lorenzo
2016-08-16 14:20:27 UTC
https://www.facebook.com/notes/tim-anderson/human-rights-watch-on-syria-relentless-war-propaganda/10151958371906234/
‘Human Rights Watch’ on Syria: relentless war propaganda
1 de febrero de 2014 a las 14:28
‘Human Rights Watch’ on Syria: relentless war propaganda
By Tim Anderson and Mazen al-Akhras
http://www.globalresearch.ca/syria-human-rights-watch-key-player-in-the-manufacture-of-propaganda-for-war-and-foreign-intervention/5366987
The Washington-based group ‘Human Rights Watch’– controlled by the US
foreign policy elite – has released another volley in its campaign to
back the ‘humanitarian war’ being waged against the independent nation
of Syria.
This is not the first or second fabrication against Syria run by Human
Rights Watch. The group was amongst the first to falsely blame the
Syrian government for the East Ghouta chemical weapons incident of
August 2013. The ‘moral panic’ from that accusation almost sparked a
major escalation of the war.
Several reports have since proven that the accusation was a fraud. A
group led by Catholic nun Mother Agnes Mariam produced a report showing
the video evidence of the incident had been manipulated and staged; US
investigative journalist Seymour Hersh showed that US intelligence
implicating the Syrian Government had been fabricated; and the New York
Times retracted its support for speculative telemetry evidence, which
they had claimed implicated the Syrian Army. On the other side, Syrian
witnesses, a Jordanian reporter and a Turkish human rights group
(‘Peace Association and Lawyers for Justice in Turkey’) implicated
Saudi-backed terrorists. Further, the last UN report on the incident
says that, in most instances, chemical weapons were used ‘against
soldiers’; that is, against the government. HRW has neither retracted
nor apologised for its role in this scam.
The latest HRW story (‘Razed to the Ground’, 30 Jan) is that the Syrian
Government over 2012-13 demolished residential buildings in seven areas
of Hama and Damascus as ‘punishment’ for certain neighbourhoods
supporting ‘the rebels’. Thousands of families lost their homes in this
way, yet there have been ‘no similar demolitions in areas that support
the government’.
HRW said it ‘has not documented that anybody was injured or killed in
the process.’ Nevertheless, the use of home demolition as punishment
was ‘a violation … of the laws of war’ and amounts to a war crime. HRW
‘calls on the UN Security Council to refer the situation in Syria to
the International Criminal Court’.
Of course, this claim will go nowhere, as previous more serious
provocations have failed at the UNSC. Yet the HRW report adds to a
poisoned climate of vilification and intervention, appearing to add
moral logic to arming the sectarian groups. Yet propaganda for war is a
war crime, in itself.
Syrian NDF soldier and political analyst Mazen al-Akhras points out
that videos associated with the HRW report show the presence of
anti-government ‘militants’ as witnesses (just as in East Ghouta),
tainting the story at the outset. The HRW report does not observe that
areas like Tadamon had been crowded with illegal constructions and,
when they were damaged during the conflict, the government decided it
more efficient to demolish and rebuild.
HRW does not mention that the government took the decision, many months
ago, to compensate ‘all citizens whose houses were damaged or totally
destroyed by the conflict’. Al-Akhras says HRW ignores the compensation
already paid, and then pretends to ‘demand’ compensation. His full
commentary is below.
The BBC, which has played a key role in relaying and amplifying
propaganda for war on Syria, promoted this ‘Razed to the Ground’ story.
An earlier notable contribution by the BBC was to help cover up the
terrorist murder of Syria’s most senior Muslim cleric, Sheikh Mohamad
al Bouti. He and fifty others were murdered inside the al Iman mosque
on 21 March 2013 by a suicide bomber from the al Qaeda-linked and
Saudi-backed Jabhat al Nusra.
Because Sheikh Bouti had always opposed salafist sectarians, the armed
sectarian gangs (‘takfiris’) said he was ‘not a real Sunni’ and called
for his death. After they murdered him they celebrated and then, in
typical fashion, blamed the Government.
Jim Muir of the BBC picked up the al Nusra scam, based on the fact that
the Sheikh did not die instantly, to run claims that he had been killed
by some other means. Nevertheless, in December 2013, five members of al
Nusra confessed on Syrian television to the murders. Al Nusra cleric,
Samir al-Ordoni, had given them religious permission to enter the
mosque and kill other Muslims.
The BBC also gave full prominence to a more recent stunt put on by the
oil monarchy of Qatar, a major funder of sectarian Islamist fighters.
On the eve of the Geneva 2 peace talks, they promoted a report by three
British lawyers, hired by Qatar, which pronounced the Syrian Government
guilty of ‘torture and 11,000 executions’. The lawyers had gone to
Qatar to interview one man, who said he had not witnessed any torture
or murder, but gave them thousands of photos of dead bodies. They
examined some of these photos and made some extravagant statements. Yet
with such tainted evidence, who knows where the bodies came from or who
killed them?
Human Rights Watch has been a key player in the manufacture of
propaganda for war and foreign intervention. It gets most of its funds
from a variety of US foundations, in turn funded by many of the biggest
US corporations. HRW Middle East reports often rely on and acknowledge
grants from pro-Israel foundations. The group is tightly linked to the
US Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), a virtual ‘Who's Who’ of the US
foreign policy elite.
HRW has ‘soft-pedalled’ on US-compliant regimes such as Colombia, the
worst human rights abuser in Latin America as shown by the murder of
trade unionists, journalists and other social activists. By contrast,
HRW repeatedly attacked the government of the late Hugo Chavez in
Venezuela.
The group has always had a political agenda. According to José Miguel
Vivanco, director of the group’s Americas division, its December 2008
report on Venezuela (‘A Decade under Chavez’), was written ‘because we
wanted to demonstrate to the world that Venezuela is not a model for
anyone’. That report was roundly criticized by more than a hundred
academics for not meeting ‘even the most minimal standards of
scholarship, impartiality, accuracy or credibility’. Rather than a
careful report on human rights, it was an attempt to discredit a
government, mainly on the basis of allegations of ‘political
discrimination’ in employment and the judiciary. The evidence was poor
and the approach anything but systematic. HRW disregarded this
criticism.
--------------------------------
Fallidos intentos para frenar acercamiento ruso a Turquia, aborto del
golpe de estado turco coordinado desde base OTAN en Incirlik y hasta el
derribo de avión ruso SU-24 para deteriorar relaciones, van quedando a
la luz con la detención de agentes norteamericanos en Turquia: la
supuesta periodista estadounidense, Lindsey Snell y un funcionario de
la NASA provisto de doble nacionalidad, estadounidense y turca, que
aparece claramente implicado en el fallido golpe militar del 15 de
julio que intentó derrocar al presidente Tayyip Erdogan.
‘Human Rights Watch’ on Syria: relentless war propaganda
1 de febrero de 2014 a las 14:28
‘Human Rights Watch’ on Syria: relentless war propaganda
By Tim Anderson and Mazen al-Akhras
http://www.globalresearch.ca/syria-human-rights-watch-key-player-in-the-manufacture-of-propaganda-for-war-and-foreign-intervention/5366987
The Washington-based group ‘Human Rights Watch’– controlled by the US
foreign policy elite – has released another volley in its campaign to
back the ‘humanitarian war’ being waged against the independent nation
of Syria.
This is not the first or second fabrication against Syria run by Human
Rights Watch. The group was amongst the first to falsely blame the
Syrian government for the East Ghouta chemical weapons incident of
August 2013. The ‘moral panic’ from that accusation almost sparked a
major escalation of the war.
Several reports have since proven that the accusation was a fraud. A
group led by Catholic nun Mother Agnes Mariam produced a report showing
the video evidence of the incident had been manipulated and staged; US
investigative journalist Seymour Hersh showed that US intelligence
implicating the Syrian Government had been fabricated; and the New York
Times retracted its support for speculative telemetry evidence, which
they had claimed implicated the Syrian Army. On the other side, Syrian
witnesses, a Jordanian reporter and a Turkish human rights group
(‘Peace Association and Lawyers for Justice in Turkey’) implicated
Saudi-backed terrorists. Further, the last UN report on the incident
says that, in most instances, chemical weapons were used ‘against
soldiers’; that is, against the government. HRW has neither retracted
nor apologised for its role in this scam.
The latest HRW story (‘Razed to the Ground’, 30 Jan) is that the Syrian
Government over 2012-13 demolished residential buildings in seven areas
of Hama and Damascus as ‘punishment’ for certain neighbourhoods
supporting ‘the rebels’. Thousands of families lost their homes in this
way, yet there have been ‘no similar demolitions in areas that support
the government’.
HRW said it ‘has not documented that anybody was injured or killed in
the process.’ Nevertheless, the use of home demolition as punishment
was ‘a violation … of the laws of war’ and amounts to a war crime. HRW
‘calls on the UN Security Council to refer the situation in Syria to
the International Criminal Court’.
Of course, this claim will go nowhere, as previous more serious
provocations have failed at the UNSC. Yet the HRW report adds to a
poisoned climate of vilification and intervention, appearing to add
moral logic to arming the sectarian groups. Yet propaganda for war is a
war crime, in itself.
Syrian NDF soldier and political analyst Mazen al-Akhras points out
that videos associated with the HRW report show the presence of
anti-government ‘militants’ as witnesses (just as in East Ghouta),
tainting the story at the outset. The HRW report does not observe that
areas like Tadamon had been crowded with illegal constructions and,
when they were damaged during the conflict, the government decided it
more efficient to demolish and rebuild.
HRW does not mention that the government took the decision, many months
ago, to compensate ‘all citizens whose houses were damaged or totally
destroyed by the conflict’. Al-Akhras says HRW ignores the compensation
already paid, and then pretends to ‘demand’ compensation. His full
commentary is below.
The BBC, which has played a key role in relaying and amplifying
propaganda for war on Syria, promoted this ‘Razed to the Ground’ story.
An earlier notable contribution by the BBC was to help cover up the
terrorist murder of Syria’s most senior Muslim cleric, Sheikh Mohamad
al Bouti. He and fifty others were murdered inside the al Iman mosque
on 21 March 2013 by a suicide bomber from the al Qaeda-linked and
Saudi-backed Jabhat al Nusra.
Because Sheikh Bouti had always opposed salafist sectarians, the armed
sectarian gangs (‘takfiris’) said he was ‘not a real Sunni’ and called
for his death. After they murdered him they celebrated and then, in
typical fashion, blamed the Government.
Jim Muir of the BBC picked up the al Nusra scam, based on the fact that
the Sheikh did not die instantly, to run claims that he had been killed
by some other means. Nevertheless, in December 2013, five members of al
Nusra confessed on Syrian television to the murders. Al Nusra cleric,
Samir al-Ordoni, had given them religious permission to enter the
mosque and kill other Muslims.
The BBC also gave full prominence to a more recent stunt put on by the
oil monarchy of Qatar, a major funder of sectarian Islamist fighters.
On the eve of the Geneva 2 peace talks, they promoted a report by three
British lawyers, hired by Qatar, which pronounced the Syrian Government
guilty of ‘torture and 11,000 executions’. The lawyers had gone to
Qatar to interview one man, who said he had not witnessed any torture
or murder, but gave them thousands of photos of dead bodies. They
examined some of these photos and made some extravagant statements. Yet
with such tainted evidence, who knows where the bodies came from or who
killed them?
Human Rights Watch has been a key player in the manufacture of
propaganda for war and foreign intervention. It gets most of its funds
from a variety of US foundations, in turn funded by many of the biggest
US corporations. HRW Middle East reports often rely on and acknowledge
grants from pro-Israel foundations. The group is tightly linked to the
US Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), a virtual ‘Who's Who’ of the US
foreign policy elite.
HRW has ‘soft-pedalled’ on US-compliant regimes such as Colombia, the
worst human rights abuser in Latin America as shown by the murder of
trade unionists, journalists and other social activists. By contrast,
HRW repeatedly attacked the government of the late Hugo Chavez in
Venezuela.
The group has always had a political agenda. According to José Miguel
Vivanco, director of the group’s Americas division, its December 2008
report on Venezuela (‘A Decade under Chavez’), was written ‘because we
wanted to demonstrate to the world that Venezuela is not a model for
anyone’. That report was roundly criticized by more than a hundred
academics for not meeting ‘even the most minimal standards of
scholarship, impartiality, accuracy or credibility’. Rather than a
careful report on human rights, it was an attempt to discredit a
government, mainly on the basis of allegations of ‘political
discrimination’ in employment and the judiciary. The evidence was poor
and the approach anything but systematic. HRW disregarded this
criticism.
--------------------------------
Fallidos intentos para frenar acercamiento ruso a Turquia, aborto del
golpe de estado turco coordinado desde base OTAN en Incirlik y hasta el
derribo de avión ruso SU-24 para deteriorar relaciones, van quedando a
la luz con la detención de agentes norteamericanos en Turquia: la
supuesta periodista estadounidense, Lindsey Snell y un funcionario de
la NASA provisto de doble nacionalidad, estadounidense y turca, que
aparece claramente implicado en el fallido golpe militar del 15 de
julio que intentó derrocar al presidente Tayyip Erdogan.
--
institutano de corazón azul
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Se trata de una circular [del Pentágono] donde se describe cómo vamos
a eliminar siete países en cinco años, comenzando por Iraq, siguiendo
con Siria, Líbano, Libia, Somalia, Sudán y terminando por Irán". Les
pregunté: "¿Es una circular reservada?" Me respondieron: "Sí, señor."
Le dije: "Bueno, entonces no me la muestren" (General Wesley Clark,
Democracy Now , 2 de marzo de 2007).
institutano de corazón azul
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Se trata de una circular [del Pentágono] donde se describe cómo vamos
a eliminar siete países en cinco años, comenzando por Iraq, siguiendo
con Siria, Líbano, Libia, Somalia, Sudán y terminando por Irán". Les
pregunté: "¿Es una circular reservada?" Me respondieron: "Sí, señor."
Le dije: "Bueno, entonces no me la muestren" (General Wesley Clark,
Democracy Now , 2 de marzo de 2007).