

Despite that, the Pentagon continued to support the Islamist insurgency, even while anticipating the probability that doing so would establish an extremist Salafi stronghold in Syria and Iraq.

As Shoebridge told me, “The documents show that not only did the US government at the latest by August 2012 know the true extremist nature and likely outcome of Syria’s rebellion” — namely, the emergence of ISIS — “but that this was considered an advantage for US foreign policy. This also suggests a decision to spend years in an effort to deliberately mislead the West’s public, via a compliant media, into believing that Syria’s rebellion was overwhelmingly ‘moderate.’”

Continue ReadingSyria and Daesh/Isil – What the UK parliament daren’t discuss

ISIS, Iraq, Kurdistan, Syria

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http://www.vox.com/cards/things-about-isis-you-need-to-know/sunni-shia-conflict-ISIS

Perhaps the single most important factor in ISIS’ recent resurgence is the conflict between Iraqi Shias and Iraqi Sunnis. ISIS fighters themselves are Sunnis, and the tension between the two groups is a powerful recruiting tool for ISIS.

The difference between the two largest Muslim groups originated with a controversy over who got to take power after the Prophet Muhammed’s death, which you can read all about here. But Iraq’s sectarian problems aren’t about relitigating 7th-century disputes; they’re about modern political power and grievances.

The civil war after the American invasion had a brutally sectarian cast to it, and the pseudo-democracy that emerged afterwards empowered the Shia majority (with some heavy-handed help from Washington). Today, the two groups don’t trust each other, and so far have competed in a zero-sum game for control over Iraqi political institutions. For instance, Shia used control over the police force to arbitrarily detain Sunni protestors demanding more representation in government last year.

So long as Shias control the government, and Sunnis don’t feel like they’re fairly represented, ISIS has an audience for its radical Sunni message. That’s why ISIS is strong in the heavily Sunni northwest.

http://www.vox.com/cards/things-about-isis-you-need-to-know/maliki-sunni-shia-tension

ISIS would be able to recruit Sunni fighters off of the Sunni-Shia tension even if Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki hadn’t held office until mid-August, but his policies towards the Sunni minority have helped ISIS considerably. It remains to be seen whether the new PM, Haider al-Abadi, will be an improvement.

Maliki, a Shia Muslim, built a Shia sectarian state and refused to take steps to accommodate Sunnis. Police killed peaceful Sunni protestors and used anti-terrorism laws to mass-arrest Sunni civilians. Maliki made political alliances with violent Shia militias, infuriating Sunnis. ISIS cannily exploited that brutality to recruit new fighters.

When ISIS reestablished itself, it put Sunni sectarianism at the heart of its identity and propaganda. The government persecution, according to the Washington Institute for Near East Studies’ Michael Knights, “played right into their hands.” Maliki “made all the ISIS propaganda real, accurate.” That made it much, much easier for ISIS to replenish its fighting stock.

 

Continue ReadingISIS, Iraq, Kurdistan, Syria

DRAFT: I’m just starting to get a grasp on this ISIS BS – and strangely enough it’s about oil

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I’m just starting to get a grasp of this ISIS BS. I wonder if any newspapers will be publishing this story with me tomorrow.

Kurdistan has control over its natural resources according to the constitution of the federal Iraq.

Kurdistan sold its oil in Texas independently of the central Iraqi government despite legal action by the central government to prevent that sale.

Basra in the south of Iraq is the region responsible for the vast majority of Iraq’s oil production – about 75% – together with huge oil and gas reserves.

Basra has also been attempting to assert its control over it’s oil resources in federal Iraq.

This Independent article raises objections to UK government claims that military intervention is legal since it is requested by the Iraqi government. It should also be appreciated that the Kurdish Regional Government has legitimate control of Kurdish oil.

This is a DRAFT and I will publish a fuller article

21.25 Still working on this. The least UK MPs can do if they’re going to vote on military intervention tomorrow is to try to comprehend the wider context and legal issues.

Continue ReadingDRAFT: I’m just starting to get a grasp on this ISIS BS – and strangely enough it’s about oil

Terrorism BS

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We’ve had two or three weeks of terrorism propaganda in UK corporate media just recently – and it’s been total BS.

It started with the Metropolitan Police warning UK citizens that they would be terrrists if they watched the supposed beheading of James Foley. If you’re following the news then you’re a terrrist? Actually, it’s probably more like if you’re able to use the internet, then you’re a terrrist.

Well come on then, I’ve watched it and am still sharing it on bittorrent. I’m not promoting it, it’s set to default upload of 1.25 and it hasn’t reached there in weeks. As soon as I post this I will not be doing my share back (because it’s been reached). I am aware that bittorrent users can be tracked – I appreciate that authorities (spooks) can clearly see my bittorrent activity. It’s very amateur and there’s not an actual beheading in the video.

That was a ramping-up of terrrorism BS (propoganda).

Much more recently – Friday – we’ve had the terrrosim BS alert has increased to be very scared because a terrorist attack is going to happen. It’s such BS because if you analyse the statements of David Cameron and Theresa May there is no intelligence to back it up – It is a political move.

There is no heightened threat of terrrism. People from UK have always gone to engage in wars abroad. You think that they’re going to have the same BS effect in UK – that the people of Croydon have been forced out of their homes and into the mountains of Surrey, are dying from exposure and are relying on humanitarian aid? Get real please.

Do you really accept that tihs that you’re fed?

My  best guess is that USUK are going to go heavy into Syria pretending to go after so-called Isis but actually having that as a secondary purpose.

Two or three weeks ago so-called Isis were USUK allies because they were – together with al the ones using chemical weapons – fighting Syria.

While there’s a heightened terror alert that’s just political BS. Hey be really afraid – you have to cross the road tomorrow.

 

Continue ReadingTerrorism BS