US NATO-backed Terrorists in Syria Mass Murder Unarmed Men

December 3, 2012 (LD) - "18 USC § 2441 - War crimes - (d) Common Article 3 Violations - (D) Murder.— The act of a person who intentionally kills, or conspires or attempts to kill, or kills whether intentionally or unintentionally in the course of committing any other offense under this subsection, one or more persons taking no active part in the hostilities, including those placed out of combat by sickness, wounds, detention, or any other cause."

Video: (RT) "WARNING: GRAPHIC FOOTAGE. Gruesome footage has emerged apparently showing Syrian rebels executing loyalists while their victims pleaded for their lives. One of the gunmen is heard referencing an al-Qaeda-linked group behind several terrorist attacks in Syria. News analyst Patrick Henningsen says the nationwide internet shutdown, that's now ended, could have been American-influenced."

....

Yet another grisly video shows US-NATO backed terrorists in Syria executing unarmed men as they plead for their lives (a similar atrocity covered here). Not only are the crimes depicted against international law, but they are explicitly against US law. Despite this, the West, including the United States, is still providing a steady stream of cash, equipment, weapons, and diplomatic support to verified terrorists and war criminals.

While the Western media and defenders of sectarian extremists committing wide scale war crimes in Syria attempt to downplay the atrocities as merely targeting "loyalists," it should be remembered that the unconfirmed affiliations of the victims have no bearing on the impartial application of both international and US law. In fact, by making such arguments and failing to condemn the atrocities, or impose punitive measures on those carrying them, indicates the overt duplicity and double standards being couched behind "humanitarian" and "democratic" concerns.

Image: Libyan Mahdi al-Harati of the US State Department, United Nations, and the UK Home Office (page 5, .pdf)-listed terrorist organization, the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG), addressing fellow terrorists in Syria. Harati is now commanding a Libyan brigade operating inside of Syria attempting to destroy the Syrian government and subjugate the Syrian population. This is clearly a  foreign invasion, not a "revolution." Al Qaeda's leadership role in the so-called "Free Syrian Army" goes far in explaining their tactics.

....

The West's increasingly unhinged narrative versus Syria is feverishly pushed by their media outlets, even as Libya degenerates into nation-wide sectarian violence that has left one American ambassador dead and a US consulate burned to the ground, while Egypt descends into a sectarian tyranny eclipsing the despotism of the ousted government of Hosni Mubarak - all while the pro-American autocratic regimes of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait, and Bahrain operate with absolute impunity amidst a self-imposed media and diplomatic blackout by American, British, and European nations.

Bush War Crime Conviction Exposes Failure of "International Law"

When international law designed to stop war crimes is used by war criminals.
by Tony Cartalucci 

May 23, 2012 - A historic ruling handed down by the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal found former-US President George W. Bush and his associates guilty of war crimes including torture. Using standards provided by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and based on the precedent set by the Nuremberg trials, the tribunal succeeded in observing existing international standards in reaching its verdict before forwarding the results to the ICC and the United Nations.

Video: Nile Bowie reports on the conclusion of the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal held in Malaysia earlier this month, which found former-US President George W. Bush and his associates guilty of war crimes. Those involved in the trial are under no illusions that the ICC and UN will most likely do nothing regarding very real war crimes, but recognize the importance of the trial in exposing this fact.

....

However, for those involved, they are under no illusions that the ICC or the UN will take actions against the accused. As noted by Professor Michel Chossudovsky of the Centre for Research on Globalization, the very institutions charged with maintaining international rule of law, have been in fact instrumental in facilitating its violation by the hands of powerful Western nations. Professor Chossudovsky stated, "the fact that if war criminals are not prosecuted by the domestic and international legal system, that means that the legal apparatus, the judicial system is turned upside down and is serving the interests of the war criminals who actually call the shots."

Indeed, it is clear, as in Libya, genocidal terrorist organizations, stated as such on both US and British terror organization lists, were empowered by this very upturning of "international law," where baseless claims of "human rights" violations were not only used to accuse and undermine leaders of sovereign nation-states, but used to justify acts of war in deposing targeted governments. In Libya, not only were militants led by terrorist organizations like the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group committing very real atrocities, but NATO itself did as well. Militants on the ground purposefully blockaded entire cities, cutting off food, water, electricity, and medical supplies while NATO flattened the city with daily airstrikes. In other words, NATO did demonstratively before the eyes of the world what it accused the Libyan government of doing used to justify its military intervention in the first place.

We see a similar scenario unfolding in Syria, however, now, the US has already admitted that despite a UN brokered ceasefire, it is arranging the arming of militants now exposed as having direct ties to Al Qaeda and other extremist organizations, admittedly carrying out a campaign of terror across Syria, specifically targeting civilian populations. The US has also admitted, in the midst of an alleged UN ceasefire, that it is attempting to trigger a violent Kurdish uprising. As Professor Chossudovsky has illustrated, "international law" has clearly been turned upside down to the benefit of real, demonstrative war criminals.

So then, the tribunal held in Malaysia successfully exposed "international law" as dysfunctional and in fact, counter productive - enabling, not deterring gross acts of global injustice, wars of aggression, and the systematic abuse of human rights and freedom in nation after nation by an expanding international criminal cartel centered on Wall Street and London. And while this is useful in and of itself, the tribunal and those involved, by extending convictions beyond figure heads like George Bush and Richard Cheney to include advisers and policy makers of corporate-funded think-tanks, a wider network of criminality has been exposed as well.

The ICC and UN will predictably do nothing regarding this ruling. This should not even be expected. Instead, the tribunal should be understood in the context as not only a form of protest, but the boycotting of a corrupt system and the creation of a viable, more inclusive alternative. Legal proceedings are designed to examine evidence and convict guilty parties, then determining appropriate and practical punitive measures.

Those involved in the crimes described by the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Tribunal are but a small proportion of a much larger international criminal cartel representing the largest corporate-financier powers on earth. While imprisonment may be the most ideal punishment to level against those convicted in Malaysia, it is not currently practical.

Instead, identifying the individuals, corporations, and institutions directly responsible and in fact harboring many of those convicted, and imposing "sanctions" on them, is not only practical, but will help erode the unwarranted base of power from which these global elite operate with absolute impunity. Eventually, if the silent majority finds the resolve to act on the tribunal's ruling, and  impose "sanctions" on the special interests driving these criminal acts, and should this atmosphere of impunity be eroded, imprisoning international war criminals may eventually become a practical reality.

Former-US President George Bush Officially a War Criminal

Independent media, rights advocates, and activists hand Bush & associates a well-deserved conviction. Next, we must organize to hand them a well-deserved penalty - economic sanctions.
by Tony Cartalucci


May 16, 2012 - In a historic ruling handed down by the Kuala Lumpur (KL) War Crimes Tribunal in Malaysia this week, former-US President George W. Bush was found guilty of war crimes along with his associates, Richard Cheney, former U.S. Vice President, Donald Rumsfeld, former Defense Secretary, Alberto Gonzales, then Counsel to President Bush, David Addington, then General Counsel to the Vice-President, William Haynes II, then General Counsel to Secretary of Defense, Jay Bybee, then Assistant Attorney General, and John Choon Yoo, former Deputy Assistant Attorney-General.

Image: A scene from the Kuala Lampur War Crimes Tribunal, Malaysia. If the global elite can contrive the International Criminal Court to provide cover for real crimes against humanity, why can't the people of the world create courts to convict them? Unlike the ICC which depends on military power to enforce its rulings, courts of the people, when convicting the global elite, can simply boycott the corporations and institutions involved, starving them of both legitimacy and resources. While it falls short of deserved jail sentences, the reality of the current global balance of power makes "jail sentences" unrealistic until actions like sanctions and boycotts equalize that balance. 

....

According to a report from Mathaba.net, Bush and his associates were found guilty as charged and convicted as war criminals for "Torture and Cruel, Inhumane and Degrading Treatment of the Complainant War Crime Victims." The article would go on to enumerate the charges, the definitions used to define the criminal acts the accused parties were tried for, and the legal precedence used, set by the Nuremberg trials after World War II.

While critics claim the KL War Crimes Tribunal holds no legitimacy, readers should be reminded that the International Criminal Court (ICC) itself is contrived by corporate-financier interests, for corporate-financier interests. And all courts worldwide, in a truly free and "democratic" society, should be of, for, and by the people. The tribunal held in Malaysia this month in fact represents a much wider spectrum of interests and individuals than even the ICC. And in a world where corporate-financier oligarchs enjoy exercising the "might makes right" doctrine, that the KL War Crimes Tribunal has been able to hold a professional hearing, well attended, covered globally by independent media outlets, and able to get its historic ruling read by millions, in and of itself makes it "legitimate" by the global elite's own standards.

While the KL War Crimes Tribunal lacks any practical means to bring to justice the convicted, in terms of a judicial sentence, the ICC itself has had only a handful of cases itself. But unlike the ICC, which is represented by a top-down hierarchy of corporations and financial institutions dependent entirely on the masses patronage to perpetuate themselves, their power, and the legitimacy of their institutions, the KL War Crimes Tribunal represents a bottom-up paradigm which can easily impose crippling sanctions on the corporations, institutions, and organizations that helped author the polices executed by Bush and his associates.

A partial list of these interests can be found here, and it is highly recommended that people incensed by the continued criminal behavior of Wall Street and London, and all of the corporate, financial, and governmental entities that gravitate around them, begin organizing themselves and their efforts to promote boycotts as well as find or create viable alternatives. Just as activists, genuine human rights advocates, and independent media organized themselves to deal Bush and his associates a well deserved conviction, we can similarly begin imposing well deserved penalties - the undermining, elimination, and replacement of the corporations, financial institutions, and organizations that facilitate their crimes.

This is a viable start that can begin with individuals worldwide simply spending their money elsewhere and disassociating themselves with those corporations and institutions connected to Bush and his associates. Conversely, the global elite in order to impose penalties, must resort to military force executed from centralized positions. It is exactly this disparity in numbers that allow the majority to penalize a criminal minority so much more effectively, and until now, it was a disparity in perceived legitimacy that has prevented us from doing so. 

US Officially Arming Extremists in Syria

Denied no longer, US officials admit US-Saudi cash & logistical support arming terrorists in Syria.
by Tony Cartalucci

May 16, 2012 - Recently reported in "Brookings Announces Next Move in Syria: War," it was stated that "by the US policy think-tank Brookings Institution's own admission, the Kofi Annan six-point peace plan in Syria was merely a ploy to buy time to reorganize NATO's ineffective terrorist proxies and provide them the pretext necessary for establishing NATO protected safe havens from which to carry out their terrorism from." It was also examined in detail, how in 2007, US, Saudi, and Israeli officials admitted they were creating a militant front of extremists for the sole purpose of causing the destabilization of Syria we see today, and ultimately overthrowing the Syrian government. It was noted how these extremist militants had direct ties to Al Qaeda.

Now it is fully admitted that weapons, cash, and logistical support is indeed being provided to terrorist forces in Syria by the United States, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other Gulf States. This, despite a current UN ceasefire the West has continuously berated the Syrian government for violating, indicates that indeed reorganizing, rearming, and redeploying NATO's terrorist proxies is complete, and another round of destructive violence has begun.

In the Washington Post's article, "Syrian rebels get influx of arms with gulf neighbors’ money, U.S. coordination," not only is this admitted, but claims made by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad have been confirmed that Syria's historically violent Muslim Brotherhood, stated in 2007 by Seymour Hersh as being a direct proxy of US-Saudi-Israeli funding and support, is also directly arming and funding contingents of extremists committing acts of terror across Syria. 

Areas across Syria that have until now been portrayed as centers for "pro-democracy" protests, racked by violence depicted as "repression" by Syrian troops, are now admitted by the Washington Post to be areas where "material is being stockpiled." This includes the flashpoint city of Idlib on the Turkish-Syrian border, in the suburbs of Damascus, and along Syria's border with Lebanon. And again, in 2007, Seymour Hersh revealed that the US, Israel, and Saudi Arabia had planned to array extremists along Syria's border to commit the very violence now being admitted by the Post today.

The Washington Post openly admits that these weapons, supplies, cash and support, provided by the US and Saudi Arabia are directly responsible for the increased violence in Syria, in the midst of a ceasefire the West has attempted to disingenuously use to defame the Syrian government, hamper its ability to restore order, and indeed, rearm, reorganize, and redeploy their terrorist proxies to begin another attempt at violent foreign-backed regime change:

"The effect of the new arms appeared evident in Monday’s clash between opposition and government forces over control of the rebel-held city of Rastan, near Homs. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said rebel forces who overran a government base had killed 23 Syrian soldiers." -Washington Post, May 16, 2012 

The Post also admitted that Washington, again, in the midst of a UN ceasefire, was attempting to trigger yet more violence, this time in areas controlled by Syria's Kurds who have remained out of the predominately foreign-backed conflict.

Paradoxically, the US and Gulf State military support being funneled into Syria to purposefully flare violence in the midst of a UN ceasefire, is continuing even after the Pentagon has admitted Al Qaeda is present and active in Syria, this after terrorist groups claimed responsibility for a series of bombings that have killed mostly civilians.

And in the midst of this admitted attempt to increase violence and chaos, the Washington Post also declared that NATO-member Turkey would be pressured to invoke Article IV of the NATO Charter, allowing NATO to militarily intervene to "stop" violence they openly admit they are creating. Unlike previous conflicts - the US' admission is not a hamhanded obfuscation of the their intentions, but an open declaration of intent to provoke a war of aggression - a Nuremberg offense for all involved. In fact, direct parallels between Adolf Hitler's September 1938 campaign of destabilization in Czechoslovakia, and NATO's current destabilization of Syria have been made by noted geopolitical analysts.

Images: The "Henry Jackson Society" and the "Brookings Institution" are just two of many similar "think-tanks" with identical members and identical corporate sponsors. These are the authors of NATO's increasingly long list of war crimes, including those authorized by US President George W. Bush, now officially a convicted war criminal. While Bush's conviction currently lacks a realistic means of arresting and sentencing him, if we know the corporations and institutions that craft the policies used by Bush to commit his crimes, we the people, ourselves, can start by "imposing sanctions" on these special interests with boycotts. (click images to enlarge)  

....

A historical conviction handed down by the Kuala Lumpur War Crimes Commission, finding former-US President George W. Bush guilty of war crimes, sets a precedent to be used against those committing war crimes today, and of course a model to be expanded upon, including methods and official calls to impose sanctions on organizations and institutions supporting leaders committing war crimes, including both the policy think tanks engineering the war crimes and boycotting and banning the corporations and institutions funding these think-tanks. This does not require an act by the UN, or your national government. You can begin boycotting these corporations today and thus begin undermining the authority and impunity from which they operate.

CONFIRMED: Libya War is CIA Op 30 Years in the Making

by Tony Cartalucci

Alternative media activist David Icke, who has been warning about the false nature of the "Arab Spring" since it began over six months ago, has pointed out an astounding "flashback" regarding an August 3, 1981 Newsweek article titled, "A Plan to Overthrow Kaddafi."

‘The details of the plan were sketchy, but it seemed to be a classic CIA destabilization campaign. One element was a “disinformation” program designed to embarrass Kaddafi and his government. Another was the creation of a “counter government” to challenge his claim to national leadership. A third — potentially the most risky — was an escalating paramilitary campaign, probably by disaffected Libyan nationals, to blow up bridges, conduct small-scale guerrilla operations and demonstrate that Kaddafi was opposed by an indigenous political force."

....

Quite obviously this plan has been executed verbatim with the necessary addition of a NATO intervention to rescue the above stated "paramilitary" campaign from Libyan security forces - a contigency plan explicitly spelled out in another Wall Street-London subsidized, signed confession, Brookings Institution's "Which Path to Persia?"

Using Military Force to Assist Popular Revolutions, page 109-110 (page 122-123 of the PDF): "Consequently, if the United States ever succeeds in sparking a revolt against the clerical regime, Washington may have to consider whether to provide it with some form of military support to prevent Tehran from crushing it." "This requirement means that a popular revolution in Iran does not seem to fit the model of the “velvet revolutions” that occurred elsewhere. The point is that the Iranian regime may not be willing to go gently into that good night; instead, and unlike so many Eastern European regimes, it may choose to fight to the death. In those circumstances, if there is not external military assistance to the revolutionaries, they might not just fail but be massacred.

Consequently, if the United States is to pursue this policy, Washington must take this possibility into consideration. It adds some very important requirements to the list: either the policy must include ways to weaken the Iranian military or weaken the willingness of the regime’s leaders to call on the military, or else the United States must be ready to intervene to defeat it."

....

The disinformation campaign began in February as overt, now verified lies were told to the public regarding both the nature of the uprising and the Libyan government's reaction to it. As tank driving, jet flying battle hardened LIFG Al Qaeda mercenaries waged war against the Libyan army, the corporate media in tandem with NATO member states preparing to intervene, portrayed the uprising as peaceful placard waving activists being mowed down by machine gun fire and strafed by Libyan warplanes. Evidence now confirms no such atrocties took place, however the UN citing this intentional disinformation authroized NATO intervention.

The very nature of the Benghazi rebels has been deceptively presented to the public. In fact, they are a collection of extremists and mercenaries, many of whom had been fighting recently in Iraq and Afghanistan against US forces. These mercenaries, who have been backed by the CIA and MI6 for the last 30 years (see time line), are being portrayed as an "an indigenous political force" opposing Libya's government. It has just been recently revealed that the rebel commander attempting to seize Tripoli is none other than Abdelhakim Belhadj, an Al Qaeda asset who was previously captured by in Malaysia, tortured by the CIA in Bangkok, Thailand in 2003, before being release back in Libya where he is now fighting on behalf of NATO.

Additional disinformation comes in the form of media attempts to portray Qaddafi as a rambling madman who despite the disparagement, has turned out to be one of the few heads of state speaking any truth at all regarding the conflict besieging his nation. From his earlier claims that the uprising was foreign backed Al Qaeda, to now verified claims that the rebellion was nothing more than a means to usher in a foreign occupation and the despoiling of Libya's resources, he has been spot on.

As rebels loot his home and his compound in central Tripoli, he is now being disingenuously portrayed as an opulent tyrant who hoarded state resources at the cost of his population. Betraying the duplicity of this lie is the UN's own Human Development Index which lists Libya as one of the most developed nations in Africa and is ranked higher than many other nations including Russia, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, and Malaysia. Quite obviously Libya's oil wealth was put to good use, and as Libya has ensured the West's nefarious corporate-funded NGOs were excluded from Libyan society, no other explanation for Libya's development exists beyond the government's own initiatives.

What we are witnessing in Libya is a concerted, admitted war of aggression by corporate-financier interests who have openly conspired to carry out a campaign of military and economic conquest throughout the Middle East (and beyond), including Northern Africa and specifically including Libya. From Wesley Clark's 2007 speech, to Newsweeks' 1981 article, we have been handed a signed confession that "our" governments are the true enemies of free humanity, masking their agenda with the thinnest veneer of moral justification, almost as if to insult the intelligence of so many who eagerly continue to empower them as they maliciously move forward. Once again, we must commit ourselves to identifying the corporate-financier interests truly driving this agenda, lurking behind the military and political leaders paraded before us as the executors of "international policy." We must also commit to boycotting and replacing these corporate-financier interests as well as ending the recognition of any of the legitimacy they endlessly heap upon themselves.

Libya: Tripoli Stands in Defiance of NATO

Reports of rebel leaders presiding over Tripoli a confirmed lie.
by Tony Cartalucci

Despite sweeping headlines claiming the Benghazi rebel terrorists have shifted their leadership over to Tripoli after continuous claims of the city falling to rebels after over a week of continuous fighting, BBC has slipped out the fact that this claim is a verified lie. Buried within an article titled, "Horror scenes at Tripoli hospital," BBC conceded that the rebels have constructed a makeshift landing strip in the western Nafusa mountains where they are "reported to be staying," only visiting Tripoli in daytime for quick photo opportunities. The article continues by also conceding the self-proclaimed, unelected leader of the rebels, Abdul Jalil and "other key leaders" are staying in the east because of "the lack of security in Tripoli." That is of course when these "key leaders" aren't groveling in Doha, Paris, and Rome before their Western sponsors.

This definitively exposes the current operations inside Libya as a desperate psychological war with the corporate media explicitly deceiving the public with misleading headlines under which facts are buried by mountains of minutia, carefully worded propaganda, unverified innuendos, and outright lies.

NATO & Rebel Murder-Spree Creating a Real Humanitarian Crisis

In another disturbing development, it appears that the rebels control a single concentration of troops within Tripoli that are scrambling from one NATO designated objective to another, streaming in after aerial bombardments on civilian infrastructure and leaving in their wake mass murder and complete social dysfunction. A hospital in the previously government controlled Abu Silem district has been abandoned after a NATO bombardment followed by rebel advances. NATO bombs also destroyed a local fire station and there are now reports of black Africans turning up in large numbers, dead, in hospitals. While BBC has officially written them off as "suspected mercenaries," it should be noted that just like every nation on earth, Libya's population includes diverse demographics, and considering its location on the continent of Africa, many black citizens.


Photo: Images and reports are beginning to trickle in as NATO-backed genocide unfolds throughout Tripoli's streets, indicating the destruction of infrastructure and the specific targeting of black Africans written off by the corporate media as "suspected mercenaries." Benghazi rebels have been long reported to harbor extremist ideologies and an intense ethnic & racial hatred.

....

Respected geopolitical analyst Dr. Webster Tarpley has long warned from the beginning of NATO's operations in Libya that Benghazi's rebel terrorists harbor vicious racial and ethnic hatreds that were manifesting themselves in brazen atrocities as NATO helped them move westward toward Tripoli. Corporate funded human rights organizations were force to recognize this alarming trend, though their reports were mostly muted, and in conjunction with corporate media spin, obfuscated from public scrutiny and debate. It should be remembered that the UK, US, France, and Qatar have all admitted their special forces and intelligence agencies were on the ground leading these very rebels. This means that not only are these atrocities taking place at the hands of rebels receiving NATO air support, funding, weapons, and political recognition, they are taking place at the hands of rebel militants literally led on the ground by NATO forces themselves.

For more on verified reports regarding the Benghazi rebels' atrocities please see "Libyan War Gets Weird," "Libya's Not-so-Noble Rebels," "Al Qaeda: Pawns of CIA Insurrection from Libya to Yemen," and "The CIA’s Libya Rebels: The Same Terrorists who Killed US, NATO Troops in Iraq."