Articles and Videos in the news I happened to read and watch ... April 8 - 18, 2025

 

Video and transcipt at link

 https://scheerpost.com/2025/04/18/emptying-gaza-w-norman-finkelstein-the-chris-hedges-report/

 Emptying Gaza (w/ Norman Finkelstein) | The Chris Hedges Report

 

Israel, both materially and rhetorically, has made their intent to destroy the Palestinian people clear. One of the most renowned and courageous Middle East scholars, Norman Finkelstein, has assiduously documented the Palestinian plight for decades and he joins host Chris Hedges on this episode of The Chris Hedges Report. Finkelstein and Hedges assess the current state of the genocide in Palestine as well as how the media and the universities have all but abandonded their principles in servitude to the Zionist agenda.

Finkelstein makes clear the gravity of Israel’s unprecedented actions: “If you take any metric—number of UN workers killed, number of medics killed, number of journalists killed, proportion of civilians to combatants killed, proportion of children killed, proportion of women and children killed—if you take any metric, Israel for the 21st century is in a class all its own.”

Israel’s use of propaganda and strategically timed attacks—often lining up with other major world events so as to avoid media scrutiny—has muddied political outlook of the genocide into one of war and defense rather than ethnic cleansing. The American media has done its part to feed these narratives as well.b

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Video

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpSMLTx-pjs

 Lawyers accuse British Israelis of Gaza war crimes

 

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https://news.antiwar.com/2025/04/09/trump-again-threatens-attack-on-iran-suggests-israel-could-lead-it/

 Trump Again Threatens Attack on Iran, Suggests Israel Could Lead It

Iran's president reaffirmed on Wednesday that Tehran does not seek a nuclear weapon and said Khamenei wasn't opposed to US investment

by Dave DeCamp April 9, 2025 at 8:41 pm ET Categories NewsTags Iran, Israel

On Wednesday, President Trump again threatened the possibility of the US taking military action against Iran and suggested Israel might “lead” the attack.

“If it requires military, we’re going to have military,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office when asked if the US would attack if a nuclear deal isn’t reached with Iran.

“Israel will obviously be very much involved in that — it’ll be the leader of that. But nobody leads us. We do what we want to do,” he added.

Trump’s latest threat comes ahead of negotiations between the US and Iran that will be held in Oman this Saturday. The talks will be attended by Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and Trump’s Middle East envoy, Steve Witkoff.

Trump has insisted the talks will be direct negotiations, while Aragchi has said they will be indirect, meaning Omani mediators will pass messages between the two sides. Reports have said that Iran would need a goodwill gesture from the US to hold direct talks, such as the removal of some sanctions. But the Trump administration continues to impose sanctions and added new ones on Wednesday..............

 

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 https://www.moonofalabama.org/2025/04/trumps-market-whiplash-continues.html

 

Trump's Market Whiplash Continues

Yesterday's piece had warned about the curious drop in Treasurys and rise of interest rates. It was a dire sign that the global economy and markets far beyond Wall Street were going bad.

The Trump administration recognized the danger and, just fifteen minutes after I had published my post, pulled back (archived):

The economic turmoil, particularly a rapid rise in government bond yields, caused Mr. Trump to blink on Wednesday afternoon and pause his “reciprocal” tariffs for most countries for the next 90 days, according to four people with direct knowledge of the president’s decision.

Asked to explain the decision, Mr. Trump told reporters: “Well, I thought that people were jumping a little bit out of line. They were getting yippy, you know, they were getting a little bit yippy, a little bit afraid.”

Behind the scenes, senior members of Mr. Trump’s team had feared a financial panic that could spiral out of control and potentially devastate the economy. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and others on the president’s team, including Vice President JD Vance, had been pushing for a more structured approach to the trade conflict that would focus on isolating China as the worst actor while still sending a broader message that Mr. Trump was serious.

This does not mean that the trouble has ended.

Who is going to invest, into what, while any day, at any moment, the most basic economic conditions may change in completely unpredictable directions:

Asked on Wednesday how he would decide on any further exemptions, Mr. Trump said: “Instinctively, more than anything else. I mean, you almost can’t take a pencil to paper. It’s really more of an instinct, I think, than anything else.”

By admitting that Trump acknowledges that he is the real problem.............

 

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https://thegrayzone.com/2025/04/09/aipac-access-trump-natsec-officials-leaked/

 

AIPAC leader boasts of special ‘access’ to top Trump natsec officials in leaked audio

Max Blumenthal·April 9, 2025

 

 

 During an off-the-record panel, AIPAC’s CEO detailed his organization’s grooming of Trump’s top national security officials, and how his group’s “access” ensures they continue to follow Israel’s agenda.

The Grayzone has obtained audio of an off-the-record session from the 2025 Congressional Summit of AIPAC, the main US lobbying arm of the state of Israel. Recorded by an attendee of the panel discussion, the audio features AIPAC’s new CEO, Elliott Brandt, describing how his organization has cultivated influence with three top national security officials in the Trump administration – Secretary of State Marco Rubio, National Security Director Mike Waltz, and CIA Director John Ratcliffe – and how it believes it can gain “access” to their internal discussions.

Joining Brandt on the panel was Dana Stroul, formerly the highest ranking civilian overseeing Middle East issues in the Biden administration’s Department of Defense. Stroul made it clear that defending Israel’s strategic imperatives from within the US government was a top priority, arguing that Washington should deepen its “mutually beneficial” special relationship with its “strong partner” in Tel Aviv. ..........

 

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https://unlimitedhangout.com/2025/04/investigative-series/one-label-under-blackmail-the-early-intersections-of-diddy-and-the-epstein-network/

  

by C.Z. Means  and  byWhitney Webb

One Label Under Blackmail: The Early Intersections of Diddy and the Epstein Network

In Part I of this series on the overlap between the worlds of Sean “Diddy” Combs and Jeffrey Epstein, we examine Combs’ early years, his mentors and the industry figures who ensured their, as well as Combs’ own, commercial success. Ties to organized crime and intelligence are readily apparent and point toward a truly sinister reason behind this network’s patronage of Combs and his close associates, like Andre Harrell and Russell Simmons. ...............

 

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https://news.antiwar.com/2025/04/13/israel-bombs-christian-run-hospital-in-gaza-city-on-palm-sunday/

Israel Bombs Christian-Run Hospital in Gaza City on Palm Sunday

The Episcopal Diocese of Jerusalem, which manages the hospital, strongly condemned the attack

 

by Dave DeCamp April 13, 2025 

Early Sunday morning, the Israeli military bombed the al-Ahli Arab Baptist Hospital in Gaza City, putting the medical facility out of service.

According to Middle East Eye, Gaza’s Civil Defense said the bombing caused “the destruction of the surgery building and the oxygen generation station for the intensive care units.” The strike damaged other buildings, including the adjoining St. Phillip’s Church.

The Civil Defense said the strike hit the hospital “minutes” after the Israeli military ordered the hospital to be evacuated. Eyewitnesses told MEE that they only had 18 minutes to leave the hospital.

 

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Video and transcription at link below.

https://corbettreport.com/what-i-learned-from-the-jfk-files/

Episode 474 – What I Learned From The JFK Files

by Corbett | Apr 16, 2025

In case you haven’t heard, the JFK files just dropped recently. So, what are these documents? Where did they come from? What do they contain? And, most important of all, why have they been hidden from us for over 60 years? James has the answers in this deep dive edition of The Corbett Report podcast.........

 

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https://www.rt.com/news/615719-us-teen-trump-assassination-ukraine/

 US teen plotted to kill Trump and flee to Ukraine – FBI

Investigators believe Nikita Casap killed his parents to fund a plan to assassinate the US president and frame Russia 

 

A Wisconsin teenager accused of murdering his parents also plotted to assassinate US President Donald Trump and flee overseas while framing Russia for the crime, according to an FBI affidavit unsealed on Friday.

Nikita

 Casap, 17, was charged last month with first-degree murder after police found the bodies of his mother and stepfather, both shot in the head, inside their Waukesha home. He was arrested in Kansas after fleeing in a stolen vehicle with $14,000 in cash, passports, and the family dog. Officers also recovered an unloaded revolver, boxes of ammunition, and two cell phones during the traffic stop.

“Casap appears to have written a manifesto calling for the assassination of the President of the United States. He was in touch with other parties about his plan to kill the President and overthrow the government of the United States,” the unsealed warrant stated. “The killing of his parents appeared to be an effort to obtain the financial means and autonomy necessary to carry out his plan.”............

 

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 https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/uk-supreme-court-equality-act-ruling-1.7511411

 

British Supreme Court unanimously rules legal definition of a 'woman' excludes trans women's identities

Five justices say language in Equality Act refers to person's assigned sex at birth

 The United Kingdom's top court on Wednesday upheld an appeal by the campaign group For Women Scotland on whether transgender women are legally women under equality legislation, but it said trans people would not be disadvantaged by its landmark decision.

The unanimous judgment from five Supreme Court justices related to whether a trans woman with a gender recognition certificate (GRC), a formal document that gives legal recognition of someone's new gender, is protected from discrimination as a woman under Britain's Equality Act.

For Women Scotland had argued rights under the Equality Act should only apply based on a person's assigned sex at birth. It had challenged guidance issued by the devolved Scottish government that accompanied a 2018 law designed to increase the proportion of women on public sector boards..............

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Too much happening in just the first 7 days of April, 2025. Here's a glimpse of it.

 

 

 https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/how-trumps-liberation-day-tariffs-are-set-reshape-global-trade

 How Trump's 'Liberation Day' Tariffs Are Set To Reshape Global Trade

Authored by Emel Akan and Andrew Moran via The Epoch Times,

President Donald Trump is set to announce reciprocal tariffs for all nations starting April 2, the date he has dubbed “Liberation Day.”

 

 

 

Companies, markets, and governments are on edge, expecting the move to send shockwaves across the globe.

Liberation Day will impact all countries, Trump told reporters over the weekend aboard Air Force One. However, some countries will be more vulnerable due to their high trade imbalances with the United States and significant trade barriers against American goods, including China, India, the European Union, Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, Vietnam, Japan, and South Korea.

The president will reveal details of his tariff plan at a White House Rose Garden event Wednesday afternoon after the stock markets close.

Speaking to reporters from the Oval Office on March 31, Trump stated that his tariff rates will be lower—and in certain instances “substantially lower”—than what other countries have been charging the United States.

“We are going to be very nice by comparison to what they were,” the president said. “We have a world obligation, perhaps, but we’re going to be very nice, relatively speaking. We’re going to be very kind.”................................

 

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https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/got-immigration-problems-fix-foreign-policy-first/

Got Immigration Problems? Fix Foreign Policy First

by Lora Karch | Apr 2, 2025

 

 

 

 

 

As Syria begins to collapse into another civil war, western nations brace for the inevitable surge of Syrian refugees to their borders. Amid a national immigration crisis, America should consider how its own foreign policy perpetuates this problem.

Over 1,500 people have been killed since the clashes earlier in March, including 1,000 civilians. Many call it the worst violence we’ve seen since Bashar al-Assad’s fall in December, yet it’s nothing new for those monitoring the situation since the Arab Spring.

In America, immigration discussions among both political camps overlook how U.S. foreign policy contributes to the growing problem. Syria’s fourteen-year conflict demonstrates how American hard power intervention worsens conditions on the ground for civilians, prompts mass migration, and enables extremists to assume control. Since the beginning of the conflict in 2011, more than fourteen million Syrians have fled the country, with many now residing in neighboring Lebanon and European countries. Politicians refuse to acknowledge the policies that created this crisis, including military intervention, economic sanctions, and aid to extremist groups—all of which drove civilians to seek refuge..................

 

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Monkey with a Grenade: Ukraine’s Nuclear Doomsday Plot

 

 Video:  https://odysee.com/@DavidKnightShow:1/Monkey-with-a-Grenade-Ukraine%E2%80%99s-Nuclear-Doomsday-Plot:4?r=2iPWBaLyZThSvDPe3CxFXyyyEMVuLdsR

 

The ousted Zelensky insider who predicted Russia’s invasion three years early and was fired for spilling the truth about a cruise missile blunder, warns America sees Ukraine as a “monkey with a grenade”—and for good reason based on the doomsday scenario of Ukraine’s military intelligence chief, Budanov.

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https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/gulf-states-refuse-launching-pad-for-us-attacks-iran

 

Gulf states refuse to be launching pad for any US attacks against Iran

US decision to amass B-2 bombers at Diego Garcia is result of Gulf Arab monarchs closing airspace to American warplanes in event of war with Iran

 

 

By Sean Mathews

Published date: 1 April 2025

 

 

Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states have imposed a ban on US warplanes using their air fields or skies to attack Iran after US President Donald Trump over the weekend threatened to bomb the country.

Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar and Kuwait have all told the US they will not permit their airspaces or territories to be used as a launchpad against Iran, including for refuelling and rescue operations, a senior US official told Middle East Eye.

The official spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive military planning.

"They do not want to be drawn in," the official said.

The Gulf states’ intransigence is a setback for the Trump administration, which has hoped to use massive air strikes on the Houthis in Yemen as a show of force to corral Tehran to the negotiating table on a nuclear deal......

 

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https://www.theamericanconservative.com/war-with-iran-is-a-path-to-destruction/ 

George D. O’Neill Jr.

Apr 2, 2025

 

 

Donald Trump rode into office—twice now—on a wave of promises to upend the Washington consensus, to drain the swamp of its self-serving mandarins and to keep America out of endless wars. His base cheered when he skewered the neoconservative architects of Iraq and Afghanistan, wars that bled our Treasury, and most importantly, many of our sons for little more than bragging rights in Beltway and Tel Aviv salons. Yet here we are, in the early days of his second term, with whispers growing louder from the usual suspects: advisors and hangers-on nudging him toward a strike on Iran, peddling the old lie that it’ll be quick, clean, and simple. History, that stern teacher we keep ignoring, tells us otherwise. Yet the hawks in the Trump administration appear to be anxious to wreck another country, which would join the long, recurring tragedy of U.S.-caused failed countries in the Middle East.

 

 

The pitch is familiar, isn’t it? A swift blow—maybe a few airstrikes on Tehran’s nuclear sites or a green light for Israel to do the dirty work—and the mullahs will crumble, the region will stabilize, and we’ll be home by Easter. It’s the same tune the warmongers hummed in 1914, when Europe’s leaders promised their boys would be back from the trenches by Christmas. These are also the same deceptions we heard in 2003, when Iraq was sold as a “cakewalk”—a war that would pay for itself with oil and gratitude. Millions of lives and trillions of dollars later, we’re still witnessing that tragedy.

The U.S. has been either directly bombing or participating in bombing the Houthis on and off since 2015. Why should we believe the war cheerleaders that this time will be more successful?................

 

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 Video:  DARPA and Elon Musk +++ other important information collected by Ryan Christian

 

https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/trump-deportations-innocent-people/

 

 

Trump Deportations Revealed To Be Full Of Innocent People – LEGAL Immigrants With No Criminal Record

 

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https://www.france24.com/en/france/20250406-french-far-right-rally-against-marine-le-pen-conviction-bardella-paris-marseilles-national-rally 

 

 

Marine Le Pen slams 'witch hunt' against her party at Paris rally

 

France's Marine Le Pen on Sunday denounced the 'witch hunt' against her National Rally party to thousands of supporters at the Place Vauban in Paris. The far-right leader alleged her conviction was a "political decision" and vowed not to give up after she was found guilty of embezzlement and banned from holding public office, potentially ending her presidential hopes for 2027.  ..............

 

 

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 Videos at link on the updates of devastating earthquake in Myanmar and Thailand. 

https://www.bbc.com/news/videos/cp8j3w0566wo

 

How the scale of Myanmar's loss is clearer one week after the quake

More than 3,000 people were killed by last week's 7.7 magnitude earthquake, Myanmar's military junta has said. Hundreds more people are missing and the toll is expected to rise.

Rescuers are still unable to reach parts of the country devastated by the quake.

As the BBC's Nick Beake explains, the BBC has been reporting from inside Myanmar during the week, since the disaster struck, revealing widespread devastation.

Some survivors have been pulled out from the rubble but many others have not been as fortunate.

 

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https://www.democracynow.org/2025/4/7/gaza_massacre

 

Video and transcript at link above.

“Point-Blank”: Israeli Soldiers Execute 15 Gaza Medics & Rescue Workers, Bury in Unmarked Mass Grave

StoryApril 07, 2025

 

 

By DemocracyNow!

Outrage is growing over Israel’s killing of 15 Palestinian medics and rescue workers north of the Gazan city of Rafah in the predawn hours of March 23. Israel initially claimed the convoy had suspiciously approached troops without headlights or flashing lights, but video footage shows the ambulances had their lights on when Israeli troops opened fire, unleashing a barrage of bullets. A paramedic who was inside the vehicle when it came under fire recorded the video on a cellphone and was among the 15 aid workers killed and buried in an unmarked mass grave. Diana Buttu, a Palestinian human rights attorney, calls the killing “the height of dehumanization.”

Transcript

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: For the second time since January, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in Washington, D.C., today to meet with President Trump as Israel expands its ground invasion of Gaza. According to the U.N. relief agency UNRWA, Israeli attacks have killed or injured at least 100 children in Gaza every day since Israel broke the ceasefire in mid-March.......................

 

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Interesting and Informative reading and videos I came upon in the second half of March, 2025

 

https://apnews.com/article/israel-palestinians-gaza-trump-somaliland-sudan-somalia-575e03aaa0c487
 

AP Exclusive: US and Israel look to Africa for moving Palestinians uprooted from Gaza

 
 By  JOSEF FEDERMAN, MATTHEW LEE and SAMY MAGDY
 

Updated 11:22 AM EDT, March 14, 2025

JERUSALEM (AP) — The U.S. and Israel have reached out to officials of three East African governments to discuss using their territories as potential destinations for moving Palestinians uprooted from the Gaza Strip under President Donald Trump’s proposed postwar plan, American and Israeli officials told The Associated Press.

The contacts with Sudan, Somalia and the breakaway region of Somalia known as Somaliland reflect the determination by the U.S. and Israel to press ahead with a plan that has been widely condemned and raised serious legal and moral issues. Because all three places are poor, and in some cases wracked by violence, the proposal also casts doubt on Trump’s stated goal of resettling Gaza’s Palestinians in a “beautiful area.”

Officials from Sudan said they have rejected overtures from the U.S., while officials from Somalia and Somaliland told The Associated Press that they were not aware of any contacts..............

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https://scheerpost.com/2025/03/18/i-o-f-targets-refugee-camps/

  By Cara MariAnna  ... March 18, 2025

15 MARCH—Home demolitions surged in the northern West Bank governorates of Tulkarm and Jenin during the first week of March. On 6 March, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency reported that Israel Occupation Forces (IOF) destroyed 16 buildings in the camp of Nur Shams, located in the Tulkarm Governorate. Residents were given two and a half hours to vacate homes they had lived in for years, according to a Middle East Monitor report. The homes were demolished for a new road through the camp for military use.

This latest escalation of violence began on 21 January — timed for the day after Trump’s inauguration — when the I.O.F. launched a new military operation it named “iron wall.”

As the apartheid regime moves to annex the West Bank, it continues to target refugee camps with what is almost certainly the intent to destroy and empty them. This is a straight repeat of the Zionists’ operation as they emptied and destroyed the original homes and villages belonging to the grandparents and great grandparents of today’s refugees.

Operation “iron wall” coincides with Israel’s efforts to shut down all UNRWA facilities throughout Occupied Palestine. Without UNRWA, the camps will quickly collapse. The organization provides many of the services necessary to community and human life: education, primary health care, social services, infrastructure improvement and basic camp sanitation including overseeing water quality and garbage removal.

Destroying UNRWA is an effective way to erase the presence and existence of Palestinian refugees altogether. In effect, this renders U.N. resolution 194—which established a right of return for Palestinian refugees to the land and homes stolen during the Nakba—meaningless....................

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https://consortiumnews.com/2025/03/20/the-new-age-militarists/

By William Hartung  ... March 20

Alex Karp, the CEO of the controversial military tech firm Palantir, is the coauthor of a new book, The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West.

In it, he calls for a renewed sense of national purpose and even greater cooperation between government and the tech sector. His book is, in fact, not just an account of how to spur technological innovation, but a distinctly ideological tract.

As a start, Karp roundly criticizes Silicon Valley’s focus on consumer-oriented products and events like video-sharing apps, online shopping and social media platforms, which he dismisses as “the narrow and the trivial.” 

His focus instead is on what he likes to think of as innovative big-tech projects of greater social and political consequence.

He argues, in fact, that Americans face “a moment of reckoning” in which we must decide “what is this country, and for what do we stand?”.........

 

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https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/03/how-the-usa-became-wedded-to-zionist-israel/#more-156998

How the USA Became Wedded to Zionist Israel From JFK to Donald Trump

by Rick Sterling / March 28th, 2025

There are many contrasts between the 35th president, John F. Kennedy, and the 45th and 47th president, Donald J. Trump. One extreme example is regarding U.S. policy toward Israel.

JFK and Israel/Palestine

Unknown to many people today, JFK supported Palestinian rights and sought a sustainable peace in the region.

In 1960, when JFK was campaigning to be president, he spoke at the convention of the Zionists of America. In his speech, Kennedy was complimentary about Israel but frankly said, “I cannot believe that Israel has any real desire to remain indefinitely a garrison state surrounded by fear and hate.” That warning, issued when Israel had only existed for 12 years, was ignored.

Kennedy did not just issue warnings. To the chagrin of the Israelis, JFK established friendly relations with Egypt’s President Nasser. The Kennedy administration provided loans and aid to Egypt......................

 

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 Video at link:   March 25..

 Whitney Webb talks to Kim Iversen on the influence of  billionaires and billionaire transnational group connected to Israel and their grip on the USA.

She also discusses recent statements made about her book, One Nation Under Blackmail, and how her findings on Epstein's network tie into key figures in Big Tech, some of whom now have significant political influence.

https://odysee.com/@UnlimitedHangout:a/2025-03-27:d

 

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Video:  Ryan Cristian brings us up to date on the shenanigans from the overlords ruling over us.

https://www.thelastamericanvagabond.com/trump-americans-el-salvador-israel/

 Trump Could Send Americans To El Salvador & Israel Commits “Largest Child Massacre In Its History”

Posted on March 22, 2025 Author Ryan Cristián

 

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https://thegrayzone.com/2025/03/25/jeffrey-goldberg-bomb-yemen-signal/
 

Why did Jeffrey Goldberg leave the ‘bomb Yemen’ Signal chat?

 By Max Blumenthal·March 25, 2025
 

With momentum for a strike on Iran building within the Trump White House, Goldberg was apparently summoned to move the neocon message. And he wound up with more access than he could handle.

Atlantic Magazine editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg has won the admiration of his Beltway peers for the conduct he displayed after being accidentally invited into a smoke-filled “bomb Yemen” Signal chat with Trump’s national security honchos and top advisors. “Props to Jeffrey Goldberg for his high standards as a professional journalist,” declared Ian Bremmer, the trans-Atlanticist foreign policy pundit on his Bank of America-sponsored GZero podcast. “When he realized the conversation was authentic he immediately left, informed the relevant senior official, and made the public aware without disclosing intelligence that could damage the United States.”

But what exactly did Goldberg do to deserve such high praise?...


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https://www.mintpressnews.com/betar-the-far-right-hate-group-helping-trump-deport-israels-critics/289301/

By Alan McLeod

A far-right, pro-Israel group with a history of support for terror and genocide is working closely with the Trump administration, preparing dossiers on thousands of pro-Palestine figures it wants deported from the United States. Betar U.S. is known to have had several meetings with senior government officials and has claimed credit for the arrest and detention of Mahmoud Khalil, a leader of the nationwide anti-genocide student demonstrations that began at Columbia University last year.

Ross Glick, the group’s executive director until last month, noted that he met with a diverse set of influential lawmakers, including Democratic senator John Fetterman and aides to the Republican senators Ted Cruz and James Lankford, and that all supported Betar U.S.’ campaign to rid the country of thousands of “terror supporters.”

Shortly after Glick’s trip to Washington, D.C., Trump signed an executive order titled “Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism” that promises “the removal of resident aliens who violate our laws,” to “quell pro-Hamas vandalism and intimidation,” and to “investigate and punish anti-Jewish racism in leftist, anti-American colleges and universities.”

Trump himself announced that Khalil’s arrest, which made worldwide headlines, was “the first of many to come.” “We know there are more students at Columbia and other Universities across the country who have engaged in pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity, and the Trump administration will not tolerate it,” he wrote on Truth Social. The 45th and 47th president has also stated that he plans to deport “Communists” and “Marxists” from the United States, even those who are citizens. As such, this marks an escalation in government-backed suppression of dissent not seen since the McCarthyist era of the 1940s and 1950s............

 

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 Video:  James Corbett and James Palado look at the crazy current state of our world.

 

 https://corbettreport.com/nwnw586/

 

Interview 1943 – Your DNA Is For Sale (And Wojcicki’s Bidding!) (NWNW #586)

by Corbett | Mar 28, 2025

 

 

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 https://responsiblestatecraft.org/massie-houthi-airstrikes/

Massie interview: Houthi strikes 'not America First'

Also said signal chats proved there was no clear 'urgency' and therefore Congress should have been notified

Kelley Beaucar Vlahos

Mar 27, 2025

 

In an interview this morning with RS, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-KY) said there was clearly "no urgency" for U.S. military airstrikes against the Houthis in Yemen, now in their 13th day. Therefore, the administration should have gone to Congress for authorization and without it, those strikes are illegal.

Massie pointed to Vice President J.D. Vance's contribution to the now infamous signal chat which described the strikes as they were happening. "JD" as identified in the chat, which has been authenticated by the administration, among other points, said that "there is a strong argument for delaying this a month, doing the messaging work on why this matters, seeing where the economy is, etc.”

"(Vance's) contribution there was to prove that there was no urgency, and that there were no U.S. troops that were in imminent danger, that needed to be defended. Which is the instance in which you might allow the president to engage in hostilities — if it was in self-defense and urgent, and before they had time to come to Congress," Massie told RS. " But they obviously, based on that signal chat, had time to come to Congress, but they chose not to."

Massie said there may be some effort in the House to push for a War Powers Act vote or for defunding the U.S. military operations in Yemen. He's tried before, but there are hurdles: the rules committee, of which he is no longer a member, could prevent a War Powers Vote from getting to the floor, for instance. "There may be opportunities to offer amendments in the appropriations process to defund the activity as well. We've done that in the past," he said.........................

 

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https://www.unz.com/article/eliminate-all-three-abrahamic-religions/

Eliminate All Three Abrahamic Religions

 

A.J. Smuskiewicz • March 28, 2025

 

 

During my review of X posts this morning, I noticed a post by a user named Ryan Dawson, who is apparently an author and television personality. (I never heard of him.) Dawson posted a quote that he attributed to the Shawnee chief Tecumseh (1768-1813), reading “When Jesus Christ came to Earth you killed him. The son of your own god. And only after he was dead did you worship him and start killing anyone who did not.”

Scott Ritter, whom I follow on X, responded to this post by writing “Christianity in a nut shell. Hell, Islam in a nutshell. Judaism, too. What’s with this Abrahamic God that he wants to kill the very creatures he allegedly created in his own image?”

I agreed with Ritter’s sentiments, so I posted my own response: “I have long believed that the three Abrahamic religions are the cause of almost all of the world’s unhappiness and conflict. If they could somehow be eliminated, the world would be a much happier and more peaceful place. Religion should be nature-based, like Wicca or Amer Indiam".............................

 

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https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/key-takeaways-nyts-secret-history-us-shocking-level-involvement-ukraine-war

Key Takeaways From NYT's Secret History Detailing US 'Shocking' Involvement In Ukraine War

March 31

 

It is years too late and alternative and independent media had already done so much work on exposing the reality, including 600+ page books which have been published, but the New York Times on Sunday is out with a lengthy report on The Partnership: The Secret History of America’s Role in the Ukraine War.

Up until very recently, mainstream media gatekeepers wouldn't so much as admit that a proxy war has been unfolding from the very start of the conflict in Ukraine. This even after the so-called paper of record had earlier in Feb. 2024 acknowledged that the CIA had built 12 "secret spy bases" in Ukraine to wage a shadow war against Russia going back to 2014. 

Again, it comes much too belatedly, but now with Ukrainian forces clearly losing the fight, the Times admits that the prior Biden administration was far more involved in being embedded on a military and intelligence level with Ukraine than was previously made public by official sources.

The report is a deep dive into the "extraordinary partnership of intelligence, strategy, planning and technology" that became Zelensky's "secret weapon" in countering Russia. It begins by describing that within two months of Putin sending his army across the border, Ukrainian generals in civilians clothes were being secretly whisked away for high-level war planning sessions at US bases in Germany........

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Interesting items I have read in the first half of March, 2025

 

https://www.antiwar.com/blog/2025/03/02/the-monsters-arent-just-in-history-books-they-live-among-us-theyre-everywhere/

The Monsters Aren't Just in History Books.  They Live Among Us.  They're Everywhere

 

Walter Salles' new film on the disappearances of regime critics in 1970s Brazil is a powerful reminder that the ghouls who defend the slaughter in Gaza are biding their time

by Jonathan Cook | Mar 2, 2025

Walter Salles’ new film I’m Still Here is a moving, true-story, Oscar-nominated portrait of a middle-class, leftwing family in Rio de Janeiro in the early 1970s struggling to come to terms with the father’s disappearance – 25 years later confirmed as murder – by the Brazilian military dictatorship.

The mother and a teenage daughter spend time inside a regime torture camp too, before being released..........

 

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https://www.moonofalabama.org/2025/03/trumps-tariff-wars-will-hurt-us-the-most.html 

Trump's Tariff Wars Will Hurt U.S. The Most President Donald Trump seems to believe that tariffs can help to bring manufacturing back to the States. Trump's tariffs have so far been aimed at four targets, the U.S. neighbors Canada and Mexico, China and, soon to come, the European Union. During his first term Trump negotiated the U.S.M.C.A. with Mexico and Canada, a free trade zone covering the U.S. and its neighbors. He is now attempting to change the rules of it. But the way he does so is inconsistent. On January 21 Trump promised tariffs on Canada and Mexico. On February 1 he announced them. Three days later he delayed the implementation of those tariffs. On February 27 he said the tariffs would go into effect on March 4. On March 5 he was again forced to pull back (archived):...................................

 

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https://www.foxnews.com/politics/massie-reveals-how-much-campaign-cash-hes-hauled-since-trump-targeted-him-ouster-fundraising-record

 
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., told Fox News Digital on Thursday morning that he had hauled in $261,000 in campaign donations in recent days since President Donald Trump targeted him for ouster for opposing a government-funding measure.

"In less than three days, I’ve received $261,000 through 3,203 individual donations, without sending an email, a text, or a phone call. It’s a fundraising record for me and it’s boosted my current cash on hand north of $1.1 million," Massie said in a statement.

After Trump took a swing at Massie in a Truth Social post on Monday night, the congressman responded in a tweet on Tuesday by soliciting campaign donations.......

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https://www.zerohedge.com/medical/flu-vaccine-exposed-shocking-nih-discovery-they-dont-want-you-know
 

Flu Vaccine Exposed: The Shocking NIH Discovery They Don't Want You To Know
Via The Vigilant Fox

Two decades ago, CBS aired a bombshell report on the flu shot, revealing a truth that health officials didn’t want to admit. Despite flu shot uptake among seniors skyrocketing from 15% to 65%, flu deaths continued to climb...................

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https://scheerpost.com/2025/03/11/sectarian-violence-sweeps-syria-as-western-backed-security-forces-rampage-in-alawite-towns/

Sectarian Violence Sweeps Syria as Western-Backed Security Forces Rampage in Alawite Towns
By The Cradle

At least 147 people have been killed in Syria in the past two days, as security forces from the country’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) – led government carried out a series of massacres and extrajudicial executions against Alawites in the country’s coastal regions as part of a broader security campaign to target remnants of the former Syrian Arab Army (SAA).

Videos of many instances of extrajudicial killings have been posted to social media showing HTS militants from the government of Ahmad al-Sharaa, the former Al-Qaeda in Iraq commander, killing unarmed Alawites in cold blood.

According to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), 69 of those killed were Alawite minority members executed by security forces. At the same time, the rest included government security personnel (of the Sunni sect), and members of the former Syrian army (of the Alawite sect), and civilians caught in the clashes.  

Among those killed were 15 Alawite men who were executed by HTS forces in the village of al-Muktariyya on 7 March. “It is not clear what or if any criteria were used for their execution,” Syria expert Joshua Landis wrote on the social media site X.....

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https://www.mintpressnews.com/professor-columbia-university-scandal-former-israeli-spy/289231/

By Alan-Macleod
Professor at Center of Columbia University Deportation Scandal is Former Israeli Spy
he professor at the center of the Columbia University deportation scandal is a former Israeli intelligence official, MintPress News can reveal.

Mahmoud Khalil, a recent graduate of the university’s School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA), was abducted by Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE) Saturday for his role in organizing protests last year against Israel’s attack on Gaza. Khalil’s dean, Dr. Keren Yarhi-Milo, head of the School of International and Public Affairs, is a former Israeli military intelligence officer and official at Israel’s Mission to the United Nations. Yarhi-Milo played a significant role in drumming up public concern about a supposed wave of intolerable anti-Semitism sweeping over the campus, thereby laying the groundwork for the extensive crackdown on civil liberties that has followed the protests......

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https://responsiblestatecraft.org/europe-defense-spending/
 
By: Almut Rochowanski

European militarism on steroids is not good, either

Lacking in any strategic thinking, a new bellicism has swept up the elites and gone into cataclysmic overdrive in recent weeks
U.S. security experts and leaders have been telling European NATO allies to increase their defense spending for at least a quarter century, initially as a gentle nudging, later more insistently, rising to a deafening din after Trump’s election.

The infamous White House press conference with President Volodymyr Zelensky on March 1 finally shocked Europeans out of their complacency and opened their purse-strings, according to American analysts, who seem very pleased with themselves.

But this approach puts the cart of military-spending-as-share-of-GDP before the horse of a dynamic assessment of the threats European countries actually face. Going on a spending spree to reach some arbitrary share of GDP or random number of billions of euros, to buy weapons systems favored by lobbyists but of dubious relevance, is a poor replacement for a comprehensive strategy for European security.....

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https://scheerpost.com/2025/03/11/chris-hedges-trumps-christian-fascists-and-the-war-on-palestine/

Chris Hedges: Trump’s Christian Fascists and the War on Palestine

Christian Nationalists who form the bedrock of support for Donald Trump — 80 percent voted for Trump in the last election according to a voter survey by the Associated Press — have mounted a concerted campaign calling on the White House to back Israel’s annexation of the West Bank and Gaza.

This campaign includes visits to Israel by prominent leaders, including Ralph Reed, Tony Perkins and Mario Bramnick, petitioning the White House, lobbying Congress and calls for annexation at Christian conferences, including a resolution of support for Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank adopted at the most recent Conservative Political Action Conference. The National Religious Broadcasters (NRB) Convention in Dallas, in March, gathered over 200 signatures from pastors and right-wing religious leaders from across the United States calling for the annexation of “Judea and Samaria” — the purported biblical name for the West Bank —and declaring the two state solution “a failed experiment.”...........

 

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https://www.antiwar.com/blog/2025/03/13/were-1-in-selling-weapons/

We’re #1 in Selling Weapons!
American Exceptionalism Defined

by William Astore | Mar 13, 2025

Reprinted from Bracing Views with the author’s permission.

We’re #1 (once again) in selling weapons! Amazingly, the USA now accounts for 43% of the world’s trade in deadly weaponry. No country beats more plowshares into swords and pruning hooks into spears than America, which is also, obviously, the most Christian nation in the world.

Let’s take a look at a useful chart from Stephen Semler (be sure to check out his blog on Substack):....

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https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/03/when-dissent-becomes-a-crime-the-war-on-political-speech-begins/
 

When Dissent Becomes a Crime: The War on Political Speech Begins

by John W. Whitehead and Nisha Whitehead / March 13th, 2025
You can’t have it both ways.

You can’t live in a constitutional republic if you allow the government to act like a police state.

You can’t claim to value freedom if you allow the government to operate like a dictatorship.

You can’t expect to have your rights respected if you allow the government to treat whomever it pleases with disrespect and an utter disregard for the rule of law.

There’s always a boomerang effect.

Whatever dangerous practices you allow the government to carry out now—whether it’s in the name of national security or protecting America’s borders or making America great again—rest assured, these same practices can and will be used against you when the government decides to set its sights on you.

Arresting political activists engaged in lawful, nonviolent protest activities is merely the shot across the bow.

The chilling of political speech and suppression of dissident voices are usually among the first signs that you’re in the midst of a hostile takeover by forces that are not friendly to freedom.

This is how it begins........... 

 

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https://ronpaulinstitute.org/my-weekend-in-moscow/
 

My Weekend in Moscow

by Andrew P. Napolitano

When an invitation from Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and the renowned Professor Alexander Dugin to visit them in Moscow arrived in my inbox, it was actually the culmination of a series of emails and telephone calls from Russian-American friends giving me a heads up. Still, it startled me.

So, last week, I flew to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates and from there to Moscow. The sanctions President Joe Biden imposed on Russian persons and businesses — and kept in place by President Donald Trump — bar, among much else, direct flights to Russia from the West............

News and Opinions from journalists ......... mid Feb to Feb 28, 2025

 

https://scheerpost.com/2025/02/24/with-troops-and-tanks-israel-gives-the-gaza-treatment-to-west-bank-camps-expelling-40000-palestinians/

Juan Cole: Israel Gives the Gaza Treatment to West Bank Camps, Expelling 40,000 Palestinians

February 24, 2025

 

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The BBC reports that Israeli forces have invaded three Palestinian refugee camps in the Palestinian West Bank — Jenin, Tulkarm and Nur Shams — and expelled their inhabitants. The ghost towns will be occupied by the Israeli military for the next year, according to Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted that the residents would not be allowed to return.

The Israeli operation against the camps began January 21, virtually as soon as Trump was inaugurated.

I suppose there isn’t any point in bringing it up, given the determination of United States and other major powers to bestow impunity on the extremist Netanyahu government, but article 49 of the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949 says, “Individual or mass forcible transfers, as well as deportations of protected persons from occupied territory to the territory of the Occupying Power or to that of any other country, occupied or not, are prohibited, regardless of their motive.”

The Israeli newspaper Arab 48 reports that Israeli tanks rumbled their way into the Jenin camp Sunday evening, in the biggest escalation of Israeli military violence against Palestinians since 2002 during the second Intifada or uprising.

Operations in the camps at Jenin, Tulkarm and Tubas left 61 Palestinians dead according to the Pelestinian ministry of health, in addition to the displacement of tens of thousands and the broad destruction of property, houses and infrastructure.

 

 

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https://thegrayzone.com/2025/02/17/milei-impeach-crypto-scam/

Argentina’s Milei faces impeachment for promoting crypto scam

 Wyatt Reed and Oscar León·February 17, 2025

The Argentinean president branded himself as an edgy economic genius to ride a wave of financial discontent to power. Now he’s implicated in one of the biggest scams in history, wiping out over $4 billion in market cap in a few hours, leaving Argentineans wondering if they’ve also been rugged.

Argentina’s President Javier Milei has been accused of fraud, and is likely to face impeachment charges, after he promoted a sham cryptocurrency token which allowed a handful of con artists to dupe crypto owners out of hundreds of millions of dollars in a single day. The scam is believed to be the first cryptocurrency “rug-pull” to have been orchestrated with the help of a sitting president. While the exact number of victims is unknown, around 75,000 people are suspected to have been swindled, and a judge has been appointed to investigate after at least 100 criminal complaints were filed against Milei in Argentina in the days since...........

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https://www.antiwar.com/blog/2025/02/17/ron-paul-on-bibi-to-rubio-lets-attack-iran/

Ron Paul on Bibi To Rubio: ‘Let’s Attack Iran!’

by Ron Paul and Daniel McAdams | Feb 17, 2025

On today’s Ron Paul Liberty Report:

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, long-known for his attachment to Israel, was in the country over the weekend for a visit with Israeli PM Netanyahu. Perhaps buoyed by Trump’s plan to ethnically cleanse Gaza, Bibi decided to push one step further, announcing that the US and Israel need to “finish the job” against Iran. Will Trump’s pledge of “no new wars” be able to withstand Bibi’s demands?................................

 

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https://dissidentvoice.org/2025/02/fiendish-experiments-trumps-guantanamo-bay-migrant-detentions/

Fiendish Experiments: Trump’s Guantánamo Bay Migrant Detentions

by Binoy Kampmark / February 28th, 2025

Guantánamo Bay has been a fiendish experiment in US law for decades. The fiendishness lies in the subversion. Operating as a naval base in Cuba, this contentious facility has been the site and location for the cruelties of paranoia and empire, a place where such laws as due process are subverted, and the presumption to innocence soiled. In this contorted way, the civilian and military branches have mingled and corrupted, the result proving a nightmare for legal authorities keen to ensure that such a facility does, at the very least, observe that sad, dusty relic known as the rule of law.

Legal sharpshooters have been baffled by the latest experiment with the facility, this time from the Trump administration and its efforts to use it as a detention centre for unwanted migrants.................

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https://corbettreport.com/how-to-get-eggs-for-free/

How to Get Eggs for Free!!! – #SolutionsWatch

by Corbett | Feb 26, 2025 | Solutions Watch, Videos

Are you concerned with the price of eggs? Well, as I see it, there are two options. Either you could participate in the slave suggestion ritual known as voting for a political candidate in the hopes that your preferred candidate will take office so that they can start pressuring the central bank (that shouldn’t exist) to tighten the money supply in the hopes of curbing monetary inflation while simultaneously easing regulatory burden on corporate farmers (who we shouldn’t be buying food from) so that they will be  .......................

 

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https://consortiumnews.com/2025/02/27/caitlin-johnstone-an-empire-being-honest/

Caitlin Johnstone: An Empire Being Honest

February 27, 2025

 Trump has shared a shockingly awful AI-generated music video envisioning Gaza as an ostentatious resort town where everyone parties as Trump and Netanyahu sip drinks by the pool.

 

President Donald Trump has shared a shockingly awful AI-generated music video envisioning a future Gaza that has been turned into an ostentatious resort town where everyone parties amid showers of cash while Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sip drinks by the pool.

The video is intended to reflect Trump’s plans for a Gaza Strip that has been permanently ethnically cleansed of Palestinians.

If you haven’t watched it yet you definitely should, because words can’t do justice to just how terrible it is...........................

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Videos that tell the happenings of the last month ............. Feb 1 - Feb 28, 2025

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