Elizabeth
Warren, Democratisch presidentskandidaat, is de derde op rij die een eind wil
maken aan de hulp die de VS aan Israël geeft, althans als Israël doorgaat met het annexatie beleid op de West Bank (o.a. middels het
uitbreiden en stichten van nieuwe illegale nederzettingen op de West
Bank). Eerder gingen Bernie Sanders en Pete Buttigieg haar voor. Tot
voor kort zou een dergelijke stap als politieke suïcide worden
gezien, maar blijkbaar veranderen de tijden (en dit keer ten goede
van het verdrukte Palestijnse volk).
Na jaren
tevergeefs druk te hebben uitgeoefend op Caterpillar, Motorola en een Israëlische bank (vreemd dat in het hieronder opgenomen artikel de
naam niet wordt genoemd) te stoppen zaken te doen met Israëlische illegale nederzettingen in de door Israël illegaal bezette West Bank, heeft de Episcopaalse kerk besloten banden met
deze bedrijven te verbreken (bijvoorbeeld de aandelen van dergelijke
bedrijven weg te doen en de rekening bij de bedoelde bank op te
zeggen).
De Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association (RRA) steunt
Betty McCollums (Republikein) wet om militaire hulp aan Israël in te
houden, vanwege het gevangenhouden van Palestijnse kinderen. Onder
druk zouden de Toronto Raptors hun reis naar Israël hebben uitgesteld en deze zal wellicht geheel worden afgesteld.
Tegelijkertijd
heeft Warren laten zien geen ruggengraat te hebben daar ze een Israëlische lobbyclub heeft verzekerd dat haar politieke beleid niets
te maken heeft met de progressieve Joodse groep IfNotNow……. De
vraag is wat e.e.a betekent als ze de volgende president van de VS
zal zijn en te vrezen valt dat ze het slappe beleid van Obama zal
voortzetten, ofwel veel beloven, maar weinig of zelfs niets doen,
immers de Joodse lobby in de VS politiek is uitermate machtig,
sterker nog deze bepaald zelfs deels de buitenlandpolitiek van de VS……
Mocht die VS hulp aan Israël tekort schieten, of wordt er door de VS politici te veel kritiek geleverd op Israël (naar de mening van de Israëlische regering), gaat Netanyahu, of diens opvolger naar
Capital Hill en laat daar de politici en het volk van de VS weten dat
men bijvoorbeeld vooral niet op figuren als Warren moet stemmen (precies dat deed Netanyahu in 2016)…… Dit wordt dan niet als ongewenste buitenlandse inmenging in de verkiezingen van de VS
gezien, iets waar men Rusland volkomen onterecht van beschuldigde, sterker
nog voor die Israëlische inmenging in de VS politiek zijn pakken dossiers voorradig…….
Intussen
hebben de ‘Israëlische kolonisten’, (echt) illegale bewoners van de
West Bank, de Palestijnse olijvenoogst als doel van haar ongebreidelde
agressie gemaakt: ze hebben olijfbomen vernietigd en zijn zelfs een 80 jarige rabbi te
lijf gegaan, daar deze 100 olijfbomen van vernietiging wilde
redden….. Een verhaal dat je niet op Radio1 zal horen, met haar Israël lobbyist Arlene Gelderblom, die als correspondent fungeert….
In
Jeruzalem zijn dit jaar een record aantal huizen van Palestijnen
vernietigd, daar Israël elke nieuwbouw als een bedreiging voor haar
voortbestaan ziet, terwijl dit land met het zo ongeveer modernste
leger ter wereld, niets te vrezen heeft van de Palestijnen, die je het
best kan vergelijken met de oorspronkelijke volkeren van de drie Amerika’s, ofwel een strijd van met pijl en boog bewapende bewoners, tegen modern bewapende schoften, die men
destijds ook kolonisten noemde……
Jurist
Remi Brulin heeft intussen aangetoond dat een terreurcampagne in de
80er jaren tegen Palestijnen in Libanon, waar een groot aantal
Palestijnen in vluchtelingenkamp Shatila en de aangrenzende buurt Sabra werden vermoord, het werk was van Israëlische agenten,
een zaak die de Israëlische militaire censor tot voor kort
onder de pet heeft weten te houden…… (al moet gezegd worden dat men hier al vanuit ging bij de destijds nog echt onafhankelijke pers [en in de alternatieve pers] en dat vrijwel onmiddellijk na de vreselijke
bloedbaden; opperschoft en massamoordenaar Sharon speelde ook hier ook een ‘mooie rol…’)
Stop
alle hulp aan Israël en boycot deze (nu officiële) fascistische
apartheidsstaat, ‘gefundeerd’ op de lijken van een enorm aantal
Palestijnen………
Het
volgende artikel werd geschreven door Phil Weiss van
Mondoweiss:
Elizabeth
Warren becomes the third Democratic candidate to broach the subject
of conditioning aid to Israel
Some
good things happened this week and we were there to chronicle them.
Palestinian
human rights are finally becoming an issue in the Democratic Party.
Elizabeth Warren became
the third Democrat, joining
Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders, to say that the United States
should withdraw aid from Israel if it continues its
settlement/annexation project. As our reporter Michael Arria said,
such a stance used to be “political suicide.”
After
years of urging Caterpillar, Motorola and an Israeli bank to cease
business in the occupied territories, the
Episcopal Church moved to
divest itself of these corporations. And the Reconstructionist
Rabbinical Association endorsed Rep.
Betty McCollum’s landmark bill to strip US military aid from Israel’s
detention of children. And though the Toronto
Raptors promised a
trip to Israel, they appear to have scratched the date under pressure
from activists.
Now
for the bad news…
Warren’s
campaign also assured
an Israel lobby group that
a young staffer who was a founder of the progressive Jewish group
IfNotNow will have nothing to do with her foreign policy work. Jeez
Louise.
Meantime,
there’s a stateside campaign against
Golbarg Bashi’s children’s book “P Is for Palestine” because
Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) and Samidoun endorse the book and they support
BDS. “The book is basically banned,” the
Iranian-American author told Nada Elia.
Here
are two other pieces we were proud to publish. Haidar Eid reflects
on the
late Ghassan Kanafani’s short story, The Land of Sad Oranges, written
50 years ago about the Nakba.
While
Remi Brulin demonstrates that
a terrorist campaign in Lebanon in the 1980s that killed hundreds was
the work of Israeli agents, but an Israeli military censor suppressed
that information till now– yet the U.S. press has not amended its
reports from that period.
Phil
Weiss Founder
and Senior Editor, Mondoweiss
=======================================
Voor meer berichten over de terreur tegen de Palestijnen, klik op het label met die naam, of op het label Israël, direct onder dit bericht te vinden.
Een
voormalige ‘hoge’ medewerker van de Israëlische militaire geheime dienst, Ari Ben-Menashe liet
onlangs in een interview weten dat Jeffrey Epstein en Ghislaine
Maxwell werkten voor de Israëlische geheime dienst……. Volgens deze
figuur werd het seksnetwerk van Epstein gebruikt om vooraanstaande
personen, zoals machtige politici (o.a. Bill Clinton en Tony Blair), te chanteren. Deze geheime dienst
heeft de chantage dienst opgezet en….. gebruikt!
Het
was overigens al duidelijk dat het netwerk van Epstein werd gebruikt
om vooraanstaande politici te chanteren daar zij kinderen seksueel
misbruikten, kinderen die hare kwaadaardigheid Ghislaine Maxwell ‘trash’ noemde, ofwel vuilnis waar
je mee kan doen wat je wilt…….. Vreemd genoeg hebben de reguliere
westerse massamedia vooral aandacht aan Epstein besteed, waar ze zijn
zelfmoord als zeker bestempelden, terwijl het meer dan duidelijk is
dat Epstein werd vermoord en dat moet een overheidsinstantie hebben
gedaan, of deze instantie heeft een ander de opdracht gegeven,
Epstein mocht de rechtszaal nooit bereiken, teveel belangrijke en
machtige figuren zouden van hun voedstuk donderen, neem Trump,
Clinton en ga nog maar een tijdje door…….
Ari
Ben-Menashe heeft overigens wel meer te vertellen, bijvoorbeeld dat
hij in de 80er jaren van de vorige eeuw samen met Robert Maxwell
betrokken was bij de Iran-Contra-Affaire…….. Dezelfde Maxwell
introduceerde Ben-Menashe bij Jeffrey Epstein in het midden van die
jaren 80.
Maxwell
had trouwens een heel netwerk in Israël en daar maakte ook Ariel
Sharon deel van uit, Sharon de beestachtige oorlogsmisdadiger die
verantwoordelijk was voor de massamoord in Sabra en
Shatila, het Palestijnse vluchtelingenkamp en de aangrenzende wijk in Beiroet, Libanon……
Voorafgaand aan een interview met Robert Parry in 2012 over Iran Contra en andere smerige geheime acties in de 80er jaren van de vorige eeuw, ging het huis van Ben-Menashe in Montreal in vlammen op, e.e.a. als gevolg van een aanval met een brandbom waarin een vloeistof die alleen door militairen wordt gebruikt, het is dan ook wel duidelijk dat Israël Ben-Menashe de mond wilde snoeren…….
Eén ding is zeker, de continue westerse steun voor de (nu officieel) fascistische apartheidsstaat Israël, is bepaald niet alleen ingegeven door een schuldgevoel over de holocaust……..
Lees
het volgende artikel geschreven door Whitney Webb en dat eerder
verscheen op MintPressNews en ook jij zal begrijpen dat Epstein zijn
mond moest houden, ofwel hij werd vermoord:
A
recent interview given by a former high-ranking official in Israeli
military intelligence has claimed that Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual
blackmail enterprise was an Israel intelligence operation run for the
purpose of entrapping powerful individuals and politicians in the
United States and abroad.
Since
the apparent death by suicide of Jeffrey Epstein in a Manhattan
prison, much has come to light about his depraved activities and
methods used to sexually abuse underage girls and entrap the rich and
powerful for the purposes of blackmail. Epstein’s ties to
intelligence, described in-depth in a recentMintPress investigative
series,
have continued to receive minimal mainstream media coverage, which
has essentially moved on from the Epstein scandal despite the fact
that his many co-conspirators remain on the loose.
For
those who have examined Epstein’s ties to intelligence, there are
clear links to both U.S. intelligence and Israeli intelligence,
leaving it somewhat open to debate as to which country’s
intelligence apparatus was closest to Epstein and most involved in
his blackmail/sex-trafficking activities. A recent interview given by
a former high-ranking official in Israeli military intelligence has
claimed that Epstein’s sexual blackmail enterprise was an Israel
intelligence operation run for the purpose of entrapping powerful
individuals and politicians in the United States and abroad.
In an
interview with
Zev Shalev, former CBS
News executive
producer and award-winning investigative journalist for Narativ,
the former senior executive for Israel’s Directorate of Military
Intelligence, Ari Ben-Menashe, claimed not only to have met Jeffrey
Epstein and his alleged madam, Ghislaine Maxwell, back in the 1980s,
but that both Epstein and Maxwell were already working
with Israeli intelligence during that time period.
“They
found a niche”
In an
interview last
week with the independent outlet Narativ,
Ben-Menashe, who himself was involved in Iran-Contra arms deals, told
his interviewer Zev Shalev that he had been introduced to Jeffrey
Epstein by Robert Maxwell in the mid-1980s while Maxwell’s and
Ben-Menashe’s involvement with Iran-Contra was ongoing. Ben-Menashe
did not specify the year he met Epstein.
Ben-Menashe
told Shalev that “he [Maxwell] wanted us to accept him [Epstein] as
part of our group …. I’m not denying that we were at the time a
group that it was Nick Davies [Foreign Editor of the
Maxwell-Owned Daily
Mirror],
it was Maxwell, it was myself and our team from Israel, we were doing
what we were doing.” Past reporting by Seymour Hersh and
others revealed
that Maxwell,
Davies and Ben-Menashe were involved in the transfer and sale of
military equipment and weapons from Israel to Iran on behalf of
Israeli intelligence during this time period.
He
then added that Maxwell had stated during the introduction that “your
Israeli bosses have already approved” of Epstein. Shalev later
noted that Maxwell “had an extensive network in Israel at the time,
which included the then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, according to
Ben-Menashe.”
Ben-Menashe
went on to say that he had “met him [Epstein] a few times in
Maxwell’s office, that was it.” He also said he was not aware of
Epstein being involved in arms deals for anyone else he knew at the
time, but that Maxwell wanted to involve Epstein in the arms transfer
in which he, Davies and Ben-Menashe were engaged on Israel’s
behalf.
Ariel
Sharon (right) meets with Robert Maxwell in Jerusalem on Feb. 20,
1990. Photo | AP
However,
as MintPress reported
in Part
IV of
the investigative series “Inside
the Jeffrey Epstein Scandal: Too Big to Fail,”
Epstein was involved with several arms dealers during this period of
time, some of whom were directly involved in Iran-Contra arms deals
between Israel and Iran. For instance, after leaving Bear Stearns in
1981, Epstein began
working in
the realms of shadow finance as a self-described “financial bounty
hunter,” where he would both hunt down and hide money for powerful
people. One of these powerful individuals was Adnan Khashoggi, a
Saudi arms dealer with close ties to both Israeli and U.S.
intelligence and one of the main brokers of Iran-Contra arms deals
between Israel and Iran. Epstein would later forge a business
relationship with a CIA front company involved in another aspect of
Iran-Contra, the airline Southern Air Transport, on behalf of Leslie
Wexner’s company, The Limited.
During
this period, it is also known that Epstein became well acquainted
with the British arms dealer Sir Douglas Leese, who collaborated with
Khashoggi on at least one British-Saudi arms deal in the 1980s.
Leese would
later introduce Epstein
to Steven Hoffenberg, calling Epstein a “genius” and describing
his lack of morals during that introduction. Thus, there are
indications that Epstein was involved with Middle Eastern arms deals,
including some related to Iran-Contra, during this period. In
addition, Epstein would later claim (and then subsequently deny)
having worked for the CIA during this period.
After
having been introduced to Epstein, Ben-Menashe claimed that neither
he nor Davies were impressed with Epstein and considered him “not
very competent.” He added that Ghislaine Maxwell had “fallen for”
Epstein and that he believed that the romantic relationship between
his daughter and Epstein led Robert Maxwell to work to bring the
latter into the “family business” — i.e., Maxwell’s dealings
with Israeli intelligence. This information is very revealing, given
that the narrative, until now at least, has been that Ghislaine
Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein did not meet and begin their relationship
until after Robert Maxwell’s death in 1991, after which Ghislaine
moved to New York.
Ben-Menashe
says that well after the introduction, though again he does not
specify what year, Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein began a
sexual blackmail operation with the purpose of extorting U.S.
political and public figures on behalf of Israeli military
intelligence. He stated:
In
this case what really happened, my take on it, in the later thing, is
that these guys were seen as agents. They weren’t really competent
to do very much. And so they found a niche for themselves —
blackmailing American and other political figures.”
He
then confirmed, when prompted, that they were blackmailing Americans
on behalf of Israeli intelligence.
In
response to his statement, Zev Shalev replied, “But, you know,
for most people it’s hard for them to think of Israel as being …
blackmailing their leaders in the United States, it’s a very …”
at which point, Ben-Menashe interrupted and the following exchange
took place:
Ari
Ben-Menashe: You’re kidding? [laughs]…. It was
quite their M.O. Sleeping around is not a crime, it may be
embarrassing, but it’s not a crime, but sleeping with underage
girls is a crime.
Shalev: It
was a crime in 2000 as well, but they let him off that…
Ben-Menashe: And
that it is [why] always so he [Epstein] made sure these girls were
underage.
In
addition, when Shalev asked Ben-Menashe about the
relationship between
Jeffrey Epstein and former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak,
Ben-Menashe stated “After a while, you know, what Mr. Epstein was
doing was collecting intelligence on people in the United States. And
so if you want to go to the U.S. if you’re a high-profile
politician you want to know information about people.” Ben-Menashe
subsequently stated that Barak was obtaining compromising information
(i.e., blackmail) that Epstein had acquired on powerful people in the
United States.
PROMIS,
sex, and blackmail
If
Robert Maxwell did recruit Epstein and bring him into the “family
business” and the world of Israeli intelligence, as Ben-Menashe has
claimed, it provides supporting evidence for information provided
to MintPress by a former U.S. intelligence official,
who chose to remain anonymous in light of the sensitivity of the
claim.
This
source, who has direct knowledge of the unauthorized use of PROMIS to
support covert U.S. and Israeli intelligence projects,
told MintPress that
“some of the proceeds from the illicit sales of PROMIS were made
available to Jeffrey Epstein for use in compromising targets of
political blackmail.” As was noted in a Mintpress series
on the Epstein scandal,
much of Epstein’s funding also came from Ohio billionaire Leslie
Wexner, who has documented ties to both organized crime and U.S. and
Israeli intelligence.
After
the PROMIS software was stolen from its rightful owner and developer,
Inslaw Inc., through the collusion of both U.S. and Israeli
officials, it was marketed mainly by two men: Earl Brian, a close
aide to Ronald Reagan, later U.S. envoy to Iran and close friend of
Israeli spymaster Rafi Eitan; and Robert Maxwell. Brian sold the
bugged software through his company, Hadron Inc., while Maxwell sold
it through an Israeli company he acquired called Degem. Before and
following Maxwell’s acquisition of Degem, the company was a
known front for
Mossad operations and Mossad operatives in Latin America often posed
as Degem employees.
With
Maxwell — Epstein’s alleged recruiter and father of Epstein’s
alleged madam — having been one of the main salespeople involved in
selling PROMIS software on behalf of intelligence, he would have been
in a key position to furnish Epstein’s nascent sexual blackmail
operation with the proceeds from the sale of PROMIS.
This
link between Epstein’s sexual blackmail operation and the PROMIS
software scandal is notable given that the illicit use of PROMIS by
U.S. and Israeli intelligence has been for blackmail purposes on U.S.
public figures and politicians, as was described in a
recent MintPress report.
Can
an ex-spy be trusted?
When
dealing in the world of deception and intrigue that defines
intelligence operations, it is often difficult to determine whether
any individual linked to an intelligence agency is telling the truth.
Indeed, in the United States, there are examplesof
elected intelligence officials committing perjury and lying to
Congress on
several occasions with
no consequences, and of intelligence officials feeding politically
motivated and untrue information to agency assets in the media.
So,
are Ari Ben-Menashe’s claims regarding Epstein and the Maxwells
trustworthy? In addition to the aforementioned, corroborating
information for his claims, a review of Ben-Menashe’s
post-intelligence career suggests this is the case.
Ari
Ben Menashe arrives at Harare International Airport, in Zimbabwe,
Feb. 22, 2002. Photo | AP
Prior
to his arrest in November 1989, Ben-Menashe was a high-ranking
officer in a special unit of Israeli military intelligence. He
would later
claim that
his arrest for attempting to sell American-made weapons to Iran was
politically motivated, as he had threatened to expose what the U.S.
government had done with the stolen PROMIS software if the U.S. did
not cease providing Saddam Hussein’s Iraq with chemical weapons.
Ben-Menashe was later
acquitted when
a U.S. court determined that his involvement in the attempted sale of
military equipment to Iran was done on behalf of the Israeli state.
After
his arrest, Ben-Menashe was visited in prison by Robert Parry, the
former Newsweek contributor
and Associated
Press reporter
who would later found and run Consortium
News until
his recent passing last year. Parry remembered
that,
during that interview, “Ben-Menashe offered me startling new
information about the Iran-Contra scandal, which I thought that I
knew quite well.”
Israel’s
government immediately began to attack Ben-Menashe’s credibility
following his interview with Parry, and claimed that Ben-Menashe had
never worked for Israeli intelligence. When Parry soon found
evidence that
Ben-Menashe had indeed served in Israeli military intelligence,
Israel’s government was then forced to admit that he had worked for
military intelligence, but only as a “low-level translator.”
Yet, the
documentation Parry
had uncovered described Ben-Menashe as having served in “key
positions” and performed “complex and sensitive assignments.”
A
year later, Ben-Menashe would be interviewed by another journalist,
Seymour Hersh. It would be Ben-Menashe who first revealed to Hersh
secrets about Israel’s nuclear program and the fact that British
media mogul Robert Maxwell was an Israeli spy, revelations that Hersh
would not only independently corroborate but include in his book The
Samson Option: Israel’s Nuclear Arsenal and American Foreign
Policy.
Hersh was then sued by Robert Maxwell and the Maxwell-owned Mirror
Group for libel. The case was later
settled in
Hersh’s favor, as the claims Hersh had made were true and not
libelous. As a result, the Mirror Group paid Hersh for damages,
covered his legal costs, and issued him a formal apology.
After
Ben-Menashe’s interviews by Hersh and Parry, Israel’s government
was apparently concerned enough about what Ben-Menashe would tell
congressional investigators that it attempted
to kidnap him and
bring him back to Israel to face state charges, much like Israeli
intelligence had done to Israel’s nuclear-weapons whistleblower
Mordechai Vanunu. The plan was foiled largely thanks to Parry.
Parry,
who broke many key stories related to the Iran-Contra scandal in the
1980s and beyond, was tipped off by a U.S. intelligence source about
a joint U.S.-Israel plan to have Ben-Menashe first be denied entry to
the United States on his planned trip to give congressional
testimony. Per the plan, Ben-Menashe would be denied entry to the
U.S. in Los Angeles and then be deported to Israel, where he would
have stood trial for “exposing state secrets.” Parry called
Ben-Menashe and convinced him to delay his flight until he secured a
guarantee for safe passage from the U.S. government.
Ben-Menashe
subsequently gave a
sworn statement to
the House Judiciary Committee that mostly focused on U.S.-Israel
collusion regarding the theft and creation of a “backdoor” into
the PROMIS software. Ben-Menashe offered to name names and provide
corroborating evidence for several of his claims if he was offered
immunity by the committee, which, for whatever reason. declined that
request.
Prior
to the conclusion of the Hersh “libel” trial, which would later
uphold Ben-Menashe’s claims regarding Robert Maxwell’s Mossad
activities as true, there was a concerted effort in the U.S. press to
downplay Ben-Menashe’s credibility. For instance, Newsweek —
in an article on Ben-Menashe entitled “One
Man, Many Tales”
— claimed that “inconsistencies may undermine Ben-Menashe’s
testimony in the British courtroom proceedings,” citing
inconsistencies from sources in Israel’s government and Israeli
intelligence as well as Ben-Menashe’s
ex-wife and
Israeli journalist Shmuel (or Samuel) Segev, a former
IDF colonel.
It goes without saying that such sources had much to gain from any
effort to discredit Ben-Menashe’s claims.
According
to Parry, this media campaign, which employed American journalists
with close
ties to
Israel’s government and intelligence agencies, was very successful
“in marginalizing Ben-Menashe by 1993, at least in the eyes of the
Washington Establishment.” After a years-long media campaign to
discredit Ben-Menashe, “the Israelis seemed to view him as a
declining threat, best left alone. He was able to pick up the pieces
of his life, creating a second act as an international political
consultant and businessman arranging sales of grain.” The effort to
marginalize Ben-Menashe has continued well into recent years, with
mainstream news outlets still referring to him as a “self-described
ex-Israeli spy”
— despite the well-documented fact that Ben-Menashe worked for
Israeli intelligence — as a means of downplaying his claims
regarding his time in Israel’s intelligence service.
After
the conclusion of the Hersh libel trial, Ben-Menashe became an
international political consultant who “surrounded his far-flung
business activities in secrecy and got involved with some
controversial international figures, such as Zimbabwe’s leader
Robert Mugabe,” and “conducted
his international consulting business … in a wide variety of global
hotspots, including conflict zones,” according to Parry. In
addition to Mugabe, Ben-Menashe has
also recently come underfirefor
his consulting work on behalf of Sudan’s military junta and
Venezuelan opposition politician Henri Falcón.
Ben-Menashe
has also maintained ties to several different intelligence services
and eventually
became a
controversial whistleblower whose information led
to the arrest of
the former head of Canada’s Security Intelligence Review Committee,
Arthur Porter.
As
far as his character is concerned, Parry
noted that
Ben-Menashe could often be “his own worst enemy” and that, even
though Parry considered his information regarding Iran-Contra and
PROMIS reliable and noted that much of it was later corroborated, he
“often compound[ed] his media problem by treating journalists in a
high-handed manner, either due to his suspicions of them or his
arrogance.”
Bill
Hamilton, the original developer of the PROMIS software and head of
Inslaw Inc., also found Ben-Menashe’s claims regarding the illicit
use of PROMIS by U.S. and Israeli intelligence agencies to be
credible, though he expressed doubts about Ben-Menashe’s
character.
Hamilton
told MintPress the following about Ben-Menashe:
Ari
Ben Menashe was the first source to tell us reliable information
about the role of Rafi Eitan and Israeli intelligence vis-a-vis
PROMIS but, in the end, of course, he was a clandestine services-type
guy whose official duties include the ability and willingness to lie,
cheat, and steal.”
A
threat revived
While
Ben-Menashe may have been viewed as a “declining threat” after
the early 1990s, his plans to meet with Robert Parry of Consortium
News years
later in 2012 to discuss Iran-Contra and other covert dealings of the
1980s appeared to change that. Right before he planned to travel from
Canada to the United States to meet with Parry and “finally prove”
the truthfulness of his past claims, a
fire-bomb was thrown into
his Montreal home, destroying it.
Air Ben-Menashe surveys
the damage to his home after it was mysteriously firebombed. Photos |
Robert Parry
Though
Canadian media referred
to the
incendiary device as a “molotov cocktail,” Consortium
News reported that
“the arson squad’s initial assessment is said to be that the
flammable agent was beyond the sort of accelerant used by common
criminals,” leading to speculation that the accelerant was
military-grade.
Had
it not been for the bomb, the origins of which Canadian police failed
to determine, Ben-Menashe would have traveled to the U.S. alongside a
“senior Israeli intelligence figure” to be interviewed by Parry.
The other intelligence-linked individual, according
to Parry,
“concluded that the attack was meant as a message from Israeli
authorities to stay silent about the historical events that he was
expected to discuss.”
Though
neither Ben-Menashe nor Parry directly blamed Israel’s government
for the destruction of Ben-Menashe’s home, Parry
noted that
the bombing did succeed in “intimidating Ben-Menashe, shutting down
possible new disclosures of Israeli misconduct from the other
intelligence veteran, and destroying records that would have helped
Ben-Menashe prove whatever statements he might make.”
While
Ben-Menashe’s post-intelligence associations with controversial
governments and individuals have given plenty of fodder to the still
thriving media campaign to discredit his claims about covert
U.S.-Israel operations in the 1980s, there remain troubling
indications that the Israeli government sees his information on
decades-old events as a threat.
Now,
with the major efforts by powerful Americans and Israelis to distance
themselves from Jeffrey Epstein and other figures associated with his
depraved sex trafficking operation, Ben-Menashe may soon again find
his reputation — and perhaps more — under fire.
Feature
photo | Graphic by Claudio Cabrera
Whitney
Webb is
a MintPress News journalist based in Chile. She has contributed to
several independent media outlets including Global Research,
EcoWatch, the Ron Paul Institute and 21st Century Wire, among others.
She has made several radio and television appearances and is the 2019
winner of the Serena Shim Award for Uncompromised Integrity in
Journalism.
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Oud-geheime
dienst medewerkers en inlichtingen veteranen hebben een memorandum
voor president beest Trump geschreven, met de waarschuwing geen
oorlog met Iran te beginnen, dit daar ze de tekenen daartoe
zien…… Zoals ze ook president George W Bush (nog zo’n gevaarlijke
malloot, dat geldt overigens ook voor Obama de gespletene)
waarschuwden geen oorlog te beginnen met Irak in de 6 weken voordat
de VS illegaal, een op leugens gebaseerde oorlog begon tegen dat
land…….
We
weten wat van de illegale oorlog tegen Irak heeft gebracht: meer dan 1,5
miljoen vermoorde Irakezen en een land dat in chaos is gedompeld en
in puin ligt (reken maar niet, met IS in het defensief, dat de
ellende voor de bevolking daar voorbij is…..)
Een
en ander is ook ingegeven door het bezoek dat de Israëlische Palestijnenslachter Netanyahu volgende week
aan de VS zal brengen, deze psychopathische moordenaar ‘is gewond
geraakt’ door met bewijs onderbouwde zware beschuldigingen van corruptie……* En als bij
gewonde roofdieren moet je dan extra oppassen, immers een oorlog met
Iran zou Netanyahu nu wel uitermate goed uitkomen…….
Uiteraard zal de VS komen met een zogenaamd bewijs waarop het ‘niet anders kan’ dan Iran aanvallen, ofwel een ‘false flag’ operatie, zoals de VS die door haar bloedige geschiedenis heen heeft gebruikt voor het uitoefenen van ongebreidelde agressie, of beter gezegd: grootschalige terreur………..
Lees het volgende uitstekende memorandum en oordeel zelf:
Intelligence
Veterans Warn of Growing Risk for War With Iran Based on False
Pretexts
(CN) — As
President Donald Trump prepares to host Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu next week, a group of U.S. intelligence
veterans offers corrections to a number of false accusations
that have been leveled against Iran.
MEMORANDUM
FOR:
The President
FROM:
Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS)
SUBJECT: War
With Iran
INTRODUCTION
In
our December
21st Memorandum to you,
we cautioned that the claim that Iran is currently the world’s top
sponsor of terrorism is unsupported by hard evidence. Meanwhile,
other false accusations against Iran have intensified. Thus, we feel
obliged to alert you to the virtually inevitable consequences of war
with Iran, just as we warned President George W. Bush six weeks
before the U.S. attack on Iraq 15 years ago.
In our
first Memorandum in this genre we
told then-President Bush that we saw “no compelling reason” to
attack Iraq, and warned “the unintended consequences are likely to
be catastrophic.” The consequences will be far worse, should
the U.S. become drawn into war with Iran. We fear that you are
not getting the straight story on this from your intelligence and
national security officials.
After
choosing “War With Iran” for the subject-line of this Memo, we
were reminded that we had used it before, namely, for a
Memorandum to President Obama on August 3, 2010 in
similar circumstances. You may wish to ask your staff to give you
that one to read and ponder. It included a startling quote from
then-Chairman of President Bush Jr.’s Intelligence Advisory Board
(and former national security adviser to Bush Sr.) Gen. Brent
Scowcroft, who told the Financial
Times on
October 14, 2004 that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had George
W. Bush “mesmerized;” that “Sharon just has him wrapped around
his little finger.” We wanted to remind you of that history,
as you prepare to host Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu next
week.
*
* *
Rhetoric
vs. Reality
We
believe that the recent reporting regarding possible conflict with
nuclear-armed North Korea has somewhat obscured consideration of the
significantly higher probability that Israel or even Saudi Arabia
will take steps that will lead to a war with Iran that will
inevitably draw the United States in. Israel is particularly inclined
to move aggressively, with potentially serious consequences for the
U.S., in the wake of the recent incident involving an alleged Iranian
drone and the shooting down of an Israeli aircraft.
There
is also considerable anti-Iran rhetoric in U.S. media, which might
well facilitate a transition from a cold war-type situation to a hot
war involving U.S. forces. We have for some time been observing with
some concern the growing hostility towards Iran coming out of
Washington and from the governments of Israel and Saudi Arabia.
National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster is warning that the “time
to act is now” to thwart Iran’s aggressive regional ambitions
while U.S. United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley sees a “wake-up”
call in the recent shooting incident involving Syria and Israel.
Particular concern has been expressed by the White House that Iran is
exploiting Shi’a minorities in neighboring Sunni dominated states
to create unrest and is also expanding its role in neighboring Iraq
and Syria.
While
we share concerns over the Iranian government’s intentions
vis-à-vis its neighbors, we do not believe that the developments in
the region, many of which came about through American missteps, have
a major impact on vital U.S. national interests. Nor is Iran, which
often sees itself as acting defensively against surrounding Sunni
states, anything like an existential threat to the United States that
would mandate the sustained military action that would inevitably
result if Iran is attacked.
Iran’s
alleged desire to stitch together a sphere of influence consisting of
an arc of allied nations and proxy forces running from its western
borders to the Mediterranean Sea has been frequently cited as
justification for a more assertive policy against Tehran, but we
believe this concern to be greatly exaggerated. Iran, with a
population of more than 80 million, is, to be sure, a major regional
power but militarily, economically and politically it is highly
vulnerable.
Limited
Military Capability
Tehran’s
Revolutionary Guard is well armed and trained, but much of its “boots
on the ground” army consists of militiamen of variable quality. Its
Air Force is a “shadow” of what existed under the Shah and
is significantly outgunned by its rivals in the Persian Gulf, not to
mention Israel. Its navy is only “green water” capable in that it
consists largely of smaller vessels responsible for coastal defense
supplemented by the swarming of Revolutionary Guard small speedboats.
When
Napoleon had conquered much of continental Europe and was
contemplating invading Britain it was widely believed that England
was helpless before him. British Admiral Earl St Vincent was
unperturbed: “I do not say the French can’t come, I only say they
can’t come by sea.” We likewise believe that Iran’s apparent
threat is in reality decisively limited by its inability to project
power across the water or through the air against neighboring states
that have marked superiority in both respects.
The
concern over a possibly developing “Shi’ite land bridge,” also
referred to as an “arc” or “crescent,” is likewise
overstated. It ignores the reality that Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon all
have strong national identities and religiously mixed populations.
They are influenced — some of them strongly — by Iran but they
are not puppet states. And there is also an ethnic division that the
neighboring states’ populations are very conscious of– they are
Arabs and Iran is Persian, which is also true of the Shi’a
populations in Saudi Arabia and the Emirates.
Majority
Shi’a Iraq, for example, is now very friendly to Iran but it has to
deal with considerable Kurdish and Sunni minorities in its governance
and in the direction of its foreign policy. It will not do Iran’s
bidding on a number of key issues, including Baghdad’s relationship
with Washington, and would be unwilling to become a proxy in Tehran’s
conflicts with Israel and Saudi Arabia. Iraqi Vice President Osama
al-Nujaifi, the highest-ranking Sunni in the Prime Minister Haider
al-Abadi government, has, for example, recently called for the
demobilization of the Shi’ite Popular Mobilization Forces or
militias that have been fighting ISIS because they “have their own
political aspirations, their own [political] agendas. … They are
very dangerous to the future of Iraq.”
Nuclear
Weapons Thwarted
A
major concern that has undergirded much of the perception of an
Iranian threat is the possibility that Tehran will develop a nuclear
weapon somewhere down the road. We believe that the current Joint
Comprehensive Plan of Action, even if imperfect, provides the best
response to that Iranian proliferation problem. The U.N. inspections
regime is strict and, if the agreement stands, there is every reason
to believe that Iran will be unable to take the necessary precursor
steps leading to a nuclear weapons program. Iran will be further
limited in its options after the agreement expires in nine years.
Experts believe that, at that point, Iran its not likely to choose to
accumulate the necessary highly enriched uranium stocks to proceed.
The
recent incident involving the shoot-down of a drone alleged to be
Iranian, followed by the downing of an Israeli fighter by a Syrian
air defense missile, resulted in a sharp response from Tel Aviv,
though reportedly mitigated by a warning from Russian President
Vladimir Putin that anything more provocative might inadvertently
involve Russia in the conflict. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu is said to have moderated his response but his government
is clearly contemplating a more robust intervention to counter what
he describes as a developing Iranian presence in Syria.
In
addition, Netanyahu may be indicted on corruption charges, and it is
conceivable that he might welcome a “small war” to deflect
attention from mounting political problems at home.
Getting
Snookered Into War
We
believe that the mounting Iran hysteria evident in the U.S. media and
reflected in Beltway groupthink has largely been generated by Saudi
Arabia and Israel, who nurture their own aspirations for regional
political and military supremacy. There are no actual American vital
interests at stake and it is past time to pause and take a step
backwards to consider what those interests actually are in a region
that has seen nothing but disaster since 2003. Countering an assumed
Iranian threat that is minimal and triggering a war would be
catastrophic and would exacerbate instability, likely leading to a
breakdown in the current political alignment of the entire Middle
East. It would be costly for the United States.
Iran
is not militarily formidable, but its ability to fight on the
defensive against U.S. naval and air forces is considerable and can
cause high casualties. There appears to be a perception in the
Defense
Department
that Iran could be defeated in a matter of days, but we would warn
that such predictions tend to be based on overly optimistic
projections, witness the outcomes in Afghanistan and Iraq. In
addition, Tehran would be able again to unleash terrorist resources
throughout the region, endangering U.S. military and diplomats based
there as well as American travelers and businesses. The terrorist
threat might easily extend beyond the Middle East into Europe and
also the United States, while the dollar costs of a major new
conflict and its aftermath could break the bank, literally.
Another
major consideration before ratcheting up hostilities should be that a
war with Iran might not be containable. As the warning from President
Vladimir Putin to Netanyahu made clear, other major powers have
interests in what goes on in the Persian Gulf, and there is a real
danger that a regional war could have global consequences.
In
sum, we see a growing risk that the U.S. will become drawn into
hostilities on pretexts fabricated by Israel and Saudi Arabia for
their actual common objective (“regime change” in Iran). A
confluence of factors and misconceptions about what is at stake and
how such a conflict is likely to develop, coming from both inside and
outside the Administration have, unfortunately, made such an outcome
increasingly likely.
We
have seen this picture before, just 15 years ago in Iraq, which
should serve as a warning. The prevailing perception of threat
that the Mullahs of Iran allegedly pose directly against the security
of the U.S. is largely contrived. Even if all the allegations were
true, they would not justify an Iraq-style “preventive war”
violating national as well as international law. An ill-considered
U.S. intervention in Iran is surely not worth the horrific
humanitarian, military, economic, and political cost to be paid if
Washington allows itself to become part of an armed attack.
FOR
THE STEERING GROUP, VETERAN INTELLIGENCE PROFESSIONALS FOR SANITY
William
Binney, former NSA Technical Director for World Geopolitical &
Military Analysis; Co-founder of NSA’s Signals Intelligence
Automation Research Center (ret.)
Kathleen
Christison, CIA, Senior Analyst on Middle East (ret.)
Graham
E. Fuller, Vice-Chair, National Intelligence Council (ret.)
Philip
Giraldi, CIA, Operations Officer (ret.)
Matthew
Hoh, former Capt., USMC Iraq; Foreign Service Officer, Afghanistan
(associate VIPS)
Larry
C. Johnson, former CIA and State Department Counter Terrorism officer
Michael
S. Kearns, Captain, USAF; ex-Master SERE Instructor for Strategic
Reconnaissance Operations (NSA/DIA) and Special Mission Units (JSOC)
(ret.)
John
Brady Kiesling, Foreign Service Officer; resigned Feb. 27, 2003 as
Political Counselor, U.S. Embassy, Athens, in protest against the
U.S. attack on Iraq (ret.)
John
Kiriakou, Former CIA Counterterrorism Officer and former senior
investigator, Senate Foreign Relations Committee
Edward
Loomis, Jr., former NSA Technical Director for the Office of Signals
Processing (ret.)
David
MacMichael, National Intelligence Council, National Intelligence
Estimates Officer (ret.)
Ray
McGovern, former US Army infantry/intelligence officer & CIA
analyst; CIA Presidential briefer (ret.)
Elizabeth
Murray, Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Near East (ret.)
Todd
E. Pierce, MAJ, US Army Judge Advocate (ret.)
Coleen
Rowley, FBI Special Agent and former Minneapolis Division Legal
Counsel (ret.)
Greg
Thielmann, former Director of the Strategic, Proliferation, and
Military Affairs Office, State
Department
Bureau of Intelligence & Research (INR), and former senior
staffer on Senate Intelligence Committee (ret.)
Kirk
Wiebe, former Senior Analyst, SIGINT Automation Research Center, NSA
ret.)
Lawrence
Wilkerson, Colonel (USA, ret.), former Chief of Staff for Secretary
of State; Distinguished Visiting Professor, College of William and
Mary (associate VIPS)
Sarah
G. Wilton, CDR, USNR, (ret.); Defense Intelligence Agency (ret.)
Robert
Wing, former Foreign Service Officer (associate VIPS)
Ann
Wright, Colonel, US Army (ret.); also Foreign Service Officer who,
like Political Counselor John Brady Kiesling, resigned in opposition
to the war on Iraq
Zoals te verwachten was, de superlatieven waarmee de Israëlische massamoordenaar Sharon wordt geprezen, zijn niet van de ‘lucht’. Joe Biden, de vicepresident van de VS, was aanwezig bij de herdenkingsdienst en vond het nodig om de waanzinnige kwaliteiten van Sharon te prijzen, waarnaast hij natuurlijk nog eens uitsprak, dat wat Israël ook mocht doen, de VS het land altijd zal blijven steunen, het land houdt zich immers ‘geweldig’ aan de internationale verdragen………. de exorbitante PvdA zelfverrijker Kok was ook aanwezig en deze ongelofelijke volksverlakker durfde te zeggen, dat met de dood van Sharon een groot staatsman is heengegaan…………
Op Radio1 de hele dag extra aandacht voor de begrafenis van deze massamoordenaar, men heeft zelfs een woordvoerder van het CIDI in de studio (in het programma De nieuws BV), veel mooie woorden. Vanmorgen op Radio1 (het programma tot 9.00 u.) een bezoek aan een joods familiebedrijf. Een dame daar, vertelde zich niet met politiek te bemoeien en nadat ze had gesteld, dat alleen Joden kritiek mogen uiten op Israël en ook alleen Joden grappen over Joden mogen maken, kwam de dame alsnog met een halve politieke ‘analyse’ van de situatie…… Na 12.45 u. was er dan toch enige kritiek op de berichtgeving aangaande Sharon, met name in de gesproken media, waarop ‘presentator’ en super leeghoofd Willemijn Veenhoven, geïrriteerd reageerde, dat er anders genoeg over geschreven is….. Logisch Veenhoven is in de veronderstelling, dat ze bij een krant werkt……. ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! De figuur van het CIDI had nog één kritiek puntje op Sharon: het terugtrekken uit en het weggeven van de Gazastrook aan de Palestijnen. Ik pleurde bijna van m’n spreekwoordelijke stoel, maar werd snel gerustgesteld door deze figuur: niet dat de Palestijnen in de Gazastrook in één grote gevangenis leven en dat dit een grof schandaal is, nee dat er sindsdien allemaal raketten worden afgeschoten vanuit de Gazastrook…… Raketten? Veredelde vuurpijlen zal je bedoelen, in Nederland zijn in de loop van de jaren meer doden gevallen door vuurwerk, dan in Israël door tienduizenden ‘raketten……’
Zojuist is bekend gemaakt, dat Ariel Sharon, de oud premier van Israël, is overleden. Ariel Sharon de massamoordenaar, haatzaaier en zionist (zionisme staat voor mij gelijk aan fascisme). Benieuwd in welke mate hij in de Nederlandse media opgehemeld zal worden, want dat dit zal gebeuren en niet alleen door de PVV fascisten, is zo zeker als de uitkomst van de optelsom 1 + 1, twee is………..
Een toevoeging: Sharon werd door een Israëlische onderzoekscommissie aangewezen als verantwoordelijke voor de bloedbaden in de Palestijnse vluchtelingenkampen Sabra en Shatila in Libanon (van 16 t/m 18 september 1982), waarbij honderden mensen (inclusief kinderen) omkwamen…..