David Cameron relies on the complicity of mainstream media and the gullibility and disinterest of the British public to get away with an extraordinary switch. Two years ago he was strongly urging military action in Syria against the forces of President Assad. Now he urges military action against the enemies of President Assad. That includes against groups and individuals who were initially armed and financed by western intelligence agencies, and are still being financed by our Saudi “allies”.
Indeed one of the many extraordinary features of this fervid political period is that the neo-cons (be they Tory or Blairite) who are so actively beating the drum for war, are the ones who absolutely refuse to acknowledge that the source of the poison is Saudi Arabia. Cameron today told Westminster that the head of the snake is in Raqqa. That is plainly untrue. The head of the snake is in Riyadh. But if your God is Mammon, that is blasphemy.
It is also fascinating that the same people who triumphantly warned Putin he would get blowback from bombing the Islamists in Syria, deny that our invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and bombing of Libya have any blowback effect or in any way cause terrorism in the West. The hypocrisy would be hilarious were it not so serious.
The French are pounding the city of Raqqa as I write and the truth is, whatever the propaganda, that they have already killed more entirely innocent civilians in their bombing than were killed in the horrible atrocity in Paris. The killing on both sides is mindless. The majority of those the French are bombing into oblivion in Raqqa are people horrified at being occupied by ISIL, just as the people killed by ISIL in Paris were ordinary people as powerless as the rest of us to affect the way the elite run our foreign policy. Those who believe that the random killing of bombing is the solution to random killing are crazy.
I was terribly, terribly sad for the victims of Paris and their loved ones. But I could not help but note that we did not fly flags at half mast or illuminate buildings in the rather lighter tones of red white and blue that could have marked Russia losing nearly twice as many dead in a related terrorist atrocity just a few weeks before.
For the terrorists themselves, I have no sympathy. To kill entirely innocent people is indefensible in any circumstances. To believe that religious kudos can be gained from killing the innocent is incredibly sick.
I have often argued that it is actually not difficult to commit a terrorist attack. If I wanted to kill people next week, did not care who I killed, and was prepared to die myself, I could most certainly do so successfully. The key point is of course that in reality there are very, very few people deranged enough to carry out such atrocious acts. Any rational analysis shows this is not an existential threat. Terrible as these attacks were, they killed 0.01% – that’s one in ten thousand – of the population of Paris. They increased the tiny chance of being murdered in France by only 20%. There are over 600 murders a year in France. Many more people die every year in traffic accidents in Paris than were killed in this atrocity.
I am not trying to mitigate the evil or atrocity, I am trying to put it in context. The drama of the incident is used vastly to exaggerate its impact and to justify those moves which the Establishment had up their sleeve anyway as the vast and growing disparity between rich and poor calls for more weapons of social control. These include massive surveillance of the population, larger and more intrusive security services, aggressive policing, an institutional system of informers in education, a new crime of “non-violent extremism”, and of course yet more wars in the Middle East –
The sad thing is of course that the terrorists are so stupid as to increase the powers of the very forces in society whose policies they purport to be fighting, while the only people they kill are also those getting the short straw of society’s gross inequality. I suspect the leadership knows this. Of course, if you are a Saudi prince, then right wing, highly authoritarian western governments hostile to economic equality are exactly what you want too. It makes your lifestyle in London, Paris and Monte Carlo so much easier.
Meanwhile David Cameron thrashes about. The only way he can see to look credible is to go and bomb someone, even if it is the opposite side he wanted to bomb last time. It won’t stop terrorism, but it will be good for the arms manufacturers and security industry. It will help stoke the jingoism that is so useful in enabling the wealthy to maintain their firm grip on political power.
Actually stopping terrorism would of course do none of those useful things for the Establishment. I do not claim that the Establishment deliberately employs a Middle Eastern policy that promotes and exacerbates terrorism. But their policy has that effect, and they use its consequence in their own interest in retaining a firm grip on political power. It helps further ensure that political power will not be employed to reorder society upon more egalitarian lines.
“Proxy wars are by definition False Flag in nature.”
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Whoever wrote that bit of egregious nonsense obviously does not know the definition of a false flag operation and would therefore do well to avoid using the word “definition” in future.
RobG
“People who come on blogs like this to slavishly back-up the official narrative are also ‘persons of interest’.”
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I get the impression from the above that you do not believe what you call the “official narrative” wrt the events in Paris.
Echoing Anon’s question to someone else, if I may, please tell us what you think really happened, by whom and why.
Thank you.
Not good, (so small and innocuous) Look at what Daesh claim is a picture of the bomb that stole 224 innocent Russian lives. Lately their claims tend to be true.
We ought to assume that they have literally hundreds of sleeper cells in Europe by now.
Russia plane crash: IS publishes ‘improvised bomb’ photo
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world/middle_east
Boots on the ground. Boots on the ground.
Our Liam is good at catching Mr Bercow’s eye. Today’s PMQs.
Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con): The continued reach and activity of ISIS represents a monumental international security challenge. The aim was to degrade and contain ISIS, but it is not contained, so I thank my right hon. Friend for what he said yesterday about the need to cut off the financial supplies to ISIS and to deal with the narrative over values, and for what he has said today about the need to join our allies in taking action over Syria, as well as Iraq. He is absolutely correct when he says that no military campaign of this nature has ever been won from the air alone, so we may yet require an international coalition on the ground of the sort that we required to remove Saddam from Kuwait. May I ask my right hon. Friend simply to rule nothing out and give no comfort to ISIS, because these people hate us not because of what we do but because of who we are?
The Prime Minister: I thank my right hon. Friend for his support. Obviously, we should be in the business of working out what we can do and what would make a difference, rather than what we cannot do; but it is my contention that, in the end, the best partner we can have for defeating ISIL in Iraq is the Iraqi Government, and that the best partner we can have in Syria is a reformed Government in Syria, without Assad at their head, who could credibly represent all the Syrian people and be a partner for getting rid of this death cult, which threatens the Syrian people, as well as the rest of us.
😉
He’s not subtle is he?
~~~
Huge donations. Trip to Saudi Arabia and one to the US under AIPAC’s auspices.
http://www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/10213/liam_fox/north_somerset#register
Merchant of Golan
“there is BIG oil in them thaar Golan Heights (et tu murdoch?!) and Heller will jump through umpteen hoops to get at it. the shameless devil had the temerity to ask Obama to recognise the 1981 Golan annexation ??!! They desperately need the Syrian State out of the way”
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Not that big I should have said.
But in any case it would appear that Israel’s annexation of part of the Golan heights is pretty safe, Syrian State or no; after all, the Syrian army lost them fairly easily in 1967 and nothing which has happened since gives one any confidence that the Syrian army has got any better at fighting the Israelis (as opposed to oppressing the Syrians themselves) than it was then 🙂
“why on earth would anybody illegal be carrying a passport on their person which would be of absolutely no use in the EU, and especially if it was fake and land them in jail?”
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Don’t understand the relevance of the “especially if it was fake bit”.
It seems rather obvious that the bearer of the passport would be working on the assumption that the passport would not be detected as being fake when produced at a normal kind of identity check.
Habba
Unlike the media, who almost instantly named ISIS as the perpetrators of the Paris attacks, then we had that ‘Syrian passport’, and then it’s almost instantly known who the killers are and their backgrounds, etc, unlike the media (and the trolls) I don’t have a prepared narrative.
I will just say that most sentient beings will find the political convenience of the Paris attacks to be somewhat suspicious, not to mention the totally topsy-turvey background to it all, which Craig points out in his post here.
“Didn’t the attack on the World Trade Center take place too early in the morning before management arrived?”
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That’s very interesting and seems to point toward….a conspiracy! 🙂
I wonder if the person who wrote that could tell us at what time the attack took place, at what time “management” normally arrived, whether there were other people than “management” in the building before “management” arrived and if so how he would categorise those other people (eg, were they cleaning staff, etc…).
This information would help us evaluate whether the claims of a cpnspiracy might have some prima facie foundation.
Welcome back Craig, I trust you’re in good health.
I read the article regarding Raqqa, and the rather Hollywoodesque quote from David Cameron, which included the words head and snake.
There seemed a bit of desperation about Cameron’s statement. I can only presuppose that the Western backed so called moderate rebels (they’re are no moderate rebels, they are all full on rebels) are taking heavy casualties from Russian pro Assad forces and the SAA.
In my opinion Turkey and America’s decision to shut off Syria’s border with Turkey is two fold, to provide a safe zone or corridor for anti-Assad rebels, and to allow Turkey to continue its persecution of the Kurds in that region.
Assads forces in my opinin have already pushed out the Western backed insurgents, to such an extent that Article 5 had to be invoked somehow (ergo Paris).
If Assads forces can caputre a section of the safe zone, which in reality is a supply line to rebel forces it could become difficult for Western forces to contain a Russian/Syrian advance.
Imagine the damage a defeat would do to NATO’s morale. The hegemony of the self appointed world police force would be broken.
Lysias
In International law the Uk. and and anyone else ( Except Russia, since they had a request from the Syrians for help ) would be acting illegally.. of course Cameron is already a war criminal over his Bombing Antics in Libya..
The Funding, Arming, Training of Terrorist factions is also a crime Cameron is Guilty of, Like Selling arms to Saudi Arabia, And the U’k is also complicit in war crimes for selling £7million-worth of military equipment to Israel just months before attacks on Gaza,
Check out Gearoid O Colmain’s take, on the Whole Crazed Shebang –
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7GAbVhjTSw
Roderick Russell
“Watching the reporting on the recent events in Paris it struck me that there is nothing more revolting or cowardly than terrorism against completely innocent citizens.”
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It’s interesting that you should have been the only commenter to have said that up to now.
And you are not even one of the ever-vociferous regulars.
Mary
“I was going to put up a link to the effect that the image of each of the seemingly hundreds of French mayors all seated and wearing a red, white and blue sash was striking. It’s a State propaganda tool just like the rows of flags we keep seeing at every gathering now.
http://www.gettyimages.co.uk/detail/news-photo/paris-mayor-anne-hidalgo-association-of-the-mayors-of-news-photo/497676380
Cameron and Blair have massively used the Union Flag as a backdrop for their messages as did Thatcher. Google ‘Cameron Union Flag’. There are hundreds of images as there are for Thatcher and Blair. Go back to Wilson and there is just one shown and that is held by a person in a crowd of people.”
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Yes, that’s the funny thing about national flags, they keep being displayed all the time and especially at important national events. And in many countries they even fly over public buildings! Can’t imagine why.
Mary
“There were new flat screen TVs in the waiting areas – tuned to BBC news of course.”
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That is a fucking disgrace! They should have been tuned to Sky, or even better, Russia Today.
If you get up a petition, I’ll be one of the first to sign it, Mary.
The United Nations children’s agency, UNICEF, warns that over 500,000 children in Yemen are facing severe life-threatening malnutrition.
The UN World Food Programme, (which incidently failed to prevent starvation in Iraq, during the Wests illegal war on it) said 13 million people in Yemen are close to starvation.
The reasons for the Yemeni predicament, once again lie in Western interference, through its Middle East attack dog.
Saudi Arabia is currently bombing Yemen, and has done so since March 26th this year. The intention is to crush Shiite rebels who deposed a Western puppet government, one that was US compliant.
Iran has stepped in to back the Yemeni Houthis rebels, much to the annoyance of Saudi Arabia and the US.
Habbabkuk to RobG:
“Echoing Anon’s question to someone else, if I may, please tell us what you think really happened, by whom and why.”
RobG to Habbabkuk:
“Unlike the media, who almost instantly named ISIS as the perpetrators of the Paris attacks, then we had that ‘Syrian passport’, and then it’s almost instantly known who the killers are and their backgrounds, etc, unlike the media (and the trolls) I don’t have a prepared narrative.
I will just say that most sentient beings will find the political convenience of the Paris attacks to be somewhat suspicious”
So you are “suspicious”. Thanks for that non-answer.
Is it true, that no Jews were killed on 9/11 attack?
http://www.ibtimes.com/israel-oil-discovery-massive-reserve-could-meet-domestic-demand-obstacles-production-2130639
Lo Zuccone 6.51pm
” Not that big I should have said ”
……………………………………………………………………………
The amateur troll becomes the oil expert in one swift jump and fails again ?
“Is it true, that no Jews were killed on 9/11 attack?”
No.
76 Jews who died at the World Trade Center are listed by name at the U.S. government document http://web.archive.org/web/20050408072925/http://usinfo.state.gov/media/Archive/2005/Jan/14-260933.html .
Practically all the high-ranking ones worked at the bond trading firm Cantor Fitzgerald.
Just the usual crap by Habby about the importance of when exactly the 9/!! attacks occurred for it to have possibly been a conspiracy when the plot was dictated by when the planes to be made suicide bombs left Boston, Newark and Washington which was early in the morning.
Turning to a subject that mirrors the atrocities in France, therefore it must be relevant,the cries for solidarity, freedom and justice, have rang loud over the past few days, lets keep them alive.
Gaza, which is home to 1.8 million people, including half a million children, is just 25 miles long and 4 miles wide. Some have rightly declared that Gaza, is the worlds largest ope air prison.
Gaza was all but razed to the ground last summer, with loss of life mostly civilians around the 2,200 mark.
Currently Israel is and has been for years now, contravening Article 33 of the 4th Geneva Convention.
[p.225] Article 33 is derived from Article 50 [ Link ] of the Hague Regulations: “No general penalty, pecuniary or otherwise, shall be inflicted upon the population on account of the acts of individuals for which they can not be regarded as jointly and severally responsible”.
https://www.icrc.org/ihl/com/380-600038
No penalty or punished it says, on a population, due to individual actions.
Yet last summer Israel maintained a concerted bombing campaign which killed innocent women and children, Israel went as far as to bomb a hospital.
Now there has been a world outcry against the murders in Paris, and rightly so. Buildings have bee illuminated in French colours testimonies off we are Paris, and terrorism won’t cower us have swamped the web and press.
Article 5 has been invoked in Alexander Dumas style “All for one, one for all.”
Yet no such global outcry has taken place over the decades of mass slaughter of the people of Palestine, and Gaza, no Palestinian flags, are abound in city streets no undaunted testimonies of we won’t be cowed, no bouquets of green black and red and white flowers adorn the French capitals magnificent architecture, the question must be why?
I understand the hypocrisy of governments, but the people, the people should know better.
Are we saying it’s okay to mourn those who fall, to the bloody hand of terrorism, especially in Europe, but not Gaza, where 20 times more women and children died last summer from Israeli aggression, than died in Paris, because if we are, then the mourning of the loss of life in France but not Gaza, only portrays us as hypocrites.
Have we become so hardened and distant to the plight of people outside our Western parameters, that we dismiss them, or have our own governments conditioned us to the point, where those people don’t really matter.
RofS, the answer is yes.
As predicted, the false-flaggers are inching towards Israel as the ‘real’ culprit for the Paris attacks. Predicted, because a few days ago I said that things would head in that direction.
Few have come out and said it straight yet, but the general noise is suggesting a Jewish plot. Indeed, some of our regulars are posting about Israel and nothing else.
Anti-Semitic conspiracy theories are rife throughout the Islamic world. The Jews are blamed for everything. Sadly, this culture seems to have spread to the apologists for Islamofascism in Europe.
Habbabkuk
18 Nov, 2015 – 2:06 pm
“Let all the [people] here who are claiming … that the attacks in Paris were NOT the work of Islamic terrorists tell us what they believe those attacks really were.”
Perhaps the important question is not “Who are the foot soldiers?” but “Who are the generals and the financiers?”.
The quote Craig uses in his post: “Raqqa is (if you like) the head of the snake”, comes from a statement that Cameron gave in Parliament yesterday, 17th November…
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201516/cmhansrd/cm151117/debtext/151117-0001.htm#15111751000580
In that same statement Cameron also said these quite chilling words:
“Thirdly, to defeat this terrorist threat in the long run we must also understand and address its root cause. That means confronting the poisonous ideology of Islamist extremism itself. As I have argued before, that means going after both violent and non-violent extremists — those who sow the poison but stop short of actually promoting violence; they are part of the problem.”
Does “… and non-violent extremists — those who sow the poison but stop short of actually promoting violence” mean people who oppose the government in any shape or form?
What does “non-violent extremists” mean? anyone who speaks out against the neo-con agenda?
If I say that Cameron & Co are quite patently a bunch of criminal loons who should be put on trial, am I now a non-violent extremist, to be dealt with by the law?
I’m sure that the ‘government people’ on here will explain.
Dave can propose one thing one year and the opposite another year, because he doesn’t really give a fuck he just wants some sort of permission to bomb something or other but preferably woolly enough to bomb Asaad communication channles and support services all the better. And once the bombing and protecting and air corridoring that the forces get involved in then the more chance of escalation.
It is suggested that 600 people in England may have committed suicide because of sanctions?
It would appear the mainly Hindu country of India, is becoming less tolerant, of othe faiths.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent visit to the UK, like China’s Jinping and Egypt’s Sisi before him, has received criticism.
One week before Modi’s arrival, a protest took place at the Houses of Parliament, likening Modi’s Hindu nationalism to Nazi ideology.
Modi was in fact banned from engaging with the UK Government for ten years from 2002 due to his alleged complicity in the massacre of over 2,000 Muslims in the Gujarat province where he was Chief Minister.
Earlier this year, a parliamentary motion signed by 40 MPs including Jeremy Corbyn, John McDonnell and Alex Salmond called on David Cameron to bring up Modi’s human rights record during the visit. The motion raised several questions over Modi’s tendency to quietly suppress uncomfortable truths.
Truths like the 2002 pogrom, the travel ban imposed on Greenpeace activists, and India’s out-and-out censorship of India’s Daughter – the BBC’s incendiary documentary on India’s extreme rape culture.
In Modi’s own country, scores of high-profile Indian intellectuals including Booker prize-winner Arundhati Roy returned their national awards in disgust at the mounting levels of communal violence that are being waged across India.
@RobG
“non-violent extremists” – orwellian speak triumph.
7.11pm – 7.14pm Three totally pointless comments plus some unpleasant vocabulary.