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Saturday, January 24, 2026

A few tweets from the Musk platform from the last few weeks .......... January 24, 2026

 

Articles well worth a read ............ January 24, 2026

 

https://thegrayzone.com/2026/01/20/google-suspends-mossad-recruiter/

Grayzone report prompts Google to suspend ads from Atlanta influencer recruiting Iranians for Mossad

Jack Poulson  

Following reporting by The Grayzone’s Max Blumenthal, Google confirmed it has suspended the account of Desi Banks Productions LLC for violations of advertising policies and deleted the Mossad recruitment ads from its transparency portal.

This article was originally published by All-Source Intelligence.

The Mountain View-based advertising and technology giant Google confirmed on Tuesday that it has suspended the advertising account of the Atlanta-based comedian Desi T. Banks Jr., Desi Banks Productions LLC, following exposure of a months-long, international ad campaign attempting to recruit family members of Iranian government officials as agents of Israel’s foreign intelligence service, the Mossad...............

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https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/uae-flights-linked-sudan-war-tracked-israel-ethiopia

 

 By Simon Hooper and Oscar Rickett

Exclusive: UAE flights linked to Sudan war tracked from Israel to Ethiopia

As Saudi Arabia-UAE rivalry intensifies, cargo plane connected to Mohammed bin Zayed conducts multiple flights across Middle East, Horn of Africa, and beyond 
 
 

A cargo plane previously linked to the supply of weapons to UAE-backed fighters in Sudan and Libya has made a number of flights in recent days between military bases in Abu Dhabi, Israel, Bahrain and Ethiopia, Middle East Eye can reveal.

While the purpose and any connection between the flights is unclear, they have taken place against the backdrop of a spiralling power struggle between the UAE and Saudi Arabia across Yemen and the Horn of Africa that has upturned the geopolitics of the region and prompted concerns of a new escalation in the Sudan war.

The UAE has been thrown onto the back foot after Saudi Arabia launched military action to oust the Emirati-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) from the Yemeni port city of Aden, and has been forced to withdraw from its key military base in Bosaso on the opposite Somali coastline.

Meanwhile, Israel’s recognition of Somaliland, where the UAE maintains another military base and controls the port of Berbera, has further destabilised the regional order and prompted speculation that Ethiopia, which is closely aligned with Abu Dhabi, could be poised to do the same in return for access to Berbera.

The war in Sudan between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF), which began in April 2023 and has led to the largest humanitarian crisis in the world, is now firmly part of this struggle, with Saudi Arabia – alongside Egypt and Turkey - stepping up its military support for the SAF in an attempt to counteract the UAE’s longstanding patronage of the RSF...................

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https://news.antiwar.com/2026/01/21/the-gaza-board-of-peace-is-dividing-the-globe/

The Gaza ‘Board of Peace’ Is Dividing the Globe

Netanyahu Reverses Course, Now Says Israel Will Join

 

https://dissidentvoice.org/2026/01/carney-at-davos-removing-that-sign-in-the-window/

Carney at Davos: Removing that Sign in the Window

“It seems that every day we’re reminded that we live in an era of great power rivalry – that the rules-based order is fading, that the strong can do what they can, and the weak must suffer what they must.” These were the grave reflections of Canada’s Prime Minister, Mark Carney, delivered in his January 22 speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

With such Thucydidean tendences in international relations bothering the PM, Carney feared that “strong tendency of countries to go along, get along to accommodate, to avoid trouble, to hope that compliance will buy safety.” In abjuring this tendency, options beyond accommodation and grudging acceptance had to be considered. Who better to inspire than the meditations of Czech dissident author Václav Havel, whose 1978 essay “The Power of the Powerless” had conspicuously moved Carney?

Carney homes in on Havel’s reference to the greengrocer who places a sign in his window each morning with the slogan “Workers of the world unite.” Neither he, nor anyone else believes it. “But he places the sign anyway to avoid trouble, to signal compliance, to get along.” (Havel argues that such formulations help “the greengrocer to conceal from himself the low foundations of his obedience, at the same time concealing the low foundations of power. It hides behind the façade of something high. And that something is ideology.”)

As every shopkeeper on the street follows the ritual “the system persists – not through violence alone, but through the participation of ordinary people in rituals they privately know to be false.” Such a performance bolsters the lie, nourishes it, and sustains the system. Its strength is also its signal weakness. “When even one person stops performing, when the greengrocer removes his sign, the illusion begins to crack.”.......

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https://consortiumnews.com/2026/01/23/the-police-state-of-america/

 

In recent days, the government in America has not only failed to protect the freedom of speech, it has attacked it.

Like authoritarians throughout history, it has sought to silence the speech it hates and fears. But most authoritarians did not have a Constitution that was written as an intentional obstacle to them.

In Miami last week, Raquel Pacheco posted a Tweet/X calling out Miami Beach Mayor Steven Meiner’s “blind support for Israel.” She called him a hypocrite for supporting the free speech of those who want Israel to take over Gaza, but opposing the free speech of those who want a Palestinian state.

When she received a visit from two Miami Police detectives asking if she had placed that post, she politely declined to answer. Pacheco told them that she has the right to remain silent. When she asked them to leave the front porch of her home, they did.

Two weeks ago in Minneapolis, Susan Tincher was arrested for following Immigration & Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents and persistently videotaping them. She was shoved to the snow on her belly and handcuffed behind her back.

 At an ICE detention facility, her clothes and her wedding ring were removed from her — the latter by a bolt cutter. After five hours of confinement, an ICE supervisor decided to release her. ICE agents returned her destroyed wedding ring but not her clothes, which they told a federal judge had been lost......

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https://ronpaulinstitute.org/arctic-craziness/

Arctic Craziness

by | Jan 23, 2026

 What ever happened to the Epstein scandal? Gone. Out of sight. Hey presto, vanished by the wave of a magic wand. It seems that Master Illusionist Donald Trump has dodged this lethal bullet – at least for the time being.

Trump’s Invasion of Venezuela and kidnapping its president Maduro, a former bus driver, removed Epstein from the news. Now Trump and his henchmen are beating the drums over his claim to world greatness launched at Davos, Switzerland. This rather ugly alpine resort – which is not great for reliable skiing – was the perfect venue for showman Trump. The annual Davos jamboree is the world stage for big egos, conmen and show-offs.

Chief among them was former British prime minister, Tony Blair, a politician of unparallel slipperiness and the ability to sugar-coat lies and half-truths. Blair has just agreed to join Trump’s so-called Board of Peace, a collection of louche politicians. The entry fee is $1 billion, a typical Trump fund-raiser.

Blair acted as a US mouthpiece during the invasion of Iraq, standing in for the inarticulate George W. Bush to sell the US invasion to the world that may have resulted in close to one million casualties. Today, oil-rich Iraq remains a US occupied state.

Europe, except for two members, refused to play along with the so-called Board of Peace charade. Canada, normally obedient to Washington’s demands, refused to join marking an important step forward in its independence from US tutelage. Mark Carney, Canada’s new prime minister, stood firm against Trump’s blandishments and threats to invade while many other US allies shivered in their boots or longed for the placid says of dotty old President Joe Biden. We applaud Carney’s courage.

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Monday, January 12, 2026

What politically minded people are talking about ..... January 12, 2026

Please go to the links to access the full articles.

 

https://www.moonofalabama.org/2026/01/why-might-makes-right-is-dangerous-for-all-of-us.html

Why ‘Might Makes Right’ Is Dangerous For All of Us

Jaqcues Baud, who was recently sanctioned by the European Union, is lamenting on Dialog Works that –  The World Is Entering a Lawless Era (vid).

He is right of course, but late.

International law, developed over centuries, has been broken by the U.S. and other imperial forces ever since it was established.

But after World War II such breaches, even when obvious, were clad in propaganda which claimed that each of those was about the enforcement of higher values. Villains had to be fought, dictators opposed, evil communists had to be prevented from stealing from their people. The old and new neo-conservatives were masters in this. The blatant imperial attacks of Iraq and Afghanistan were sold as good men’s missions to bring democracy to the downtrodden and suppressed poor people in those countries. We had to liberate their women.

That propaganda that covered the brutal wars of conquest under the mantle of democracy promotion held up for a while. It served two purposes.

It allowed U.S. vassals to justify their co-operation with the imperialists. It also allowed a significant part of the ‘western’ populations to still feel good about their countries. When the wars went southward and losses increased they acknowledged that waging those wars were bad. But the consoling feeling was that at least “We Meant Well“, as one of those imperialists ransacking Iraq titled his memoir.

It worked for a while for some people. The Iraq war was protested against in Europe. Germany and France rejected the war and Congress renamed french fries into freedom fries.

But even their moral high ground has further deteriorated since.

The decade long dirty war against Syria was supported by all NATO countries. The 2014 Nazi-coup in Kiev and the following war against the people of Donbas were patched over. Western propaganda drowned out all protests. But the doubts about these wars lingered. The propaganda was becoming too obvious..........

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https://scheerpost.com/2026/01/10/from-noriega-to-maduro-the-long-us-history-of-kidnapping-foreign-leaders/

 

From Noriega to Maduro: The Long US History of Kidnapping Foreign Leaders

January 10, 2026  ,

While it has undoubtedly shocked the world, the Trump administration’s abduction of President Nicolás Maduro fits into a long history of United States kidnapping of foreign leaders.

On January 3, U.S. Special Forces entered Venezuela by air, captured Maduro and First Lady Cilia Flores, killing around 80 people in the process. They were flown to the United States, where Maduro was put on trial on spurious drug trafficking and possession of firearms charges.

Despite President Trump himself declaring that “kidnapping” was an appropriate term for what happened, corporate media around the world have refrained from using the obvious word for what transpired, preferring to use “capturing” or “seizing.” These terms reframe the incident and cast doubt on its illegality, helping to manufacture public consent for a grave breach of international law. Indeed, managers at the BBC sent out a memo to its staff, instructing them in no uncertain terms to “avoid using ‘kidnapped’” when reporting on the news.

Targeting Venezuela

Maduro is not the first Venezuelan official Washington has helped kidnap. In 2002, the Bush administration planned and executed a coup d’état that briefly ousted Maduro’s predecessor, Hugo Chavez, from power.

The U.S. government had been organizing and financing the ringleaders of the coup for months, flying the key players back and forth to Washington, D.C. for meetings with top officials. On the day of the coup, American Ambassador Charles Shapiro was at the mansion of local media magnate, Gustavo Cisneros, the headquarters of the coup.

Two U.S. warships entered Venezuelan waters, moving towards the remote island of La Orchila, where Chavez was helicoptered to. Chavez himself stated that senior American personnel were present with him during his abduction. Unsurprisingly, the Bush administration immediately endorsed the proceedings, describing them as a return to democracy.........................

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https://thegrayzone.com/2026/01/05/indictment-maduro-cia-network-witness/

Behind the DOJ’s politicized indictment of Maduro: a CIA-created ‘network’ and coerced star witness 

 

Friday, January 9, 2026

Some videos you might have missed ........ January 9, 2026

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Wednesday, January 7, 2026

Some informative videos on US's aggression on Venezuela ... January 7, 2026

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Wednesday, December 31, 2025

Some Posts on the X platform with news worth reading ......... Dec 21 - 31, 2025