Aletho News

ΑΛΗΘΩΣ

French government fines TV news for allowing a skeptic to speak without being challenged

We know what secrets they fear the most, by how they overreact

By Jo Nova | July 13, 2024

In France, the second largest news network let an economist go on air and declare he thought global warming was a lie and a scam used to justify State intervention. He even went on to say it is a form of totalitarianism. Shockingly (to the regulators Arcom*), the CNEWS TV* hosts did not contest this, and nor did anyone else in the studio. For this, 11 months later, the TV channel is being fined €20,000.

Too close to the truth then?

A popular French rolling news channel has been fined for broadcasting climate scepticism unchallenged

By Saskia O’Donoghue, EuroNews

During the programme, prominent economist Philippe Herlin shared personal climate scepticism – but was not contradicted by anybody else in the TV studio, including the hosts.

“Anthropogenic global warming is a lie, a scam… Explaining to us that it is because of Man, no, that is a conspiracy, and why does that have so much weight?”, Herlin said. “Because it justifies the intervention of the State in our lives, and it absolves the State from having to reduce its public spending… It is a form of totalitarianism.”

Apparently, the real crime here is not that he said the unthinkable, but that the TV crew didn’t correct him:

After investigation, Arcom found that CNews’ lack of reaction was a “failure” to meet the obligations of the channel …

Perhaps if they’d laughed at him, called him petty names, and treated him like a leper it would have been OK?  (No, seriously, there is a razor point here. There are bound to be past examples where the only response to a skeptic was to call them a climate denier, and Arcom was apparently happy with that, since they’ve never used this fine before.) Does Arcom approve of namecalling or social approbation as a “balanced response”? Oh. Yes. They. Do.

The regulators go on to explain that  the channel:

“… is required to ensure an honest presentation of controversial issues, in particular by ensuring the expression of different points of view”.

Which must be a new requirement since French TV has relentlessly hammered the establishment line in a one sided way for thirty years without needing any balance at all. And Arcom didn’t fine them for shamelessly promoting government propaganda. Perhaps a French skeptic could ask Arcon if controversial government opinions need to be balanced “in an honest presentation” or whether it’s only critics of the government who need to be held to account?

Arcom found that the views shared “contradicted or minimised” the scientific consensus on climate change “through a treatment lacking rigour and without contradiction”.

Since when was it the job of journalists to promote government approved “science”?

The regulator is going out on a limb and sawing off the branch…

Officially, the regulators are trying to pretend they are not punishing the TV channel for putting on a skeptic, which would be a free speech issue, but it’s clearly what they are doing. So they dress this up as a lack of balance, which accidentally exposes that they’ve never cared a jot about balancing opinions before. Immediately, this opens up all kinds of interesting doors: for one, skeptics can start asking where the balance is on controversial government propositions? In most countries about half the population doesn’t agree that mankind is solely responsible for “climate change”. Where is their voice? The government is suggesting that solar panels can stop storms, and EV’s will control floods, why isn’t this a failure of the obligations of a news channel?

Secondly, skeptics can ask when this rule started and why the regulator missed so many past examples. Why aren’t breaches the other way being fined too?

The overreaction IS the news story

Ponder how afraid the believers must be if the mere opinion of an economist is so dangerous. This man is a not a scientist and every person in France has heard the evidence is overwhelming, climate change is real, and 130% of all scientists who ever lived know that CO2 threatens life on Earth. For three decades children have been trained to say that skeptics are funded by Big Oil, and motivated by money, and yet here is one guy who used the word “totalitarian” and they all go off their rocker.

Why, perhaps because it suggests that believers are motivated by a bigger pot of money and power than skeptics ever could be.

* BACKGROUND

Arcon stands for  theRegulatory Authority for Audiovisual and Digital Communication

CNews is controlled by billionaire business magnate Vincent Bolloré and has been compared to FOX in the US.

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

‘Dangerous, Anticompetitive Behavior’: Big Brands Colluding to Control Online Speech

By John-Michael Dumais | The Defender | July 12, 2024

A congressional investigation uncovered allegations that some of the world’s largest brands and advertising agencies are colluding to control online speech through coordinated boycotts and content demonetization schemes.

A 39-page interim staff report, released Wednesday by the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on the Judiciary, claims that the Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM) — an initiative of the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA) — is using its market power to silence disfavored voices in possible violation of antitrust laws.

“Through GARM, large corporations, advertising agencies, and industry associations participated in boycotts and other coordinated action to demonetize platforms, podcasts, news outlets, and other content deemed disfavored by GARM and its members,” the report states.

The committee’s investigation, which focused on GARM’s activities since its creation in 2019, examined its influence over major social media platforms, news outlets and content creators.

The report suggests that GARM’s actions may have far-reaching implications for online discourse and consumer choice in media.

‘Sounds a lot like a cartel to me’

GARM was established in 2019 by the WFA, which represents over 150 of the world’s biggest brands and more than 60 national advertiser associations globally.

According to this week’s congressional report, GARM’s influence stems from the collective power of its members. “WFA members represent roughly 90% of global advertising spend, or almost one trillion dollars annually,” the document states.

The alliance includes major players in the advertising industry:

  • Every major advertising agency holding company.
  • GroupM, the world’s largest media buying agency, on its Steer Team.
  • Four large corporations — Unilever, Mars, Diageo, and Procter & Gamble — that together spend billions annually on advertising.

GARM’s Steer Team, which acts as a board of directors, is closely involved in day-to-day operations. The initiative reports to the WFA Executive Committee, which includes representatives from major corporations such as AB InBev, L’Oréal, Nestlé and IBM.

Robert Rakowitz, GARM’s initiative lead and co-founder, plays a central role in the organization’s activities. The report cites internal emails in which Rakowitz expressed views on free speech, describing an “extreme global interpretation of the US Constitution” as problematic.

GARM claims to focus on “content monetization” rather than “content moderation.” However, the report argues that these areas are “inextricably linked,” suggesting that GARM’s work effectively influences what content appears online.

In Wednesday’s congressional hearing on GARM, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), while questioning the CEO of GroupM and GARM board member Christian Juhl, said that GARM “sounds a lot like a cartel to me.”

Alleged antitrust violations and examples

The congressional report alleges that GARM’s activities may violate Section 1 of the Sherman Anti-Trust Act, which prohibits unreasonable restraints of trade. The committee report cites several examples of GARM’s alleged coordinated actions:

1. Twitter boycott after Elon Musk acquisition. Following Musk’s acquisition of Twitter (now known as X) in October 2022, GARM allegedly orchestrated a boycott of the platform. According to the report, GARM recommended its members “stop … all paid advertisement” on Twitter in response to the takeover.

Internal documents show that GARM held “extensive debriefing and discussion around [Musk’s] takeover of Twitter,” providing opportunities for the boycott to be organized. The report claims that GARM later boasted about “taking on Elon Musk” and noted that Twitter was “80% below revenue forecasts” as a result.

2. Pressure on Spotify over Joe Rogan podcast. In early 2022, GARM and its Steer Team allegedly pressured Spotify over content on Rogan’s podcast, “The Joe Rogan Experience.” The report states that GARM members urged action against Spotify due to alleged misinformation on Rogan’s show, particularly regarding COVID-19 vaccines after Rogan said that young, healthy people didn’t need them.

Rogan later featured Dr. Robert Malone on his podcast, which prompted GroupM to reach out to Spotify after musician Neil Young removed his content from the platform in protest over vaccine-skeptical material.

Internal emails cited in the report show Rakowitz coordinating with member companies to formulate responses to Spotify. In one instance, he wrote that he “can’t publicly advise all clients to do X — that gets us into hot water by way of anticompetitive and collusive behaviors.”

3. Efforts to demonetize certain news outlets. The report alleges that GARM and its members discussed strategies to block certain news outlets, including Fox News, The Daily Wire and Breitbart News.

An internal email from a GARM Steer Team member describes monitoring these outlets closely. The email states that as much as he “hated their ideology and bulls**t,” his company “couldn’t really justify blocking them for misguided opinion[s]” but that it “watched them very carefully and it didn’t take long for them to cross the line.”

The congressional committee argued that these coordinated actions if proven, could constitute illegal restraints of trade that harm consumers by limiting their choices and access to diverse viewpoints online.

GARM’s influence on political content and elections

Through their content moderation efforts, GARM and its members attempted to influence political discourse and election outcomes — including pushing for coordinated action around the 2020 U.S. presidential election, according to the report.

In an October 2020 email, Rakowitz suggested telling Facebook it was “at a crossroads for the platform and fence sitting on content curation and moderation” and that it should apply its COVID-19 content moderation policies to election-related content.

The report cites an instance of GARM members pressuring Facebook to label a then-President Donald Trump campaign advertisement as misinformation. When Facebook refused, citing its policy of not fact-checking political candidates’ ads, Rakowitz allegedly described the decision as “honestly reprehensible” in an internal email.

The report also claims that GARM members expressed concerns about Musk’s handling of the Hunter Biden laptop story on Twitter. After Musk released internal Twitter documents about the platform’s suppression of the story, a GARM member reportedly described Musk’s actions as an “overtly partisan take.”

Misinformation definition and application. In 2022, GARM added a definition of misinformation to its framework, describing it as “verifiably false or willfully misleading content that is directly connected to user or societal harm.”

The report suggests this broad definition could be weaponized against disfavored political views.

Committee members said Wednesday that these actions demonstrate GARM’s potential to influence political discourse and election outcomes by controlling which content receives advertising revenue and visibility on major platforms.

GARM’s partnerships with ad-tech companies and AI integration

The congressional report delves into GARM’s relationships with advertising technology companies and plans to integrate its framework into artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning tools.

According to the report, GARM partnered with several “ad-tech partners” that offer solutions to help brands understand where their advertisements appear and what content surrounds them.

The report alleges that membership in GARM was conditioned on these partners agreeing “to make commensurate changes to business operations in pursuit of GARM’s goals.”

According to the congressional committee, this arrangement allowed GARM’s biases to be “baked directly into the solutions, allowing brands to seamlessly integrate GARM’s censorship.”

AI and machine learning integration

GARM’s plans for the future involve pushing its framework into AI solutions, according to the report. The committee said it was concerned that GARM’s partners are developing AI tools that will integrate GARM’s standards seamlessly across social media platforms.

“Such an automated censorship effort could result in the demonetization of any views or voices that GARM’s advertising cartel dislikes, potentially without any human involvement at all,” the report states.

Specific examples cited in the report include:

1. Zefr, a GARM ad-tech partner, which claims its “proprietary discriminative AI is powered by years of training data on platforms, and goes beyond keyword and text-based analyses, combining AI and ground truth data from global fact checking organizations that is mapped to the industry standards” set by GARM.

2. YouTube’s incorporation of Zefr-powered solutions to prevent advertisements from appearing next to content that violates GARM’s standards.

The combination of GARM’s framework with AI-powered content moderation tools could lead to opaque and potentially biased decisions about which content receives advertising revenue, ultimately limiting consumer choice and diverse viewpoints online, according to the report.

Connections to government agencies and censorship efforts

The congressional report alleges connections between GARM’s partners and government agencies involved in content moderation efforts. Specifically, it points to collaboration between GARM ad-tech partner Channel Factory and the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).

According to the report, Channel Factory worked with CISA to develop a “common lexicon” for discussing misinformation.

An email cited in the report shows Channel Factory’s global chief strategy officer sharing this lexicon with GARM’s initiative lead, stating, “The industry will need a common lexicon and detailed definitions in order to make progress … attached is the lexicon we developed with CISA/DHS … which may provide” a useful starting point.

This type of collaboration could lead to government influence over private-sector content moderation practices, the committee report stated.

The report noted that Channel Factory is also a member of YouTube’s Measurement Program, suggesting that these connections could have far-reaching implications for online content moderation.

Former U.S. Department of State official Mike Benz in a video posted on X Wednesday, alleged that U.S. government-linked efforts to control online content with groups like GARM go back at least to 2017.

GARM engages in ‘dangerous, anticompetitive behavior’

The House Judiciary Committee concluded that GARM’s actions may violate antitrust laws and threaten free speech and consumer choice online.

According to the report, GARM’s members’ collective power allows them to achieve through coordination what they could not accomplish individually.

The report states:

“If collusion among powerful corporations capable of collectively demonetizing, and in effect eliminating, certain views and voices is allowed to continue, the ability of countless American consumers to choose what to read and listen to, or even have their speech or writing reach other Americans, will be destroyed.”

The committee emphasized that antitrust laws still apply even if GARM claims to have good intentions. It states that federal antitrust laws “do not diminish because GARM or its members claim to have good intentions.”

The committee said it will continue its oversight of GARM and evaluate the adequacy of existing antitrust laws. It suggested that legislative reforms may be necessary to address what it describes as “dangerous, anticompetitive behavior.”

Watch the House Judiciary Committee’s July 10 hearing:

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance | | Leave a comment

Pro-Israel Group Censoring Social Media Led by Former Israeli Intelligence Officers

By Lee Fang and Jack Poulson | July 11, 2024

CyberWell, an Israeli nonprofit with deep ties to the intelligence arm of an Israeli government propaganda effort, has been influential in shaping social media content since October 7. The group, which purports to be independent, has lobbied Meta, X, and TikTok to remove social media posts under the banner of fighting hate and antisemitism.

The group claimed a major victory regarding Meta’s decision on Tuesday to expand its definition of antisemitic hate speech to include many criticisms of “Zionists” – those who call for an independent state in the Middle East that privileges Jews over other ethnic groups. “CyberWell intends to leverage its technological tools and analysis efforts to ensure this policy is implemented efficiently and fully, and that Meta’s moderation tools are trained to effectively bar this content,” the organization claimed in a press release.

The success is the latest string of victories to shape permissible speech when it comes to Israel and its actions.

In January, CyberWell reported that it had pushed to censor accounts that disputed the false allegation that Hamas had slaughtered dozens of babies during the October 7th attack. Any accounts disputing claims around babies killed during the attack, CyberWell argued, are akin to “content denying or distorting the Holocaust.” President Joe Biden and leading Israeli figures have falsely claimed that Hamas beheaded or burned forty babies during the assault into Israel.

That claim has been widely debunked. Despite repeated false assertions to the contrary, only one baby was killed during the Hamas assault: a 10-month-old infant named Mila Cohen, who was killed at Kibbutz Be’eri. In more recent months, CyberWell has lobbied TikTok and Meta to censor social media posts with the phrase “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” claiming that the slogan constitutes hate speech.

CyberWell is one of many agenda-driven nonprofits now censoring social media discourse, including benign or true information, under the cover of fighting hate and misinformation. The pharmaceutical industry, for instance, funded a nonprofit that worked to censor tweets critical of pandemic-related policies. The U.S. government funds several think tanks that work to moderate social media content critical of NATO’s policies impacting Ukraine.

We briefly mentioned the organization in our recent exclusive on the rebirth of an Israeli government influence effort to counter critics in the United States. After ignoring our detailed request for comment by email, CyberWell recently contacted The Guardian, our publishing partner, and falsely claimed that we never contacted the group for comment.

CyberWell has not received “government funding whatsoever from any country,” wrote Stan Steinreich of Steinreich Communications in a statement to The Guardian, which included a request for a correction. “CyberWell’s leadership is neither affiliated with nor compensated by Voices for Israel,” he continued, in reference to the joint venture created by Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs roughly eight years ago under the name Kela Shlomo before renaming to Concert in 2018 and adopting its current name in 2022. In response to Hamas’s October 7 attack, the organization formally rebooted to focus on winning the online war of narratives surrounding Israel’s ongoing invasion of Gaza, which has so far killed roughly 13,000 women and children.

But CyberWell’s attempts to portray itself as independent obscures its deep ties to Israeli intelligence officials and the government-backed influence operation we wrote about.

CyberWell, as we originally reported, maintains close ties to the Israeli government ministries involved in covert advocacy in the U.S. and to the Voices for Israel group now at the center of a sprawling influence campaign. Since reaching out for comment for our investigation, CyberWell has scrubbed the biographies of its executives and advisors, such as former Israeli military intelligence chief Amos Yadlin and a current spokesperson for the Israeli Defense Forces.

When CyberWell was reached for comment regarding why the biographies of its staff and advisors were removed, they stated: “Highlighting the danger of generating false and misleading information, we were forced to remove the ‘Our Team’ page for safety reasons. Following the publication of your story, our analysts were attacked and identified by name on X. Users shared your article and our employees’ names with a wider network and we became concerned for our staff’s safety.”

Despite CyberWell’s denial of ties to Voices of Israel, the organization’s 2022 annual report listed its Chief Financial Officer as Sagi Balasha, the first CEO of the organization now known as Voices of Israel. The list of CyberWell advisors in the report also included Israel Defense Forces spokesperson Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, who Israeli corporate records reveal to be a director of the research and intelligence arm of Voices, known as Keshet David, which is Hebrew for “David’s Rainbow.” Keshet David was initially headed by Yossi Kuperwasser, the former head of research in the IDF Military Intelligence Directorate, widely known as Aman, and an ex-director general of the Ministry of Strategic Affairs. Another advisor to CyberWell, Amos Yadlin, previously led Aman.

“Proud to support @CyberWell_org,” Mr. Lerner posted on X on Wednesday, in response to CyberWell’s celebration of Meta’s new policy on criticisms of Zionism.

Voices of Israel chairman Micah Avni explained the history of Keshet’s aliases in a December 2018 interview, including the previous name of Israel Cyber Shield and the official English name Innovative Collaboration Strategies. “Concert [Voices of Israel] funds Keshet David and we get all the information. That’s one leg of what we’re doing,” said Avni. But, unlike Voices, Keshet David Research and Information Ltd., its legal Israeli entity, maintains no directly attributed public website.

Peter Lerner, an Israeli Defense Forces spokesperson and advisor to CyberWell, as well as former head of international relations at the Israeli labor federation Histadrut, is listed as both a shareholder and director of Keshet David. (As reported by Calcalist, the Histadrut was apparently a customer of the online campaigning firm STOIC, which Haaretz reported to have beat out Voices of Israel for a contract with Israel’s Ministry of Diaspora Affairs to covertly influence U.S. lawmakers.)

Formed in 2021 under the name Global Antisemitism Research Center (Global ARC), CyberWell shared a $30,000 donation that year with Keshet David through a foundation run by the wife of CyberWell board member Adam Milstein, who co-founded the influential Israeli-American Council (IAC) in 2007 under the direction of Israel’s then-consul general in Los Angeles, Ehud Danoch, before pleading guilty to two felony counts of tax evasion. Keshet David received an earlier donation through IAC in 2016 under its previous name of Israel Cyber Shield, just as future CyberWell CFO Sagi Balasha transitioned from chief executive of IAC to chief executive of Voices.

The chief executive of Keshet David since 2018, former Israeli police officer Eran Vasker, disclosed on his LinkedIn profile that he has simultaneously led the private intelligence firm Argyle Consulting Group since April 2017. The head of CyberWell, Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor, similarly noted in a January podcast interview and on LinkedIn that her immediate previous job was working at Argyle as head of business development circa January to October 2021, the same year as the joint donation to Keshet David and CyberWell. Tal-Or’s manager at the time was Argyle Chief Operating Officer Zohar Gorgel, who became a founding board member of CyberWell. Gorgel co-founded a solar power company in early 2021 with Arik Becker, a member of CyberWell’s audit committee who was, according to Becker’s LinkedIn profile, head of strategic operations at Argyle circa 2018 to 2020.

In other words, the chief executive of CyberWell and two of its board members previously worked at the same private intelligence spin-off from Voices of Israel, a director of the spin-off is an advisor to CyberWell, and the CEO of Voices became the CFO of CyberWell.

Israeli corporate records further show that CyberWell shares the same accountant as Keshet David and Voices of Israel, Yakov Pal (פאל יעקב) of Yakov Pal & Co. Certified Public Accountants. (CyberWell and Voices have also shared the same fiscal sponsor, Central Fund of Israel, which reportedly donated $700,000 to Voices in 2017.)

Letterhead of Yakov Pal CPA from the 2017 financial statements of Voices of Israel, then known as Kela Shlomo, as revealed by the Israeli independent investigative site The Seventh Eye.

A recently-deleted page on CyberWell’s website noted that it was founded as a result of Tal-Or’s time working in private intelligence at an unnamed firm (Argyle), as a result of “her then-manager and IDF intelligence veteran, Zohar Gorgel, [suggesting] that Tal-Or use her open-source expertise and deep understanding of social media” to combat online antisemitism.

Tal-Or’s biography in her podcast interview also noted that she had “provided analysis” to Israel’s Ministry of Strategic Affairs, the agency that founded Voices of Israel. CyberWell’s 2022 annual report further disclosed that the nonprofit partnered with Act-IL, a failed online propaganda effort partly run by IAC and closely affiliated with the Ministry of Strategic Affairs, noting that “CyberWell served as the data provider to Act-IL’s community for their end of year call to action on the state of online antisemitism.”

According to 2018 reporting from the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Israel Cyber Shield (Keshet David) surveilled the prominent Palestinian-American activist Linda Sarsour as part of compiling a dossier for Act-IL.

CyberWell CEO Tal-Or Cohen and founding board member Zohar Gorgel did not respond to repeated questions regarding their previous positions at the private intelligence firm Argyle Consulting Group or on Argyle’s relationship to Keshet David. Instead, CyberWell blocked one of our accounts on X.

Argyle and Keshet David CEO Eran Vasker similarly did not respond to a request for comment through Argyle. Neither CyberWell nor Adam Milstein and his wife, Gila, responded to requests for comment on MERONA Leadership Foundation’s receipt of a joint donation for Keshet David and CyberWell.

***

CyberWell’s primary focus has been to pressure social media companies to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) redefinition of antisemitism, which has been described by one of its core contributors as designed to combat growing international human rights criticisms of Israel as an apartheid state, beginning with the United Nations’ 2001 Durban declaration. In reference to the now-defunct advocacy organization known as the Adopt IHRA Coalition, CyberWell’s 2022 annual report noted that “On the heels of Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter,” CyberWell “served as the [Adopt IHRA Coalition] data provider, demonstrating our value through collecting, vetting, and leveraging a dataset of over 1,200 recent antisemitic Tweets.”

The IHRA definition has come under fire as an attempt to criminalize and suppress First Amendment-protected speech critical of Israel and its occupation of Palestine. Pro-Israel lobbyists have pushed to encode the IHRA definition into hate crime statutes and official speech codes for hundreds of institutions and have succeeded in advancing legislation on the state and federal level. The IHRA definition of antisemitism includes “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.” If enacted, such a definition would mean that an American can call any government, including his own, racist, except for Israel.

CyberWell’s high-level influence on social media policy arose during a meeting of the Israeli legislature’s immigration committee on June 21 of last year, which included representatives of Facebook, TikTok, and Twitter.

Matthew Krieger, a representative of Twitter and Elon Musk at the hearing, bluntly refused to answer questions from the committee chairman about a report from the Israeli advocacy organization Fighting Online Antisemitism (FOA), which accused Twitter of only removing 14% of antisemitic content, in contrast to TikTok allegedly removing 100%. Immediately after, Facebook policy manager Yehuda Ben Yaakov noted his relationship with FOA, CyberWell, and Tal Or-Cohen, stating: “The activity of non-profit organizations in this context is important and non-profit organizations like FOA and CyberWell, just last week Tal-Or [Cohen] and I met and had the ability to exchange things.” “Tal-Or told us about a new way of linking the theory of Freemasons and the theory of anti-Semitism,” Ben Yaakov added.

During the same hearing, Ella Saban, an official in Israel’s Ministry of Aliyah and Absorption, noted that “We work with ADL [Anti-Defamation League], we work with civil society organizations, CyberWell and [FOA] are based here, we also have a good relationship with the social networks in Israel.”

Images from a pair of posts on X on June 17 and on June 25 by CyberWell.

“VICTORY: TikTok is the first social media platform to publicly recognize denial of sexual violence on October 7 as prohibited content,” CyberWell boasted on June 17 through a post on X, which further implied that the decision was a result of CyberWell’s status as a trusted partner of TikTok.

A subsequent post claimed that: “Thanks to CyberWell’s data, TikTok is leading the way in recognizing and actioning this new form of antisemitism, and we urge all other social media platforms to follow suit.”

The image coupled with the post praising TikTok accused X user @HadiNasrallah of “Encouraging Violence” and “Denying that well-documented violent events took place” for claiming that “Hamas did not rape anyone on October 7th and Israel killed their own people with tanks and helicopter shelling.”

The degree to which Hamas committed sexual violence during its attack, and the scale of Israeli usage of the so-called Hannibal Directive preference of killing its own troops and citizens rather than let them be taken hostage, are perhaps the central narrative battles surrounding October 7.

More than 50 tenured journalism professors signed a letter in April asking The New York Times to investigate the reporting process behind its flagship publication on alleged sexual violence on October 7, “Screams Without Words,” and the Associated Press argued the next month that two “debunked” allegations had created a fog over credible evidence presented by organizations such as the United Nations.

Following a late October article from the independent American news site The Grayzone, Times journalist Ronen Bergman reported in the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth in January that the country’s military had invoked the Hannibal Directive, indeed firing on any vehicle approaching Gaza, including those that may have carried hostages. Haaretz provided further detail on Sunday, reporting the usage of the Hannibal Directive by the Gaza Division of the Israeli military’s Southern Command in three army facilities. The number of potential casualties remains a matter of ongoing controversy in Israeli papers.

Whether controversial debates relating to the Israeli military should be refereed by a de facto spin-out of a covert Israeli government intelligence effort is perhaps an easier question.

In a series of posts on the social media platform X crediting CyberWell with Meta’s recent decision to classify many criticisms of “Zionists” as hate speech, CyberWell board member Adam Milstein bragged that: “all content targeting Zionists with claims about running the world or controlling the media, plus more, WILL BE REMOVED!” “Will @elonmusk and @X follow suit?” Milstein then asked.

But Meta’s policy update on Tuesday noted that it has not yet decided on how to handle critical speech such as “Zionists are war criminals” and has forwarded the question to its oversight board. Meta argued that “the term ‘Zionists’ can be used to refer to people on the basis of their nationality (i.e., Israeli people), [and] commentary about ‘Zionists’ may also refer to government or military actions.” “We look forward to any guidance the [Oversight] Board may provide,” Meta added. “

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Deception, Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , | Leave a comment

Microsoft shuts Palestinian accounts used to contact relatives in Gaza

MEMO | July 12, 2024

Microsoft has been accused of shutting down email accounts belonging to Palestinians using Skype to call Gaza, according to a BBC investigation.

The report found that several Palestinians living abroad had their Microsoft-owned voice and video chat accounts terminated without warning, “destroying their digital lives.”

Salah Elsadi, a Palestinian living in the US, told the BBC: “I’ve had this Hotmail account for 15 years. They banned me for no reason, saying I violated their terms — what terms? Tell me.”

The investigation revealed at least 20 cases where Palestinians had their accounts suspended without any explanation. Those impacted explained that a paid Skype subscription allowed them to make affordable mobile calls to Gaza, providing a vital service for many Palestinians during Internet outages.

In some cases, these email accounts were over 15 years old, leaving users unable to access emails, contacts, or memories. Moreover, some reported that their email accounts were connected to their work.

Eiad Hametto, who has been calling his family from Saudi Arabia, said: “We are civilians with no political background who just wanted to check on our families.”

“They’ve suspended my email account that I’ve had for nearly 20 years. It was connected to all my work. They killed my life online,” he added.

Another Palestinian, Khalid Obaied, told the BBC that he no longer trusted Microsoft. “I paid for a package to make phone calls, and then, after 10 days, they banned me for no reason,” he said. “It has to be because I’m a Palestinian calling Gaza.”

A Microsoft spokesperson clarified that the company does not block calls or ban users based on the calling region or destination. Adding: “Blocking in Skype can occur in response to suspected fraudulent activity.”

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Full Spectrum Dominance | , , , | Leave a comment

Christians in occupied Jerusalem see marked surge in Israeli settler attacks

The Cradle | July 12, 2024

Settler attacks on the Christian community in occupied Jerusalem have surged since the start of the Israeli war on Gaza, according to Hebrew reports.

Hebrew news outlet Channel 13 reported on 12 July that over the past three months, there have been at least 36 recorded incidents of violence or abuse against Christians.

This includes 17 incidents of Israeli settlers spitting on Christian worshippers, nine acts of vandalism, five assaults, and five cases of verbal abuse – all under police protection.

The government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has also been imposing taxes on Churches and Church property. The Israeli government claims the taxes are routine financial matters, yet the Christian community has accused Tel Aviv of a “coordinated attack on the Christian presence in the Holy Land” and a violation of a centuries-old status quo.

“In this time, when the whole world, and the Christian world in particular, are constantly following the events in Israel, we find ourselves, once again, dealing with an attempt by authorities to drive the Christian presence out of the Holy Land,” wrote the heads of the major Christian denominations in a joint letter to Netanyahu late last month.

Earlier in June, a report released by Israeli NGO Rossing Center for Education and Dialogue reported a significant increase in Israelis attacking Christians throughout 2023.

“The ongoing shift towards the far-right, a growing sense of nationalism, and the emphasis on Israel primarily as a state for the Jewish population have collectively undermined both the legal and perceived sense of equality for any minority within the country,” the report read.

Attacks and restrictions against Christian worshippers by Israeli police are also common in the holy city.

While Christians face an uptick in abuse and oppression under Netanyahu’s far-right government, they have always suffered under occupation in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

In 2019, the head of the Sebastia Diocese of the Greek Orthodox Church in Jerusalem, Archbishop Atallah Hanna, accused Israeli forces of trying to kill him after he was hospitalized with poisoning following an Israeli tear gas attack on his church.

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Subjugation - Torture | , , , | Leave a comment

Possible consequences and prospects of Vladimir Putin’s visit to DPRK

By Konstantin Asmolov – New Eastern Outlook – 12.07.2024 

The consequences of the visit of the Russian leader to North Korea and the documents signed there are so significant that they can propel the trend of global turbulence. How have Seoul, Beijing and Washington reacted to such a rapprochement between Moscow and Pyongyang and what will be Moscow’s response to the steps taken by Seoul and its allies?

Seoul’s response 

Until a certain point, Seoul was ‘the friendliest of the unfriendly countries’ – the Russian president recently noted in a positive way. As Vladimir Putin said on June 5, 2024, within the framework of the International Economic Forum in St Petersburg, “Russia highly appreciates the refusal of ROK to directly supply lethal weapons to Ukraine”.

However, such a demonstrative rapprochement between Pyongyang and Moscow cannot be ignored by Seoul, especially since the content of the Treaty (which contains a military component along the lines of the Soviet-North Korean treaty of 1961) has turned out to match the worst expectations of South Korean analysts.

Even before the visit, South Korean diplomats hinted to the author that Seoul would definitely respond to such a level of cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang, at least for domestic political and reputation reasons. This response would most likely entail boosting Seoul-NATO cooperation to a similar level. The United States, along with its allies and systemic right-wing politicians, are putting pressure on President Yoon Suk Yeol to take a more anti-Russian stance, especially on the Ukrainian track; Seoul is constantly being convinced that since Pyongyang has been ‘proven’ to be aiding Russia, South Korea has the right to provide similar support to Ukraine, despite all possible risks of retaliatory measures and a significant cooling of relations with Moscow.

In a statement on June 20, 2024, former Ambassador to Russia and current National Security Adviser to the President Chang Ho-jin noted: “Four ships, five organisations and eight individuals from third countries, as well as Russian and North Korean organisations involved in the supply of weapons and oil transshipment between Russia and North Korea, are on the list of independent sanctions… We have also included 243 new items to the list of sanctioned goods exported to Russia, bringing the total number to 1,402 items…We plan on reconsidering the issue of military support for Ukraine, as the government has so far maintained the position that it will not supply lethal weapons to this country”.

Chang’s statement, on the other hand, could not but evoke a threatening reply from Moscow. Vladimir Putin almost immediately declared that the supply of lethal weapons to Ukraine would be a “very big mistake” and that Moscow would in this case make “the appropriate decisions, which the current leadership of South Korea will most likely not appreciate”. However, the Russian president expressed hope that such a thing would not happen.

There was also a natural exchange of reprimands. On June 21, 2024, First Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs of ROK Kim Hong Kyung summoned Russian Ambassador Georgy Zinoviev to convey Seoul’s official position on the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Agreement between Russia and DPRK from June 19.  The vice minister called on Russia to “immediately cease military cooperation with North Korea and comply with UN Security Council resolutions”. He made it clear that ROK, along with the international community, will “resolutely resist any actions that threaten its security”.

Zinoviev said that cooperation between Russia and DPRK is not directed against third countries, complies with the principles and norms of international law and is aimed at strengthening peace and stability on the Korean peninsula. Russia is ready to continue to make political and diplomatic efforts to form an architecture of long-term peace and stability based on the principle of indivisible security”, the ambassador stressed.

Meanwhile Seoul slowly began to backtrack. On June 23, 2024, in a speech on the KBS channels, Chang Ho-jin made it clear that the question of whether South Korea will supply lethal weapons to Ukraine will depend on Russia; if it starts sending high-precision modern weapons to North Korea, then nothing will stop South Korea from helping Ukraine. Among the options under consideration are 155 mm artillery shells and air defence systems.

In essence, the parties formally voiced to each other the long-known, informal red lines: South Korea is not to be engaged in direct supplies of weapons and military equipment to Ukraine and Russia is not to be engaged in the development of the North Korean military potential. It is important for Seoul to prevent the supply of dangerous modern weapons and technologies to the North, and North Korean shells (which are allegedly provided to the Special Military Operation) are a nuisance, but not yet a disaster.

It is worth remembering that, despite his high position, Chang still does not have the right to speak on behalf of the state unlike the president, the prime minister and the foreign minister. If such statements were to come from them as well, then it would indeed be a cause for concern. For now, though, one should wait and see, considering how, on the eve of his visit to the United States, Yoon Suk Yeol stated that the Republic of Korea could start supplying weapons to Ukraine if the Russian Armed Forces were to commit an atrocity.

Thus, the point of no return in relations between Moscow and Seoul has not yet been passed, but we are close. The author hopes for the best, as Moscow and Seoul understand that when crossing the ‘red’ line, Russia will also have to take action in response and South Korea may lose its status as ‘the friendliest of the unfriendly’.

China’s position 

The reaction to the visit by the Chinese media and government agencies was between neutral and positive; they did [not] provide any statements of judgement and simply noted that this was an important and serious event. The Chinese Foreign Ministry called the DPRK’s desire to develop relations with Russia normal, and the Global Times noted that this cooperation could perhaps even make the United States afraid.

Western media actively wrote that China was not happy with the rapprochement between Russia and the DPRK that Putin’s visit to North Korea and Vietnam was actually anti-Chinese in nature and that having a parallel 2+2 dialogue shows China’s desire to be friends with Seoul, showing its tough stance to Pyongyang.

This is not exactly true. Firstly, coordination between Moscow and Beijing on the Korean issue has always been and is very close. A look at the joint statements on the Korean issue made during Putin’s visit to China is enough to prove this. This means that the essence of Moscow and Pyongyang’s agreements with Beijing was probably discussed in advance.

Secondly, on June 18 negotiations did indeed take place in Seoul. They were attended by senior officials from the foreign and defence ministries of ROK and China in a 2+2 format.

Before the start of the talks, the official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Korea, Lim Soo-suk, believed that “issues of cooperation between Russia and North Korea will be discussed, since dialogue is taking place simultaneously with the scheduled visit of the Russian president to North Korea”. Professor of the Hankuk University of Foreign Affairs Kang Jung-young said that “having this dialogue is in itself is a clear signal to North Korea that China will not support Pyongyang’s attempts to create a trilateral bloc with Beijing and Moscow”.

The Korean approach to the 2+2 format is as follows: representatives of Seoul expressed deep concern to their Chinese colleagues about the visit of the Russian president to DPRK and the deepening of ties between Moscow and Pyongyang amid rising tensions on the Korean peninsula. They stressed that the Russian leader’s visit to North Korea should not undermine peace and stability in the region or lead to the strengthening of military cooperation between the two countries. Additionally, ROK called on China to play a constructive role in ensuring peace, stability and security on the Korean peninsula, emphasising that the deepening of Russian-North Korean military cooperation and its consequences run in contradiction to Beijing’s interests. In turn, China confirmed its unchanged position on the Korean peninsula, expressing its readiness to take an active part in solving the problems of the region.

A ‘bloc’ as a limiting factor 

Almost immediately after the signing of the comprehensive strategic partnership agreement between the Russian Federation and North Korea, the Russian president noted that there were no fundamentally new points in it and that the document was similar to the 1961 treaty, including Article 4 on ‘automatic military intervention’. According to Putin, the provisions of the new Agreement stipulate that military assistance is provided only in case of aggression, and therefore ROK has nothing to worry about, since there are no known plans of the South to attack the North. The Russian president also expressed the opinion that the Agreement would to some extent limit the threat of the crisis on the Korean peninsula entering a ‘hot phase’.

The author supposes that the cooperation between Moscow and Pyongyang within the framework of a possible military bloc reduces the likelihood of conflict on the Korean peninsula rather than increases it. The fact that the opposing sides are two serious military blocs reduces the likelihood of an escalation of the conflict, as it could too easily escalate to become nuclear, and neither Moscow nor Pyongyang are suicidal.

One more detail: on the one hand, article 4 of the Agreement is harsher than article 5 of the NATO treaty. On the other, it clearly indicates that a state of war is required for comprehensive assistance, and if we recall the 1961 treaty, then it is worth paying attention to the events of 1968 when Moscow clarified to Pyongyang in which situations military assistance would be cancelled.

We should likely expect a confrontation similar to the Cold War. There will be an arms race, muscles will be flexed, loud statements and minor incidents will take place, but the parties are well aware of the red lines and do not intend to cross them. Being prepared for war, including the development of preemptive strike plans as a way of self-defence in a critical situation, is not the same as the desire to initiate a conflict.

The fate of UNSC sanctions 

The demonstrative liquidation of UN Security Council sanctions, which was expected in the West, has still not taken place. Both Putin’s article and the additional decree emphasise cooperation in the fields of education, healthcare and science and maintain that the unjust sanctions should be lifted.

For now, though, Moscow says it will comply with the sanctions it previously voted for.

It is likely that the lifting of sanctions may occur following the next round of escalation because regardless of whether there were actually arms deals or not, the West will still blame Moscow and Pyongyang for colluding and take retaliatory measures.

The appearance of a North Korean labour force in Russia is a sign that a de jure or de facto decision to ignore a part of the sanctions has been made. Price, quality, safety and keeping a low profile are the strengths of North Korean builders, and talks of their employment have been going on for a long time.

Summa summarum, there is a lot of uncertainty in the future and the situation is similar to that described in the book ‘The Guns of August’ by Barbara Tuchman: nobody wanted war, so war was inevitable. However, it cannot be said that the visit of the President of the Russian Federation to the DPRK has significantly aggravated the situation.

Konstantin Asmolov, PhD in History, Leading Research Fellow at the Korean Studies Center of the Institute of China and Contemporary Asia of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | 1 Comment

Kremlin comments on Türkiye’s SCO bid

Türkiye’s obligations to the US-led military bloc are not consistent with the Eurasian organization’s values, Moscow has said.

RT | July 12, 2024

Türkiye’s bid to become a full member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) is not compatible with its membership in NATO, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Friday.

Last week, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan attended a summit of the Eurasian mutual defense group, in which his nation has observer status. While returning home from Kazakhstan, he told journalists that Ankara wants to “further develop” ties with the SCO and its founding members Russia and China. During the NATO leaders’ summit in the US this week, he said Türkiye wants to join the SCO as a permanent member.

Asked by journalists when Turkish accession could be expected, Peskov said there was a problem with such a proposal.

“There are certain contradictions between Turkish commitments and [its] position on fundamental issues as a NATO member and the worldview formulated in the founding documents of the SCO,” he explained.

The expansion of the SCO is of interest to many nations and remains on its agenda, but there is no specific timeline for accepting new members, he added. Commenting later during a press call on bilateral relations with Türkiye, Peskov said Russia was “open for attempts to reach agreements based on a certain worldview.”

Moscow perceives NATO as a hostile, aggressive military organization, which serves US geopolitical interests and is currently conducting a proxy war against Russia in Ukraine.

Despite being a NATO member state, Türkiye has maintained a neutral stance on the Ukraine conflict, refusing to impose economic sanctions on Russia and serving as an intermediary between Moscow and Kiev on several occasions. Ankara helped to mediate a nascent peace deal in the early months of the hostilities, which Kiev eventually ditched in favor of continued fighting. The Russian government believes that the US and its allies, particularly the UK, forced Ukraine to reject the proposal.

The SCO was founded in 2001 and currently has ten full members: Russia, China, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Belarus. Kazakhstan holds the rotating presidency this year and hosted the leaders of member states on July 3 and 4 in Astana.

One of the key pledges to which SCO members subscribe is not to seek the improvement of their own national security at the expense of the national security of other parties. NATO policy does exactly that, according to its critics, including Russia.

July 12, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment