thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-07-06--How a US and Qatari regime change deception produced ‘Caesar’ sanctions driving Syria towards famine

he US Department of Treasury ’ s imposition this June of the so-called Caesar Civilian Protection Act , a draconian set of economic sanctions on Syria , amounts to a medieval-style siege on all Syrians living inside the country .
Inspired by photos that Western governments and media claim were smuggled out of Syria by a supposed Syrian military whistleblower codenamed “ Caesar , ” the sanctions are the product of a highly deceptive intelligence operation orchestrated by the US and Qatari governments .
As this investigation will demonstrate , a network of US- and Qatar-backed regime change operatives marketing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Syrian activists groomed the supposed whistleblower , managed his files , and worked overtime to obstruct public scrutiny .
Desperate to stimulate support for war on Syria , this network worked with the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in a cynical campaign to portray the Syrian crisis as equal to – and possibly worse than – the Jewish genocide in Europe .
Shockingly , investigators have determined that at least half of the photographs in the “ Caesar ” trove depict the bodies of government soldiers killed by the armed opposition .
This highly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ narrative of Caesar ’ s promoters and exposes them as cynical liars , has been ignored across the board by mainstream US media , Congress , and of course , by the network of operatives that managed “ Caesar.
” Authorized by Congress with no opposition , the so-called Caesar Civilian Protection Act amounts to an act of all out war on the very people it claims to protect .
Targeting the Syrian Central Bank and penalizing any foreign company that does business with Damascus , the bill was conceived with the explicit @ @ @ @ @ @ @ after it defeated a proxy war imposed on it by the West , Israel , Turkey , and Gulf monarchies .
Charles Lister , a Gulf-backed de facto lobbyist for the Syrian opposition in Washington , inadvertently revealed the Caesar Act as an instrument of financial terror .
In an op-ed for Politico this June , he forecasted “ even greater levels of destitution , famine , and worsening criminality and predatory behavior ” as a result of the new sanctions .
Predicting that “ bread shortages are only a matter of time @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the near future , Lister cheerfully framed the human suffering caused by the sanctions as “ an opportunity ” for the United States to achieve regime change .
After a decade of grinding war , however , the Syrian government has proven resilient .
And in Damascus , even opponents of Assad concede that sanctions are unlikely to scathe government officials .
“ Assad and his people are doing fine , and the security state is only stronger because of the war , ” a businessman who was active in the initial round @ @ @ @ @ @ @ me over lunch in Damascus in September 2019 .
“ The sanctions ruin our currency and put old ladies into the street , but they don ’ t touch the regime.
” A pair of pro-opposition analysts echoed this view in the national security website War on the Rocks : “ The Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act may prove little more than a policy of economic escalation by default — a box-checking exercise for which ordinary Syrians will pay the price , ” they wrote .
Thanks to the policy choices of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ set to sink deeper into economic misery .
Migration abroad will intensify , another generation will be lost , excess deaths will climb , and in a country where over one-third of the population are children , youth will experience deprivation at unprecedented levels .
The coming human catastrophe is the byproduct of a years-long lobbying campaign carried out by a network of regime-change operatives working under cover of shadowy international NGOs and Syrian-American diaspora groups .
Their push for an escalation of the economic war revolved around a supposed Syrian whistleblower who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a military prison , revealing an industrial slaughter of opposition activists .
It was the code-name of that so-called whistleblower , “ Caesar , ” that inspired the sanctions bill .
A close look at these operatives and the forces propelling their activities reveals their campaign as a deceptive operation financed by the Qatari government and orchestrated in Washington , raising serious questions about the credibility of “ Caesar.
” The dubious origins of the “ Caesar ” file In June 2019 , The Grayzone exposed a non-profit widely praised in Western media @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Accountability ( CIJA ) , as a US- and EU-funded regime-change initiative that aims to destabilize the Syrian government by subverting the international legal system .
As The Grayzone reported , CIJA field investigators worked directly with extremist militants – including Al Qaeda ’ s local affiliate – to gather documents from pillaged government offices and spirit them out of the country .
CIJA even “ pays rebel groups and couriers for logistical support , ” the New Yorker acknowledged in a puff piece about the organization .
No trove of documents has @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Washington than the so-called “ Caesar ” file .
In another profile of CIJA that omitted the role of the US State Department in establishing the group , the New York Times ’ Anne Barnard claimed that Caesar “ fled Syria with pictures of at least 6,700 corpses , bone-thin and battered , which shocked the world when they emerged in 2014.
” Caesar ’ s supposed escape from Syria , and the story of how he obtained the photos , closely mirrored the shady tactics that CIJA investigators used to obtain other @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of Syrian former officials in Western courts .
According to Vanity Fair , “ Caesar ” was actively spying for the Syrian opposition since 2011 , and working with a “ handler ” described as “ a Syrian academic and human-rights figure named Hassan al-Chalabi.
” This character ( no relation to the late Iraqi con artist Ahmad Chalabi ) was himself “ running a shadowy intelligence network inside Syria , ” according to the magazine .
Chalabi told Vanity Fair that he arranged for “ Caesar ” to be smuggled out of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the help of the CIA-created Free Syrian Army and an obscure militia known as the Strangers Battalion .
( Observers of the Syrian conflict has since identified the latter group to be a collection of Uyghur foreign fighters allied with Al Qaeda . )
Caesar then passed his files to the Syrian National Movement , a marginal group of Islamists that was funded and overseen by the government of Qatar .
From there , the files went to outfits like CIJA , Human Rights Watch , and the New York Times – and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The Caesar files were first brought to the American public ’ s attention in a New York Times articlepublished on January 21 , 2014 – a PR stunt carefully timed to coincide with the opening of the UN-backed Geneva II Peace Conference on Syria .
The following acknowledgement was mentioned in passing in the Times article : “ only a few photographs have actually been released by lawyers commissioned by the Qatari government , an avowed opponent of Mr. Assad , and the claims about their origins could not be independently verified.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ prosecutor in the trial of the former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic , was quoted prominently by the Times .
“ It was like getting the keys to the Nazi archive , ” Nice said of the Caesar file .
Nice , who had been charged with authenticating the photographic files , was listed at the time as “ an advisor to Qatar in the possible Syria case to come.
” Desmond De Silva , another British lawyer called in to authenticate the documents , was later described as part of a team of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Qatari government.
” The permanent monarchy of Qatar has bankrolled an array of Islamist militias across Syria over the years , including Al Qaeda ’ s ruthless affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra .
Carter-Ruck , the law firm employing Nice and De Silva under a Qatari contract , had also been hired by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan , another key sponsor of Syria ’ s insurgency and the destabilization campaign against Damascus .
Also quoted on the significance of the Caesar file in the New York Times article was David Crane , who was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ an investigator involved in examining the photos , who previously indicted President Charles G. Taylor of Liberia.
” In fact , Crane was a veteran military-intelligence operative who previously held various positions inside the Pentagon , including at the Defense Intelligence Agency .
Months before the Caesar file surfaced , he appeared on Capitol Hill to advocate for prosecuting Syrian government officials .
Crane stated in a 2014 interview that when his team began its investigation into the file , “ We brought in what we named ‘ Caesar , ’ the individual @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with handler – his case officer – interviewing them separately.
” His case officer ?
Crane ’ s casual use of a term almost uniquely associated with CIA activity offered a strong suggestion that the Agency had played a role in grooming the mystery man known as “ Caesar.
” The UK-based academic Tim Hayward outlined the US government ’ s role in supporting Crane ’ s various Syria regime change projects .
Crane “ also leads the Syrian Accountability Project ( SAP ) , which he founded some time prior to Caesar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
“ SAP is said to be student-run and its clients include the Syrian National Council and US State Department .
It also ‘ works very closely with ’ the Syria Justice and Accountability Centre , which in turn is a conduit of US funding to CIJA.
” Crane authored the initial Qatar-sponsored report on Caesar ’ s trove , yet was merely described as “ a war crimes prosecutor ” in a Vanity Fair puff piece about the file .
On April 13 , 2014 , an anonymous man completely cloaked in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trail Outfitters , purporting to be “ Caesar ” and claiming to bear photographic evidence of “ genocide , ” appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee .
Audio and video recording of the testimony was strictly forbidden , supposedly to protect Caesar ’ s safety .
Caesar ’ s handlers spun an elaborate tale to neoconservative Daily Beast writer Tim Mak about the “ counter-surveillance techniques ” they employed to protect their star witnesses identity in the days and hours before the hearing .
Somehow , no one covering the appearance of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Syrian military might have already known the identity of one of the most high-profile defectors to emerge from its ranks .
Were they protecting him from the Syrian Mukhabarat ( which has no presence in the United States ) or from public scrutiny ?
As the anti-war activist and writer Rick Sterling pointed out , “ how many military photographers took photos at Tishreen and Military 601 Hospitals during those years and then disappeared ?
According to the [ Qatari ] Carter Ruck report , Caesar ’ s family left Syria around @ @ @ @ @ @ @ why is ‘ Caesar ’ keeping his identity secret from the Western audience ?
Why does ‘ Caesar ’ refuse to meet even with highly sympathetic journalists or researchers ?
” When “ Caesar ” appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on August 4 , 2014 , he was seated beside the man who had brought him to Washington .
The handler was Mouaz Moustafa , a Syrian-American regime-change lobbyist who served as the director of the State Department-funded Syria Emergency Task Force .
A key figure pushing for more arms to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ opposed the State Department ’ s listing of Jabhat al-Nusra , the Syrian Al Qaeda affiliate , as a terrorist group .
“ It was a mistake , ” he said to Foreign Policy of Nusra ’ s blacklisting .
A year prior , Moustafa escorted Arizona Sen. John McCain on a trip inside Syria to meet with members of the CIA-backed Free Syrian Army — including kidnappers of Shia pilgrims — during a failed stunt to stimulate US military intervention .
Testifying alongside Caesar was David Crane , the author of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Syrian government of “ crimes the likes of which we have not seen since Auschwitz.
” Next , Frederic Hof of the Atlantic Council ’ s Saudi-funded Rafic Hariri Center demanded that Congress respond to Caesar ’ s testimony by allocating more US tax dollars to purchase weapons for anti-Assad extremist militants in Syria .
The stage was set for Congress to sign off on crushing sanctions on Syria , in bipartisan fashion and with negligible opposition .
But first , the regime-change lobby mobilized to build a public case for its agenda @ @ @ @ @ @ @ helped foment in Syria to the Jewish genocide that took place in mid-century Europe .
Enlisting the Holocaust Memorial Museum in the push for war Back in July 2014 , a self-styled human rights lawyer named Stephen Rapp sat on stage at the Saudi-funded Rafiq Hariri Center of DC ’ s Atlantic Council think tank and demanded regime change in Syria : “ Its legitimacy , its ability to serve the people of Syria is gone , if ever it where there , ” he said of Assad ’ s government .
Throughout @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Case Against Assad , “ Rapp touted the work the aforementioned US-funded Center for International Justice and Accountability ( CIJA ) was doing to gather documents implicating the Syrian government , and the State Department ’ s role in supporting them .
At the time , Rapp was the Barack Obama administration ’ s ambassador-at-large for global criminal justice .
He later moved on to serve as the chair of CIJA and visiting fellow at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum ’ s Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide , where according to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and accountability on Syria.
” Rapp had worked with the Qatar-sponsored authors of the initial Caesar inquiry in the past when he , David Crane , and Desmond De Silva each served as chief prosecutor at the special court for Sierra Leone .
In his capacity at the Holocaust Museum , Rapp focused on “ bringing forth the first case against the Assad regime and working on potential cases related to the ‘ Caesar file ’ in Germany.
” Under Rapp ’ s watch , the Holocaust Museum was transformed into an overt @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Middle East .
The institution ’ s interventionist bent was supplemented by the presence of neoconservative ideologues like Iran-Contra felon Elliott Abrams , former DHS Chief Michael Chertoff , and Stuart A. Levey – a pioneer of US sanctions policy – on the museum ’ s ironically named “ Committee on Conscience.
” In 2014 , Mouaz Moustafa , the Syrian-American regime change lobbyist who worked as “ Caesar ’ s ” handler , joined Stephen Rapp in helping the Holocaust Memorial Museum establish an exhibitionlikening the Syrian war to the Jewish genocide @ @ @ @ @ @ @ exhibit contained a special section on the Caesar file , presenting it as evidence of industrial mass murder without a scintilla of critical context or evidence .
According to Rapp , the file provided a “ better ” basis for prosecutions of Syrian officials than the Allies mustered at Nuremberg , where key Nazi German officials were convicted for crimes against humanity .
Rapp has even claimed that , based on the Caesar files , “ Conservatively , we ’ re looking at 50,000 Syrian civilians tortured and murdered by their own government.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ established its exhibition in late 2014 , it was only able to display 10 carefully selected photos from the Caesar file .
Once other investigators were able to view the full file , however , the one-sided narrative of its promoters began to crumble .
46 % of the Caesar file reveals mass killings – by a brutal armed opposition Though the full contents of the supposed Caesar file has never been made public , Human Rights Watch ( HRW ) was able to view the documents in full in 2015 .
In @ @ @ @ @ @ @ attempting to reinforce the push for regime change , HRW inadvertently demolished Washington ’ s narrative .
In a virtual footnote in its lengthy report on the Caesar file , HRW acknowledged that nearly half of the entire file – some 24,568 photos – depicted the bodies of government soldiers who had been killed by the armed opposition , “ including [ by ] incidents of terrorism , fires , explosions and car bombs ) .
” As Rick Sterling noted , “ nearly half the [ Caesar ] photos show the opposite @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , never revealed to the public , confirm that the opposition is violent and has killed large numbers of Syrian security forces and civilians.
” HRW openly acknowledged its wholesale disinterest in this explosive fact , stating , “ This report focuses on deaths in detention.
” However , the organization ’ s researchers were unable to prove that the photos they were focused on showed the bodies of those who died in government prisons and not on the battlefield , or in other circumstances .
In fact , it was able to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ who appeared in the photos had been arrested .
The initial Qatar-sponsored Carter-Ruck investigation falsely claimed that the 11,000 individuals who appeared in the Caesar file had been killed in Syrian government custody .
In an interview with France24 , David Crane , the lead author of that report , noted that the bogus number was a only a “ statistical estimate.
” HRW also revealed that though its researchers “ sought an interview with Caesar through groups that identified themselves as representing him , the organization did not manage to meet with @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s hyper-interventionist director Ken Roth continued to rattle offcalls for US military intervention in Syria .
Others entities and individuals promoting the Caesar file , such as the New York Times and the directors of CIJA , similarly omitted HRW ’ s stunning revelation that at least half the photos depicted government soldiers killed in the hands of foreign-backed opposition militias .
In doing so , they preserved the Western narrative of the Syrian conflict as a one-sided , unprovoked slaughter carried out by President Assad against the whole of “ the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Congress expanded its sanctions on Syria while authorizing more funding for groups like CIJA focused on planning the prosecution of Assad and his officials .
Co-sponsored by Rep. Eliot Engel , the aggressively pro-war , AIPAC-backed Democrat serving at the time as ranking chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee , the bill was called the Caesar Civilian Protection Act .
“ Caesar ” was shepherded by his handler , Mouaz Moustafa , to meet personally with Engel and his Republican counterpart on the Foreign Affairs Committee , Rep. Ed Royce , in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ mysterious figure was shrouded in his blue Patagonia hooded jacket .
The meeting in Washington coincided with several new rounds of unilateral sanctions on Syria , meting out unprecedented economic punishment on the country ’ s civilian population .
Nabih Boulos of the LA Times documented how the US and EU economic war against Syria had been especially harsh on the medical sector , making radiology equipment , chemotherapy drugs , and even basic pharmaceuticals increasingly difficult to obtain .
One doctor told Boulos that 10 percent of his kidney patients had died @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Sanctions also spurred a fuel crisis that made heating oil difficult to obtain during the winter of 2018 , and brought ground traffic in several cities to a near-hault by the following Spring .
Rebuilding the war-torn country had also been slowed by the impact of the coercive measures , as the Caesar Act explicitly imposed costs on companies that participated in reconstruction , even threatening to punish Gulf states which dare to normalize relations with Damascus .
Congress signs off on Syrian misery , plunging the country ’ s currency On @ @ @ @ @ @ @ suspects of the Caesar production assembled on Capitol Hill for one final lobbying push .
This time , the full-time regime-change lobbyist Mouaz Moustafa delivered a self-described former prisoner from Syria ’ s Saydnaya complex named Omar Alshogre to the House Foreign Affairs Committee to make the case for escalating the economic war .
Alshogre ’ s dramatic performance demonstrated his background as a business consultant at the Boston Consulting Group and a motivational speaker managed by an elite speaker ’ s bureau to secure Ted X lecture gigs .
( Back in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ CNN to attack Rep. Tulsi Gabbard , the maverick Democratic presidential candidate who had made opposition to regime-change wars a centerpiece of her campaign . )
Finally , this June , Congress passed the most crushing round of sanctions on Syria in history , imposing penalties on anyone conducting sovereign economic relations with any entity overseen by the Syrian government .
“ Anyone doing business with the Assad regime , no matter where in the world they are , is potentially exposed to travel restrictions and financial sanctions , ” said Secretary of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ sanctions began to sink their teeth into the Syrian economy , the Financial Times acknowledged in a June 24 report , “ The first and biggest act of the Caesar act was felt , not by regime insiders , but by ordinary Syrians , who saw prices spike as the threat of sanctions roiled the country ’ s currency market.
” A civilian population that has suffered through nearly a decade of war is being denied a peacetime recovery .
For them , it marks another chapter in a tragic conflict imposed by @ @ @ @ @ @ @ behind the Caesar deception , the economic pain felt by average Syrians provides another regime-change “ opportunity .
”

Like the mysterious figure it is named for, the Caesar sanctions bill is the product of an elaborate deception by shadowy US- and Gulf-backed operatives. Instead of protecting Syrian civilians, the unilateral measures are driving them towards hunger and death .
T
he US Department of Treasury’s imposition this June of the so-called Caesar Civilian Protection Act, a draconian set of economic sanctions on Syria , amounts to a medieval-style siege on all Syrians living inside the country.
Inspired by photos that Western governments and media claim were smuggled out of Syria by a supposed Syrian military whistleblower codenamed “Caesar,” the sanctions are the product of a highly deceptive intelligence operation orchestrated by the US and Qatari governments.
As this investigation will demonstrate, a network of US- and Qatar-backed regime change operatives marketing themselves as human rights lawyers and concerned Syrian activists groomed the supposed whistleblower, managed his files, and worked overtime to obstruct public scrutiny.
Desperate to stimulate support for war on Syria, this network worked with the US Holocaust Memorial Museum in a cynical campaign to portray the Syrian crisis as equal to – and possibly worse than – the Jewish genocide in Europe.
Shockingly, investigators have determined that at least half of the photographs in the “Caesar” trove depict the bodies of government soldiers killed by the armed opposition. This highly inconvenient fact, which undermines the entire narrative of Caesar’s promoters and exposes them as cynical liars, has been ignored across the board by mainstream US media, Congress, and of course, by the network of operatives that managed “Caesar.”
Washington encourages Syrian famine as “an opportunity”
Authorized by Congress with no opposition, the so-called Caesar Civilian Protection Act amounts to an act of all out war on the very people it claims to protect. Targeting the Syrian Central Bank and penalizing any foreign company that does business with Damascus, the bill was conceived with the explicit aim of preventing the country from rebuilding after it defeated a proxy war imposed on it by the West, Israel, Turkey, and Gulf monarchies.
Charles Lister, a Gulf-backed de facto lobbyist for the Syrian opposition in Washington, inadvertently revealed the Caesar Act as an instrument of financial terror. In an op-ed for Politico this June, he forecasted “even greater levels of destitution, famine, and worsening criminality and predatory behavior” as a result of the new sanctions.
Predicting that “bread shortages are only a matter of time,” and projecting a famine in the near future, Lister cheerfully framed the human suffering caused by the sanctions as “an opportunity” for the United States to achieve regime change.
After a decade of grinding war, however, the Syrian government has proven resilient. And in Damascus, even opponents of Assad concede that sanctions are unlikely to scathe government officials. “Assad and his people are doing fine, and the security state is only stronger because of the war,” a businessman who was active in the initial round of protests against Assad in 2011 told me over lunch in Damascus in September 2019. “The sanctions ruin our currency and put old ladies into the street, but they don’t touch the regime.”
A pair of pro-opposition analysts echoed this view in the national security website War on the Rocks: “The Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act may prove little more than a policy of economic escalation by default — a box-checking exercise for which ordinary Syrians will pay the price,” they wrote.
Thanks to the policy choices of the US government, the Syrian people are set to sink deeper into economic misery. Migration abroad will intensify, another generation will be lost, excess deaths will climb, and in a country where over one-third of the population are children, youth will experience deprivation at unprecedented levels.
The coming human catastrophe is the byproduct of a years-long lobbying campaign carried out by a network of regime-change operatives working under cover of shadowy international NGOs and Syrian-American diaspora groups.
Their push for an escalation of the economic war revolved around a supposed Syrian whistleblower who they claim smuggled thousands of photographs from a military prison, revealing an industrial slaughter of opposition activists. It was the code-name of that so-called whistleblower, “Caesar,” that inspired the sanctions bill.
A close look at these operatives and the forces propelling their activities reveals their campaign as a deceptive operation financed by the Qatari government and orchestrated in Washington, raising serious questions about the credibility of “Caesar.”
The dubious origins of the “Caesar” file
In June 2019, The Grayzone exposed a non-profit widely praised in Western media, the Center for International Justice and Accountability (CIJA), as a US- and EU-funded regime-change initiative that aims to destabilize the Syrian government by subverting the international legal system.
As The Grayzone reported, CIJA field investigators worked directly with extremist militants – including Al Qaeda’s local affiliate – to gather documents from pillaged government offices and spirit them out of the country. CIJA even “pays rebel groups and couriers for logistical support,” the New Yorker acknowledged in a puff piece about the organization.
No trove of documents has been more valuable to regime-change lobbyists in Washington than the so-called “Caesar” file. In another profile of CIJA that omitted the role of the US State Department in establishing the group, the New York Times’ Anne Barnard claimed that Caesar “fled Syria with pictures of at least 6,700 corpses, bone-thin and battered, which shocked the world when they emerged in 2014.”
Caesar’s supposed escape from Syria, and the story of how he obtained the photos, closely mirrored the shady tactics that CIJA investigators used to obtain other documents they planned to exploit for prosecutions of Syrian former officials in Western courts.
According to Vanity Fair, “Caesar” was actively spying for the Syrian opposition since 2011, and working with a “handler” described as “a Syrian academic and human-rights figure named Hassan al-Chalabi.” This character (no relation to the late Iraqi con artist Ahmad Chalabi) was himself “running a shadowy intelligence network inside Syria,” according to the magazine.
Chalabi told Vanity Fair that he arranged for “Caesar” to be smuggled out of Syria with his files in 2013 with the help of the CIA-created Free Syrian Army and an obscure militia known as the Strangers Battalion. (Observers of the Syrian conflict has since identified the latter group to be a collection of Uyghur foreign fighters allied with Al Qaeda.)
Caesar then passed his files to the Syrian National Movement, a marginal group of Islamists that was funded and overseen by the government of Qatar.
From there, the files went to outfits like CIJA, Human Rights Watch, and the New York Times – and “Caesar” went to Capitol Hill.
Caesar’s Qatari connection
The Caesar files were first brought to the American public’s attention in a New York Times articlepublished on January 21, 2014 – a PR stunt carefully timed to coincide with the opening of the UN-backed Geneva II Peace Conference on Syria.
The following acknowledgement was mentioned in passing in the Times article: “only a few photographs have actually been released by lawyers commissioned by the Qatari government, an avowed opponent of Mr. Assad, and the claims about their origins could not be independently verified.”
Sir Geoffrey Nice, the lead prosecutor in the trial of the former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic, was quoted prominently by the Times. “It was like getting the keys to the Nazi archive,” Nice said of the Caesar file.
Nice, who had been charged with authenticating the photographic files, was listed at the time as “an advisor to Qatar in the possible Syria case to come.” Desmond De Silva, another British lawyer called in to authenticate the documents, was later described as part of a team of “high profile lawyers instructed by the Qatari government.”
The permanent monarchy of Qatar has bankrolled an array of Islamist militias across Syria over the years, including Al Qaeda’s ruthless affiliate Jabhat al-Nusra. Carter-Ruck, the law firm employing Nice and De Silva under a Qatari contract, had also been hired by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, another key sponsor of Syria’s insurgency and the destabilization campaign against Damascus.
Also quoted on the significance of the Caesar file in the New York Times article was David Crane, who was merely described by the newspaper as “an investigator involved in examining the photos, who previously indicted President Charles G. Taylor of Liberia.”
In fact, Crane was a veteran military-intelligence operative who previously held various positions inside the Pentagon, including at the Defense Intelligence Agency. Months before the Caesar file surfaced, he appeared on Capitol Hill to advocate for prosecuting Syrian government officials.
Crane stated in a 2014 interview that when his team began its investigation into the file, “We brought in what we named ‘Caesar,’ the individual who brought out these photographs, along with handler – his case officer – interviewing them separately.”
His case officer? Crane’s casual use of a term almost uniquely associated with CIA activity offered a strong suggestion that the Agency had played a role in grooming the mystery man known as “Caesar.”
The UK-based academic Tim Hayward outlined the US government’s role in supporting Crane’s various Syria regime change projects.
Crane “also leads the Syrian Accountability Project (SAP), which he founded some time prior to Caesar’s defection,” Hayward wrote. “SAP is said to be student-run and its clients include the Syrian National Council and US State Department. It also ‘works very closely with’ the Syria Justice and Accountability Centre, which in turn is a conduit of US funding to CIJA.”
Crane authored the initial Qatar-sponsored report on Caesar’s trove, yet was merely described as “a war crimes prosecutor” in a Vanity Fair puff piece about the file.
“Caesar” goes to Capitol Hill
On April 13, 2014, an anonymous man completely cloaked in a blue Patagonia hooded jacket from Hudson Trail Outfitters, purporting to be “Caesar” and claiming to bear photographic evidence of “genocide,” appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Audio and video recording of the testimony was strictly forbidden, supposedly to protect Caesar’s safety.
Caesar’s handlers spun an elaborate tale to neoconservative Daily Beast writer Tim Mak about the “counter-surveillance techniques” they employed to protect their star witnesses identity in the days and hours before the hearing.
Somehow, no one covering the appearance of “Caesar” stopped to consider that the Syrian military might have already known the identity of one of the most high-profile defectors to emerge from its ranks. Were they protecting him from the Syrian Mukhabarat (which has no presence in the United States) or from public scrutiny?
As the anti-war activist and writer Rick Sterling pointed out, “how many military photographers took photos at Tishreen and Military 601 Hospitals during those years and then disappeared? According to the [Qatari] Carter Ruck report, Caesar’s family left Syria around the same time. Considering this, why is ‘Caesar’ keeping his identity secret from the Western audience? Why does ‘Caesar’ refuse to meet even with highly sympathetic journalists or researchers?”
When “Caesar” appeared before the House Foreign Affairs Committee on August 4, 2014, he was seated beside the man who had brought him to Washington. The handler was Mouaz Moustafa, a Syrian-American regime-change lobbyist who served as the director of the State Department-funded Syria Emergency Task Force.
A key figure pushing for more arms to extremist militias inside Syria, Moustafa fervently opposed the State Department’s listing of Jabhat al-Nusra, the Syrian Al Qaeda affiliate, as a terrorist group. “It was a mistake,” he said to Foreign Policy of Nusra’s blacklisting.
A year prior, Moustafa escorted Arizona Sen. John McCain on a trip inside Syria to meet with members of the CIA-backed Free Syrian Army — including kidnappers of Shia pilgrims — during a failed stunt to stimulate US military intervention.
Testifying alongside Caesar was David Crane, the author of the Qatar-sponsored Caesar report, who accused the Syrian government of “crimes the likes of which we have not seen since Auschwitz.”
Next, Frederic Hof of the Atlantic Council’s Saudi-funded Rafic Hariri Center demanded that Congress respond to Caesar’s testimony by allocating more US tax dollars to purchase weapons for anti-Assad extremist militants in Syria.
The stage was set for Congress to sign off on crushing sanctions on Syria, in bipartisan fashion and with negligible opposition. But first, the regime-change lobby mobilized to build a public case for its agenda by cynically linking the crisis it had helped foment in Syria to the Jewish genocide that took place in mid-century Europe.
Enlisting the Holocaust Memorial Museum in the push for war
Back in July 2014, a self-styled human rights lawyer named Stephen Rapp sat on stage at the Saudi-funded Rafiq Hariri Center of DC’s Atlantic Council think tank and demanded regime change in Syria: “Its legitimacy, its ability to serve the people of Syria is gone, if ever it where there,” he said of Assad’s government.
Throughout the event, entitled “Making the Case Against Assad,“ Rapp touted the work the aforementioned US-funded Center for International Justice and Accountability (CIJA) was doing to gather documents implicating the Syrian government, and the State Department’s role in supporting them.
At the time, Rapp was the Barack Obama administration’s ambassador-at-large for global criminal justice. He later moved on to serve as the chair of CIJA and visiting fellow at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, where according to his bio, he pursued “justice and accountability on Syria.”
Rapp had worked with the Qatar-sponsored authors of the initial Caesar inquiry in the past when he, David Crane, and Desmond De Silva each served as chief prosecutor at the special court for Sierra Leone.
In his capacity at the Holocaust Museum, Rapp focused on “bringing forth the first case against the Assad regime and working on potential cases related to the ‘Caesar file’ in Germany.”
Under Rapp’s watch, the Holocaust Museum was transformed into an overt tool of US foreign policy in the Middle East. The institution’s interventionist bent was supplemented by the presence of neoconservative ideologues like Iran-Contra felon Elliott Abrams, former DHS Chief Michael Chertoff, and Stuart A. Levey – a pioneer of US sanctions policy – on the museum’s ironically named “Committee on Conscience.”
In 2014, Mouaz Moustafa, the Syrian-American regime change lobbyist who worked as “Caesar’s” handler, joined Stephen Rapp in helping the Holocaust Memorial Museum establish an exhibitionlikening the Syrian war to the Jewish genocide of World War Two Europe. The exhibit contained a special section on the Caesar file, presenting it as evidence of industrial mass murder without a scintilla of critical context or evidence.
According to Rapp, the file provided a “better” basis for prosecutions of Syrian officials than the Allies mustered at Nuremberg, where key Nazi German officials were convicted for crimes against humanity. Rapp has even claimed that, based on the Caesar files, “Conservatively, we’re looking at 50,000 Syrian civilians tortured and murdered by their own government.”
When the Holocaust museum in DC established its exhibition in late 2014, it was only able to display 10 carefully selected photos from the Caesar file. Once other investigators were able to view the full file, however, the one-sided narrative of its promoters began to crumble.
46% of the Caesar file reveals mass killings – by a brutal armed opposition
Though the full contents of the supposed Caesar file has never been made public, Human Rights Watch (HRW) was able to view the documents in full in 2015. In a lengthy report hyping the photos and attempting to reinforce the push for regime change, HRW inadvertently demolished Washington’s narrative.
In a virtual footnote in its lengthy report on the Caesar file, HRW acknowledged that nearly half of the entire file – some 24,568 photos – depicted the bodies of government soldiers who had been killed by the armed opposition, “including [by] incidents of terrorism, fires, explosions and car bombs).”
As Rick Sterling noted, “nearly half the [Caesar] photos show the opposite of what was alleged. These photos, never revealed to the public, confirm that the opposition is violent and has killed large numbers of Syrian security forces and civilians.”
HRW openly acknowledged its wholesale disinterest in this explosive fact, stating, “This report focuses on deaths in detention.” However, the organization’s researchers were unable to prove that the photos they were focused on showed the bodies of those who died in government prisons and not on the battlefield, or in other circumstances. In fact, it was able to verify only 27 cases in which individuals who appeared in the photos had been arrested.
The initial Qatar-sponsored Carter-Ruck investigation falsely claimed that the 11,000 individuals who appeared in the Caesar file had been killed in Syrian government custody. In an interview with France24, David Crane, the lead author of that report, noted that the bogus number was a only a “statistical estimate.”
HRW also revealed that though its researchers “sought an interview with Caesar through groups that identified themselves as representing him, the organization did not manage to meet with him.”
Despite these disclosures, HRW’s hyper-interventionist director Ken Roth continued to rattle offcalls for US military intervention in Syria.
Others entities and individuals promoting the Caesar file, such as the New York Times and the directors of CIJA, similarly omitted HRW’s stunning revelation that at least half the photos depicted government soldiers killed in the hands of foreign-backed opposition militias. In doing so, they preserved the Western narrative of the Syrian conflict as a one-sided, unprovoked slaughter carried out by President Assad against the whole of “the Syrian people.”
As Caesar works Congress, sanctions begin killing the Syrian people
In November 2016, Congress expanded its sanctions on Syria while authorizing more funding for groups like CIJA focused on planning the prosecution of Assad and his officials. Co-sponsored by Rep. Eliot Engel, the aggressively pro-war, AIPAC-backed Democrat serving at the time as ranking chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, the bill was called the Caesar Civilian Protection Act.
“Caesar” was shepherded by his handler, Mouaz Moustafa, to meet personally with Engel and his Republican counterpart on the Foreign Affairs Committee, Rep. Ed Royce, in July 2018. As usual, the mysterious figure was shrouded in his blue Patagonia hooded jacket.
The meeting in Washington coincided with several new rounds of unilateral sanctions on Syria, meting out unprecedented economic punishment on the country’s civilian population.
Nabih Boulos of the LA Times documented how the US and EU economic war against Syria had been especially harsh on the medical sector, making radiology equipment, chemotherapy drugs, and even basic pharmaceuticals increasingly difficult to obtain. One doctor told Boulos that 10 percent of his kidney patients had died due to faulty or inaccessible dialysis machines.
Sanctions also spurred a fuel crisis that made heating oil difficult to obtain during the winter of 2018, and brought ground traffic in several cities to a near-hault by the following Spring.
Rebuilding the war-torn country had also been slowed by the impact of the coercive measures, as the Caesar Act explicitly imposed costs on companies that participated in reconstruction, even threatening to punish Gulf states which dare to normalize relations with Damascus.
Congress signs off on Syrian misery, plunging the country’s currency
On March 11, 2020, the usual suspects of the Caesar production assembled on Capitol Hill for one final lobbying push. This time, the full-time regime-change lobbyist Mouaz Moustafa delivered a self-described former prisoner from Syria’s Saydnaya complex named Omar Alshogre to the House Foreign Affairs Committee to make the case for escalating the economic war.
Part of my testimony in front of U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee about detention and Idlib pic.twitter.com/yizHrve21G — Omar Alshogre (@omarAlshogre) March 11, 2020
Alshogre’s dramatic performance demonstrated his background as a business consultant at the Boston Consulting Group and a motivational speaker managed by an elite speaker’s bureau to secure Ted X lecture gigs. (Back in March 2019, Alshogre was brought onto CNN to attack Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, the maverick Democratic presidential candidate who had made opposition to regime-change wars a centerpiece of her campaign.)
Finally, this June, Congress passed the most crushing round of sanctions on Syria in history, imposing penalties on anyone conducting sovereign economic relations with any entity overseen by the Syrian government. “Anyone doing business with the Assad regime, no matter where in the world they are, is potentially exposed to travel restrictions and financial sanctions,” said Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
As the Caesar sanctions began to sink their teeth into the Syrian economy, the Financial Times acknowledged in a June 24 report, “The first and biggest act of the Caesar act was felt, not by regime insiders, but by ordinary Syrians, who saw prices spike as the threat of sanctions roiled the country’s currency market.”
A civilian population that has suffered through nearly a decade of war is being denied a peacetime recovery. For them, it marks another chapter in a tragic conflict imposed by outside powers.
But for the operatives behind the Caesar deception, the economic pain felt by average Syrians provides another regime-change “opportunity.”


thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-07-06--Understanding Deep Politics featuring Michael Parenti

is an American political scientist and cultural critic who writes on scholarly and popular subjects .
He has taught at @ @ @ @ @ has been a guest lecturer before campus and community audiences .
One of his most @ @ @ @ @ of Julius Caesar , is an eyeopener not only about the true historical complexion of @ @ @ @ @ as a deconstruction of falsified histories .

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thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-07-06--The Return of the Anti-Antiwar Left

The Return of the Anti-Antiwar Left

In our view , the `` anti-antiwar left '' is not left at all ; it is a parasitic entity that simply hijacked that label .
Much of it marches to the old fetid music of the old anticommunist left .
n her recently published memoir , Circle in the Darkness , the author and journalistrecalls that only “ a few decades ago , “ the Left ” was considered the center of opposition to imperialism , and champion of the right of peoples to self-determination.
” Johnstone is part of a distinguished line of American expatriate writers , who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by distance , saw their country more clearly than many of their stateside contemporaries .
Members of the club include William Pfaff who for many years wrote from Paris and the longtime Asia correspondent Patrick Lawrence .
The Paris based Johnstone brings a moral clarity to matters of war and peace that is , alas , too often absent from most contemporary foreign affairs writing .
Its near total absence on the Left during the Trump years should be cause for reflection , and concern .
As Johnstone recounts , after the Cold @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of waging wars for humanitarian ends .
A generation of journalists and foreign policy experts including Samantha Power , Christiane Amanpour , Jamie Rubin , and Christopher Hitchens , would make the Balkans a proving ground for their liberal theories of preventative war , in the process throwing the ancient and venerable tradition of St. Augustine ’ s Just War theory on the trash heap and paving the way for what was to follow in the coming decades , including Iraq II , Libya , Syria and a global drone war and a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the time , Johnstone was one of the few who saw through the ruse , but , as she recalled , she couldn ’ t get her articles published in the liberal press .
According to Johnstone , Hitchens and Company saw to that .
The wisdom of bombing Serbian civilians for 78 days in order to carve out a Muslim enclave in the middle of Europe ( which in short order would be overrun by the Saudis , Albanian organized crime and human organ traffickers ) was rarely questioned .
Indeed , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Today , skepticism of the mainstream narrative regarding both Russia and the war in Syria is likewise deemed out of bounds by the Left .
It is fair to say that a 3 year non-scandal , Russiagate , ignited a cold war fever among liberals and self-styled progressives .
Indeed , liberals who once took principled stands against the Iraq war , such as Tom Dispatch and Nation regular Bob Dreyfuss , transmogrified , after Trump ’ s election , into frothing-at-the-mouth conspiracy theorists .
By my count , during the course @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Dreyfuss wrote at least 30 articles promoting the most ludicrous of the Russiagate conspiracies , among them that Russia was “ hiding in your Facebook , ” and that , variously , Paul Manafort , Felix Slater and/or General Michael Flynn would , somehow , bring down Trump .
That Dreyfuss would prove so credulous in the face of what was so clearly an absurd distraction is perhaps not surprising given his past ties to Lyndon Larouche .
Others , even less discerning than Dreyfuss , but far , far hungrier for attention @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now discredited collusion conspiracy theory were themselves guilty of indulging in , you guessed it , conspiracy theories of their own .
And so , if in the writings of Dreyfuss , The New York Times ’ Michelle Goldberg , Mother Jones ’ David Corn , The Atlantic ’ s Franklin Foer , New York magazine ’ s resident dolt Jonathan Chait , and many more besides , we can see the emergence of the anti-anti-Cold War Left , there has also reemerged alongside it the very vocal and ravenously unscrupulous anti-antiwar Left @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of the Syrian war on which the anti-antiwar Left has coalesced , inexplicably arguing for the wholesale takeover of a secular police state ( sic ) by the very same Islamist radicals who , if given the chance , would turn around and immediately kill them on the grounds of apostasy .
In Syria , the protests that began in 2011 were quickly overtaken by armed jihadists whose motto was “ Christians to Beirut , Alawis to the grave.
” Before he was murdered by Syrian rebels , the Jesuit missionary Father Frans @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the start the protest movements were not purely peaceful .
From the start I saw armed demonstrators marching along in the protests , who began to shoot at the police first .
Very often the violence of the security forces has been a reaction to the brutal violence of the armed rebels.
” But many prominent voices in mainstream liberal media outlets such as The New York Times , The Washington Post and VICE turned a blind eye to the atrocities committed by the Islamist opposition in their hunger for a US-led regime @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the war fever extended from the mainstream to the progressive Left .
On the pages and website of the New York Review of Books one searches for genuine antiwar voices in vain .
Instead what you most likely will come across are screeds such as the one issued by Janine di Giovanni .
In her rage for another US-led war in the Middle East , di Giovanni channelled the ghost of Joseph McCarthy and baselessly accused the antiwar journalist Max Blumenthal of , you guessed it , being in league with ( who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ And then there is The Intercept , funded by a shadowy billionaire with ties to the US Agency for International Development , Pierre Omyidar .
Under the editorship of former Nation managing editor Betsy Reed , The Intercept has given space to some of the most strident anti-antiwar voices including those of James Risen , Robert McKay and the British-born Mehdi Hasan .
Hasan ’ s enthusiasm for a jihadi victory over the socialist , multi-confessional Syrian state is perhaps not surprising given his past views in which he compared non-believers to “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for The Intercept , Hasan penned a hysterical open letter to those he deemed “ al-Assad apologists ” for the crime of expressing skepticism regarding the latest round of accusations of chemical weapons use by the Syrian [ government ] “ To those of you on the anti-war far left who have a soft spot for the dictator in Damascus : Have you lost your minds ?
Or have you no shame ?
, ” cried Hasan .
What followed was a lengthy iteration of Assad ’ s [ putative ] crimes and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ that he too stands against no fly zones , arming the rebels and regime change wars .
So what , we might be forgiven to ask , was the point ?
It was simply a tedious exercise in moral preening .
A speciality of the anti-antiwar Left .
Hasan ’ s , example is instructive because , in his obvious opportunism and sly fanaticism , he exemplifies everything that a writer like Diana Johnstone is not and , by extension , much that is seriously wrong with the anti-antiwar Left .
Worryingly , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
Indeed , it has some powerful allies-in-waiting should Joseph R. Biden win in November .
In a recent interview with CBS , Biden protege and former deputy secretary of state Antony Blinken bemoaned the fact that the Obama administration ’ s regime change efforts in Syria didn ’ t go nearly far enough .
Indeed , Biden ’ s foreign policy team is stacked from one end to the other with regime change and new cold war enthusiasts who , alas , will find plenty of support from the growing ranks of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this development more than mildly depressing might do worse than to take refuge in the work of genuine antiwar voices such as Diana Johnstone ’ s .

JAMES W. CARDEN
In our view, the "anti-antiwar left" is not left at all; it is a parasitic entity that simply hijacked that label. Much of it marches to the old fetid music of the old anticommunist left.
I
n her recently published memoir, Circle in the Darkness , the author and journalistrecalls that only “a few decades ago, “the Left” was considered the center of opposition to imperialism, and champion of the right of peoples to self-determination.”
Johnstone is part of a distinguished line of American expatriate writers, who, perhaps because of an objectivity conferred by distance, saw their country more clearly than many of their stateside contemporaries. Members of the club include William Pfaff who for many years wrote from Paris and the longtime Asia correspondent Patrick Lawrence. The Paris based Johnstone brings a moral clarity to matters of war and peace that is, alas, too often absent from most contemporary foreign affairs writing. Its near total absence on the Left during the Trump years should be cause for reflection, and concern.
As Johnstone recounts, after the Cold War liberals became bewitched by the prospect of waging wars for humanitarian ends. A generation of journalists and foreign policy experts including Samantha Power, Christiane Amanpour, Jamie Rubin, and Christopher Hitchens, would make the Balkans a proving ground for their liberal theories of preventative war, in the process throwing the ancient and venerable tradition of St. Augustine’s Just War theory on the trash heap and paving the way for what was to follow in the coming decades, including Iraq II, Libya, Syria and a global drone war and a “targeted” assassination program.
At the time, Johnstone was one of the few who saw through the ruse, but, as she recalled, she couldn’t get her articles published in the liberal press. According to Johnstone, Hitchens and Company saw to that. The wisdom of bombing Serbian civilians for 78 days in order to carve out a Muslim enclave in the middle of Europe (which in short order would be overrun by the Saudis, Albanian organized crime and human organ traffickers) was rarely questioned.
Indeed, among the bien-pensants, it was impermissible.
Today, skepticism of the mainstream narrative regarding both Russia and the war in Syria is likewise deemed out of bounds by the Left. It is fair to say that a 3 year non-scandal, Russiagate, ignited a cold war fever among liberals and self-styled progressives. Indeed, liberals who once took principled stands against the Iraq war, such as Tom Dispatch and Nation regular Bob Dreyfuss, transmogrified, after Trump’s election, into frothing-at-the-mouth conspiracy theorists.
By my count, during the course of the three year Russiagate ordeal, Dreyfuss wrote at least 30 articles promoting the most ludicrous of the Russiagate conspiracies, among them that Russia was “hiding in your Facebook,” and that, variously, Paul Manafort, Felix Slater and/or General Michael Flynn would, somehow, bring down Trump. That Dreyfuss would prove so credulous in the face of what was so clearly an absurd distraction is perhaps not surprising given his past ties to Lyndon Larouche.
Others, even less discerning than Dreyfuss, but far, far hungrier for attention, have claimed that skeptics of the now discredited collusion conspiracy theory were themselves guilty of indulging in, you guessed it, conspiracy theories of their own.
And so, if in the writings of Dreyfuss, The New York Times’ Michelle Goldberg, Mother Jones’ David Corn, The Atlantic’s Franklin Foer, New York magazine’s resident dolt Jonathan Chait, and many more besides, we can see the emergence of the anti-anti-Cold War Left, there has also reemerged alongside it the very vocal and ravenously unscrupulous anti-antiwar Left. And it is on the issue of the Syrian war on which the anti-antiwar Left has coalesced, inexplicably arguing for the wholesale takeover of a secular police state (sic) by the very same Islamist radicals who, if given the chance, would turn around and immediately kill them on the grounds of apostasy.
In Syria, the protests that began in 2011 were quickly overtaken by armed jihadists whose motto was “Christians to Beirut, Alawis to the grave.” Before he was murdered by Syrian rebels, the Jesuit missionary Father Frans vans der Lugt observed that “From the start the protest movements were not purely peaceful. From the start I saw armed demonstrators marching along in the protests, who began to shoot at the police first. Very often the violence of the security forces has been a reaction to the brutal violence of the armed rebels.”
But many prominent voices in mainstream liberal media outlets such as The New York Times, The Washington Post and VICE turned a blind eye to the atrocities committed by the Islamist opposition in their hunger for a US-led regime change operation against Bashar al-Assad. And the war fever extended from the mainstream to the progressive Left.
On the pages and website of the New York Review of Books one searches for genuine antiwar voices in vain. Instead what you most likely will come across are screeds such as the one issued by Janine di Giovanni. In her rage for another US-led war in the Middle East, di Giovanni channelled the ghost of Joseph McCarthy and baselessly accused the antiwar journalist Max Blumenthal of, you guessed it, being in league with (who else?) the Russian government.
And then there is The Intercept, funded by a shadowy billionaire with ties to the US Agency for International Development, Pierre Omyidar. Under the editorship of former Nation managing editor Betsy Reed, The Intercept has given space to some of the most strident anti-antiwar voices including those of James Risen, Robert McKay and the British-born Mehdi Hasan. Hasan’s enthusiasm for a jihadi victory over the socialist, multi-confessional Syrian state is perhaps not surprising given his past views in which he compared non-believers to “animals.”
In an April 2018 column for The Intercept, Hasan penned a hysterical open letter to those he deemed “al-Assad apologists” for the crime of expressing skepticism regarding the latest round of accusations of chemical weapons use by the Syrian regime. [government] “To those of you on the anti-war far left who have a soft spot for the dictator in Damascus: Have you lost your minds? Or have you no shame?,” cried Hasan. What followed was a lengthy iteration of Assad’s [putative] crimes and then, oddly, reassurances from Hasan that he too stands against no fly zones, arming the rebels and regime change wars.
So what, we might be forgiven to ask, was the point? It was simply a tedious exercise in moral preening. A speciality of the anti-antiwar Left.
Hasan’s, example is instructive because, in his obvious opportunism and sly fanaticism, he exemplifies everything that a writer like Diana Johnstone is not and, by extension, much that is seriously wrong with the anti-antiwar Left.
Worryingly, the anti-antiwar Left is not going away. Indeed, it has some powerful allies-in-waiting should Joseph R. Biden win in November. In a recent interview with CBS, Biden protege and former deputy secretary of state Antony Blinken bemoaned the fact that the Obama administration’s regime change efforts in Syria didn’t go nearly far enough.
Indeed, Biden’s foreign policy team is stacked from one end to the other with regime change and new cold war enthusiasts who, alas, will find plenty of support from the growing ranks of the anti-antiwar Left. Those who find this development more than mildly depressing might do worse than to take refuge in the work of genuine antiwar voices such as Diana Johnstone’s.


thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-07-07--The Latest ‘Russiagate’ BOMBSHELL Took Just One Week To Be Exposed As Dud. Who Was Its Source?

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible .
Share with kin , friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise .
DISPATCHES FROM MOON OF ALABAMA , BY `` B '' This article is part of an ongoing series of dispatches from Moon of Alabama That the story was obviously bullshit did not prevent Democrats in Congress , including 'Russiagate ' swindler Adam Schiff , to bluster about it and to call for immediate briefings and new sanctions on Russia .
ithin just one week the recent attempt to revive 'Russiagate ' has failed .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ media who pushed it .
Their 'journalists ' fell for obvious nonsense .
They let their sources abuse them for political purposes .
On June 27 the New York Times and the Washington Post published stories which claimed that Trump was informed about alleged Russian bounty payments to the Taliban for killing U.S. soldiers and did nothing about it : A Russian military spy unit offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants to attack coalition forces in Afghanistan , including U.S. and British troops , in a striking escalation of the Kremlin ’ s hostility @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has found .
The Russian operation , first reported by the New York Times , has generated an intense debate within the Trump administration about how best to respond to a troubling new tactic by a nation that most U.S. officials regard as a potential foe but that President Trump has frequently embraced as a friend , said the officials , who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive intelligence matter .
The story ran on page A-1 of the paper version of the NYT .
We immediately called it @ @ @ @ @ @ @ was : Now the intelligence services make another claim that fits right into the above [ 'Russiagate ' ] scheme .
Reporters from the New York Times and the Washington Post were called up by unnamed 'officials ' and told to write that Russia pays some Afghans to kill U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan .
There is zero evidence that the claim is true .
The Taliban spokesman denies it .
The numbers of U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan is minimal .
The alleged sources of the claims are criminals the U.S. has taken @ @ @ @ @ @ @ nonsense is again used to press against Trump 's wish for better relations with Russia .
Imagine - Trump was told about these nonsensical claims and he did nothing about it !
Others likewise dumped on the shady reporting : • In ‘ Russian Bounty ’ Story , Evidence-Free Claims From Nameless Spies Became Fact Overnight - Alan MacLeod/FAIR • What Does The Russia Bounty Story Really Amount To ?
- Rivkin , Beebe/The Hill But that the story was obviously bullshit did not prevent Democrats in Congress , including 'Russiagate ' swindler @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and to call for immediate briefings and new sanctions on Russia .
Just a day after it was published the main accusation , that Trump was briefed on the 'intelligence ' died .
The Director of National Intelligence , the National Security Advisor and the CIA publicly rejected the claim .
Then the rest of the story started to crumble .
On June 2 , just one week after it was launched , the story was declared dead : A memo produced in recent days by the office of the nation ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
and top counterterrorism officials have assessed that Russia appears to have offered bounties to kill American and coalition troops in Afghanistan , but emphasized uncertainties and gaps in evidence , according to three officials .
...
The memo said that the C.I.A .
and the National Counterterrorism Center had assessed with medium confidence — meaning credibly sourced and plausible , but falling short of near certainty — that a unit of the Russian military intelligence service , known as the G.R.U.
, offered the bounties , according to two of the officials @ @ @ @ @ @ @ parts of the intelligence community — including the National Security Agency , which favors electronic surveillance intelligence — said they did not have information to support that conclusion at the same level , therefore expressing lower confidence in the conclusion , according to the two officials .
The NYT buried the above quoted dead corpse of the original story on page A-19 .
Last week we also learned that Adam Schiff , who had blamed Trump for not reacting to the fake 'intelligence ' and who used the story to call for more @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the very same 'intelligence ' months ago : Top committee staff for Rep. Adam Schiff ( D-Calif. ) , the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence , were briefed in February on intelligence about Russia offering the Taliban bounties in Afghanistan , but he took no action in response to the briefing , multiple intelligence sources familiar with the briefing told The Federalist .
...
The revelation raises serious questions that Schiff is once again politicizing , and perhaps even deliberately misrepresenting , key data for partisan gain .
Asked @ @ @ @ @ @ @ any knowledge of the Russia story prior to the New York Times report , Schiff said “ I can ’ t comment on specifics.
” Schiff ’ s recent complaints that Trump took no action against Russia in response to rumors of Russian bounties are curious given that Schiff himself took no action after his top staff were briefed by intelligence officials .
As chairman of the intelligence committee , Schiff had the authority to immediately brief the full committee and convene hearings on the matter .
Schiff , however , did nothing @ @ @ @ @ @ @ knew about the claims they may well have been the ones who pushed it to the reporters .
Consider that both papers , the NYT and the WaPo , attribute their knowledge to 'officials ' .
There is a code for anonymous sources in U.S. political reporting that is usual adhered to .
Sources are described as 'White House officials ' , 'administration officials ' , 'Pentagon officials ' or 'intelligence officials ' when they are working for the government .
Congressional sources are usually described as 'officials ' without any additional attribute @ @ @ @ @ @ @ false claim that Trump had been briefed on the 'intelligence ' .
Sources in the White House or the CIA would have likely known that this had not been the case .
Sources from Congress had no way of knowing that .
That makes it quite likely that Schiff and/or members of his staff were the original sources of the fake story .
Consider that it was Schiff who for two years had claimed again and again that there was 'direct evidence '' that the Trump campaign had colluded with the Russian government @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been a lie .
It is certainly not beyond Schiff to sell a dubious 'intelligence ' report , based on circumstantial [ and probably `` worked on '' ] evidence , as alarming news that required immediate action .
The purpose of this shabby round of 'Russiagate ' nonsense was to hinder Trump 's plans to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan before the election , to sabotage the cooperation between Russia and the U.S. on the negotiations with the Taliban and to blame Trump of another 'collusion ' with the ever hated Russia @ @ @ @ @ @ @ false claims made certain that it failed to achieve this .
Posted by b on July 7 , 2020 at 17:08 UTC | Permalink '' b '' is Moon of Alabama 's founding ( and chief ) editor .
This site 's purpose is to discuss politics , economics , philosophy and blogger Billmon 's Whiskey Bar writings .
Moon Of Alabama was opened as an independent , open forum for members of the Whiskey Bar community .
Bernhard ) '' b '' ) started and still runs the site .
Once in @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and art from regular commentators .
You can reach the current administrator of this site by emailing Bernhard at MoonofA @ aol.com .
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License .

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.
DISPATCHES FROM MOON OF ALABAMA, BY "B"
This article is part of an ongoing series of dispatches from Moon of Alabama
That the story was obviously bullshit did not prevent Democrats in Congress, including 'Russiagate' swindler Adam Schiff, to bluster about it and to call for immediate briefings and new sanctions on Russia.
W
ithin just one week the recent attempt to revive 'Russiagate' has failed. It was an embarrassing failure for the media who pushed it. Their 'journalists' fell for obvious nonsense. They let their sources abuse them for political purposes.
On June 27 the New York Times and the Washington Post published stories which claimed that Trump was informed about alleged Russian bounty payments to the Taliban for killing U.S. soldiers and did nothing about it:
A Russian military spy unit offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants to attack coalition forces in Afghanistan, including U.S. and British troops, in a striking escalation of the Kremlin’s hostility toward the United States, American intelligence has found. The Russian operation, first reported by the New York Times, has generated an intense debate within the Trump administration about how best to respond to a troubling new tactic by a nation that most U.S. officials regard as a potential foe but that President Trump has frequently embraced as a friend, said the officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive intelligence matter.
The story ran on page A-1 of the paper version of the NYT.
We immediately called it out for the obvious nonsense that it was:
Now the intelligence services make another claim that fits right into the above ['Russiagate'] scheme. Reporters from the New York Times and the Washington Post were called up by unnamed 'officials' and told to write that Russia pays some Afghans to kill U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan. There is zero evidence that the claim is true. The Taliban spokesman denies it. The numbers of U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan is minimal. The alleged sources of the claims are criminals the U.S. has taken as prisoners in Afghanistan. All that nonsense is again used to press against Trump's wish for better relations with Russia. Imagine - Trump was told about these nonsensical claims and he did nothing about it!
Others likewise dumped on the shady reporting:
But that the story was obviously bullshit did not prevent Democrats in Congress, including 'Russiagate' swindler Adam Schiff, to bluster about it and to call for immediate briefings and new sanctions on Russia.
Just a day after it was published the main accusation, that Trump was briefed on the 'intelligence' died. The Director of National Intelligence, the National Security Advisor and the CIA publicly rejected the claim. Then the rest of the story started to crumble. On June 2, just one week after it was launched, the story was declared dead:
A memo produced in recent days by the office of the nation’s top intelligence official acknowledged that the C.I.A. and top counterterrorism officials have assessed that Russia appears to have offered bounties to kill American and coalition troops in Afghanistan, but emphasized uncertainties and gaps in evidence, according to three officials.
...
The memo said that the C.I.A. and the National Counterterrorism Center had assessed with medium confidence — meaning credibly sourced and plausible, but falling short of near certainty — that a unit of the Russian military intelligence service, known as the G.R.U., offered the bounties, according to two of the officials briefed on its contents. But other parts of the intelligence community — including the National Security Agency, which favors electronic surveillance intelligence — said they did not have information to support that conclusion at the same level, therefore expressing lower confidence in the conclusion, according to the two officials.
The NYT buried the above quoted dead corpse of the original story on page A-19.
Last week we also learned that Adam Schiff, who had blamed Trump for not reacting to the fake 'intelligence' and who used the story to call for more Russia sanctions, had been briefed on the very same 'intelligence' months ago:
Top committee staff for Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, were briefed in February on intelligence about Russia offering the Taliban bounties in Afghanistan, but he took no action in response to the briefing, multiple intelligence sources familiar with the briefing told The Federalist.
...
The revelation raises serious questions that Schiff is once again politicizing, and perhaps even deliberately misrepresenting, key data for partisan gain. Asked by a reporter Tuesday if he had any knowledge of the Russia story prior to the New York Times report, Schiff said “I can’t comment on specifics.” Schiff’s recent complaints that Trump took no action against Russia in response to rumors of Russian bounties are curious given that Schiff himself took no action after his top staff were briefed by intelligence officials. As chairman of the intelligence committee, Schiff had the authority to immediately brief the full committee and convene hearings on the matter. Schiff, however, did nothing.
As Schiff and his committee staff knew about the claims they may well have been the ones who pushed it to the reporters.
Consider that both papers, the NYT and the WaPo, attribute their knowledge to 'officials'. There is a code for anonymous sources in U.S. political reporting that is usual adhered to. Sources are described as 'White House officials', 'administration officials', 'Pentagon officials' or 'intelligence officials' when they are working for the government. Congressional sources are usually described as 'officials' without any additional attribute.
The original sources also made the false claim that Trump had been briefed on the 'intelligence'. Sources in the White House or the CIA would have likely known that this had not been the case. Sources from Congress had no way of knowing that.
That makes it quite likely that Schiff and/or members of his staff were the original sources of the fake story. Consider that it was Schiff who for two years had claimed again and again that there was 'direct evidence" that the Trump campaign had colluded with the Russian government. That has turned out to have been a lie. It is certainly not beyond Schiff to sell a dubious 'intelligence' report, based on circumstantial [and probably "worked on"] evidence, as alarming news that required immediate action.
The purpose of this shabby round of 'Russiagate' nonsense was to hinder Trump's plans to withdraw all troops from Afghanistan before the election, to sabotage the cooperation between Russia and the U.S. on the negotiations with the Taliban and to blame Trump of another 'collusion' with the ever hated Russia.
But the short life of the false claims made certain that it failed to achieve this.
Posted by b on July 7, 2020 at 17:08 UTC | Permalink
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NOTE ^1000Careerist lackeys serving the elites control the American press. Ever pushing for war and inequality, covering up the oligarchy's crimes... They are in reality shameless disinformers. No wonder the world is in such terrible disarray.
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