Robert Parry

More than seven weeks after Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 crashed in eastern Ukraine killing 298 people, a preliminary report failed to address the mystery of who shot the plane down. The Dutch investigators didn’t even try to sort through conflicting allegations and evidence.

Beyond confirming that Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 apparently was shot down on July 17, the Dutch Safety Board’s interim investigative report answered few questions, including some that would seem easy to address, such as the Russian military radar purporting to show a Ukrainian SU-25 jetfighter in the area, a claim that the Kiev government denied.

Either the Russian radar showed the presence of a jetfighter “gaining height” as it closed to within three to five kilometers of the passenger plane – as the Russians claimed in a July 21 press conference – or it didn’t. The Kiev authorities insisted that they had no military aircraft in the area at the time.

But the 34-page Dutch report is silent on the jetfighter question, although noting that the investigators had received Air Traffic Control “surveillance data from the Russian Federation.”

The report is also silent on the “dog-not-barking” issue of whether the U.S. government had satellite surveillance that revealed exactly where the supposed ground-to-air missile was launched and who may have fired it.

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Paul Craig Roberts

Some Western commentators interpret the cease fire in Ukraine obtained by President Putin as a victory for Russia. The reasoning is that the cease fire leaves Ukraine with disputed borders, which rules out Ukraine’s membership in NATO.

But will the cease fire hold? The right-wing Kiev militias, whose members often wear nazi insignias, are not under Kiev’s complete control. These militias can easily violate the cease fire, and there are already reports of violations. Moreover the billionaire oligarch that Washington has installed in Kiev as president of Ukraine will violate the ceasefire on Washington’s orders, unless, of course, Putin has put the fear of God in him.

To a military strategist the Russian response to the trouble that Washington has caused Russia in Ukraine, longer a part of Russia than the US has existed, is a mystery. Russia lost Ukraine because of its weakness when the Soviet Union collapsed, and Washington forced Russia to permit an independent Ukraine, which served Washington’s purpose of breaking up the Russian Federation.

The western Ukrainians, who fought for Hitler during World War II, maintained an impressive lobby organization in Washington and secured their independent country, but they did not control Ukraine because much of the country consists of former Russian territories made part of Ukraine by Soviet leaders in the 20th century.

Blood ties from intermarriage over centuries and tied economic interrelationships between Russia and Ukraine achieved over centuries essentially left Ukraine as part of Russia, where it has resided for centuries.

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Stephen Lendman

State terror is official Israeli policy. It's longstanding. It's war without mercy on Palestine. It’s against any nation, group or individual Israel targets.

Operation Protective Edge is the latest example. It was well-planned premeditated aggression. It was cold-blooded murder. It had nothing to do with Hamas rockets. It was about preventing Palestinian self-determination. It was to sabotage Palestinian unity. It was to maintain occupation harshness. It was to keep stealing Palestinian land. It showed Palestinians they're defenseless against overpowering Israeli might. It proved Israel can commit genocidal high crimes against peace with impunity. It can do it whenever it wishes. It can do it for any reason or none at all. It can blame Palestinian victims for its crimes.

Nora Barrows-Friedman is an Electronic Intifada editor and contributor. On Monday, she headlined "Dr. Mona El-Farra on mass trauma and destruction in Gaza." Dr. El-Farra is prominent Palestinian physician. She chairs Gaza's Palestinian Red Crescent Society. She directs Gazan projects for the Middle East Children's Alliance (MECA). During Operation Protective Edge, she lost nine family members. They included five children. Palestinians are aggrieved victims. Justice remains denied. A rocket or missile hit the El-Farra family home. Survivors fled in panic. A second Israeli attack struck them as they did so. It was clear, cold calculated murder. Israel murdered them in cold blood. It's standard Israeli practice. It's longstanding Israeli policy. Rogue states operate this way.

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Sam Kriss

What happened to the English that turned them into the most evil people on the planet? There’s not much in their national prehistory to explain the horrors that would come later: the English are, even according to their own national mythology, a supremely wimpy tribe. When the other Germanic peoples were pushed from their homes by the constant westward pressure of the Huns they went off on grand adventures, pouring through the cracks of the rotting Roman empire, sacking the great cities of Africa, tearing Europe down and building it up again. The Anglo-Saxons, meanwhile, settled for a few damp and undefended islands on the surf-softened periphery of the continent. They could have had Byzantium; they settled for Basildon. Most historians now conclude that they didn’t even have the guts to conquer the place outright, but just slowly assimilated its existing residents into what passed for their culture. No classic primal scene, just a miserable clump of soil in the middle of a grey sea, where the English festered, waiting to erupt. Maybe there was. Maybe they saw something on their journey, those first witlessly seasick Saxons, tactically chundering over the sides of the Britannia-bound banter boat. Some primordial nymph or siren lurking in the chilly waters of the North Sea, all blue tits and seaweed-strewn limbs and timeless malice, who emerged wreathed by storms and lighting before the bedraggled ancestors of our modern hell, saw a bunch of easy marks, and told them: accept my evil, and I will let you conquer the world. Something that struck madness and bloodlust into their hearts and those of their children even unto the hundredth generation. For centuries the promise went unfulfilled: the English had to stay cooped up in their island-prison, being periodically humiliated by the other dregs of Europe (such as the Normans, an utterly wretched gang of lost Vikings led by the walking embodiment of preening insecurity) and using their spare time to compose tediously alliterative poetry. But when it finally came to pass, it did so with raging hatred; four centuries of unrelenting revenge against the world.

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Les Visible

Masters of Deception: Zionism, 9/11 and the War on Terror Hoax by Zander C. Fuerza

What if there is no third world war? What if the trend of ever continuing exposure continues? What if the incredible buffoonery of the pigeon toed elite goes on in that Keystone Cops format and the identifiable outrages get more and more and more absurd?

Let us consider a metaphysical truth that I have no doubt is also true as an operational law of physics. The force of the collective belief of the people is a powerful thing. When the mass of the aggregate reaches a certain percentage, where enough people believe the whole terror scare put up job is a government op, the impact of this collective belief is something to be reckoned with. Here is an interesting example of how the elite consider such things. In the 60's, some thousands of anti- Vietnam war protesters met at The Pentagon grounds to perform an occult ritual. Perhaps only a few of them knew the deeper reasoning behind it. Whatever... suffice to say that all of these protesters began to join hands and encircle The Pentagon with the intention of levitating it. The police response was immediate and brutal. They took it seriously.

Go to your history books and look at the results of the impact of great faith upon world conditions. Look at what was accomplished by Mahatma (great souled) Gandhi. Look at what Martin Luther King accomplished with the civil rights movement. Look at the life of Rasputin and so many others and the power they were able to demonstrate as a result of great belief. I'm not interested in hearing about Sankar Ghose but... if you prefer, use him as an example. I'm not interested in hearing anyone's theories about King being an FBI operative. The way disinfo works is that it can come at you from any angle. Of course the FBI was deeply infiltrated into King's camp but what the literal truth of the matter is remains inconclusive; what we have is more along the line of so and so says such and such. If one wants to paint a certain picture, one includes particular objects and does not include others. It's known that the FBI was involved, one way or another in the assassination of Dr. King, just as they were in 9/11 and a host of dirty tricks that span decades. If he was owned and controlled, what would be the point of killing him? The rot that permeates the Administrative, Legislative and Judicial branches of the Zionist owned and controlled American government emits a perfume not unlike what you get when you inadvertently puncture the stomach of a floater that's been in the water for ten days. It is an unmistakable statement of composition.

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Gilad Atzmon

I am amused that as the Zionist smear campaign against me and my work has faded, the so called Jewish ‘anti’ Zionists, aka AZZ (anti Zionist Zionists), are ever more infuriated by my thoughts. They are desperate to silence me. They don’t have a chance, but, let’s face it, they have some really good reasons.

The recent events in Palestine have proved beyond any doubt my interpretation of Jewish nationalism and Jewish identity politics. It is not a coincidence that I was the only one to predict the Israeli defeat even before the first Israeli soldier entered Gaza. Since Israel defines itself as the Jewish State, its actions and atrocities must be understood within the context of Jewish culture and heritage. This is my line of thought and this is what I am known for.

Leading commentator, Jeff Blankfort, argued recently that the Jewish Left is not the solution, it is actually a continuation of the problem. I believe that the Jewish Left is not merely a continuation of the problem, it is actually at the heart of the problem. Jewish power, as I see it, is the capacity to silence criticism of Jewish power. In that regard, AIPAC and the Jewish Lobby are not ‘Jewish power,’ they are symptoms of Jewish power. The institutional attempt to silence any debate about Jewish power is provided by the Jewish Left and the so called Jewish anti Zionist network (JVP, Mondoweiss, Chomsky, Blumenthal, etc.). It is the Jewish Left that attempts to set the boundaries of the discussion and dictates what can and cannot be said.

For instance, we may talk about Zionism and Israel but we must never elaborate on the Jewishness of the Jewish state. Israel defines itself as the Jewish State, it attests to its affinity to Jewish history, and it draws its vile inception from the Old Testament, yet, the Jewish pro Palestinian outlet Mondoweiss, changed its comment policy to ban discussion of Jewish culture in the context of criticizing Israel.

To sum it all up, I am not just an anti Zionist, I am actually critical of all forms of Jewish politics, both Zionist and Anti. I contend that all forms of Jewish politics are ethno-centric and to a certain extent, racially driven. And in my latest book The Wandering Who I substantiate this point and yet to see any attempt to prove me wrong.

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Richard K. Moore

We are able to see the architecture – the structural patterns – of each kind of mind-control regime. This can help us recognize precursors – signs that such a future is coming our way.

Dystopian predictions — In 1984, George Orwell paints a picture of a dark, gray world. People are afraid to say anything contrary to the official party line, and surveillance is universal. Even thinking contrary to the party is a crime, and thoughtcrimes may be treated by radical psychological intervention. Information is closely controlled by the party media, and the historical record is routinely edited, so as to conform to the latest party statements.

By contrast, in Brave New World, Aldous Huxley paints a colorful, superficially pleasant world. Personal freedom of all kinds is encouraged, even to the point of being a cultural imperative. In the book a young boy is referred to a therapist, because he doesn’t want to play sex games with a girl classmate. An adult character is considered aberrant, because he is drawn toward a monogamous relationship. Drugs and distractions are readily available for mood enhancement.

Central to Huxley’s world is the abolition of the family. Sex never results in pregnancy, and embryos are grown in a production process, based on selected seed material. As part of the production process, an embryo can be fed or starved, at various stages of its development, so as to create classes of people (alphas, betas, etc) with differing levels of intelligence and skills. Quotas are set, regarding how many people of each class are going to be needed, and should therefore be produced.

Various kinds of conditioning are then used on infants in order to get them to accept their class, along with its prerogatives and restrictions, as being best for them. Children are raised on a communal basis, with no concept of parents, siblings, or family. From embryo to adulthood, the state has fine-tuned control over the development of the person, and of their thinking. In the resulting society, people behave as they were programmed to behave, and can’t imagine things being any different.

In Orwell’s world, wrong-thought (thought crime) is detected and suppressed. In Huxley’s, wrong-thought is unlikely to arise. Orwell’s world suppresses the individual; Huxley’s manufactures the individual. Orwell explores a brute-force approach to mind control, while Huxley explores a scientific approach. In both cases, mind control, control over what people are able to think, is the strategy of the regime, as its means of social control generally.

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Paul Craig Roberts

Official statements from the Russian government indicate that the president and foreign minister continue to rely on the good will of “our Western partners” to work out a reasonable diplomatic solution to the trouble in Ukraine caused by Washington. Not only is there no evidence of this good will in Western capitals, the hostile measures against Russia are increasing. Moreover, hostile measures are on the rise even though their main effect is to disadvantage Europe.

For example, the socialist president of France has followed Washington’s orders and refused to deliver a ship that it owes to Russia under contract. The news reports are so incompetent that they do not say whether Russia has paid for the ship or whether payment was awaiting completion. If Russia has not already paid, then the failure to deliver will harm whoever financed the construction of the ship. If Russia has paid, then the idiot French president has placed France in violation of a contract and under international law France is subject to heavy financial penalties.

It is not clear how this hurts Russia. It is Russia’s strategic nuclear force that the West has to fear, not a helicopter carrier. What Hollande has taught Russia is not to do business with France or any country in NATO.

Russia should promptly take the contract violation to court. Either France will be sanctioned with penalties that could exceed the value of the contract or the West will prove that in its hands international law is meaningless. If I were Russia, I would give up a helicopter ship in order to establish this point.

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Stephen Lendman

NATO warlords concluded two days of meetings and related activities. Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen said a Readiness Action Plan was agreed on." It'll "strength (the alliance's) defense," he said. It can be deployed on very short notice. It includes "several thousand land troops." It complement's NATO's (multinational) Response Force. It includes land, air, sea and special force elements. It's a stand-alone force available for rapid deployment. It maintains up to 25,000 troops.

NATO's mission is offense, not defense. Its readiness tells "any potential aggressor: should you even think of attacking one (member), you will be facing the whole alliance." Rasmussen announced plans to launch a Defense Capacity Building Initiative. It "reinforce(s) (NATO's) commitment to partner nations. It includes cooperation with Georgia, Moldova and Jordan. It provides "security capacity support" for Libya. It's ready to assist Iraq on "request." The alliance's US-led Open Door policy aims for establishing a global police force. To include as many nations as possible. To subordinate member-state militaries under its command. To operate virtually everywhere. To do so extrajudicially. "Today we have decided how to make NATO more ready and better connected," said Rasmussen. "This is the blueprint for the NATO of tomorrow.

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Racheal Ninsiima

On November 28, 2013, Julius Kiiza, 26, a father of four, was diagnosed with MDR-TB – a multi-drug resistant Tuberculosis (TB).

Julius Kiiza was like many youths his age a few years back. He loved to hang out and live a good life. Never in his wildest dreams did he think he was developing a virulent form of TB.

Prior to this, Julius was already grappling with HIV which was diagnosed in 2011. Later he was to develop a wracking cough, characterized with chest pain.

“I would lose breath especially at night because of chest congestion,” he said.

Julius was diagnosed with TB and was started on the regular eight-month drug regimen. Five months down the road, Kiiza was found to have MDR-TB. MDR-TB occurs when bacteria do not respond to Isoniazid and Rifampicin, the two most powerful, first-line anti-TB drugs.

Because of Julius Kiiza’s co-infection (HIV and TB), he now takes at least 20 pills a day and he will be receiving an anti-TB injection daily for six months. I met him at Hoima regional referral hospital TB ward. As he motioned towards me, it was as if his legs would snap under the weight of his body.

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Les Visible

Yesterday afternoon I lay down for a nap. Some time after I fell asleep, I found myself in a noxious and toxic swamp. Hot winds blew across a blasted landscape, where the souls of the damned howled and shrieked. It was a place of infinite sadness and terror, juxtaposed in a land that the ineffable had forgotten. It was somewhere outside of The Ring Pass Not. I continued slogging my way through this odoriferous country that constantly reminded me of the intestinal track of a drowned hyena, ten days after the fact. I went on and on. I could not stay and I could not go back. Somehow... I knew that going back led to an even worse environment. Finally, I found myself in a long tunnel. It also stank horribly. Everything in this place stank. It stank of rot and a corruption that was both physical and spiritual. Under any normal circumstances I would have been retching uncontrollably but... it was a dream.

After a time I came to the end of the tunnel and was confronted by large columns of various sizes that reminded me of what the trunks of an infected mucous tree might look like, were there such a thing. You make weird comparisons in dreams. Don't ask me why. It happens. I found some rubble strewn about and I tossed some of it at the columns and the sound was what you might expect from ravens and frogs... but unlike any ravens and frogs from this plane. These were percussive sounds such as you might expect from infernal ravens and frogs, who perched on dead trees and in stagnant ponds, in some awful place far to the south of the worst purgatory.

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James Ridgeway

The interior of a cell in the 4B SHU at Corcoran State Prison.
Inmates are in these cells most of their day. They rotate to cages
outside for three to four hours. (Photo: Grant Slater/89.3KPCC)

Introduction by Paul Craig Roberts: American politicians and media can’t stop screaming about how inhumane Muslims are because those few whom we have enraged cut off heads of a handful of people instead of blowing to bits with bombs hundreds of thousands of people. Read Ridgeway’s report and decide for yourself if anyone is more inhumane than Americans.

Inhumane Treatment: Inside America’s Prisons
by James Ridgeway

“While waiting for an officer to handcuff and escort me back to the cell that awaited me after showering, I sat on the floor holding a razor used for shaving,” W writes to me. “Today was the day I decided to end my life.”

I do not know W. I have never met him. I have no idea whether he is black or white, tall or short, old or young. I don’t know what he’s done that’s landed him in prison, or why the prison system has seen fit to place him in solitary confinement.

Every week I receive 50 or so letters from people like W. He is one of 80,000 men, women, and children who live in states of extreme isolation in U.S. prisons and jails. They spend their days and nights in cells that measure, on average, 6 by 9 feet. They live sealed off from the world, sometimes without a window, usually behind a solid metal door with a slot where a guard can slip in a food tray. If they are lucky they are let out a couple of times a week to shower, or to exercise for an hour in a fenced or walled pen resembling a dog kennel.

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Peter Haisenko

Introduction by Paul Craig Roberts: Peter Haisenko was a pilot for Lufthansa for 30 years. In the article below he explains his conclusion that the Malaysian airliner downed in Ukraine was hit first by an air-to-air missile from a Ukrainian fighter jet and then by machine gun fire. As Ukrainian air control has refused to release its communications with the airliner and Washington refuses to release its satellite photos, we have to form a judgment based on experience and available evidence. This judgment is superior to unsupported propagandistic claims. The withholding of pertinent information suggests that Washington and/or Kiev are responsible for the downed airliner. (For the full article in German, go here.)

The Evidence: MH 017
by Peter Haisenko

Seven weeks have passed since the downing of MH 017 and we have still not been provided with official investigation results. This is an extraordinary circumstance, but ultimately not surprising. Just a few days after the crash of the airliner a short message was published that in this case the debris of the wreck will not be collected to be put together like a puzzle. However, this would have been the normal procedure if there were serious interest to determine the cause of the accident objectively.

When an airplane crashes, within 24 hours there are usually legions of experts at the scene who register everything in detail and start collecting the debris. First of all experts of the plane manufacturer are sent to the scene — in this case Boeing – followed by the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board), and by specialists and experts from the countries concerned. In addition to the flight recorder, these specialists are responsible for an examination of the debris. Normally, the airplane is reconstructed from the pieces in order to determine the cause of the crash.

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Stephen Lendman

Russia's President Vladimir Putin addresses the audience as he
takes part in festivities to mark the 75th anniversary of the vic-
tory in the Battle of Khalkhin Gol in Ulan Bator, Mongolia,
September 3, 2014. (Distributed by Reuters)

Fail safe days appear over. The unthinkable appears possible. At stake is world peace.

On Wednesday, Putin offered a seven-point plan to end Southeastern Ukraine's conflict. A previous article discussed it. It's genuine. It's sincere. It's fair-minded. It favors neither side. It's a way to restore regional peace. It's an important proposal to keep conflict from spreading.

It doesn't matter. Obama wants war, not peace. So do rogue NATO partners. Kiev's puppet regime is a convenient proxy. Obama commented before Putin explained his plan, saying:

"There is an opportunity here. But no realistic political settlement can be achieved if, effectively, Russia says:" 'We are going to continue to send tanks and troops and arms and advisors under the guise of separatists who are not homegrown, and the only possible settlement is if Ukraine cedes its territory or its sovereignty or its ability to make its own decisions about its security and its economic future.’"

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Robert Parry

Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria
Nuland, speaking to Ukrainian and other business leaders at
the National Press Club in Washington on Dec. 13, 2013, at
a meeting sponsored by Chevron.

Given the very high stakes of a nuclear confrontation with Russia, some analysts wonder what’s the real motive for taking this extraordinary risk over Ukraine. Is it about natural gas, protection of the U.S. dollar’s dominance, or an outgrowth of neocon extremism, says Robert Parry.

A senior U.S. diplomat told me recently that if Russia were to occupy all of Ukraine and even neighboring Belarus that there would be zero impact on U.S. national interests. The diplomat wasn’t advocating that, of course, but was noting the curious reality that Official Washington’s current war hysteria over Ukraine doesn’t connect to genuine security concerns.

So why has so much of the Washington Establishment – from prominent government officials to all the major media pundits – devoted so much time this past year to pounding their chests over the need to confront Russia regarding Ukraine? Who is benefiting from this eminently avoidable – yet extremely dangerous – crisis? What’s driving the madness?

Of course, Washington’s conventional wisdom is that America only wants “democracy” for the people of Ukraine and that Russian President Vladimir Putin provoked this confrontation as part of an imperialist design to reclaim Russian territory lost during the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.

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