A former Saudi chief’s dilemma 5-25-2020

 

25, May 2020              A former Saudi chief’s dilemma

A prominent Saudi official is hiding abroad fearful what might happen to him if he returns home. Saad Aljabri, a former intelligence chief, fled abroad when he ran afoul of the de facto Saudi ruler commonly known as MBS. The Saudi prince wants him to return home concerned that the secrets he posses might compromise the security or embarrass the Kingdom. He was one of Saudi Arabia’s top intelligence officers, an expert in artificial intelligence who played a major role in the kingdom’s fight against Al Qaeda and served as a security liaison with the United States.

But Saad’s career ended abruptly during a power struggle between two powerful princes over who would rule the Kingdom.

Shortly after this fallout he fled to Canada resisting pressures to return home terrified he might be the next “Khashoggi” victim. Each country seems to have their favorite recipes for eliminating political opponents. Russian dissidents conveniently fall off tall buildings while MBS’s political opponents are locked up in hotel rooms until they pledge fealty to the ruler and handed over their riches. Those who resist are often subject to flogging, disappearances or dismemberment.  MBS deserves a special place in Madame Tussauds Chamber of Horrors.

Unable to persuade Saad to return to home, the Kingdom has turned their attention to his two sons and his brother holding them incommunicado and freezing their bank accounts.

MBS is especially nervous what state secrets Saad might have shared with his main primary American interlocutors, the CIA. American intelligence experts said the Saad’s former employer, the Saudi Interior Ministry vast surveillance network was a treasure trove of the kingdom’s dark secrets. However, all these activities do not seem to dissuade the Trump administration, the Russians, Chinese and other governments in negotiating trade deals with the Saudi Kingdom.

 

 

Pompous Pompeo & Trump 5-22-2020

 

22, May 2020                       Pompous Pompeo & Trump

It’s past time to apply the brakes on the Trump-Pompeo duo who are determined to remove the oversight guard rails of our democracy

The latest watchdog to receive a pink slip is State Department inspector general, Steve Linick who was reportedly close to completing his report on Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo’s efforts to bypass Congressional oversight in an end run to close a $8bn arms deal with Saudi Arabia and the United Emirates. This is yet another example of “American Exceptionalism.” – selling weapons to Saudi Arabia, the architects of 9/11, and the torture and dismemberment of Jamal Khashoggi. These weapons will enrich US defense contractors, but will be used to blow up innocent men, women and children in neighboring Yemen, a country on the brink of mass starvation,  a cholera epidemic and Coronavirus pandemic. It is inconceivable that Pompeo and VP Pence, who claim to be devout Christians, would negotiate arms deals with such autocratic regimes. Jesus must be weeping.

Linick’s firing is the latest in a string of dismissals of officials in watchdog roles, as Trump has steadily dismantled the machinery of government oversight. Linick was also investigating gross misuse of security staff to run errands for Pompeo and his wife Susan. They are also guilty of entertaining friends at expensive restaurants, all at taxpayer expense, a gross abuse of power. Trump should fire Pompeo and submit his own resignation. He is inflicting enormous harm to America, its people and the world at large.

 

Israel MUST EMBRACE SINGLE STATE WITH EQUAL RIGHTS 7-17-2020

 

17, July 2020            Israel MUST EMBRACE SINGLE STATE WITH EQUAL RIGHTS

The Balfour Declaration was a public statement issued by the British government in 1917 during the First World War announcing support for the establishment of a "national home for the Jewish people" in Palestine, then an Ottoman region with a small minority Jewish population and a significantly larger indigenous Palestinian population. The declaration was contained in a letter dated 2 November 1917 from the United Kingdom's Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour to Lord Rothschild, a leader of the British Jewish community, for transmission to the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland. Fast forward to the global “Black Lives Matter” movement. Palestinians have eagerly embraced the symbolism with large banners “Palestinian Lives Matter’ on prominent display in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

Since its birth Israel has displaced the local indigenous Palestinian population by brute force supported by $billions in US military and economic aid prodded by AIPAC and other powerful Jewish organizations.

In the midst of the grinding Coronavirus and crippling economy more and more Americans, including Senator Bernie Sanders, are calling for a complete halt to further unconditional aid to Israel which enjoys a significantly higher standard of living than the US.

For decades, Israel has encouraged illegal settlers to occupy more and more Palestinian land and fulfill its dream of creating a “greater Israel,” closely resembling former apartheid South Africa.

About 640,000 illegal Jewish settlers now live in East Jerusalem and the West Bank. Israeli and American governments now admit that a contiguous Palestinian state has lost any sense of reality. Even the leaders of Israel’s center-left parties no longer support such a fragmented Palestinian state.

The Trump-Kushner disastrous “peace plan” envisions an archipelago of Palestinian towns, scattered across as little as 70 percent of the West Bank, under tight Israeli military control, much like Bantustans of apartheid South Africa. This is a profoundly cruel “remedy” perpetrated by Netanyahu’s right wing government in close collaboration with the Trump administration.  The only practical, equitable way forward is ONE STATE where all Palestinians and Jews enjoy the SAME EQUAL RIGHTS otherwise Israel’s claim to be a Jewish democratic state is patently absurd.

Highly respected writers, Peter Beinart, Yousef Munayyer and Edward Said, have long argued that equality comes in the form of one state that includes Israel, the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem.

Military checkpoints, special bypass roads for Jews and favored energy and water rates should be tossed into the dustbin of history. The siege of Gaza must be lifted and a peace initiative should be initiated by Israel and soon to be President Biden to support a single state initiative to heal the wounds of decades of horrific Israeli military occupation and multiple assaults on Gaza.

Recent history provides convincing examples where such remedies have been successfully implemented. A peace agreement between Protestant Northern Ireland and a Catholic South ended decades of strife. 

Another poignant example is the peaceful settlement between Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda. Rwanda is currently one of the most progressive states in the African subcontinent. Decades of foreign “divide and rule” mischief (Britain in Ireland), (Belgium in Rwanda) and the (US and Britain in Israel) was responsible for creating death and misery for many millions of innocent victims.

Michael Flynn 5-12-2020

 

  

12, May 2020                        Michael Flynn

 

I am appalled and profoundly saddened by the blatant action of the Justice Department to undermine its own prosecutors in its case against Michael Flynn, who pleaded guilty twice to lying to F.B.I. investigators and Vice President, Mike Pence attempting to collude with the Russians.

                   

This is a political move, orchestrated by attorney general Bill Barr to help his boss, Donald Trump to divert public attention away from this administration’s inadequate response to the virus and to rile up the president’s political base. I hope the presiding judge will ignore the AJ’s recommendation to dismiss the charges, as the judge has already ruled that those charges are warranted. But it is still likely that the president will pardon Mr. Flynn, citing his decision the Justice Department’s conclusion that there is no evidence of Flynn’s guilt. Sadly, the Justice Department is moving in lockstep with a highly dysfunctional president and Republican Party who have lost their moral bearings.

 

Finally, this is the same Flynn who riled up Trump’s base with the chant, “lock her (Hilary Clinton) up!” Let us hope that justice may finally be served by locking up Flynn for a very long time.

 

 

The heartless President 5-9-2020

 

9, May 2020                   The heartless President

I wonder if Donald Trump possesses any empathic genes.

The is the same Trump who gleefully boasted of selling $billions of killing machines to the Saudis which were used to slaughter Yeminis men, women and children.

While grief stricken families mourn their loved ones who are often dispatched alone to rendezvous with the angel of death, others agonizing over the inability to embrace friends and family or seek nature’s abundant pleasures, the President obsesses with reopening businesses ignoring the advice of his medical advisors. He is currently fixated on opening meat packing companies where employees have close contacts which us is certain to accelerate the death toll.

It’s hard to watch the daily Coronavirus, “dog and pony" show, briefings at the White House where the President seems to relish hurling verbal grenades at reporters who dare challenge his abysmal record.

This is the same man who mocked a disabled journalist and boasted about grabbing women.

His flag-waving, gun toting unmasked MEGA brigade responded to Trump’s call to “LIBERATE” their Democrat governor’s states of Michigan and Wisconsin. Trump hailed the right-wing agitators as “good men”.

In a blatant attempt to deflect Americans from his gross mismanagement and incompetence, Trump and his sycophant Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, saturated the network media accusing China of manufacturing the Coronavirus in one their labs in Wuhan, a charge denied by American intelligence. Chinese, Korean and Japanese Americans have been targeted with racial slurs following Pompeo-Trump’s insensitive and inaccurate comments.

 

 

 

Stable genius unravelling? 5-1-2020

1, May 2020                            Stable genius unravelling? 

The White House coronavirus medical team were aghast at Trump’s medical musing on disinfects. He has become a global laughing stock and the widespread ridicule has clearly bruised his fragile ego. He withdrew sulking but was back a few days later, snarling at reporters and deflecting embarrassing questions of disinfectants claiming that he was being “sarcastic.”  Scarce medical resources were squandered warning Americans of the dangers of ingesting disinfectants. Instead of denouncing his comments leading Republicans like Sen. McConnell chose to drink his Kool-Aid and remain silent. His servile “Christian” VP Pence gazed loving towards his boss gushing at his “incredible leadership”. 

Trump has never been a paradigm of calmness or competence but has become more and more erratic and irritable lashing out at reporters. His misspelling of (Noble instead of NOBEL) is only his latest assault on the English language.  He blasted at a NYT article which accused him of spending his days eating junk food and watching TV.

He tweeted that he does not eat hambergers (misspelled). His previous attempt was “hamberders”. Trump would be star performer in a misspelling BEE contest.

The only people deserving more public ridicule are his “basket full of sycophant deplorables” including FOX News who applaud his incoherent ramblings. 

It is baffling why Trump has stubbornly refused to release his “amazing” school and college transcripts or his tax returns to prove he was an academic superstar and a successful businessman. Is the “very stable genius” beginning to unravel?