Global Research

Recent events has enabled Western governments, Israel and the mainstream media (MSM) to launch a propaganda crusade against Russia and Palestine. They accused the Russian government and the Anti-Kiev militias in East Ukraine for its direct involvement in the downing of Malaysian Airlines MH-17 without any hard evidence to support their claim. US intelligence agencies did admit that Russia was not directly linked to the Malaysian Airlines incident, but they managed to blame Russia indirectly.

They claimed “that Russia was responsible for “creating the conditions” that led to the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, but they offered no evidence of direct Russian government involvement” according to ABC news. The accusations against Russia were baseless. What is important to the families of the Malaysian Airlines tragedy is for them to find out the truth about those responsible for the crimes. Blaming actors who are not responsible for the crime will not bring peace to the families.

The MSM has been actively defending Israeli actions against the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip declaring that it was Hamas that murdered the three Israeli teens, an accusation that was also never proven. Regardless of the facts on the tragic deaths of those teenagers, Israel had declared a “revenge” war on the Palestinians. The MSM is following Washington and Tel Aviv’s talking points. The bias reporting on the situation in Gaza is shameful. The death toll surpassed 800 for the Palestinians and for the Israeli’s it’s close to 40 casualties. The US and their Western partners along with their Israeli counterparts are working in conjunction against their political adversaries through its MSM Empire. They want war and they will do anything even have their media lie to the public in order to go what they want. What had occurred in the last couple of weeks concerning events in the Ukraine and Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are both tragic incidents, but the point I am making reflects on the MSM itself and their lack of journalistic principals.

The MSM has been a dominant force that has demonized many governments and its leaders in almost every region of the world since the Spanish-American War of 1898. It became what was to be known as “Yellow Journalism”. It was journalism at its worst because it was based on sensationalism, lies and what was to be described as “eye-catching headlines” to sell newspapers. Many stories were not based on facts but agendas. The MSM was always Washington’s mouthpiece for spreading “American Democracy” to all nations by way of propaganda. And with propaganda you can build public support for war. Relations between the US and Spain were already tense before the start of the war, but an incident took place in the Havana Harbor where the USS Maine was sent to protect US interests during a Cuban revolt against the Spanish government suddenly exploded. At that time, Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World and William Randolph Hearst’s New York Journal who were competing with each other to sell newspapers used the method of “Yellow Journalism” and of course without any proper investigation to what really happened to the USS Maine newspaper, published headlines that read “Remember the Maine, To Hell with Spain.”  Even before the start of the Spanish-American War the media was in competition against each other to sell newspapers. The US eventually went to war with Spain with the support of the majority of Americans since they built popular support to go to war. The media acted on behalf of Washington’s war mongers by blaming Spain.

Since the end of WWII, The US either overthrew or went to war with many governments who were not in line with their policies. For example, the democratically elected Haitian President Jean Bertrand Aristide who won the Presidency twice with the majority of the Haitians voting for him, but was soon demonized by the US government namely the CIA and the MSM. They initiated a smear campaign against Aristide by claiming he was mentally ill, unstable and corrupt. Aristide’s supporters were even accused of drug trafficking. Why? Aristide was an anti-imperialist leader who wanted to help the poor in his country. He believed that Haiti can become truly independent from Western powers that came to dominate them for more than two centuries. Washington and the MSM propaganda unfortunately won the propaganda war.

Russia was not Directly Involved, but they were Responsible for “Creating the Conditions”?

The media will continue to manufacture propaganda on behalf of Washington to blame Vladimir Putin and the Militias in East Ukraine for the Malaysian Airlines tragedy. For the US intelligence agencies to claim Russia “created the conditions” that lead to the tragedy in the first place is like the police blaming a victim of a crime who was just robbed at gunpoint for carrying his money.  The MSM purposely forgot that it was Washington’s destabilization campaign which began with a $5 billion investment to US Ambassador and wife of Neoconservative Robert Kagan, Victoria Nuland to build “democratic institutions”, but the intention was to overthrow the democratically elected government of Viktor Yanukovych.

Why would the Anti-Kiev Militias shoot down an airliner in the first place? Why would Russia back a move that would jeopardize their role in world affairs especially after they prevented Washington from starting a war against Syria? It would not serve any useful purpose even if it was to blame the Ukrainian government. Vladimir Putin and the Russian government are not madmen. The anti-Kiev resistance does not seek an open ended war with their compatriots. It is the Ukrainian coup government and its Washington puppet masters that seek war with Russia.

After all, it has been the United States government and its corporate oligarchy that has been instigating wars since its creation in 1776. From the American Indian holocaust to the present day, including Libya, Iraq and now the destabilization of the Ukraine, war was the agenda The US was created by war during its fight for independence from the British monarchy. It’s been a part of its culture since its founding. Washington will continue to blame the Putin government for the tragedy of Malaysian airline MH-17. One question you must ask is who was instigating that Russia was originally behind the anti-Kiev militia accused of shooting the passenger airliner. It is Washington and their MSM propagandists such as Judith Miller of the New York Times who claimed that Iraqi president Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass destruction (WMD) which began in 2001 right up to the 2003 US invasion. The New York Times and other news organizations follow Washington’s line. An opinion piece written by the editorial board of the New York Times called ‘An Outrage Compounded by Mystery: Putin’s Unconvincing Words on Flight 17 in Ukraine’ accused Russia of “callousness” in their introduction:

There are still innumerable questions about how Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 was shot down over rebel-held areas of Ukraine on Thursday. But nobody contests that the 298 people so senselessly killed deserve far greater respect than they have been shown by the Russian-backed rebels who have controlled the incompetent searches of the fields on which the Boeing 777 came down. The callousness of the rebels and, by extension of their Russian sponsors, is outrageous

Calling the “rebels’ and the Russian government actions outrageous is labeling an adversary without any solid proof that they indeed committed this crime. They do admit that the facts have to be established, however, by their introduction, it seems that Russia and the rebels are already guilty. The New York Times states:

The facts about the shooting down of the plane must be established by trusted, international experts. The most likely finding, for which American and other Western officials say there is strong evidence, is that the jetliner was brought down by rockets fired from rebel-held territory in eastern Ukraine. That would require not only ground-to-air missiles but also the expertise and equipment to guide them, raising the possibility of assistance from Russia itself. Russia has denied any such role, and its military officials have pushed a competing scenario, inculpating Ukraine

The Malaysian Airlines tragedy is a crime and the truth will reveal itself because the alternative media will expose what really happened. But the point is about the truth in journalism; the standard procedure for the MSM is that they should provide evidence before placing the blame on the Russian government and the anti-Kiev militias. An accusation without clear evidence is not real journalism, its only unsubstantiated evidence that ultimately destroys their credibility.

Israel’s Survival and the Palestinians: How the Media distorts the War in Gaza

Gaza is under attack again by the Israeli government. More than 800 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF). However the MSM would state that the Palestinians, namely Hamas wants to destroy the state of Israel. Why not? They claimed that the former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad suggested that Israel should be “wiped off the map” which was proved to be false by Arash Norouzi in an article published by Global Research in 2007 called ‘Wiped off the Map” – The Rumor of the Century.’ Norouzi translated what Ahmadinejad actually said which was that “The Imam said this regime occupying Jerusalem must vanish from the page of time”. The MSM completely misquoted what he actually meant which was that the Zionist regime needed to be removed because it “was imposed on the Islamic world as a strategic bridgehead to ensure domination of the region and its assets.” The MSM obviously did not do their homework. Richard Cohen wrote an opinion piece for the Washington Post called ‘A Fight for Israel’s Existence.’ He said:

Since 1948, nation after nation has retired to the sidelines. Egypt and Jordan have made peace with Israel. Saudi Arabia, which stayed out of the first war, has little desire for any subsequent one. Lebanon has been battered too often by Israel to still have a taste for war. Iraq is coming apart at the seams and can fight no one. Syria, too, is a chaotic mess, no longer really a nation and now more of a geographic designation. With the exception of Hezbollah and Hamas, no one much wants to fight. Happy days should be here . . . again

He continued:

The nations that once went to war vowing to push Israel into the sea are unstable, rickety creations. They are under siege not from Israel but from their own religious zealots. Whatever emerges is going to be either less accepting of Israel or manically intent on annihilating it. Even Egypt, which is now under military dictatorship, could revert once again to a government of the Muslim Brotherhood, the ideological parent of Hamas, and deeply anti-Semitic. In time, Israel could be surrounded by states that would make Hamas seem the soul of moderation. It does not, after all, go in for beheadings and such

He concludes with Israel’s legal creation by the Western powers who they not the Palestinians declared it as legal right under the United Nations:

A deal is there to be made but the United States has to either make it or determine its outcome. The effort cannot be left to countries that are hostile to Israel — Turkey and Qatar come to mind — or the Middle East will once again wind up with a peace that is just a prelude to more war.

Israel is the legal creation of the United Nations. It has an absolute right not merely to exist but to do so safe from rockets or incursions by tunneling terrorists. In 1948, Harry Truman swiftly recognized Israel. The United States took the lead. It is time for it to do so again

Let’s be clear. Israel is an occupying force that has broken every UN resolution involving Israeli war crimes against the Palestinians. Both the UK and the US governments literally gave away Palestinian lands to the Zionist movement in 1948. Richard Cohen cannot even tell the truth in regards to the Palestinians right to exist because to him it’s Israel as the victim, not the Palestinians.

There has also been an ongoing debate on Israel’s policies towards Palestinian rights under an apartheid state but the propaganda headquarters in the West coast of the United States namely California, the home of Hollywood and the Los Angeles Times who has a writer named Seth M. Siegel. Online alternative news website mondoweiss.net published an excellent report titled ‘NY Times’ and ‘LA Times’ run op-eds by an AIPAC board member without telling readers’ on February 17th of this year. The story was based on Siegel’s connection to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). The introduction to the story sums up how US media operates:

Last month the LA Times ran a cute test on its op-ed page to show that Israel doesn’t practice apartheid, and that Palestinians are treated very well by Israel. Today the NY Times runs an op-ed saying that Israel gives Palestinians all the water they need, and as the region dries out, Palestinians are going to feel very lucky

A new CNN poll says “A majority of Americans say Israel’s military actions in Gaza are justified, with only four in 10 saying that Israel has used too much force, according to a new national poll.” The majority of Americans believe that Israel’s military incursion into the Gaza Strip against Hamas which is causing mass civilian deaths is justified. Maybe the articles written by Cohen which gives an inaccurate portrayal of Israeli-Palestinian conflict versus the reality on the ground contributes to the public’s ignorance on the matter:

According to the poll, 57% of the public said the Israeli actions against Hamas, the Palestinian organization that runs Gaza, are justified, with just over a third saying they are unjustified.

Forty-three percent of those questioned said Israel’s using about the right amount of force, with 12% saying they’re not using enough. Nearly four in 10 said Israel is using too much force in Gaza

With writers such as Richard Cohen and Seth M. Siegel who are employed by major news organizations, it is no wonder the American public supports Israel’s atrocities. Edward Bernays, one of the architects of modern day propaganda and the nephew of Sigmund Freud explained in his book ‘Propaganda’ how the public can be manipulated to support the interests of the ruling class:

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. 

We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society

The Mainstream Media is on the Titanic

The propaganda out of the US, UK and Israel in recent days has been filled with accusations with no journalistic integrity against Russia and Palestine. An online website managed by the Pew Research Center called www.jounalism.com published the ‘Principles of Journalism’. It is an article those working for the mainstream media should read; however the first principle defines how “Truth” and “Journalism” is the only “Practical Solution”:

Journalism’s first obligation is to the truth – Democracy depends on citizens having reliable, accurate facts put in a meaningful context. Journalism does not pursue truth in an absolute or philosophical sense, but it can–and must–pursue it in a practical sense. This “journalistic truth” is a process that begins with the professional discipline of assembling and verifying facts. Then journalists try to convey a fair and reliable account of their meaning, valid for now, subject to further investigation. Journalists should be as transparent as possible about sources and methods so audiences can make their own assessment of the information. Even in a world of expanding voices, accuracy is the foundation upon which everything else is built–context, interpretation, comment, criticism, analysis and debate. The truth, over time, emerges from this forum. As citizens encounter an ever greater flow of data, they have more need–not less–for identifiable sources dedicated to verifying that information and putting it in context 

The New York Times did not verify facts about the Malaysian airlines incident, already insinuating that Putin and his government is most likely responsible for the crime saying “Western officials say there is strong evidence.” He says, she says is not a fact according to journalistic principles. Verifying facts before accusing someone of a crime is a normal procedure.

It’s obvious that not only the New York Times, or the Los Angeles Times but CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, BBC, the Washington Post, the Daily Beast, the Chicago Tribune, PBS, NPR and every other news media outlet has no journalistic principles. Perhaps, many of the journalists either forgot or purposely ignore the basic principles of journalism because they want to advance in their careers. Maybe some are simply told what to say or write by their producers and high-level management under Washington’s orders. In the real world, you should be innocent until proven guilty. Journalists should be guided by the desire to tell the truth by researching the facts.

The New York Times editorial board should revisit what real journalism should be, not accusing Russia and the people of East Ukraine (who are anti-Kiev militias fighting against a Fascist coup government, not pro-Russian rebels as the MSM would like to call them) of a crime without evidence. The bias reporting of Gaza is another issue since Israel is the victim according to the media. The mainstream media is in decline for a reason. Nobody in the US and in the world can possibly believe them anymore.

The game is over. They have no journalistic integrity nor does it believe in obtaining facts. It is a propaganda machine that does not serve the interests of the public but the interests of Washington, the Military-Industrial Complex, corporations and its top 1% of the wealthy elite. Maybe those who work in the media need to revisit their old text books from journalism school and learn what journalism is really about. Maybe they should turn to alternative media and take notes. Then we can see truth in media, but that will not happen anytime soon. The mainstream media is already at an all-time low when it comes to moral integrity when it comes to reporting the truth to the public. Earlier this year CNN lost 39% of its primetime viewers. In a Pew Research study in 2013 found that all major cable news outlets including MSNBC, CNN and Fox news lost prime-time viewership:

The combined median prime-time viewership of the three major news channels—CNN, Fox News and MSNBC—dropped 11% to about 3 million, the smallest it has been since 2007. The Nielsen Media Research data show that the biggest decline came at MSNBC, which lost nearly a quarter (24%) of its prime-time audience. CNN, under new management, ended its fourth year in third place, with a 13% decline in prime time. Fox, while down 6%, still drew more viewers (1.75 million) than its two competitors combined (619,500 at MSNBC and 543,000 at CNN). The daytime audience for cable news was more stable, holding flat at about 2 million viewers across the three news channels. CNN (up 12%) and Fox (up 2%) actually experienced growth here. That was counterbalanced by more deep loses at MSNBC (down 15.5%)

Maybe that is why they continue to use propaganda as news because they have nothing to lose at this point. Their ratings have already collapsed. They will lie as much as they can to appease Washington and its allies, why not? For them the ship has already sunk! What else can they lose their paychecks? Then again Washington would bail them out since they are too big to fail, especially during an ongoing battle against the alternative media. Times are changing, the truth is all that matters.

Russia and China are obstacles to the US and European world dominance.  The US in collaboration with the Ukrainian coup government attempted a false flag against Russia.  If the US had succeeded and won public opinion, then the US and NATO allies would advance its war preparations against the Putin government.  It would have opened an opportunity to marginalize Russia as the threat to world peace.  Make no mistake, the US wants war with Russia as Israel wants War with the Palestinians.

Israeli genocidal policies is what this new Gaza war was all about since the beginning of Operation Protective Edge.  The media was used to justify Israel’s war on the Palestinians in regards to the three Israeli teens as self defense.  The media  is a weapon, it always was.  They must build public support in order for Washington, London or Tel Aviv to launch their wars of aggression. Without it, they will only anger their own population because they will only say no to war.  That is one outcome those in power will try to avoid at all costs because once they lose credibility with their own citizens, their agenda automatically collapses.