Chris Kijne van de VPRO 58

Ik kreeg de volgende reactie van de lezer Jan Verheul:

'Stan, ik begrijp dat je vooral geïnsipreerd en gedreven wordt door boosheid op individuen - journalisten meestal- en daar moeten we blij om zijn, want anders zou je wellicht minder publiceren. Maar als je even veel zou publiceren zonder al die persoonlijke afrekeningen, zou het voor de lezer mogelijk nòg overtuigender zijn.'

Deze reactie is kenmerkend voor de levenshouding van mensen die niet verder kunnen denken dan hun eigen directe belang. Ik heb al een paar keer benadrukt dat het mij niet in eerste instantie om Chris Kijne zelf gaat, maar dat zijn columns een heldere illustratie geven van de corruptie in de Nederlandse televisiejournalistiek. Ik heb ook opgemerkt dat Chris Kijne geen slechte journalist is, ook geen goede, maar dat hij behoort tot de categorie: doorsnee journalist. Ook hier is Kijne een heldere illustratie van het werk van de commerciele massamedia in Nederland. Is Chris Kijne daarmee een slecht mens? Nee, geenszins, hij is net zo slecht en goed als ik, net als ik is hij modaal. Soms een rotzak, soms een engel, meestal geen van beiden. 

Waar het hier om draait is de journalistiek, de pretenties van 'objectiviteit' en oprechtheid. Waar ik mij aan stoor is de vanzelfsprekendheid en het gemak waarmee tongue-in-cheek op quasi ironische toon de kluit belazerd wordt. Arnon Grunberg heeft gelijk wanneer hij stelt dat 'tegenwoordig ironie een etiket [is] geworden om op immorele uitingen te plakken, opdat men zich aan de verantwoordelijkheid kan onttrekken.' Ik heb daarvan talloze voorbeelden gegeven in de journalistiek en ik probeer kritiek te leveren aan de hand van inzichten van doorgaans Angelsaksische collega's en academici gespecialiseerd in de massa communicatie. Ik doe dat met open vizier, niet omdat ik denk dat mijn journalistieke opponenten een publieke discussie zullen aangaan, want zij zijn uitgeslapen genoeg om te beseffen dat ze weinig weerwoord hebben in een dergelijke discussie. Ik doe dit zelfs niet vanuit de gedachte dat ik daarmee een bijdrage lever aan een verandering. Volstrekt niet. Ik doe dit omdat ik mijzelf zie als chroniqueur van de tijd waarin ik leef. Ik probeer een tijdgeest te vangen, hoe vaag de contouren van dit fenomeen ook mogen lijken. Wij allen zijn onderdeel van de nooit ophoudende geschiedenis. Later zullen anderen naar onze tijd kijken en denken: wat gebeurde er toen toch in hemelsnaam? Uiteindelijk werkt iedere schrijver voor de geschiedenis. Waarom zou men anders iets opschrijven? Wat mij telkens weer verbijsterd is de onvoorstelbare stupiditeit van onze cultuur. Die probeer ik te beschrijven. Dat is alles. En daarbij word ik niet gedreven door 'boosheid op individuen' of zoiets onbenulligs, maar door verbijstering. De opvattingen van Chris Kijne gelden daarbij voor mij als een maatstaf om mijn eigen dwaasheid te meten. Alleen voor de kleinburger die alles op zichzelf betrekt en die alleen maar bezig is 'nog overtuigender' te zijn geldt dat kritiek niets anders kan zijn dan een lange reeks 'persoonlijke afrekeningen.' Voor hem bestaat het publieke niet meer. De wereld is voor zo iemand één groot IK.


'His dismissal of the hypocrisies, half truths and pretences of the greedy and powerful is total because they breed and foster ignorance, which is a form of blindness towards reality. Also because they shit on memory, including the memory of language itself, which is our first heritage.'
John Berger over Pier Paolo Pasolini.

Syrie 34

'Nieuwe post op Willy Van Damme's Weblog Vernielde kerken in Homs by willyvandamme Terwijl onze journalisten slag Gert Van Langendonck en Jorn De Cock in De Morgen en De Standaard de loftrompet zingen van wat zij de Syrische vrijheidsstrijders noemen klinkt er vanuit de vernielde Syrische stad Homs een ander beeld door. En dat is wel heel verschillend van wat zij brengen. Geweervuur Priester Daniel Maes en zijn team hebben de voorbije weken een videoreportage gemaakt over de vernielde kerken in de stad Homs waar volgens hen ooit 80.000 christenen woonden en er nog nog amper enkele honderden, ouderlingen en gehandicapten, overblijven. Sommige kerken werden volgens dit verslag door die rebellen gebruikt als uitvalsbasis voor hun bloedige raids tegen de bevolking in die christelijke wijken en de ordediensten. Alle kerken werd zwaar beschadigd, geplunderd en soms in brand gestoken. Een kaart van de stad Homs met het rood omkaderde deel waar zich de christelijke gemeenschap concentreerde. Amper een westerse journalist die er aandacht voor heeft. Evenmin als Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Pax Christi en Broederlijk Delen. Voor deze laatste twee organisaties mogen ze in Syrië blijkbaar christelijke kerken platbranden. De fotoreportage geeft een schrijnend beeld van een land dat men bewust doet afglijden richting een burgeroorlog. Wat opvalt is dat de vernielingen bijna altijd het gevolg zijn van geweervuur of afkomstig van granaatwerpers, het type van wapens gebruikt door die rebellen. Orwelliaans Onze media beperken zich in essentie tot de verhalen komende van de oppositie. Verder kijkt men niet.  De reportage is te zien op de blog van de mediawerkgroep Syrië op de volgende link: http://mediawerkgroepsyrie.wordpress.com/2012/06/18/des-eglises-brulees-et-detruites-par-des-terroristes-a-homs-video/ VRT-journalist Rudi Vranckx klaagde hen onlangs op Facebook aan omdat ze volgens hem bepaalde informatie achterhielden en had het over Orwelliaans. Maar wat dan te denken van diegenen die dit aspect heel bewust verzwijgen en het maar steeds hebben over vrijheidsstrijders die de burgers beschermen? Als dat geen Newspeak is! Zijn collega Jens Franssen insinueerde zelfs dat sommige van deze religieuzen die dit rapport samenstelden betrokken waren bij die dodelijke aanslag op hun groep toen ze eerder Homs bezochten. Het toont het wel erg lage niveau waarop dit soort journalistiek zich begeeft. Willy Van Damme willyvandamme | 18 juni 2012 op23:32 | Categorieën:Buitenland - Midden-Oosten | URL: http://wp.me/pgSxv-1x6'

Syrie 33

'Juan Cole's Columns

Sectarian Violence Undermines Syrian Regime

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Posted on Jun 17, 2012

AP Photo

A Syrian revolutionary flag waves on top of a building on the outskirts of Aleppo, Syria.

By Juan Cole

The Syrian upheaval has gone through several stages. It began with relatively peaceful protests by crowds in a handful of small and medium-size cities outside the large metropolitan areas of Damascus and Aleppo. Severe repression by the national regime led some revolutionaries to turn to guerrilla tactics. The ruling Baath government subjected the quarters held by the Free Syrian Army to heavy artillery and tank assaults. More recently, as the rebellion continued to spread in small towns, the military has provided cover to death squads that have massacred civilians in an attempt to scare them into submission. The most frightening thing about this spiral of ever greater violence and brutality is that some of the now-hardened lines have been sectarian.

The Syrian army assault on the rebellious Sunni village of al-Haffa in Latakia province, which has left it a ghost town, exemplifies this move toward religious war. Latakia is heavily Alawite, and protecting members of this religious group from Sunni dominance is one of the latent functions of the regime. The upper echelons of the ruling Baath Party and its officer corps are dominated by the Alawite sect of Shiite Islam. Only about 10 percent of Syrians are Alawite. On the order of 70 percent of Syrians belong to the rival Sunni branch of Islam. (Many Syrian Sunnis are secularists.) The car bomb that recently damaged the Shiite shrine of Sayyida Zaynab in Damascus may have primarily targeted nearby Intelligence Ministry buildings, but those who detonated it may have been happy enough to hurt Shiite religious sensibilities.

The death squads, Shabiha, deployed by the regime against the towns of Houla and Mazraat al-Qubair in recent weeks are drawn from the Alawi sect. Many of the Sunnis being targeted have been organized by the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood. Houla and Mazraat al-Qubair are largely Sunni hamlets surrounded by powerful Alawi towns.

The black-garbed Shabiha, or “ghost gangs,” began as criminal organizations in the Alawite-dominated port of Latakia in the 1970s after the Alawite Assad family came to power in Syria, and some of its members are drawn from the Assad and related Deeb and Makhlouf clans. Although the groups were curbed in the 1990s after they became too arrogant even for the Assads to countenance, they re-emerged in 2011 as paramilitary adjuncts to the army and security police. In Alawite areas, they have been accused of detaining Syrians with Sunni names at checkpoints and doing away with them.

The Baath Party was founded in the 1940s by two Christian intellectuals who advocated a secular Arab nationalism. In some ways, the “Resurrection,” or Baath, party was to resemble the Communist Party, but instead of championing the working class and being universal it would uplift ethnic Arabs and unite them to throw off the vestiges of Western, colonial domination. This attempt to subvert socialism with an appeal to essentially racist themes made the Baath an odd hybrid of fascism and Third-Worldism. Non-Arab minorities in Baath-ruled countries, such as the Kurds, often faced discrimination or worse.

Baathists came to power through coups in Syria and Iraq in the 1960s. Ironically, the Baath one-party state became a vehicle for well-organized minorities to take over the government. Thus, in Syria the Alawite Shiites dominated the Baath regime from 1970, whereas in Iraq control of the ruling Baath party was held by a Sunni clan from Tikrit (that of Saddam Hussein).

Syria’s Baath Party has lasted so long and attracted the loyalty of so many Syrians over the decades in part because it aided Syria’s transition from a rural, peasant country to an urban one. It carried out a land reform that redistributed land to peasants and liquidated the old big-landlord class. The Baathists built dams and irrigation works for farmers, earning the gratitude and support of many rural Sunni clans. Largely rural depot towns such as Deraa in the south near the Jordanian border were among the biggest beneficiaries of these Baath programs, and so were known as strong party backers, producing several high regime officials and officers.

Rural Syria has had a prolonged and severe drought, and the Baath government has not been good in this decade about managing water resources. Rural Sunni clans have suffered most from this water crisis.

A majority of Syrians now live in towns and cities, and their needs are different from those of their farming parents. The Baath Party’sreduction of fuel and other subsidies and encouragement of unaccountable big business have angered the urban population. (These policies, pushed by international banks and elites, are generally referred to as “Neoliberalism.”) Largely Sunni towns have seen high unemployment, especially in slums on outskirts full of former farmworkers forced to seek jobs in the cities, often unsuccessfully.

At its heart, the Syrian crisis is a conflict that pits the urban metropolises (Damascus, Aleppo and Latakia) that benefit from government largesse against the medium-size cities and rural towns that have suffered from drought and Neoliberal policies. It so happens that this divide also aligns, if unevenly, with sectarian cleavages, with the provincial cities and towns being mostly religiously conservative and Sunni, and the big-cities bastions of minority power and secular Sunni business classes dependent on the regime.

The Syrian government’s resort to Alawite death squads in recent weeks, however, has threatened the big-city alliance that has allowed the Baath to survive. The sight of Sunni women and children massacred by the Shabiha in Houla and Mazraat al-Qubair drove Sunni shopkeepers in the capital to instigate a general strike. Protests and small insurgencies are now taking place even in Damascus.

The regime of Bashar Assad squandered whatever good will it had in rural and small-town Syria by its heavy-handed repression of the protests. Among its few remaining assets was the support of Christian, Alawi and secular Sunni middle classes in the large cities, groups that fear the rise of Sunni fundamentalism, are disturbed by the decline of security for property, and benefit from Baath government licenses and contracts. The deployment of Shabiha death squads, however, has clearly pushed many of these former supporters into the opposition. It is now the regime that is threatening public security and fanning the flames of sectarian hatred. If the Syrian revolution finally succeeds, it will be because the Baath regime betrayed its commitments to secularism, socialism and public order, becoming in the eyes of the public just another sectarian mafia.'

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/sectarian_violence_undermines_syrian_regime_20120618/

Zionist Propaganda

Declassified: Massive Israeli Manipulation of US Media Exposed

In 2010 a set of declassified documents from a sealed Senate Investigation revealed widespread Israeli manipulation of the United States corporate media.
The documents showed that Israel was attempting to quell any coverage of one of their nuclear weapons facilities as well as paying the Atlantic to spread disinformation to disrupt a U.S. peace proposal which would have allowed Palestinian refugees to return to their homes in Israel.
Talk of censorship and disruption is also mentioned in the now declassified documents, something the Zionists seem to do very well.

The corporate media has allowed or possibly has always been controlled by Zionist influences.

While we clearly have corporate media bias on other issues such as globalism and the coming world government, the Israeli issue seems to be a major corporate media talking point.

(Source: CorporateMediaExposed)

http://counterpsyops.com/2012/06/18/declassified-massive-israeli-manipulation-of-us-media-exposed/

Syrie 32

Sonja heeft een nieuwe reactie op uw bericht "Syrie 31" achtergelaten: 

Washington Arming Syrian Insurgents

Ben benieuwd wanneer Amnesty Nederland bij de Amerikaanse ambassade gaat demonstreren. 

Washington Arming Syrian Insurgents

Washington Arming Syrian Insurgents

by Stephen Lendman

It's no surprise. It's an open secret. It's been ongoing since early last year directly and/or indirectly. Rhetorically supporting peace while waging war exposes Washington's transparent hypocrisy.

On June 15, the UK Daily Telegraph headlined "US holds high-level talks with Syrian rebels seeking weapons in Washington," saying:

In the past week, a Free Syrian Army (FSA) representative met with outgoing Syrian ambassador Robert Ford and special Syrian coordinator Frederick Hof at the State Department.

Meetings with senior National Security Council officials were also held.

FSA members want heavy weapons. They include anti-tank missiles and heavy machine guns.

"(T)he Daily Telegraph has learned that advanced contingency plans are already in place to supply heavy weapons to the rebels, including sophisticated anti-tank weapons and surface to-air-missiles."

Plans may crystallize at the upcoming June 30 Geneva Friends of Syria meeting. The June 18-19 Los Cabos, Mexico summit will focus more on Eurozone economic crisis conditions. 

Syria discussions won't change Russian and Chinese opposition to military intervention.

Nonetheless, Obama and Putin will hold bilateral talks. It'll be their first meeting since Putin's reelection. Obama will also meet privately with Chinese President Hu Jintao. Expect no Syrian breakthroughs.

Unnamed "(s)enior Middle East diplomatic sources" said large insurgent weapons supplies are already stockpiled. "(I)nevitable" intervention is coming. At issue is toppling Assad. One unnamed source said:

It "will happen. It is not a question of 'if,' but 'when.' "

"Middle Eastern diplomatic sources said that the Obama administration was fully aware of the preparations being made to arm Syrian opposition groups."

"The US has also agreed to be part of a group of countries that coordinates assistance to the rebels, the sources said, but was still deliberating over the time frame for escalation."

On June 16, DEBKAfile said Washington "is very near a decision on the types of weapons to be shipped to the Syrian rebels and when."

Most supplied are bought and paid for. Saudi Arabia and Qatar funds were used. "The White House is also close to deciding on the format of its military operation in Syria."

"Some sources" call it "Libya lite." It includes a no-fly zone. It also involves "direct air and other strikes...." 

If implemented, expect full-scale war. Washington always resolves issues this way when other interventionist measures fail.

According to Alexei Pushkov, Chairman of the Russian Duma's International Affairs Committee:

Thousands of insurgents are waging war on Syria. They're using "heavy weapons." They include "heavy machine guns (and) anti-tank guns...." 

They're coming from Libya. Lebanese authorities interdicted a ship. It was "full of US weapons...."

Syria is secular, multi-ethnic and multi-religious. Syrians lived together peacefully for years. If war erupts, "100 thousand" may die.

If protracted and intense, it could be many more. Libya's population numbers around six million. Syria is four times its size. 

Some estimates say 100,000 or more Libyans died. Conflict continues. Casualties mount daily. Syria could be Libya 2.0. Imagine the potential toll and regional destabilization. 

Pushkov added:

"We think that the Libyan example showed that these kinds of interventions lead to chaos and to the creation of a parallel international law...."

Russia rejects subverting rule of law principles. "We don’t want to accept a world where there would be another international law instead of the internationally accepted one." 

"Syria is just a very serious example of the Russian desire to fight for international law which is universally accepted."

In May, Ford and Hof held State Department meetings with Syrian Kurdish National Council members. Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs Jeffrey Feltman attended.

At issue was enlisting anti-Assad support and creating an autonomous Syrian independent Kurdistan region together with Iraq's Kurdish north. 

Turkey is fundamentally opposed. At issue losing some of its territory for a Greater Kurdistan. Resolving that issue appears distant.

In 2007, Bush administration officials held talks with then Israeli Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns were involved.

At the time, then State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said:

"We’re not going to manage Israeli foreign policy. But let’s take a look at Syria’s behavior over the recent past, and I don’t think you’re going to find many indications of Syria showing the rest of the world that they are interested in playing a constructive, positive role in trying to bring about a more peaceful, secure region."

Macormack accused Assad of supporting Lebanese "terrorist groups" linked to Iran. He meant Hezbollah without saying so.

US and Israeli officials met to discuss possible war with Syria. Then Prime Minister Ehud Olmert contacted Assad secretly. 

At issue was discussing peace in return for Syria severing ties with Iran and Hezbollah. Rejection was assured.

Olmert claimed Assad declined his offer. Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Muallem said he was ready to negotiate based on land for peace. He added that Israel signaled no interest.

Since Israel annexed Golan and other Syrian territory in 1967, it showed no willingness to relinquish it. Hostile relations continued. Hawkish Israelis believe withdrawing from any part of Judea and Samaria exposes Israel to annihilation.

Then opposition leader Netanyahu asked:

"What is a peace agreement with Syria worth? A piece of paper!" His comment left no ambiguity. It also suggested Israel's preference for war, not peace.

At the time, Israeli intelligence suggested that Syria, Iran and Hezbollah planned joint preparations for war. An alleged Syrian arms build-up was claimed, including sophisticated Russian anti-aircraft systems and long-range missiles. Any part of Israel could be attacked.

In response, Israel conducted military exercises. Syria became Israel's top focus. Then Chief of General Staff General Gabi Ashkenazi said:

"The IDF is preparing for an escalation on both the Palestinian and the northern fronts."

Israeli cabinet ministers expected Syrian war preparations completed within weeks. Israel television showed IDF tanks positioned in case of attack.

A ministerial committee on Syria was established. Preparations for war were readied. Cooler heads worried it could happen by "miscalculation." Damascus could misinterpret Israel's mobilization or vice versa.

At the time, Dick Cheney favored conflict, not diplomacy. Condoleezza Rice turned hardline. She demanded Syria close its Iraq border and crack down on Palestinian "extremists." Normalizing relations with Washington depended on it. She accused Assad of regional destabilization.

Syria believed Israel wanted war. It prepared countermeasures just in case. On September 6, 2007, Israeli warplanes invaded Syrian airspace. They bombed an alleged nuclear site. 

Later evidence showed none existed. Damascus denounced the raid but didn't retaliate. At the time, IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei said satellite imagery showed little likelihood that the building struck was a nuclear facility.

After days of initial reports, Israel said little more about it. War might have erupted. What was avoided then threatens now. Washington wants it. Israel may as well. It's coming. Expect it. Only its timing is unknown.

Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago and can be reached at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net. 

His new book is titled "How Wall Street Fleeces America: Privatized Banking, Government Collusion and Class War"

http://www.claritypress.com/Lendman.html

Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com and listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network Thursdays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.

http://www.progressiveradionetwork.com/the-progressive-news-hour

Syrie 31

'Nieuwe post op Willy Van Damme's Weblog Een zeldzaam verhaal by willyvandamme De Tijd bracht het voorbije weekend op twee pagina’s het verhaal ‘De kinderen van Assad’, de fotoreportage met een korte tekst van de Nederlandse persfotografe Marielle van Uitert. Een zeldzaam verhaal in onze media waarbij voor een keer ook eens een andere klok te horen is. Een waar ditmaal geen wit/zwart in thuishoort. Ze fotografeerde illegaal in het grensgebied van Libanon met Syrië, een gevaarlijke regio waarlangs die rebellen wapens en jihadisten het land binnensmokkelen. Een etnisch lappendeken waar dorpen met verschillende religieuze achtergrond naast elkaar leven. In normale omstandigheden vreedzaam. Maar nu al veel minder. Zo schrijft zij: “Op een bepaald moment werd ik uit een bus getrokken en in een bunker geduwd. Daar dwong een man – wellicht een rebel – me foto’s te maken van de grens, waar tanks en sluipschutters stonden opgesteld. Enkele dagen voordien waren op die plek twee journalisten vermoord. Ik dacht de hele tijd: ‘Ik wil niet dood!’ Pas nadien heb ik me gerealiseerd dat het die man niets kon schelen als ik zou worden neergeknald. Dan konden die rebellen zeggen: ‘Zie je wel, Assad deinst er zelfs niet voor terug westerse journalisten af te maken.’ Behalve journalisten worden in Syrië ook kinderen ingezet als wapen en propagandamiddel. ‘Bij manifestaties lopen ze voorop, ze krijgen microfoons in de hand geduwd en zingen verzetsliederen om de massa op te hitsen’, vertelt van Uitert. Bij dit laatste dient men ook nog het verhaal van de Nederlandse oorlogscorrespondent Arnold Karskens en van anderen te voegen. Zij hebben het over gewapende rebellen die reeds bij het prille begin van het verzet vanuit die betogingen op de ordediensten schoten. Uiteraard om zo bloedbaden te creëren welke dan op het conto van de Syrische regering kon geschoven worden. Willy Van Damme willyvandamme | 18 juni 2012 op14:22 | Categorieën:Buitenland - Midden-Oosten | URL: http://wp.me/pgSxv-1wY'

Onze Buurjongens

Onze buurjongens toen ze gisteravond nog dachten dat Oranje zou winnen.