Will Section 12 Die of Shame?

Returning to Beirut, I reflect on the impact of events in the Middle East on Western politics

There was absolutely nothing stopping them, but not one single member of western mainstream media ever visited a bomb site in Lebanon to verify whether Israeli claims it was a Hezbollah base or missile site were true. Because they knew the answer is negative, as I found across dozens of bomb sites, and that is not the narrative they are paid to promote.

But when a narrative they are paid to promote came to the fore, they flocked to Damascus - driving right through the bombed civilian homes, ambulance centres and schools of Lebanon's Bekaa Valley to get there - to promote Syria's new Israel, USA and Turkey sponsored "democratic" government of entirely "reformed" HTS Wahhabists.

Now in the past I had unfortunate arguments with some who broadly take a similar view of politics to me - Vanessa Beeley comes to mind - because I was never a fan of the Assad regime and its human rights record. Nevertheless, I consistently preferred Assad to the NATO, Gulf and Israel sponsored extremist Wahhabi "rebels" who were fighting him.

But you can acknowledge Assad's human rights abuses without subscribing to the ludicrous atrocity propaganda that spewed out of the mainstream media - 150,000 prisoners in one jail, 100,000 people in a mass grave, the "body press" whose plywood pressing surfaces were peculiarly unstained, the suntanned American prisoner who had been "locked in a room for seven months", the splendidly groomed dissident prisoner "rescued" by CNN.

Atrocity propaganda is as old as warfare. Like the "60 beheaded babies" of 7 October, or the 100,000 prisoners in a mass grave, it will doubtless recur indefinitely despite being nonsense. The installation of HTS by the NATO powers and Israel was a propaganda orgy of "joy" and "liberation".

Undoubtedly some people did feel joy and liberation. But the western media have not stayed around since, to report the subsequent numerous incidents of beatings and summary executions of non-Sunnis, that the "democratic revolution" will start to think about an election only in four years time, that women judges have all been dismissed, that starting yesterday there are official Sharia patrols on the streets of Damascus "advising" women to cover their hair, and that for the first time also starting yesterday the hijab is official compulsory uniform in most Syrian state schools.

Still less have they reported that HTS has done nothing whatsoever to oppose the Israeli invasion of Southern Syria, which as of today controls the dams that supply 40% of Syria's potable and agricultural water. Israel is constructing 13 permanent military bases in the newly occupied Syrian territories, putting in concrete emplacements and building or improving fenced roads between them. It is building gun emplacements around dams.

HTS has, while not opposing the Israeli invaders, however managed to make several incursions into Lebanon including direct attacks on the Lebanese Army. In some cases these attacks by HTS on Lebanon have occurred within five miles of illegal Israeli outposts of soldiers within Syria - a clear indication of which side HTS is on.

The new HTS government has of course been feted by the global neoliberals. The agenda of the western security services has nowhere been more obvious than in the linkage of the HTS and Ukrainian causes, and the second foreign delegation received by the new HTS government was indeed from Ukraine.

Uzbek militants formed a significant section of HTS' Wahabbi army, and it is not a coincidence that around the same time, it was an Uzbek militant who murdered a key Russian general on behalf of the Ukrainian government.

The Ukrainian delegation to the HTS government was closely followed of course by the ubiquitous harpie Annelina Baerbock, the most outspoken and enthusiastic advocate outside the state of Israel of the massacre of Palestinians.

As some kind of counterweight to the Western support of Al Qaeda/Al Nusra/HTS in Syria, which the public was entitled to find somewhat confusing, we have the narrative of the "ISIS inspired" terrorism attack in New Orleans, just to reassure that Muslims are still the official enemy.

There are a number of things about this narrative which are just too pat to sit easily with me. The killer, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, helpfully aided identification by being equipped with an ISIS flag, which despite being an important item in a multiple murder investigation was somehow unguarded and available to the media to photograph, plainly clearly laid out in line with the flagstone pattern and not lying as it fell. Why is the crime scene tape strewn around like this?

A further interesting question is why the flag is upside down on the makeshift staff. If somebody cared enough about the cause to kill and die for it, presumably they would know which way up the flag goes? It is worth noting that the official story is that Jabber was "inspired by ISIS", not that he actually had any form of contact with anyone from ISIS. Maybe nobody told him which way the flag goes. But it also transpires he had Arabic language books, including the Koran, at home, so he plainly would have known the writing was upside down.

Entirely weird is this report from the New York Post, where their reporter is able apparently to walk around the completely unsecured apartment of Jabbar and poke about evidence at will. Again it is all delightfully perfect - the Koran is open at a page about fighting and being killed, and the camera lingers on a helpfully hung Palestinian keffiyeh, while there are lots of chemicals and apparent bomb making areas.