By Tony Cartalucci for Global Research.

Despite what appears to be a terminal decline of US influence over the Middle East, Washington has no intentions of gracefully abandoning its aspirations of regional hegemony.

Air strikes carried out against Syria by Washington’s Israeli proxies, a mysterious explosion near Tehran, and the current Iraqi Prime Minister’s decision to round up leaders of Iranian-backed militias who helped defeat the self-proclaimed “Islamic State” (ISIS) unfolded in quick succession in an apparent coordinated campaign aimed at Iran and its allies.

New Iraqi Prime Minister’s Checkered Past

Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi took office in May 2020.

While he has warned about deepening relations with Iran he has concurrently stated the importance of US backing – despite the US having illegally invaded, destroyed, and since occupied Iraq starting in 2003.

A Saudi-brokered ceasefire between the Saudi-backed government in Yemen and the Southern Transitional Council (STC) has not lasted long, and after tensions on the island of Socotra, fighting erupted in Abyan Province.

Fighting has raged over 24 hours in Abyan Province, with at least 54 fighters killed. Both sides are blaming the other for starting the fighting and “violating” the truce. Monitors are still heading into Abyan, but it’s not clear there is a ceasefire left to monitor.

A coastal province, Abyan has often been contested by the STC, and the same territory was under dispute during the Arab Spring, when Islamist groups tied to al-Qaeda seized several towns in the area, including the provincial capital of Zinjibar.

SOURCE: JUST THE NEWS
In a Gallup public opinion survey released near the beginning of the coronavirus shutdown, eight of the nine institutions studied received majority positive ratings — led by U.S. hospitals, at 88% approval.

The media ranked dead last in the study of Americans' trust in institutions. Only the media got a more negative than positive review. The finding is part of a decades-long decline in popular trust in the media, Gallup's editor-in-chief Mohamed Younis said Tuesday during a virtual panel organized by the U.S. Council on Competitiveness.

Since 2015, Gallup has tracked an increase in divergence between Republicans and Democrats on their attitudes toward the national media, Younis explained.

The current partisan split is "not surprising," given the contentious relationship President Trump, a Republican, has with the current media, Younis said. Still, the deterioration of trust among Republicans has been persisting for decades.

SOURCE: KURT NIMMO
“The protests, riots, violent and non-violent actions sweeping across the United States since May 25, including an assault on the gates of the White House, begin to make sense when we understand the CIA’s Color Revolution playbook,” writes economic researcher, historian, and freelance journalist F. William Engdahl.

Engdahl then breaks down the connections between Black Lives Matter, socialist organizations, George Soros’ Open Society Foundations, the Ford Foundation (as previously noted, a CIA front organization), the Foundation to Promote Open Society, Borealis Philanthropy, the Kellogg Foundation, Ben & Jerry’s Foundation, and the Heinz Foundation (John Kerry).

Following the murder of George Floyd, “major corporations such as Apple, Disney, Nike and hundreds others may be pouring untold and unaccounted millions into ActBlue under the name of Black Lives Matter, funds that in fact can go to fund the election of a Democrat President Biden.”

SOURCE: JON RAPPOPORT
As my readers know, I’ve been reporting on new types of technology that could be used in a coming COVID-19 vaccine—and warning about the consequences.

One such technology is: DNA vaccines. They would alter recipients’ genetic makeup permanently.

But Reuters has seen fit to claim: “A future COVID-19 [DNA] vaccine will not genetically modify humans.” This comes from their “fact-check team” — May 18, 2020: “False claim: A COVID-19 vaccine will genetically modify humans.”

To reach this conclusion, Reuters cites two people: “Mark Lynas, a visiting fellow at Cornell University’s Alliance for Science group”, and “Dr. Paul McCray, Professor of Pediatrics, Microbiology, and Internal Medicine at the University of Iowa.”

I have cited the New York Times, March 10, 2015, “Protection Without a Vaccine.” Here are quotes from the Times article:

SOURCE: RT
Deceased pedophile Jeffrey Epstein directed his best-known accuser to have sex with former Israeli PM Ehud Barak, according to a sealed deposition – one of many papers lawyer Alan Dershowitz is trying to use to clear his own name.
Lawyers for Dershowitz, who was a friend of Epstein as well as a member of his legal defense team, released the claim about Barak in a Tuesday court filing, attempting to cast doubt on allegations made by accuser Virginia Roberts Giuffre, one of the first Epstein victims to go public with her story.

Pointing to the “denials and disclaimers” issued by the powerful men Giuffre said she’d had sex with, they suggested her word had been “thoroughly discredited by her proven lies.” If their hope was to smear Giuffre, however, it didn’t quite go as planned, instead renewing media interest in the suspects named by the former Epstein “sex slave.”

SOURCE: KURT NIMMO
The kids squatting on the CHOP or CHAZ declared “autonomous zone” in Seattle have announced they are folding tents and going home. They also threw support behind Joe Biden, demonstrating they have the political understanding of a fence post.

Joe Biden is an establishment stalwart. He will be whatever the DNC and its wealthy controllers want him to be. When the elite told Bill Clinton to kill Serbians, Joe was onboard. He argued in favor of the Iraq invasion that has thus far killed around 1.5 million people. The LGBT crowd should understand that Joe was an ardent supporter of the Defense of Marriage Act. As for BLM, they should look into Biden’s opposition to desegregation busing. He spoke to a crowd in Delaware opposed to integration. He pushed hard for the passage of the 1994 crime bill. It resulted in mass incarceration and longer prison sentences for Black Americans. It further warped the judicial system.

Paul Street writes:

Customers will be under more surveillance every time they walk into a 7-Eleven but the reason for the new CCTV isn't to stop theft.

The convenience store chain has rolled out facial recognition software at more 700 than stores across Australia to be used to verify customer feedback rather than as an anti-theft measure.

The software is connected to Rate It, an online customer experience platform that runs on a tablet device in-store.

7-Eleven confirmed the installation of the new technology after a growing number of eagled-eyed customers noticed new signs at store entrances in recent weeks.

The University of Cambridge has spoken out in support of one of its lecturers who was hit by a wave of abusive messages and death threats for tweeting 'White Lives Don't Matter'.

Dr Priyamvada Gopal, 51, who teaches in the Faculty of English at Churchill College, took to the social media platform on Tuesday evening to write: 'I'll say it again. White Lives Don't Matter. As white lives.'

However the controversial message, which has since been deleted by Twitter, was met with a barrage of outrage, with many people responding both publicly and privately with death threats and racist abuse.

At least one major mainstream media outlet, the LA Times, has been reportedly “angry” that gun sales have shot up because of the tyrannical takeover of government in response to the COVID-19 panic they induced. Apparently, fear can have effects on the public that the MSM and government do no want – more self-reliance.

Authored by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com

e talked about this briefly last week– I told you that I expect a massive trend in migration from high tax, high cost urban places to lower tax, lower cost suburban and rural places.

And the reasons are obvious.

Plenty of people have been miserably cooped up in shoebox-sized apartments for the past three months due to local lockdown restrictions. And now they’re finally realizing– ‘if I don’t need to go to the office anymore, I don’t need to be in this city anymore…’

Plus they’re wisely thinking about the future.

Sure, maybe medical researchers find the miracle drug to treat Covid-19. Or they develop a vaccine that Bill Gates will personally inject into each and every one of us at gunpoint.

But then what happens if Covid-20 hits? Or an antibiotic resistant super-bug is unleashed upon the world?

Back in October, the World Trade Organizations announced that the US could legally retaliate against the EU by slapping new tariffs on some $7.5 billion in European exports as punishment for the Europeans providing illegal government subsidies to Airbus. At the time, we warned that this was like throwing gasoline on the embers of the US-EU trade spat as the Trump administration auto tariffs still loomed large over the global economic landscape.

Since then, the US has imposed some of those tariffs. Now, Robert Lighthizer has a plan for the last $3.1 billion

Several military bases in central and southern Syria have been targeted by air attacks that Damascus has blamed on Israel, Syrian state media have reported. Videos on social media show massive explosions illuminating the night.
Israel targeted several locations in Salamiyah and Saburah just before 1 am on Wednesday, the Syrian army said, adding that its air defenses shot down “a large number” of hostile missiles but that some struck their targets and inflicted “limited material damage.”

Last Thursday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi slammed President Trump for being "clearly ethically unfit" and "intellectually unprepared" to be the president of the United States. American observers have discussed how the Dems will play the Bolton book card after using both the COVID crisis and the racism issue against the president.

'Nancy Pelosi is Playing Her Role to the Hilt'
"It is highly ironic that Nancy Pelosi talks about being 'intellectually unprepared' in light of the numerous public appearances of the Democratic Nominee, Joe Biden, whose performance frequently makes both his supporters and detractors wonder about his mental preparedness", remarks Vladimir Golstein, associate professor at Brown University in Rhode Island.

"In his almost four years in office, Trump hasn’t done anything that would automatically qualify him as 'unfit and unprepared'".

In an act of pure hypocrisy and obsessive cruelty, GOP Senators Marco Rubio, Rick Scott and Ted Cruz joined together to penalize developing nations who seek to take advantage of Cuba’s hands-on humanitarian work.

The bill, if passed, will require the U.S. State Department to publish a list of nations contracting with the Cuban government for their medical services and consider that as a factor to include said nations in the Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report; opening the door for further economic sanctions and other measures against any country on that list.

Cairo sent a letter to the United Nations Security Council requesting it to intervene in the dispute over the Great Renaissance Dam of Ethiopia (GERD). A hasty filling of the dam in Ethiopia threatens food and agriculture in Egypt and Sudan, and for this reason Cairo wants the UN Security Council to lend a hand in tripartite negotiations.

In its letter, Egypt’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs activated Article 35 of the UN Charter, which allows member states to warn the international entity of any crisis that threatens peace and security. Egypt’s Foreign Ministry decided to appeal to the UN after tripartite negotiations stalled due to Ethiopia’s “non-cooperative behavior.” The GERD, that Ethiopia has been working on since 2011, is to provide electricity for not only the whole country, but also its neighbors. The main problem Egypt and Sudan have with the Ethiopian project is the timeline to fill up the $4.8 billion dam with water.

While a Sunday afternoon may not seem an appropriate time for a legislative body to accept witness testimony or to conduct its legislative business unless there is a clear intent to limit public participation. That kind of strategy has a way of boomeranging with a loss of public trust and confidence; yet the Democrats had an intense legislative urge to codify SB 163 with as little public input as possible. The Dems control both Houses of the General Assembly as well as the Governor’s mansion; thereby controlling the State’s entire legislative agenda.

What the Democrats were not counting on was Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., on his way to becoming a national icon, who arrived to testify against SB 163. He was allotted two minutes to address the committee. What else the Dems were not counting on was a last-minute rally attended by 3,000 outside the Capitol that Sunday afternoon. Kennedy quoted one of the Democratic members of the Committee who told the media:

A group of high-ranking Congress members is launching an investigation into Lockheed Martin’s F-35 fighter jet program after being told U.S. military had to spend $300 million in the last five years on defective and missing parts.

The trillion-dollar F-35 program is just getting over many of the problems that plagued its early design and production and has now hit on delivery targets three years in a row and recently announced it had lowered the per-plane cost to $77.9 million.

But an investigation by the Department of Defense’s Inspector General said last year the office overseeing the spare parts program “did not receive ... F\u201135 spare parts in accordance with contract requirements and paid performance incentive fees on the sustainment contracts based on inflated and unverified F\u201135A aircraft availability hours.”

The problem with spare parts will continue to cost the military about $55 million a year, the report said.

Faced with growing pressure to crack down on the "occupied" protest zone following two weekend shootings, Seattle’s mayor said Monday that officials will move to wind down the blocks-long span of city streets taken over two weeks ago.

As AP reports, Mayor Jenny Durkan said at a news conference that the violence was distracting from changes sought by thousands of peaceful protesters seeking to address racial inequity and police brutality. She said the city is working with the community to bring the “Capitol Hill Occupied Protest” zone to an end.

“The cumulative impacts of the gatherings and protests and the nighttime atmosphere and violence has led to increasingly difficult circumstances for our businesses and residents,” Durkan said.

“The impacts have increased and the safety has decreased.”

The BBC’s new drama “The Salisbury Poisonings” concluded over the weekend. A three-part story “based on actual events”, claiming to tell the story of the alleged poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia in Salisbury in 2018.

It’s exactly what you’d expect. Schlocky tat. Poorly researched, badly written and woefully factually inaccurate.

The Guardian gave it four stars. Because of course they did. Because when you’re dealing with government-backed narrative everything that reinforces it must be described as having value. It’s one of the hallmarks of propaganda, that no story which supports the propaganda – however ridiculous – can ever be questioned, criticised or disputed.

There’s room for an in-depth review, and indeed Craig Murray has done a fine job deconstructing the series. But here, I just want to focus on everything they don’t tell you.

Here are five key facts the BBC simply forgot to mention.

SOURCE: ELLEN BROWN

Authored by Jeffrey Tucker via The American Institute for Economic Research,

“Run away and hide” seems to have replaced anything like a sophisticated understanding of viruses and immunities.

For all of recorded history, humans have done a deadly dance with viruses. Measles, smallpox, polio, and influenza viruses changed the course of human history: Measles and smallpox killed hundreds of thousands of Native Americans; polio killed and crippled people, including US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt; and the 1918 influenza epidemic killed more people than were killed during all of World War I.

For most viruses that attack humans, your only defenses are prevention and your own immune systems. Antibiotics don’t kill viruses, and scientists haven’t discovered many effective antiviral drugs.

New Delhi (Sputnik): Over the last few days, the two Asian giants - India and China - have been involved in diplomatic talks as the situation on the border is tense following the face-off between troops from the two countries on 15 June that left 20 Indian soldiers killed and many others injured. China hasn't confirmed any casualties so far.

Undated videos showing Indian soldiers engaged in a fierce stand-off with Chinese troops supposedly at a border area in Sikkim Sector are going viral on social media.

In one such video, a group of Indian soldiers can be seen jostling and pushing back Chinese troops. They can also be heard asking the People's Liberation Army to go back.

Another round of sanctions, the ironically named Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act, has taken effect in Syria. Through the magic of secondary sanctions, Washington will forbid everyone on earth from dealing with the Syrian regime. Even before the penalties took effect, noted the Washington Post: "they have already contributed to the collapse of Syria’s long-troubled economy."

Thus, the law will further impoverish the Syrian people and hurt them more than their government. However, no one in Washington appears to care that national reconstruction will be further impeded. All that matters is claiming to care.

Sanctions have become the U.S. government’s "go to" policy. Whatever the problem, Washington seems to respond by launching or intensifying economic war. And American policymakers are determined to conscript the entire world in their favorite crusades, using secondary and financial penalties to dissuade others from dealing with Uncle Sam’s enemy du jour.

Egypt and Turkey have long been on opposite sides of the raging battle for the fate of Libya, with Turkey providing major military support and backing for the UN-recognized Government of National Accord (GNA) in Tripoli, and with Egypt backing Gen. Khalifa Haftar.

The situation escalated over the weekend, amid a pullback of pro-Haftar forces from Tripoli after being defeated in the bid for the capital, when Egypt's President Sisi announced from an airbase near the Libyan border that the Egyptian Army stands ready to intervene in Libya on behalf of Haftar.

Sisi declared that if GNA forces attempt to enter Haftar-controlled Sirte, pushing deeper into central Libya, this would be a 'red line' for Egypt, forcing it's intervention. Crucially both Tripoli and its main ally Turkey on Sunday condemned what they called Sisi's "declaration of war".

Among the new revelations and interesting tidbits found in John Bolton's now leaked pre-published edition of “The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir,” is that President Trump was said to be prepared to endorse an Israeli preemptive strike on Iran's nuclear sites.

In a section which describes the "elusive search" for an Arab-Israeli peace deal, Bolton writes that Trump told him at a moment of increased Israeli concerns over Iran's nuclear development:

"You tell Bibi that if he uses force, I will back him. I told him that, but you tell him again."

NPR has altered an article after they were busted using a misleading photo of a 'vehicle ramming' in Louisville to make the claim that 'right-wing extremists' are targeting protesters with cars.

Here's what actually happened - the driver of the car, a woman with dreadlocks, was attacked by the 'peaceful' protesters, one of whom reportedly pulled a gun on her - and another who was struck as she accelerated to escape:

Tim Young
?
@TimRunsHisMouth
Replying to @NPR
Here's a fuller video of what you're calling a "right-wing extremist attack" ... a driver is harassed by a group of people, tries to get away, is then attacked by a larger group... and uses their vehicle to defend themselves and get away.

This story is leftist bullshit.

Having closed the US Mint and halted production (blaming COVID-19) after a surge in demand for gold and silver coins, and warned of the danger of using bills (once again blaming the pandemic and choosing to "quarantine" cash for the sake of Americans' health), Fed Chair Powell quietly admitted to lawmakers this week that The Fed will be rationing coins as the circulation of coins across the US economy ground to a halt due to the pandemic.

"What's happened is that with the partial closure of the economy, the flow of coins through the economy ... it's kind of stopped," Powell told lawmakers.

He said the shortage was due to the mass business closures that prevented people from spending their coins, as well as a lack of places that are open where people can trade coins for paper bills.

Via The Epoch Times,

One person was wounded in what was the second shooting in Seattle’s protest zone in less than 48 hours, police said.

The shooting happened late Sunday night in the area near Seattle’s downtown that is known as CHOP, for “Capitol Hill Occupied Protest,” police tweeted, adding that one person was at a hospital with a gunshot wound.

The person arrived in a private vehicle and was in serious condition, Harborview Medical Center spokesperson Susan Gregg said in a statement.

The zone evolved after weeks of protests in the city over police brutality and racism, sparked by the police killing of George Floyd, a black man, in Minneapolis.

The Sunday shooting followed a pre-dawn shooting on Saturday in a park within the zone that left a 19-year-old man dead and a 33-year-old man critically injured. The suspect or suspects in that first shooting fled the scene, and no arrests had been made as of Sunday, Detective Mark Jamieson had said.

A member of Yemen’s Supreme Political Council has held Saudi Arabia and its regional allies, which are involved in an atrocious military campaign against the impoverished Arab country, fully responsible for a potential oil leakage from a decaying tanker in the Red Sea, and the impending environmental disaster it could cause.

“We do not assume any responsibility for any leakage from the Safer tanker afloat at the sea,” Arabic-language al-Masirah television network quoted Mohammed Ali al-Houthi as saying on Thursday.

He called for immediate actions over the matter, holding the United States, Saudi Arabia and their allies fully liable for any disastrous consequences as they have not allowed Yemen to sell the crude loaded at the tanker.