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Washington Is Awash in Debt, Yet Hawks Want Us to Borrow Even More
Doug Bandow - Responsible Statecraft
Uncle Sam is headed toward insolvency. Warned the Congressional Budget Office this month: “By the end of 2021, federal debt held by the public is projected to equal 102 percent of GDP. Debt would reach 107 percent of GDP (surpassing its historical high) in 2031 and would almost double to 202 percent of GDP by 2051.” … Washington’s inveterate hawks fear this will complicate their attempt to sell an ever-growing military budget … Rather than intervene constantly in the Mideast, Washington should step back. America’s responsibility is at best secondary or tertiary. There is no justification for a military build-up amid a tsunami of red ink … The United States no longer can afford to police the world.
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Making Sense of American History
Podcast
Mark Weber joins host Fróði Midjord to talk about how the “official” American identity has changed over the past 80 years, and how the prevailing narrative of US history has similarly changed. The two men first discuss Profiles in Courage, the best-selling work by John F. Kennedy that highlights US Senators who took stands for principle in defiance of colleagues, constituents and popular opinion. Weber and Midjord also examine how an America that was once so dynamic, confident and successful for so many years has become so divided, confused and pessimistic. They discuss America Revised, a book by Frances Fitzgerald that explains how the “official” narrative of US history, as presented in school textbooks, has been made and re-made. Runtime: 109 mins.
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The Dream of the '90s Died in Portland
Nancy Rommelmann - Reason
… Of the more than 1,000 protest-related arrests from May through November, charges were dropped more than 90 percent of the time. This was at the behest of Multnomah County District Attorney Mike Schmidt, who upon assuming office in August announced he would decline to prosecute the “breaking windows of businesses, lighting things on fire, stealing from those stores in the protest environment.” … The situation in Portland did not improve after the election. Activists kept marching nightly … They vandalized 27 businesses along a six-block strip in Northeast Portland … On New Year’s Eve, they used Molotov cocktails and other high-powered incendiary devices to cause tens of thousands of dollars in damage in downtown.
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Napoleon Isn’t a Hero to Celebrate
Marlene L. Daut - The New York Times
After a year in which statues of enslavers and colonizers were toppled, defaced or taken down across Europe and the United States, France has decided to move in the opposite direction. The year 2021 is being hailed by many museums and institutions in the country as the “Year of Napoleon” to commemorate France’s biggest tyrant, an icon of white supremacy, Napoleon Bonaparte, who died 200 years ago … As a Black woman of Haitian descent and a scholar of French colonialism, I find it particularly galling to see that France plans to celebrate the man who restored slavery to the French Caribbean, an architect of modern genocide, whose troops created gas chambers to kill my ancestors.
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The French Fuhrer: Genocidal Napoleon Was as Barbaric as Hitler, Historian Claims
C. Hudson – Daily Mail (Britain)
… New research has shown that France’s greatest hero presided over mass atrocities which bear comparison with some of Hitler’s worst crimes against humanity. These reassessments of Napoleon have caused anguish in France … During his reign as Emperor, concentration camps were set up and gas was used to massacre large groups of people. There were hit squads and mass deportations … Claude Ribbe, a respected historian …accuses him of being a racist and an anti-Semite who persecuted Jews and reintroduced widespread slavery just a few years after it had been abolished by the French government. The most startling of these findings, the attempted massacre of an entire population over the age of 12 by methods which included gassing them in the holds of ships, relate to the French Caribbean colony of Haiti …
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Polish Catholic University Professor Who Endorsed Jewish 'Blood Libel' Views Is Exonerated by Disciplinary Committee
The Algemeiner
A professor at Poland’s leading Catholic university has been spared from disciplinary action and exonerated for a lecture he delivered in 2018 in which he claimed that Polish Jews had engaged in ritual murder – one of the deadliest antisemitic falsehoods to have persisted over the centuries. Fr. Tadeusz Guz, a professor of philosophy at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin (KUL), endorsed the “blood libel” during a May 26, 2018, public lecture in Warsaw, in which he alleged that Jews in Poland had engaged in the slaughter of Christian children for ritual purposes. “We know, dear people, that the facts of ritual murder cannot be erased from history,” Guz told his audience.
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A university professor in Russia’s second city of St. Petersburg is under investigation for publicly denying the Holocaust. The Leningrad regional prosecutor’s office said in a statement on March 25 that the probe was launched after preliminary investigations revealed a lecturer at a webinar for teachers on January 21 stated that the Holocaust during the World War II was “a myth” and “fiction.” … Professor Vladimir Matveyev of the St. Petersburg State University of Economy and the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration … stated that the number of Jews killed during the war was “exaggerated,” making a conclusion that the “genocide of Jews” cannot be called a Holocaust.
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Iran, China Sign Strategic Long-Term Cooperation Agreement
Associated Press
Iran and China on Saturday signed a 25-year strategic cooperation agreement addressing economic issues amid crippling U.S. sanctions on Iran, state TV reported. The agreement dubbed the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership covers a variety of economic activity from oil and mining to promoting industrial activity in Iran, as well as transportation and agricultural collaborations, according to the report. No additional details of the agreement were revealed as Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and Chinese counterpart Wang Yi took part in a ceremony marking the event. The deal marked the first time Iran has signed such a lengthy agreement with a major world power … The two countries have had warm relations and both took part in a joint naval exercise in 2019 with Russia in the northern Indian Ocean.
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Alena Lee, a meteorologist at Kansas City’s KCTV5, has a tradition: Every Saturday night, she features a pet submitted by a local viewer to be featured in a “Caturday” shoutout during her weather update. This weekend [Feb. 20], Lee pulled up a picture of a white cat with a black patch just below its nose whose resemblance to Adolf Hitler would have been obvious even if its name hadn’t been “Kitler.” But it was, a fact that was spelled out in capital letters below the cat’s picture. And Lee read it without indicating that she saw anything amiss about the cat’s name.
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Jews ‘Will Always Have a Dual Loyalty,’ Whether They Know It or Not, Says Former Israeli Spy Pollard
The Times of Israel / JTA
Jonathan Pollard, an American who served a 30-year sentence for spying for Israel and who moved to Israel in December after the end of his parole, made blunt comments on supposed Jewish dual loyalty and the FBI in an interview published Thursday. “American Jewry has one major problem: they consider themselves more American than they do Jews,” Pollard told the Israel Hayom daily. Asked how he felt about being accused by US Jews of having dual loyalties, Pollard did not take issue with the title … “The bottom line on this charge of dual loyalty is, I’m sorry, we’re Jews, and if we’re Jews, we will always have dual loyalty,” he added. And he suggested that if asked for advice, he would counsel a young US Jew working in the American security apparatus to spy for Israel.
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Serious Question: What is Zionism?
John Carville
… Personally, I reject the “Zionism is not Judaism” approach and see that we are being fobbed off with nonsense … We cannot begin to understand Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians without examining the roots of Judaic thinking and Jewish identity in the ethnically and religiously discriminatory doctrines of Judaic religion, which has shaped the Jewish mindset for most of its history … To say that we cannot understand the roots of Israel’s ongoing genocide without examining the doctrines of Judaic teaching over the centuries is not to call for violence or discrimination against people who identify as Jews (and there are various different mechanisms of identification involved here, which merit considerable academic analysis in themselves).
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Straight Talk About Zionism
Mark Weber
… A Zionist Jew, by definition, owes his primary loyalty to the Jewish community and to Israel. Zionism is not compatible with patriotism to any country or entity other than Israel and the world Jewish community … Zionist Jews and their non-Jewish supporters embrace a blatant double standard. Jewish-Zionist organizations, along with their non-Jewish allies, support one social-political ideology for Israel and the world Jewish community, and a completely different one for the United States and other non-Jewish countries. They insist that ethnic nationalism is evil and bad for non-Jews, while at the same time they vigorously support ethnic nationalism — that is, Zionism — for Jews.
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Exactly 150 years after the Paris Commune, rival passions are flaring again over how to remember the city’s brief and much-romanticised experiment in power to the people … Over the next three months, people’s committees ran the capital while the official French government fulminated in Versailles. But in May [1871] the army moved in and the Commune was crushed. For supporters then – and since – it was a springtime of hope bloodily repressed by the forces of conservatism. Karl Marx saw it as a prototype of his workers’ revolution … A century and a half on, the Commune continues to divide. For three months from today, Paris’s left-run city hall has prepared commemorations focusing on what it sees as the movement’s great social advances: equality for the sexes, disempowering the Church, participative democracy.
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If Israel Accuses Iran of Doing Something, Israel Is Likely Already Doing It
Ted Snider - Mondoweiss
Israel has accused Iran of doing many nefarious things. But the historical record shows that whatever Israel accuses Iran of, it is likely that Israel is already doing it … Most vociferously, Israel has accused Iran of possessing a nuclear weapons program and of secretly constructing nuclear weapons facilities. It is well known that Israel has a nuclear weapons program. A leaked email written by Colin Powell suggests that the US estimates Israel’s arsenal at 200 nuclear weapons … As in the case of regional influence, use of proxies, terrorism, and constructing secret nuclear facilities, Israel seems to be guilty of the very thing it is accusing Iran of: blowing up ships. This boomeranging accusation is consistent with a historical pattern of Israel accusing Iran of the very things Israel is doing.
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Letters Found in Attic Reveal Similarities Between Adolf Hitler and His Father
The Washington Post
In the annals of scholarly research, it is possible that nobody in history has been written about more than Adolf Hitler. By 1975, 30 years after he killed himself at the end of World War II, more than 50,000 books and scholarly articles had been written about him, according to a 2006 study of those studies. Two decades later, the total reached 120,000. “That computes to more than 24 scholarly books and articles on Hitler and Nazism published every working day for 20 years — and the number is growing exponentially,” the study said. “Thus public interest in the mystery of Hitler continues to grow, with no end in sight.” … A few years ago, in the tiny Austrian town of Wallern, a pensioner named Anneliese Smigielski was rummaging in her attic when she happened upon 31 letters written by none other than Alois Hitler.
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How Hitler Consolidated Power in Germany
Leon Degrelle
“We have the power. Now our gigantic work begins.” Those were Hitler’s words on the night of January 30, 1933, as cheering crowds surged past him, for five long hours, beneath the windows of the Chancellery in Berlin. His political struggle had lasted 14 years. He himself was 43 … Half a century later, few people understand the crisis Germany faced at that time … During the preceding years, a score of “democratic” governments had come and gone, often in utter confusion. Instead of alleviating the people’s misery, they had increased it, due to their own instability …
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University Students Back Lecturer Under Attack From ‘Proud Zionists'
Middle East Monitor
Students at the University of Bristol [England] have spoken out in defence of prominent British Professor David Miller who is under attack for criticising the Zionist state of Israel. Other university students have joined them in their defence of the renowned lecturer. Pro-Israel groups describing themselves as “proud Zionists” have been leading a vicious campaign to have the sociology professor sacked from his post at Bristol … Most of the students in the anonymised list praised Miller as an “exceptional teacher” while dismissing the claim that he is anti-Semitic … The suppression of free speech is a major issue for Miller’s supporters.
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'Holocaust Denial' Was Already Taking Root in Britain During WWII, Says UK Author
The Times of Israel
In the grim search by historians and academics to pinpoint the first examples of postwar Holocaust denial, the finger of blame is most often pointed at fascists, anti-Semites and far-right figures in France, Sweden and the United States. However, argues a new book, this misses the pivotal role played by Nazi sympathizers in Britain, both during World War II and in its immediate aftermath, in developing a “blueprint” that has been drawn on ever since by those who seek to deny history’s greatest crime. “The truth is that Holocaust denial in its traditional form began not in France or America, as most have argued, but actually in Britain,” says Dr. Joe Mulhall, author of “British Fascism After the Holocaust: From the Birth of Denial to the Notting Hill Riots 1939-1958.”
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Hell Hath No Fury Like a Superpower in Decline
Graham E. Fuller - Responsible Statecraft
The U.S. leadership must have set some kind of new record in managing to personally insult the leadership of the two other great powers of the world within 48 hours of each other in these early days of Biden administration foreign policy … It is difficult to understand how Blinken feels comfortable at lecturing China on its domestic failings at a time when U.S. democracy and social policy have never presented a more damaging face to the world. Surely such self-righteousness on the administration’s part shows a lack of seriousness and honesty about U.S. history and positions. Or, more disturbingly, it suggests that Washington lacks all capacity for self-reflection and self-awareness.
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In a recent interview, US President Joe Biden said that Vladimir Putin is a “killer,” and that he has “no soul.” Responding to that, the Russian President says that Biden’s remarks reflect Americans’ own difficulty in coming to terms with their history and identity, and thus the US role in the world. Putin goes on to recall the “European conquest of the American continent,” the “genocide” and “extermination of the indigenous population,” the grim history and legacy of slavery, and the militarily needless mass killings of civilians in the US atomic bombings of Japan in World War II. Russians and Americans are different peoples, Putin adds, each with its own “genetic, cultural and moral code.” But in spite of “sanctions and insults” from the US, he says, “we know how to defend our own interests.” Runtime: 5:25 mins.
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Terminate NATO
Jacob G. Hornberger
… In 1989, the Cold War suddenly and unexpectedly came to an end, which, needless to say, put the U.S. national-security establishment and NATO into a panic. After all, the Cold War was the justification for both of these institutions. With no Cold War, they could both be dismantled. Instead, the national-security establishment simply went into the Middle East and began poking hornets’ nest, which ultimately brought terrorist retaliation, which in turn brought the “war on terrorism” … As Moller argues, however, Russia poses no real threat to Europe and, therefore, cannot be seriously considered to be a justification for NATO. Instead, she argues, it’s time to replace Russia with China, owing to China’s rise as an international powerhouse.
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Trump Pardons Brokered by Jewish Groups Tied to Jared Kushner
B. L. Nadeau - Daily Beast
President Trump relied heavily on a network that revolved around two influential Jewish organizations tied to Jared Kushner to determine who would get pardons, according to an investigation by the New York Times. The Aleph Institute and Tzedek Association, which are tied to influential lawyers including Alan Dershowitz, Brett Tolman and Nick Muzin used what the Times calls a “combination of access, influence and substantive expertise they brought to bear produced striking results.” Of the 238 total pardons and commutations granted by Trump in the last days of his presidency, 27 went to people supported by Aleph, Tzedek and those who worked with them. A further 13 clemency grants were supported by Alice Marie Johnson, an advocate whose own drug conviction was pardoned by Trump, who worked closely with Aleph, according to the report.
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This year’s annual Gallup poll has revealed a shift in sentiment among Americans regarding Israel and the Palestinians, with the majority of Democrats for the first time responding that the US should be putting more pressure on the Israeli government than the Palestinian leadership. The poll, published on Friday, said 53 percent of Democrats want US pressure to focus on Israel, compared with the 29 percent that said they want US pressure to be placed on the Palestinians. That figure is up from 2018, when 43 percent of Democrats said they supported putting more pressure on Israel. The findings continued among the general population, with the number of all Americans wanting more US pressure on Israel increasing from 27 percent in 2018 to 34 percent in 2021.
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Is Biden's Foreign Policy Clumsiness Due to Incompetence or Arrogance?
Ted Galen Carpenter - The National Interest
The dominant narrative in the news media is that the election of Joe Biden means that the “adults” and “professionals” are now back in charge of U.S. foreign policy after four years of dangerous, amateurish behavior by Donald Trump and his appointees. Events are proving otherwise. Several early Biden administration actions should sound alarm bells with both Congress and the American people. The only question is whether those missteps reflect incompetence or arrogance … The Biden administration’s initial foreign policy performance has been not merely unimpressive, but alarming. If this boorish amateurism is what America can expect from supposedly experienced professionals, the United States is in for a rough ride over the next four years.
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Do We Not Have Enough Enemies?
Patrick J. Buchanan
… Does not America have enough on her plate already? Our national debt is now larger than our national economy. COVID-19 has killed half a million of us and is killing 1,000 a day more. We have a broken and bleeding Southern border being overrun with no end in sight. Politically, our nation is divided as deeply as it was on the eve of the Civil War. We are caught up in a culture war, at the root of which is an irreconcilable conflict over whether America is a good and great country, perhaps the greatest — or a nation of whose history and founding we ought to be eternally ashamed. If time is on America’s side in our cold wars with Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, is not the wiser policy to maneuver to avoid any new hot wars?
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Peace, Waiting to be Picked Up: The Secret Diplomacy Failure of 1916 that Changed the World
Philip Zelikow
… For more than five months, from August 1916 until the end of January 1917, leaders from Germany, Britain, and the United States secretly struggled to end the Great War. They did so far out of public sight, one reason their battle is still little understood today. Few know that the German government secretly sought peace and pleaded for President Wilson to mediate a peace conference. This was no informal feeler. It was a direct move made at the top, coordinated with allies and key political figures in Germany. Few know of the German move; fewer still can trace exactly what happened to it … During those five months of speculation, arguments, and choices behind closed doors, the future of the war, and the world, hung in the balance as never before.
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Israel’s ongoing military occupation of Palestinian territory is regarded around the world as illegal and outrageous. The Zionist state’s oppressive and belligerent policies are condemned nearly everywhere – except in the United States. This documentary film explains how and why the US is exceptional. It focuses on the vast pro-Israel public relations efforts aimed at the American people. It shows how the Israeli government, American politicians, and the pro-Israel lobby in the US work together to shape American media coverage in Israel’s favor. Narrated by Roger Waters, this film features leading observers of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and US media culture. Runtime: 84 mins.
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“A Regime of Jewish Supremacy from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea: This is Apartheid,” was the title of a January 12 report by the Israeli rights group B’Tselem. No matter how one is to interpret B’Tselem’s findings, the report is earth-shattering. The official Israeli response merely confirmed what B’Tselem has stated in no uncertain terms … Let’s be clear on what this actually means … According to B’tselem, which has for decades diligently documented numerous facets of Israeli government practices in the realm of politics, military, land-ownership, water distribution, health, education, and much more, Israel is, now, wholly an apartheid, undemocratic regime.
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California Approves Ethnic Studies Curriculum for K-12 Schools After Years of Debate
Los Angeles Times
Ending years-long and often divisive debate over ethnic studies coursework in California’s K-12 schools, the State Board of Education on Thursday unanimously approved a model curriculum to guide how the histories, struggles and contributions of Asian, Black, Latino and Native Americans – and the racism and marginalization they have experienced in the United States – will be taught to millions of students … Supporters said the anti-racist teachings and the historic perspectives of marginalized groups in the curriculum are of critical importance at this moment in the U.S. … The curriculum now includes a discussion of anti-Semitism in a sample lesson about Jewish Middle Eastern Americans and an additional sample lesson about Jewish Americans , both submitted by Jewish educators, in a section on “inter-ethnic bridge building.”
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Regime Changers Love to Think Iran is Always on the ‘Brink of Collapse’
A. Rad - Responsible Statecraft
… Despite four years of “maximum pressure” on Iran under the Trump administration, which included unprecedented sanctions, extrajudicial assassinations, sabotage, threats, and belligerent rhetoric, the Islamic Republic continues to stand — as it has done in the face of enormous pressure over several decades … The narrative of imminent collapse has been part of the discourse on Iran since the revolution of 1979. But like the story of total stability before the revolution, this analysis appears to be driven more by the political interests of a few than an objective examination of the Islamic Republic’s internal security.
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Afghanistan: How Long Must This Go On?
Ron Jacobs - CounterPunch
The United States military and mercenary forces need to leave Afghanistan now. Even Donald Trump understood this, at least in public. The US mission was a failure within a year of its 2001 invasion. It could not and cannot reshape the political landscape in that nation … Over the weekend, the Washington Post reported that the Biden White House (and its friends in the Pentagon) are considering postponing the scheduled May 1, 2021 withdrawal of most US military forces from Afghanistan. This is not only wrong, it’s foolish. The US will not get its way in Afghanistan more than any other invading nation has. Twenty years of war and close to fifty years of armed meddling should prove that … If one looks at the history of Afghanistan over the past fifty years, it becomes clear that the primary reason for its current situation is the meddling of the United States.
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Why is America Still in Syria?
Matthew Petti – Reason
… U.S. policy toward Syria was torn between two often-clashing goals during the Obama administration: The CIA and State Department were focused on ending the Assad family’s decades-long rule, while the U.S. military was trying to crush violent religious extremists such as the Islamic State … In 2018 and 2019, Trump ordered U.S. forces out of Syria, only to walk back the order both times … U.S. policy has not only failed to stop the conflict; it has helped prolong it, leaving millions of Syrians at the mercy of White House palace intrigue … The United States began backing Syrian rebels because many in the Obama administration believed that they could help quickly bring down an oppressive tyrant. Instead, the U.S. intervention fed into a bloody, years-long international conflict.
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Who and What Killed George Floyd?
Patrick J. Buchanan
… Most Americans who saw the nine-minute tape of Chauvin with his knee on the neck of George Floyd as he pleaded, “I can’t breathe,” will probably concur with the charge of criminal culpability of Chauvin. Yet, over the months, new facts and factors have emerged. George Floyd was not choked to death. He was not asphyxiated. He was not killed by Chauvin’s knee on the side of his neck. An autopsy showed Floyd’s neck muscles were not even bruised … In short, Chauvin’s defense attorneys will likely make a credible case, backed by evidence, that Floyd’s death was not caused by the knee on his neck but by the battered condition of his heart, the near-lethal dose of fentanyl in his system, and his anxiety and panic at being arrested and fearing, as he wailed, that he was going to be shot.
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The Spectre of Totalitarianism
Edward Skidelsky - The Critic (Britain)
… The new intolerance is often seen as a specifically left-wing phenomenon … But that is a one-sided view of the matter. It was US Zionists who pioneered the tactic of putting pressure on organisations to disinvite unfavoured speakers … Less bombastic, but no less mischievous, are the words by which the progressivist left signals that certain ideas and behaviours are not to be tolerated. “Inappropriate” and “unacceptable” are two familiar gaggers. “Toxic” is a newer and nastier arrival. Then there is the “phobic” family: “homophobic”, “Islamophobic”, “transphobic”. Their function is to disarm criticism of the thing in question by tracing it back to pathological fear and disgust. The “denier” tag works in a similar way. All these are words designed to short-circuit the usual processes of reflection and debate …
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Zionists Pioneered 'Cancel Culture,' Professor Claims
I. Stoll - The Algemeiner
American Zionists are to blame for pioneering cancel culture, a British professor claims in a new article. Under the headline “The Spectre of Totalitarianism,” the essay by Edward Skidelsky in the March 2021 issue of The Critic warns against “the new intolerance,” the onslaught of what the article calls “the ‘woke’ left.” The article attracted positive attention from some prominent public intellectuals. “A powerful essay,” tweeted Niall Ferguson, a senior fellow at Stanford’s Hoover Institution. “This is excellent,” said Adrian Wooldridge, political editor of The Economist. Somewhat disturbingly, though, the article traces the origins of cancel culture to the actions of pro-Israel advocates.
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Defense Department Booklet Targets Holocaust Revisionism
The Journal of Historical Review
American military service personnel are now being told that skepticism toward the official history of Europe’s Jews during World War II is not permissible. A recently [1996] published Department of Defense booklet tells armed forces members that revisionist criticism of the Six Million extermination story is nothing less than a threat to national security. Entitled Holocaust Revisionism, the booklet instructs military personnel: “A successful fighting force is a cohesive one, one where all members have respect for each other’s diversity and dignity. Holocaust revisionism has the potential to destroy that respect.” … In essence, this booklet is an arrogant effort to persuade non-Jewish Americans to regard parochial Jewish-Zionist concerns as their own.
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Biden’s Chinese War
Stephen J. Sniegoski
… A serious conflict is brewing with China, infinitely more dangerous than anything regarding Russia or Iran … The problem for the U.S. is that China seems to be ahead of our country in its space capability … If Taiwan were to become part of China, as Beijing has insisted it must, China would instantly become a Pacific power, control some of the world’s most cutting-edge technologies, and have the ability to choke off oil shipments to Japan and South Korea — leverage it could use to demand the closure of U.S. military bases in both countries. In effect, Beijing would likely be able to achieve its goal of forcing the U.S. out of Asia. With the conquest of Taiwan, China would become the most powerful country in the world.
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China, Russia Images in U.S. Hit Historic Lows
M. Younis - Gallup
Americans’ favorable ratings of China have plummeted to a record low 20%, following a 13-percentage point drop in favorability from 33% a year ago. This comes on the heels of last year’s eight-point decline … Currently, 20% of Americans view China favorably, marking the lowest on record. Last year’s 33% was tied with the previous low point. The highest on record was 72% in 1989 … Of 17 other nations, Americans express the most favorable views of traditional allies, such as Canada and Great Britain, and the least favorable opinions of nations often at odds with the United States on the global stage, such as Iran and North Korea … The overall favorable view of Russia has dropped six points to a new low of 22%, and 77% now have an unfavorable opinion of the country.
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Jewish American Tycoons are Financing Far-Right Policies in the US and Israel
Middle East Monitor
The biggest donors of Republican politicians who have been denounced for trying to overturn the US Constitution on the day of the storming of the Congress building in January are also the biggest backers of an Israeli lobby group that is pushing far-right policies within the Zionist state, [the Israeli daily] Haaretz has reported. The Jewish American tycoons behind the right-wing Kohelet Policy Forum have been exposed by the Israeli newspaper in an extended article headlined “The US billionaires secretly funding the right-wing effort to reshape Israel” … Haaretz said that Kohelet’s principal financial backers are two Jewish American billionaires, Jeffrey Yass and Arthur Dantchik.
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Iran’s Supposed Threat to the U.S. is a Scam Israel and its Lobby Promote to Change the Subject from Palestine
Philip Weiss
Someday historians will scratch their heads over the fact that for the better part of 20 years U.S. presidents were engaged as a leading foreign policy question in how to restrain Iran, a small country half the world away that has not attacked the U.S., that does not have nuclear weapons, that is the seat of ancient civilization, and whose contribution to regional instability doesn’t look any worse than Israel’s or Saudi Arabia’s … The answer to this question is actually simple. It is in Israel’s interest for the U.S. to treat Iran as a supposed “existential” threat to the world. Having the U.S. so engaged in Israel’s cold war with Iran serves Israel by keeping the world’s attention on a supposed dire threat to world peace instead of on the Israeli apartheid system for Palestinians … Israel’s lackies in the Congress on both sides of the aisle pipe the Israeli line.
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Congressional Testimony: The Leading Activists for Online Censorship Are Corporate Journalists
Glenn Greenwald
… In October, the Committee, after a sixteen-month investigation, produced one of those most comprehensive and informative reports by any government body anywhere in the world about the multi-pronged threats to democracy posed by four Silicon Valley monopolies: Facebook, Google, Amazon and Apple … Contrary to the popular narrative propagated by news outlets … much if not most Silicon Valley censorship of political speech emanates from pressure campaigns led by corporate media outlets and their journalists, demanding that more and more of their competitors and ideological adversaries be silenced. Big media, in other words, is coopting the power of Big Tech for their own purposes.
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Antifa 'Unmasked' in New Book by Andy Ngo
James Kirkpatrick - VDare
Andy Ngo’s new book, Unmasked: Inside Antifa’s Radical Plan to Destroy Democracy … shows that far from being just an “idea,” as Present Joe Biden would have us believe, Antifa comprises highly organized groups of dedicated activists with an extreme political agenda and a commitment to violence. But Ngo also shows, perhaps less consciously, that Antifa operates with de-facto backing from the Ruling Class, including Main Stream Media journalists, the principal enforcers of the current order … He shows, often literally with chapter and verse, what motivates Antifa, how they are organized, how they are trained, and how this is turned into concrete action … Right-wing activity even at this level would be shut down by the government instantly.
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Suggested Reading: A Study Guide
Mark Weber
In an age when vast amounts of information from a wide range of sources are instantly available online, it can be difficult to sort out what’s reliable, useful, and trustworthy. In response to many inquiries over the years, here are recommended books on five important historical topics: The Second World War, American History, International Relations, Communism, Marxism and the Soviet Union, and, Zionism, US-Israel Relations, and the ‘Jewish Question.’ This listing is neither exhaustive nor final. Additional subject categories and titles are planned, and descriptions may be revised or updated.
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Trump and Biden’s Secret Bombing Wars
Medea Benjamin, Nicolas J.S. Davies
On February 25, President Biden ordered U.S. air forces to drop seven 500-pound bombs on Iraqi forces in Syria, reportedly killing 22 people. The U.S. airstrike has predictably failed to halt rocket attacks on deeply unpopular U.S. bases in Iraq, which the Iraqi National Assembly passed a resolution to close over a year ago … But unbeknownst to many Americans, the U.S. military and its allies are engaged in bombing and killing people in other countries on a daily basis. The U.S. and its allies have dropped more than 326,000 bombs and missiles on people in other countries since 2001 (see table below), including more than 152,000 in Iraq and Syria. That’s an average of 46 bombs and missiles per day, day in day out, year in year out, for nearly 20 years.
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Jews in Iran Freely Observe Their Religion, Says an Iranian Jewish Leader
New York Jewish Week / JTA
Contrary to a commonly held belief, Jews living in Iran find it easier to practice their religion today than they did prior to the Islamic Revolution of 1979, according to a longtime leader of the Jewish community in Tehran … Arash Abaie, a civil engineer and prominent Jewish educator, cantor, Torah reader and scholar, explained why he believes Jews living in the country have intensified their religious observance over the past four decades … The largest Jewish community in the Muslim world is able to live in peace as long as its members steer clear of political involvement or showing support for Israel … Iran’s Jewish population has largely managed to navigate the complexities of a situation that allows them official minority status, a permanent seat in parliament, and freedom to practice their religion, in return for eschewing Zionism.
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New British Documentary Claims Hitler Was ‘Very Hands Off’ In Implementing 'Final Solution'
The Times of Israel
Adolf Hitler did not wish to confront the reality of the Final Solution, a documentary on British television claimed on Monday night. The program alleged the Nazi dictator never visited an extermination camp … It also stated that the origins of the Holocaust lay in remarks made by Hitler at a private dinner, and noted the lack of a “paper trail” linking him directly to its instigation.
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Public Figures Speak Out to Defend Bristol Professor David Miller
The Canary (Britain)
A campaign is growing to defend professor David Miller against attempts to have him suspended from his role at the University of Bristol [England]. Campaigners have planned an act of solidarity in Bristol city centre. And on the evening of 13 March, Labour Campaign for Free Speech (LCFS) is holding a public online meeting in support of Miller. A number of public figures will be speaking out in Miller’s defence at this meeting.The Community Security Trust (CST) launched a campaign to censor Miller two years ago. This was based on allegations of anti-semitism in response to his academic work linking Zionism to Islamophobia.
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Dictionary.Com Will No Longer Use 'Slave' as a Noun to Describe People
E. Donnelly – Yahoo
As part of its ongoing efforts to feature language that is more inclusive and reflective of modern-day society, Dictionary.com will no longer include the word “slave” as a noun identifying a person, instead using the adjective “enslaved” or referencing the institution of slavery. The change is one of 7,600 updates the online resource has announced, which also include the addition of terms relevant to race, social justice and identity, such as “BIPOC” (Black, Indigenous and People of Color) and “Critical Race Theory.” The latest updates — which also include capitalizing “Indigenous” when referring to people, and adding entries for “racialization,” “disenfranchisement” and “overpolice” — follow those announced last September.
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Progressive Neo-McCarthyism: A Serious Threat to the First Amendment?
Ted Galen Carpenter – The National Interest
… In essence, America seems to be witnessing the early stages of mirror-image McCarthyism, with leftists harassing their opponents. And if that trend is not halted, we are likely to suffer similar deleterious effects. The original McCarthy era smothered the expression of iconoclastic, or even unorthodox, views on various issues, especially foreign policy, and the corrosion persisted well into the 1960s … Manifestations of neo-McCarthyism are now taking place on multiple fronts. Echoes of McCarthyism are loud and growing louder. So, too, is a campaign to compel ideological conformity and blacklist dissenters on a wide array of policy issues.
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A 2,000-year-old device often referred to as the world’s oldest “computer” has been recreated by scientists trying to understand how it worked. The Antikythera Mechanism has baffled experts since it was found on a Roman-era shipwreck in Greece in 1901. The hand-powered Ancient Greek device is thought to have been used to predict eclipses and other astronomical events. But only a third of the device survived, leaving researchers pondering how it worked and what it looked like … The mechanism has been described as an astronomical calculator as well as the world’s first analogue computer. It is made of bronze and includes dozens of gears. The back cover features a description of the cosmos display, which shows the motion of the five planets that were known at the time the device was built.
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Letters From Adolf Hitler’s Father Give Rare Glimpse Into German Leader’s Upbringing
Deutsche Welle (Germany)
Previously unknown letters written by Adolf Hitler’s father, Alois Hitler, shed light on the family origins of the Nazi dictator, reveals a new book that was published on Monday. In his German-language book, “Hitler’s Father: How the Son Became a Dictator,” Austrian historian Roman Sandgruber argues the elder Hitler played a large role in shaping the psychology of his son. Alois Hitler, who died in 1902, was an Austrian customs officer whose job required moving house and family 18 times. The book draws on 31 letters father Alois Hitler wrote to master road builder Josef Radlegger after buying his farm at Hafeld in Upper Austria.
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… Though Alois was known to be a “very tyrannical head of the family,” Sandgruber said the letters also offer an occasional glimpse at congeniality in his home life. To Alois, his wife Klara was more than the “silent housewife” later described by Adolf in Mein Kampf. One of the few people Alois had anything positive to say about, Sandgruber believed her to have been “a thoroughly emancipated woman, as we would put it today.” “One can assume that she certainly had a say in the household,” Sandgruber noted, and particularly when it came to money matters. “My wife … has the necessary enthusiasm and understanding for finances,” Alois wrote in one of the letters.
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My Patient, Hitler: A Memoir of Hitler’s Jewish Physician
Dr. Eduard Bloch
… What kind of boy was Adolf Hitler? Many biographers have put him down as harsh-voiced, defiant, untidy; as a young ruffian who personified all that is unattractive. This simply is not true. As a youth he was quiet, well-mannered and neatly dressed … In the practice of my profession it is natural that I should have witnessed many scenes such as this one, yet none of them left me with quite the same impression. In all my career I have never seen anyone so prostrate with grief as Adolf Hitler.
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Leave Dr. Seuss for Dead
Edward Welsch - Chronicles
… It is ironic to see members of the right run to the defense of the dear doctor, who himself was one of his era’s greatest cancelers of conservatives. Dr. Seuss was the lead cartoonist during the interwar years for PM, a leftist New York daily tabloid dominated by Communist fellow travelers. He routinely used his post to smear conservatives opposed to the Roosevelt administration as racists and anti-Semites, and the paper’s editorialists aggressively lobbied Roosevelt’s government to shut down conservative media. Moreover, in his role at PM, Dr. Seuss was one of the most effective propagandists advocating for war and internationalist foreign policies committing American troops and treasure abroad.
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The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden has singled out a “growing rivalry with China, Russia, and other authoritarian states” as a key challenge facing the United States. A White House document outlining Biden’s national-security policies, made public on March 3, describes China, the world’s second-largest economic power, as “the only competitor potentially capable of combining its economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to mount a sustained challenge to a stable and open international system.” … Both Beijing and Moscow “have invested heavily in efforts meant to check U.S. strengths and prevent us from defending our interests and allies around the world,” according to the document, titled Interim National Security Strategic Guidance.
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Remembering the First Gulf War
Kathy Kelly
Thirty years ago, when the United States launched Operation Desert Storm against Iraq, I was a member of the Gulf Peace Team … We witnessed the dismal onset of the air war at 3 a.m. local time on January 17, 1991, huddled under blankets, hearing distant explosions, and watching anxiously as war planes flew overhead … On February 24, the United States Army forces buried scores of living Iraqi soldiers in trenches … Noam Chomsky notes that there were diplomatic alternatives to the bloodletting and destruction visited upon Iraq by Operation Desert Storm. Iraqi diplomats had submitted an alternative plan which was suppressed in the mainstream media and flatly rejected by the Bush administration.
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The Dark Side of the 1991 Gulf War
Video - Carlton Meyer
The 1991 Gulf war is regarded by many Americans, if they remember it at all, as a “good” war. In this video, Carlton Meyer presents a different view. In realty, he says, worldwide sanctions would have forced Iraq to peacefully withdraw. The 1991 Gulf war, he reminds us, cost billions of dollars, killed or sickened a million people, left the region much worse off, assisted Iran, and set off a worldwide economic recession. Runtime: 14:36 mins.
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How the National Security State Manipulates the News Media
Ted Galen Carpenter
An especially dangerous threat to liberty occurs when members of the press collude with government agencies instead of monitoring and exposing the abuses of those agencies. Unfortunately, collusion is an all-too-common pattern in press coverage of the national security state’s activities. The American people then receive official propaganda disguised as honest reporting and analysis. The degree of collaboration frequently has reached stunning levels. During the early decades of the Cold War, some journalists even became outright CIA assets … Bernstein emphasized that the most valuable of the close associations were “with the New York Times, CBS and Time Inc.” … Major media outlets, especially the Washington Post, the New York Times, CNN and MSNBC, have avidly joined the national security state’s campaign to demonize Russia.
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During WWII, Dr. Seuss Tried to Slay Anti-Semitism, But Also Promoted Racism
Matt Lebovic – The Times of Israel
Lost in the fracas about beloved children’s author Dr. Seuss’s racially offensive books is that the iconic writer and illustrator launched his career by denouncing German expansionism and going after racists and anti-Semites at home. For Theodore Seuss Geisel — better known as Dr. Seuss — the lead-up to World War II provided unparalleled creative opportunities. At New York’s liberal-leaning PM daily newspaper, Geisel created more than 400 cartoons to help prod Americans into a war that most people did not desire. “His cartoons attacked reactionaries and isolationists such as Charles Lindbergh, and in a few instances he ridiculed anti-Semitism in America,” said Rafael Medoff … While Geisel’s cartoons sometimes depicted the folly of racism, he also penned bigoted cartoons of Japanese American citizens and Japan.
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How FDR Made the Depression Worse
Robert Higgs
Franklin Roosevelt “did bring us out of the Depression,” Newt Gingrich told a group of Republicans after the recent election, and that makes FDR “the greatest figure of the 20th century.” … Gingrich’s view that FDR saved us from the Depression is indefensible; Roosevelt’s policies prolonged and deepened it … In their understanding of the Depression, Roosevelt and his economic advisers had cause and effect reversed. They did not recognize that prices had fallen because of the Depression. They believed that the Depression prevailed because prices had fallen. The obvious remedy, then, was to raise prices, which they decided to do by creating artificial shortages. Hence arose a collection of crackpot policies designed to cure the Depression by cutting back on production.
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Are the Democrats Bent on Suicide?
Patrick J. Buchanan
… The Green New Deal is designed to recall the halcyon days of the 1930s, when, so the story goes, [Pres. Franklin Roosevelt] FDR came to Washington to enact the historic reforms that rescued America from the Great Depression. Only that story is more than a small myth. The unemployment rate when FDR took the oath in 1933 was 25 percent. It never fell below 14 percent through the 1930s. In June 1938, despite huge Democratic majorities in Congress, FDR was presiding over a nation where unemployment was back up to 19 percent. World War II and the conscription of 16 million young men gave us “full employment.” And the war’s end and demobilization saw the return of real prosperity in 1946, after FDR was dead … Fifty years after the Great Society, apparently half the country consists of victims of oppression.
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To deal with the massive unemployment and economic paralysis of the Great Depression, both the US and German governments launched innovative and ambitious programs. Although President Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal” measures helped only marginally, the Third Reich’s much more focused and comprehensive policies proved remarkably effective. Within three years unemployment was banished and Germany’s economy was flourishing. And while Roosevelt’s record in dealing with the Depression is pretty well known, the remarkable story of how Hitler tackled the crisis is not widely understood or appreciated.
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What is Israel Building at its Dimona Nuclear Site?
R. Silverstein - Middle East Eye
An international NGO devoted to halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons recently released satellite imagery showing that Israel, for the first time in decades, was engaged in new construction at its Dimona nuclear site. The reactor there, which first became active in the mid-1960s, manufactures plutonium as fuel for Israel’s reputed stockpile of 80 nuclear warheads … The ultimate irony of the Dimona project is that no one questions Israel’s right to make nuclear weapons or to improve the lethality of its arsenal … Why does the world believe that Israel has the right to such an immense arsenal, and that it will maintain it responsibly, while Iran has no right to even a single weapon … What has Israel ever done to deserve such credibility, and what has Iran ever done that is so much more heinous as to deserve this level of obloquy?
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Biden Extends National Emergency Executive Order That Sanctions Iran
The Times of Israel
President Joe Biden on Friday extended the country’s state of emergency with regard to Iran by another year. Executive Order 12957, first approved in 1995, has been renewed periodically since. It had been set to expire on March 15. Announcing the move, Biden — who is seeking to reenter the nuclear deal between Iran and world powers — said the Islamic Republic poses an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to the US … Biden last month launched an airstrike just over the border into Syria in retaliation, joining every American president from Ronald Reagan onward who has ordered a bombardment of countries in the Middle East.
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The United States is the world’s most militarized and belligerent nation. Stating this reality shocks and outrages Washington policymakers. Yet the facts are incontestable, like the sun’s rise … A new study from Brown University’s Watson Institute found that between 2018 and 2020 the US backed surrogate forces in combat in four countries, unleashed air and/or drone strikes in seven, engaged in combat operations in eight, undertook military exercises in 41, and participated in military training in 79. All of these were labeled “counter-terrorism” operations. Washington’s endless “global war on terrorism” has been a notable failure, with ever-increasing terrorist threats attracting ever-expanding military action.
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American Decline, The 2020 Elections, Donald Trump, Historical Revisionism, the Third Reich, and More
Audio Archive - Institute for Historical Review
Newly updated! Dozens of probing, thought-provoking podcasts, talks and interviews on a broad range of topical and historical issues. In these presentations, IHR director Mark Weber and others examine: the 2020 elections, factors behind America’s accelerating decline, “The Godfather” films, the Trump phenomenon, World War II, “The Great Gatsby,” the trajectory of US history, Third Reich Germany, the Jewish-Zionist grip on American political and cultural life, historical revisionism, and much more.
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President Joe Biden singled out a “growing rivalry with China” as a key challenge facing the United States, with his top diplomat describing the Asian country as “the biggest geopolitical test” of this century. The administration rolled out its thinking in a 24-page document outlining Biden’s national security policies along with the first major foreign policy speech by Secretary of State Antony Blinken. “It is the only competitor potentially capable of combining its economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to mount a sustained challenge to a stable and open international system,” the national security document said of China.
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How Democratic is China?
Here Comes China
… Over the five years, economic growth [in China] averaged 7.8 percent, services became the largest sector, and consumption became the major growth driver, energy intensity fell 18 percent, and emissions dropped 12 percent, the urban-rural income gap narrowed, rudimentary health insurance became universal, three hundred million folk gained access to safe drinking water, and one hundred million were lifted from poverty. Harvard’s Tony Saich, who conducts his own surveys, concludes that 90 percent of [China’s] people are satisfied with the government, and surveys found that eighty-three percent think it runs the country for everyone’s benefit rather than for special groups.
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Waiting for Our Salazar: Portugal’s 20th Century
Michael Warren Davis - The American Conservative
… [António de Oliveira] Salazar [premier of Portugal, 1932-1968] ruled as a Catholic, and his regime was naturally conservative on social issues. He constantly insisted upon “the intrinsic value of religious truth to the individual and society.” His stated goals were to prevent “the perversion of public opinion” and to “safeguard the moral integrity of citizens.”… It was never Salazar’s goal “to make Portugal great again,” but simply to ensure the country’s imperfect economy worked for the ordinary Portuguese … If we Americans lack the self-discipline necessary for self-government, if liberalism is off the table, the only alternative to a tyrant like Lenin or Hitler may be a man like Salazar: a paternalistic traditionalist, a philosopher-king.
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The Portuguese government complained about an Israeli ambassador’s criticism of Lisbon’s mourning in 1945 of Adolf Hitler’s death. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs instructed its ambassador to Israel to “transmit disapproval” to the Israeli authorities regarding remarks attributed to his Israeli counterpart, Ehud Gol, in October [2012] about “a stain” on Portugal’s record … Antonio de Oliveira Salazar, Portugal’s right-wing dictator from 1932 to 1968, declared three days of national mourning after Hitler’s death. According to Publico, another newspaper, Gol said in October that “Portugal was the only country to lower its flag for three days” and that “for us Jews this is a stain that will forever be associated with Portugal.”
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A group of 1,800 retired Israeli generals, officers and Mossad operatives have written a letter to U.S. President Joe Biden urging him not to return to the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran. In the March 1 letter, the group, which goes by the name “Habithonistim,” states that it has watched “with great concern” as the Biden administration seeks to return to the “flawed principles” of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). “From a strict security perspective, [rejoining the accord] represents an existential threat to the Jewish state. It would also work against your administration’s stated goal of stabilizing the Middle East,” states the letter.
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Why Hasn’t Biden Rejoined the Iran Deal?
Barbara Boland - The American Conservative
… Biden has not yet started talks with Iran, and all the sanctions the Trump administration enacted remain in place. The U.S. military continues to gear up for an all-out war with Iran. Iran refuses to sit down for negotiations with the U.S. unless sanctions are lifted, and Biden says his administration will not lift sanctions just to bring them to the negotiating table … Despite the campaign rhetoric, the Biden administration’s governing posture towards Iran is virtually unchanged from Trump’s … There may only be a few months left to save the deal, after which both countries will have reached the point of no return, nonproliferation experts told TAC … The Trump administration purposefully crafted a series of onerous sanctions that would be difficult for a subsequent administration to remove. They were successful.
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A US State Department employee named Fritz Berggren has been moonlighting as a blogger devoted to attacking Jews and promoting white Christian nationalism. “Jesus Christ came to save the whole world from the Jews — the founders of the original Anti-Christ religion, they who are the seed of the Serpent, that brood of vipers,” Berggren wrote in an October 4, 2020, post on his website titled “Jews are Not God’s Chosen People. Judeo-Christian is Anti-Christ.” Later in the post he writes, “Jewish ideas poison people.” Berggren has been sharing his extremist and anti-Semitic views under his real name for years while working as a mid-level civil servant … He has been identified as a Foreign Service worker since as early as 2009. According to biographical information shared by Berggren online, he has a doctorate from the University of Miami.
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Biden’s Syria Strikes: A Perpetual Cycle of Endless War
Stephen Miles - Responsible Statecraft
… As is often the case with recent instances of U.S. military force abroad, a debate has quickly emerged on what legal authority such an attack was conducted under and if it complied with international law. The administration claims it acted in self-defense. Multiple members of Congress have weighed in, with some of Congress’s strongest war powers champions either outright rejecting or raising significant concerns about the administration’s claims … Whatever authority was used to launch the strikes, it has been nearly 20 years since Congress debated and weighed in on our wars in the Middle East … Whatever is happening today in Iraq and Syria is a state of conflict, an endless war, existing in a perpetual cycle of attack and counterattack, retaliation and retribution, that can only be broken by choosing to walk away.
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America Is Not ‘Back.’ And Americans Should Not Want It to Be.
Stephen Wertheim – The New York Times
“America is back,” President Biden has declared in every major foreign policy speech he has given since taking office. He means to restore what he sees as the essence of global leadership — the United States joining with allies to “fight for our shared values” — that his predecessor defiled. Back, then, is America’s quest to order the world in the name of democracy, human rights and the American way … America’s version of “liberal internationalism” — code for global military dominance exercised on behalf of liberal values — remains the primary source of decades of foreign policy disaster. Unless Mr. Biden challenges the very premise, he will repeat the same mistakes, now in a more competitive world … Investing military might with self-righteous moralism has not only produced one policy failure after another.
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Biden: No New Cold Wars or Democracy Crusades
Patrick J. Buchanan
… America’s mission is “ending tyranny in our world,” said [President George W.] Bush. Biden’s declared mission is far less ambitious … “I believe that — every ounce of my being — that democracy will and must prevail. We must demonstrate that democracies can still deliver for our people in this changed world. That, in my view, is our galvanizing mission. Democracy doesn’t happen by accident. We have to defend it, fight for it, strengthen it, renew it. We have to prove that our model isn’t a relic of our history.” … Biden’s remarks also reveal the dichotomy that exists between what is on the minds of his countrymen, and what is on the minds of so many among our foreign policy elites. … About new crusades for democracy, Americans don’t care much. They do care, deeply, about what is happening to their own country.
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Dr. Seuss Books Removed From eBay
New York Daily News
In the days following the announcement that six Dr. Seuss books which contain racist imagery would no longer be published by Dr. Seuss Enterprises, sales have skyrocketed — but you won’t be able to find the banned books on eBay anymore. “These books portray people in ways that are hurtful and wrong,” the organization said in a statement … A spokeswoman for eBay said the company “is currently sweeping our marketplace to remove these items.” Resellers have reportedly already been informed that the six books violated eBay’s “offensive material policy,” which bans items that promote “hatred, violence, or discrimination.” The books were also removed from stores at Universal Studios theme parks.
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The online auction giant eBay has removed at least 15 Nazi-themed toys — including SS guard figurines and play Nazi tanks — from its listings. The toys violated eBay’s policy against products that promote hate or violent ideologies, according to the Jewish News. The site bans an array of items, from human body parts to used cosmetics. Among its prohibited items are anything that promotes anti-Semitic stereotypes, as well as “Historical Holocaust-related and Nazi-related items, including reproductions, any item that is anti-Semitic or any item from after 1933 that bears a swastika [and] media identified as Nazi propaganda.” Nazi German coins are an exception.
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Celebrated American children’s author Dr. Seuss is now considered too controversial for one of Virginia’s largest school districts, a new report reveals. For over two decades, Dr. Seuss’s birthday has been celebrated in schools as Read Across America Day … Following pressure from activists, Loudon County Public Schools is reportedly dropping the annual Dr. Seuss celebration … Learning for Justice, a liberal education advocacy group, was reportedly behind the pressure campaign against the celebrated children’s author. The organization pegs itself as a group that seeks “to uphold the mission” of the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center, according to their website. Learning for Justice cited a study by St. Catherine University that claimed Dr. Seuss’s books are covered with “orientalism, anti-Blackness and White supremacy” …
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The Southern Poverty Law Center Is Everything That’s Wrong With Liberalism
Nathan J. Robinson - Current Affairs
The Southern Poverty Law Center, the wealthiest civil rights organization in the country, has ousted its founder, Morris Dees, and president, Richard Cohen, amid unspecified allegations of workplace misconduct by Dees … The organization has long been dysfunctional in even deeper ways, and the story of Dees and the SPLC is useful for illustrating some of the worst and most hypocritical tendencies in American liberalism … The biggest problem with the hate map, though, is that it’s an outright fraud. I don’t use that term casually. I mean, the whole thing is a willful deception designed to scare older liberals into writing checks to the SPLC … The SPLC has continuously sent out terrifying lies to make old people part with their money … To me, this is a scam bordering on criminal mail fraud.
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German Internees at the Curragh Camp: Ireland in World War II
Luke Diver - History Ireland
… Like [in] other neutral countries across Europe, particularly Switzerland and Sweden, the Curragh Camp [in Ireland] adopted a relatively liberal parole system, and life as an internee was reasonably good … Over time, the relaxation of the parole system allowed internees to attend religious services, the cinema, dances, public houses and horse-races. The Germans were able to use the army recreational facilities and to compete against local and army sports teams … Throughout the local area surrounding the Curragh, Germans worked … Many Germans integrated well into the nearby communities and developed friendships with locals from the neighbouring towns … Some even married local girls … By the end of the conflict, the Curragh [Camp] had interned 54 Luftwaffe officers and 210 German sailors.
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The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election
Molly Ball - Time
… This is the inside story of the conspiracy to save the 2020 election, based on access to the group’s inner workings, never-before-seen documents and interviews with dozens of those involved from across the political spectrum. It is the story of an unprecedented, creative and determined campaign whose success also reveals how close the nation came to disaster … That’s why the participants want the secret history of the 2020 election told, even though it sounds like a paranoid fever dream – a well-funded cabal of powerful people, ranging across industries and ideologies, working together behind the scenes to influence perceptions, change rules and laws, steer media coverage and control the flow of information … Protecting the election would require an effort of unprecedented scale.
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Biden’s Reckless Syria Bombing Is Not the Diplomacy He Promised
Medea Benjamin, Nicholas J. S. Davies
The Feb. 25 U.S. bombing of Syria immediately puts the policies of the newly-formed Biden administration into sharp relief. Why is this administration bombing the sovereign nation of Syria? Why is it bombing “Iranian-backed militias” who pose absolutely no threat to the United States and are actually involved in fighting ISIS? … The Pentagon made the incredible claim that this action “aims to de-escalate the overall situation in both Eastern Syria and Iraq.” This was countered by the Syrian government, which condemned the illegal attack on its territory and said the strikes “will lead to consequences that will escalate the situation in the region.” The strike was also condemned by the governments of China and Russia. A member of Russia’s Federation Council warned that such escalations in the area could lead to “a massive conflict.”
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What’s Holding Back American Teenagers?
L. Steinberg – Slate
… High school students haven’t made any progress at all. Reading and math scores have remained flat among 17-year-olds, as have their scores on subject area tests in science, writing, geography, and history. And by absolute, rather than relative, standards, American high school students’ achievement is scandalous. In other words, over the past 40 years, despite endless debates about curricula, testing, teacher training, teachers’ salaries, and performance standards, and despite billions of dollars invested in school reform, there has been no improvement — none — in the academic proficiency of American high school students. It’s not just No Child Left Behind or Race to the Top that has failed our adolescents — it’s every single thing we have tried. The list of unsuccessful experiments is long and dispiriting.
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Six Dr. Seuss Books Will No Longer Be Published Over Racist Images
Associated Press
Six Dr. Seuss books — including “And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street” and “If I Ran the Zoo” — will stop being published because of racist and insensitive imagery, the business that preserves and protects the author’s legacy said Tuesday. “These books portray people in ways that are hurtful and wrong,” Dr. Seuss Enterprises told The Associated Press in a statement … The other books affected are “McElligot’s Pool,” “On Beyond Zebra!,” “Scrambled Eggs Super!,” and “The Cat’s Quizzer.” … In “And to Think That I Saw It on Mulberry Street,” an Asian person is portrayed wearing a conical hat, holding chopsticks, and eating from a bowl. “If I Ran the Zoo” includes a drawing of two bare-footed African men wearing what appear to be grass skirts with their hair tied above their heads.
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Israel’s Leaders Livid Over 'Scandalous' and 'Anti-Semitic' ICC War Crimes Probe
The Times of Israel
Israeli leaders on Wednesday denounced the International Criminal Court after its top prosecutor opened a probe into alleged Israeli and Palestinian war crimes, while the Palestinians and rights groups hailed the move. Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda’s announcement of the investigation, which will focus on suspected war crimes around Operation Protective Edge, beginning on June 13, 2014, came under a month after The Hague-based court ruled it had the jurisdiction to open a probe. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was “under attack” and condemned the decision as “the epitome of anti-Semitism and hypocrisy.”
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Israel estimates that hundreds of its citizens might be subject to war crimes probes by the International Criminal Court, whose jurisdiction it rejects, and is working on how to protect them, the Defence Minister said on Tuesday … The Hague-based tribunal ruled last month that it has jurisdiction over the occupied West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem. The ruling could lead to criminal investigations of Israel and of Palestinian militant groups including Hamas. Israel is not a member of the court and rejects its jurisdiction, a position backed by its close ally the United States … In an interview on Israel’s fortified border with Gaza, Gantz, who also holds Israel’s justice portfolio, called the ruling a “negative development” and added: “We have our own teams working in different (places) to try (and) influence (the ICC).”
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A former senior US official has said some 20 American mouthpieces for the Israeli regime had unrivaled access to the White House during Barack Obama’s presidency, highlighting the close link between Israeli lobbies and the White House and Congress. Ben Rhodes, former deputy national security adviser under Obama, said he had to meet with Israel lobbyists as much as all other interest groups combined. He said there were 10 to 20 individuals who invariably took the position of the Israeli regime and were apparently scripted by the Israelis in some cases. “You just have this incredibly organized pro-Israel community that is very accustomed to having access in the White House, in Congress, at the State Department. It’s taken for granted, as given, that that’s the way things are going to be done,” Rhodes said in an interview …
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A Straight Look at the Jewish Lobby
Mark Weber
… Jews wield immense power and influence in the United States. The “Jewish lobby” is a decisive factor in US support for Israel. Jewish-Zionist interests are not identical to American interests. In fact, they often conflict. As long as the “very powerful” Jewish lobby remains entrenched, there will be no end to the Jewish-Zionist grip on the US political system and the American media, the Zionist oppression of Palestinians, and the Israeli threat to peace.
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What to Do About Israel?
Philip Giraldi
… Under President Donald Trump, one Jewish billionaire Sheldon Adelson contributed as much as $300 million to GOP coffers, money which had with it a quid pro quo, that Trump should do a series of favors for Israel, which he did. The Democrats have their own counterpart in Israeli film producer Haim Saban, who has said that he is a “one issue guy and his issue is Israel.” Neither major party can be counted upon to resist Israeli pressure on foreign policy or even on domestic issues that might limit the “aid” that the Jewish state receives. The money coming from the Israel Lobby has corrupted American government all the way down to the local level … Israel’s ability to corrupt and misdirect is all based on Jewish money, a well-established process whereby Zionist oligarchs buy their way to power and access.
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Miriam Adelson Now Leads Sheldon’s Pro-Israel Empire
Asa Winstanley
Casino magnate Sheldon Adelson died this month [January] at the age of 87. He is survived by his Israeli widow Miriam Adelson, who looks set to continue the couple’s work empowering Israel and its lobby. She is now Israel’s richest person. One of the world’s richest men, Adelson was for two decades the sugar daddy of the pro-Israel lobby in the US … Sheldon and Miriam Adelson poured about $250 million into Republican campaigns, including Trump’s, during the 2020 election cycle alone. Sheldon Adelson’s largesse on behalf the Zionist cause is a matter of record. But Miriam Adelson – Sheldon’s Israeli-American second wife – is less well known. She now controls the vast majority of the shares in the Adelson company – a stake reported to be worth $24 billion. At 75, she may continue the couple’s malign work for years to come.
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Last Thursday President Biden continued what has sadly become a Washington tradition: bombing Syria. The President ordered a military strike near the Iraqi-Syrian border that killed at least 22 people. The Administration claims it struck an “Iranian-backed” militia in retaliation for recent rocket attacks on US installations in Iraq. As with Presidents Obama and Trump before him, however, Biden’s justification for the US strike and its targets is not credible. And his claim that the US attack would result in a “de-escalation” in the region is laughable … Initiating a war against a country that did not attack and does not threaten the United States without Congressional authority is an impeachable offense … President Biden should be impeached for his attack on Syria, as should have Trump and Obama before him.
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Is Biden Reenlisting in the Forever Wars?
Patrick J. Buchanan
Thursday, in its first military action, the Biden Pentagon sent two U.S. F-15Es to strike targets of Kataib Hezbollah, an Iranian-backed Iraqi militia just inside the eastern border of Syria. The U.S. strikes were in retaliation for a missile attack on a U.S. base in Irbil, capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, which killed a contractor and wounded a U.S. soldier … Democratic Sens. Tim Kaine and Chris Murphy want to know where President Joe Biden got his authority to launch attacks in Syria, where there was no clear or present danger to any U.S. troops. Days before the U.S. strike, Kataib Hezbollah issued a statement denying any complicity in the Irbil attack … Six weeks into his administration, Biden seems in danger of being drawn back indefinitely into the forever wars of the Middle East.
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Antifa’s ‘J20’ Campaign: Anarcho-Communist Actions Since the New Year
A. Ramirez - Jamestown Foundation
The new year brought about a noticeable shift in the tactics and goals of Antifa groups nationwide. After President Joe Biden’s January 20 inauguration, Antifa cells in the Pacific Northwest, northern California, and Colorado simultaneously broadened their focus from anti-police rhetoric to condemnation of the United States as a whole … On President Biden’s Inauguration Day, Antifa cells in cities such as Portland, Seattle, and Denver took to the streets for coordinated marches and riots called “J20.” … The messaging at all the rallies was harmonized around anti-American sentiment and a rejection of the United States’ political and economic system as a whole … One difference between various “J20” Antifa actions was that rioting was widespread on the West Coast, while rallies in the Rocky Mountain region remained lawful.
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Clinton Email Shows US Sought Syria Regime Change For Israel’s Sake
Jason Ditz – Antiwar.com
It is rare for a succinct foreign policy platform paper to so fully encapsulate a candidate’s thinking process. A policy paper [Jan. 2001] sent to Hillary Clinton, available on WikiLeaks, lays out the Democratic front-runner’s strategy as an architect of US intervention in Syria, shows the flawed reasoning that beget the scheme. Perhaps most importantly, the document shows utter blindness to the huge problems that the war ultimately led to. As with so many US wars in the Middle East, it all starts with Israel, and saw the US imposing regime change in Syria as primarily about benefiting Israel and spiting Iran, a position that closely mirrors that of several Israeli officials.
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Iraq Was 'Invaded to Secure Israel,' Says Sen. Hollings
Institute for Historical Review
When a prominent American political figure speaks boldly about Jewish-Zionist power, that’s news. So the remarks by South Carolina’s senior Senator that Iraq was invaded “to secure Israel,” and that “everybody” in Washington knows it, are indeed remarkable … Bush’s motive in going to war for Israeli interests, charged Ernest “Fritz” Hollings, was to get Jewish support in election campaigns.
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Israel’s ‘Vaccine Diplomacy’ is a Scandal, Not Michael Che’s ‘SNL’ Joke
A. Adamit-Gorstein - JTA
Michael Che of “Saturday Night Live” made a joke last week during the show’s “Weekend Update” segment saying that “Israel is reporting that they’ve vaccinated half of their population, and I’m gonna guess it’s the Jewish half.” The joke struck a nerve among some Jews, who rushed to condemn the satirical show for anti-Semitism and demanded that Che and “SNL” apologize for using “dangerous” and “anti-Semitic” tropes against Israel … Some liberal Jewish groups, on the other hand, celebrated the joke for pointing out Israel’s systematic discrimination against the Palestinians … It is not anti-Semitic to note that Jewish settlers living in the West Bank are full and equal citizens of Israel, while Palestinians living there are deprived of basic rights; it is the plain truth.
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After viewers noted that the stage at the CPAC conference was shaped like a Nazi symbol, the organizer of the conservative political conference said any resemblance was unintentional … CPAC is perhaps the leading annual conservative conference, drawing a who’s-who of prominent Republicans as well as lower-profile activists. This year, former President Donald Trump was the top-billed speaker. On Friday, The Daily Beans, a liberal news podcast, noted that the stage of CPAC, which was taking place in Orlando, Florida over the weekend, was shaped like the Odal Rune, an ancient European symbol that was later appropriated by the Nazis as part of the Waffen-SS uniform.
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Nearly 200 US and UK Scholars Back British Lecturer Who Called Jewish Students ‘Pawns’ of Israel
JTA
About 200 academics from the United Kingdom and the United States have signed a petition defending a British university lecturer who had called Jewish students on his campus “pawns” of Israel, “a violent, racist, foreign regime engaged in ethnic cleansing.” Jewish groups and organizations have protested the remarks by David Miller, a professor of political sociology at the University of Bristol, made during an online videoconference Feb. 13. Some have called for his ouster. The signatories of the letter published Friday supporting Miller include linguist Noam Chomsky and gender theorist Judith Butler, both Jewish Americans.
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Secretive Israeli Nuclear Facility Undergoes Major Project
Associated Press
A secretive Israeli nuclear facility at the center of the nation’s undeclared atomic weapons program is undergoing what appears to be its biggest construction project in decades, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press show. A dig about the size of a soccer field and likely several stories deep now sits just meters (yards) from the aging reactor at the Shimon Peres Negev Nuclear Research Center near the city of Dimona … Under its policy of nuclear ambiguity, Israel neither confirms nor denies having atomic weapons. It is among just four countries that have never joined the Non-Proliferation Treaty, a landmark international accord meant to stop the spread of nuclear arms.
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Israel is carrying out a major expansion of its Dimona nuclear facility in the Negev desert, where it has historically made the fissile material for its nuclear arsenal. Construction work is evident in new satellite images published on Thursday by the International Panel on Fissile Material (IPFM), an independent expert group … The Israeli embassy in Washington had no comment on the new images. Israel has a policy of deliberate ambiguity on its nuclear arsenal, neither confirming nor denying its existence. The Federation of American Scientists estimates that Israel has about 90 warheads, made from plutonium produced in the Dimona heavy water reactor.
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… [Iranian Foreign Minister] Javad Zarif couldn’t help but notice hypocrisy among [Western] leaders when reports emerged of substantial expansion of Israel’s nuclear program, which is already known to include a nuclear arms component, and which the West continues to ignore. Israel doesn’t officially acknowledge its nuclear arms, but they are well established to have them. They also don’t offer anywhere near the transparency Iran does, which Western officials rarely make note of, let alone press for improvements on. Israel’s Dimona site is, as Zarif put it, the region’s only “nuclear bomb factory,” from which Israel’s arsenal came … The US has long made it a matter of policy to not mention Israel’s nukes or the program by which they get those nukes.
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Can Political Fantasy Remake America?
Samuel Gregg - Law & Liberty
You don’t need to look far to see that catastrophism is in the air in America. Whether it is widespread analogies between the United States and the fall of Rome, suggestions that a second Civil War is in the offing, or observations concerning the social pathologies characterizing particular social groups (most notably, young white blue-collar men), there is no shortage of commentators from the left, center, and right who believe that America has entered a period of internal decline as a society and external deterioration as a global power … What, however, if we are misreading the symptoms? What if, far from terminal decay, we are witnessing a transformation that will create a different America, much as Rome underwent a shift from a divided Republic drowning in civil war to an unmatched Empire that lasted four centuries?
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Polish State Historian Resigns After Far-Right Past Revealed
Associated Press
A Polish historian resigned Monday from the government’s historical institute after controversy erupted over his past ties with a far-right organization and photos of him making the stiff-armed fascist salute. Tomasz Greniuch was recently appointed to head the Wroclaw office of the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), a state organization whose role is to document Nazi and communist crimes carried out on Polish soil … Greniuch also authored a book, “The Way of the Nationalist,” published in 2013, which glorifies Léon Degrelle, a Belgian collaborator of the Third Reich, according to the Gazeta Wyborcza newspaper. President Andrzej Duda had awarded Greniuch in 2018 with the Bronze Cross of Merit … Greniuch, who is in his late 30s, issued a public apology Friday for his past behavior.
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Leon Degrelle was a legendary combat hero of the Second World War, a charismatic political leader, and a prolific author. This “Mark Felton Production” focuses on his daring escape from death at the hands of the victors at the end of the war in a plane that flew from Norway to northern Spain. Although this presentation is quite hostile to Degrelle, it includes striking footage. Runtime: 7:34 mins. In the the wake of the German-led attack against the Soviet Union, the 35-year-old Degrelle joined a volunteer battalion of fellow French-speaking Belgians that took its place in the pan-European campaign against the Bolshevik regime. He rose through the ranks to become commander of what came to be known as the 28th SS Division “Wallonie.” He was wounded seven times and earned 22 military decorations.
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The Eastern Front: Memoirs of a Waffen SS Volunteer
Leon Degrelle -- Book available from IHR
A gripping first-person memoir of soldierly sacrifice, heroism and fierce combat against numerically superior Soviet forces during World War II, by a charismatic Belgian writer and politician turned front-line infantryman. New, revised IHR edition, with index and photos. Here is the epic story of the Walloon Legion, a volunteer Belgian unit of the World War II pan-European SS force, as told – in absorbing prose — by the legendary Degrelle. Captures the grit, terror and glory of Europe’s crusade against Communism.
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Sculpture by 'Nazi-Era' Artist Removed from Bay Area college Campus
San Francisco Chronicle
A statue by a German sculptor celebrated by the Nazi party during World War II has been removed from display at St. Mary’s College in Moraga [California] after three students circulated a petition demanding its ouster. The metal statue of a boy and a falcon by sculptor Fritz von Graevenitz, who also sculpted Nazi-era works in the 1930s and 1940s, was taken down from the courtyard of the campus art museum and placed in storage at the order of college administrators … The online petition, posted on Tuesday by students Sara Mameesh, Melanie Moyer and Venessa Ramirez, called the sculpture “Nazi art” and demanded the college get rid of it and apologize … The sculpture, titled “Falcon Boy,” was bought for the college half a century ago by a former art professor …
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The head of the Anti-Defamation League is among the critics blasting a joke on last weekend’s “Saturday Night Live” as anti-Semitic. The joke about Israel’s vaccination program aired during the program’s “Weekend Update” segment and was made by anchor and chief SNL writer Michael Che, according to The Washington Post. “Israel is reporting that they vaccinated half of their population,” Che said, “and I’m going to guess it’s the Jewish half. Jonathan Greenblatt, the Anti-Defamation League’s CEO, in a statement said the joke was “deeply offensive” and played into anti-Semitic tropes.
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Mercado Libre, Latin America’s largest online retailer, is purging anti-Semitic objects it previously listed for sale from its store. The company is removing books such as “Mein Kampf” and “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” in addition to other Nazi coins, posters and memorabilia. On Feb. 11, the retailer publicized an agreement it signed with a regional branch of the World Jewish Congress to work to fight anti-Semitism. As part of a joint strategy, both organizations will work to identify other publications on the platform that incite racial hatred speeches. “From our social role in the 18 countries of the region where we operate, we trust that we have taken another step towards the eradication of racial hatred and anti-Semitism,” said Jacobo Cohen Imach, Mercado Libre’s senior vice president of legal and government relations.