What Do You Think Today?

[peter]

Actually quite difficult to comment on what is happening on the ground between Israel and Iran, but notice how the upbeat, almost euphoric, commentary of the first few days is falling away.

Exchanges are ongoing between the two belligerents, that's for sure, but while Iran are fairly open about what damage is being done, Israel are pretty much slapping a blackout zone around all reportage.

We know a hospital in Beersheba was hit - of that Israel has made much (which is somewhat puzzling given their own propensity for striking hospitals in Gaza) - and the stock exchange building. Last night the strikes also in Beersheba left fires burning near the Microsoft buildings there. But in the main, coverage is limited and concentrated upon political and diplomatic efforts to bring the conflict to a halt being made by third party nations.

President Trump, following his ridiculously bellicose rhetoric of the past few days, and the yammering media speculation that he was "about to strike", has suddenly damped it all down. He's clearly been briefed (there's no indication that he understands the situation fully enough to be able to construct this chain of reasoning on his own) on how dangerous and effectively irreversible such a lurch into active involvement would be, and on this basis has announced a 'two week window' within which he will 'make his decision'. (Note the 'inverted commas' of the last words; that is of course because he won't actually be making any decisions for himself on this. His decision will effectively be made by the last person who gets to speak to him - it always is.)

The truth is that once that final decision to involve the USA is made, then its almost impossible to speculate on where it ends. And what does America actually do?

Okay. They could take out this nuclear site at Fordo with their 30,000 pound bombs. But this is easier said than done. It requires many, many planes to create the 'corridor' via which the B52 bombers could approach the site of the enrichment plant. This in itself is a hugely massive and complex operation. And to what end does it serve? If, as is actually more probably the case than not, Iran is not actually constructing a nuclear bomb, has no bomb, nor any actual desire to have one......then bombing the site has absolutely zero strategic effect on Iran's capability to strike at Israel and draws America into the conflict (with all of the dangers, both domestic and geopolitical that that involves, never mind militarily) without making the slightest dint in the Iranian capacity to inflict damage in return.

So what? Does it concentrate on Iranian militarily targets? Attempting to beat down on its ability to mount air defences and fire ballistic missiles at Western targets in the region? It might ultimately be able to achieve this end, but the indicators are that it would be at enormous cost to Western assets in the region, not to mention the effects on the global economy and the completely unpredictable nature of what other countries might do in consequence of this escalation of the conflict. And what if the Straits of Hormuz where 30 percent of the world's oil passes through are closed? Or the Saudi or Iraqi oil fields are hit? Ot the Western naval assets struck? When the costs of these things in terms of material and human losses start to turn up on the doorstep of people in the home countries, the blowback is likely to be considerable. Unlike in Iran itself, where people are becoming more, not less, inclined to support their government, in the USA and UK (in particular, but not exclusively) the population is far more sceptical about the whole adventure, and visible costs at home are only going to make this worse.

So Trump, so normally dismissive of the possibility of anybody else being able to make an input into any situation, finds himself having to take a back seat for a couple of weeks while he hopes that the Europeans that he is usually disdainful of, try and dig him out of the situation that either he and Israel together, or less possibly Israel alone, has landed him in.

To that end a meeting will take place in Geneva today, in which the foreign ministers of France, the UK and Germany will meet with their Iranian counterpart. It will be a blow to the inflated Trumpian ego to have to deferr to European diplomacy in order to dig him and Israel out of the situation they have contrived to get themselves into, and you can bet that the Iranians will make them pay heavily. But there will be absolutely no Iranian surrender, as Trump demanded. By now the likelihood is that Israel is realising it has bitten off more than it can chew and will be looking for its exit strategy. All kinds of behind the doors concessions will be promised - sanctions lifting and the like - in order to get Iran to cease responding and make it appear that Israel has won. They will even be offered the option of keeping being able to enrich uranium up to and including the levels required for domestic energy production (essentially what they actually had in the JCPOA agreement that Trump screwed up).

And another thing that will be dropped is the demand from the USA of a strict limitation on the amount of conventional missile holdings they could have. Unreported and unbeknownst to Western audiences, this limitation was actually included in the nuclear limitations talks that America was holding with Iran prior to the Israeli intervention. Thus, the Americans were demanding not only were Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions (which it probably never had anyway) but also to render itself defenceless to any future attack from whatever source as well!

How could any country ever accept that? It was a nonsense and it's a testament to Iranian patience that they were even prepared to keep negotiating under this kind of nonsense anyway. But the Israeli attack put this particular bit of foolishness to bed at least, and it's doubtful that any of the European negotiators in Geneva will have the temerity to suggest it again. If they do, they can expect a pretty robust response from the Iranian delegation to be sure.

But let's summarise. In short, I don't think that this piece of Israeli adventurism is going anything like according to plan. I think that the damage to Israel from Iranian strikes is way more substantial than they expected and the Iranian response is much more effective than anything that they had planned for. The Americans have at last grasped that they sit on the brink of a fucking disaster, and are desperately playing for time in the hope of putting the genie back into the bottle. To this effect, a backdoor deal involving all kinds of concessions to Iran will be slubbered up, and then, when the hostilities end, will be presented as an Israeli win to the Western public. Thus will the public perception of Israeli invincibility be maintained - a perception that Israel as the last bastion of a Western Settler Colonial State mentality long dead everywhere else, is absolutely dependent upon.

But behind the scenes, in Iran and across the non-Western world, the truth will be more understood. Israel started a war that it couldn't finish, against an enemy that would not be cowed. It remains to be seen how this will play out in the future, but my guess is that the long time coming redressing of the balance in the Middle East will begin to be effected. Israel will need to adopt a very, very, different attitude to its neighbours and a very much curtailed vision of its future, if it is going to survive.

(Edit: The alternative is of course that European efforts to dig Israel and America out of the shit fail, the two week window is wasted, and the whole thing goes to hell in a handcart. It will all depend upon the talents (questionable, certainly in the UK's case) of our foreign ministers and the diplomatic teams behind them. I really hope that they've got some good advisers on hand; ones versed in the realities of the situation and not bought into the nonsense rhetoric of the media and propoganda machines that feed the rest of us our information.)

[peter]

I don't know what is happening to us.

Over on the BBC website this morning is an article that records that a senior Russian government official has said that regime change in Tehran is not something that it can condone. 'Unacceptable' is the word he, the spokesman, uses, but doesn't go into what the Russians might actually do about it.

But this isn't what got me.

Reading the article I was stunned at the blase way it referred to "killing the Iranian leader". In a number of places it spoke in this language, like the killing of another state's head of state was something that you do every day - part of the normal run of things. And that it was perfectly okay. Part of the plan of the action that was sanctioned, justified and totally okay to be comfortable with.

Well I'm not. I still don't understand why we are talking about supporting a country engaged in committing if not a genocide, then the next thing to it. And why we are talking about going to war with the single country in the region that seems to be trying to do something about it (sorry - not actually true, because Yemen's Houthis have absolutely done their bit as well). And now it seems, we are supposed to be casual about our country engaging in talk, let alone actually aiding, in the 'taking out' of another world leader? And dear old 'Auntie' can blithely refer to it multiple times as though it's like going to the market to buy vegetables.

Let's just be clear here. Ayatollaha Ali Khamenei is not Adolf Hitler. He's always been regarded as fairly moderate in comparison to his predecessor, the fearsome Ayatollah Khomeini, if fairly conservative in his views on the country's governance. Because Israel is at war with Iran is not a reason why the world should suspend its normal moral compass and start sanctioning the killing of any leader that we - the Western hegemony - happen not to like.

In fact you have to agree with the Russian official interviewed in the article, Dmitry Peskov, that doing this would open a Pandora's Box none of us want to see opened.

Needless to say, this casual indifference to what would previously have been considered to be one of the world's total no-no's has come from Donald Trump. He was the one who started talking in terms of, "We know where he is, we won't kill him - not yet - ....." as though this was part of normal geopolitical diplomacy. And it's amazing how rapidly it has spread. It goes hand in hand with the West's indifference to the genocide itself. Once brutalised to the point where we (or our establishments at least) can see what their ally is about in Gaza and barely react to it, let alone God forbid do anything to actually stop it, then the sky's the limit. A political assassination of another world leader is a mere trifle in comparison. If the language can be found to smooth over the near sixty thousand dead in Gaza, the images of people burning in their tents and being driven to crowd surging madness for a bowl flour, all the while being shot at as if in a fairground shooting gallery...... Well, against this the talking around a single political assassination is as nothing.

-----0-----

But there's another story I wanted to talk about this morning but I'm too afraid to do so. Thanks to a recent government decision, I'm afraid that if I go anywhere near this story, I'll be courting the kind of trouble that at my age, I simply don't need.

How ridiculous is that? This, the country I was born in, the country that my forebears went to war for and died in numbers to protect. And now I'm too afraid to outline my feelings on a story, not for the societal backlash or anything, but because I fear that the actual state could misinterpret my posting and I could bring down its anger upon myself.

Here I post, every day pretending to be something that I'm not - a 'fearless reporter of the news' - when in fact I'm too lilley-livered to go anywhere near something I consider a real impingement upon our freedom to protest, our freedom to express our opinion about that which our government, or other individuals/groupings in our society, get about in their daily activities.

How did this happen - and woe upon us that we allowed it. Truly was it done, slowly slowly catchee monkey style. Very cleverly brought about, thinly sliced like salami. But make no mistake; like Aldous Huxley's dystopian novel Brave New World, we find ourselves somewhere that while it looks fine on the surface, has a dark underside, such that the clever money is to go about looking upwards, whistling as you pretend it isn't there.

Too late for that in my case I suppose, but even I am clever enough not to stick my head directly into the lions mouth. I can only apologise for my failure to step up to the plate, to do the decent thing and be prepared to risk everything, to give all, in order to say that which should be said.

In recompense I give you the names of people who put me to shame, so that if you would truly see that which is out there to be seen, you can do so for yourself.

Rap artist and activist Lowkey. His recent interview with George Galloway was simply astounding in the depth of understanding and knowledge he evidenced. More to be learned of how things really are in fifteen minutes conversation than in weeks, months of BBC coverage. (Ghost Soldier, George Galloway on YouTube should get it.)

Aron Mate and Max Blumenthal from the Greyzone. Just about everything they post is a revelation, full of facts that you will never find on the main stream media. So, so informative and unstinting in their pursuit of the truth.

Owen Jones, recently recognised by Amnesty International as their outstanding journalist of the year. A force of nature unto himself, Owen has earned his place amongst the pantheon of greats with his Gazan coverage. Unstinting and unafraid.

Novara Media, in particular Michael Walker. His playful style and light touch is refreshing, but he has the capacity to really cut through. More power to the guys at Novara.

Judge Andrew Napolitano and his regular guests. In all matters military and geopolitical the Judge is out in front in his coverage.

These guys are a serious starting point to what is out there. I'd give my right nut to be half as good as any one of them.

[peter]

If Colonel Douglas Macgregor, ex American serviceman and advisor to the US government has any kind of handle on things, then the decision join Israel in its war on Iran has already been made.

By his reckoning the two week window that Donald Trump has allowed, purportedly to give time for diplomatic efforts to bring the war to a close, is in fact more about giving the American forces the preparation time they need in order to get their ducks in a row.

Certainly the big bunker busting bombers are moving into situ as we speak, heading for the US military base in Guam. In addition US aircraft carrier, the USS Nimitz has been pulled from the South China Sea and is headed towards the Gulf. Movement of planes has already been seen to the UK and other European bases (KC- 135's) and F-16, F-22 and F-35's have been moved to the Middle East.

Certainly put together, this indicates that at least a serious preparation is being made to join the conflict, and in terms of the diplomatic efforts, there is not much indication that either side, Iran or Israel, is in any mind to halt the ongoing strikes each are making. Iran has said that it is happy to restart the talks with the USA interrupted by the Israeli first strike, but will not do so while under attack from Israel. Israel shows no inclination to stop the attacks until the nuclear program of Iran as it sees it, is destroyed. Clearly they have no capability to do this on their own, and are thus totally reliant upon the American entry into the war, at least to the tune of mounting attack on the Fordo nuclear enrichment site. Only the American B-52 stealth bombers can carry the 3,000 pound bombs required to even stand a chance of penetrating to the depth required to disable the plant, and even this is in some doubt.

Geopolitical expert Professor John Mearsheimer believes that even should this goal be achieved, it would be only a short time before Iran would reestablish its program make up the loss. Even in the event of a regime change, he says this would be done. If there is any lessons to be learned from the past few days, he says, it is that possession of a nuclear deterrent as quickly as possible is absolutely the clever money. As to the nuclear non-prliferation agreements that have served the world so well since the 1960's and 70's - well, they're dead in the water with all of the long term consequences that brings.

John Mearsheimer and Douglas Macgregor both, as a matter of interest, are of the opinion that Israel is taking far more intensive damage than we are being led to believe in the media. Mearsheimer believes that they are loosing the war and is unequivocal saying so. They are desperate to get the USA involved, not simply in order to achieve their objectives, but on an actual existential level. They've bitten off far more than they can chew and are on the ropes. If he's correct then USA involvement would seem, again, to be a certainty. Having said that, neither Mearsheimer nor Macgregor see any good end resulting from an American decision to enter the fray; Mearsheimer observes that no regime change has ever been achieved without putting boots on the ground. Air strikes alone are simply, he says, not enough. But mounting a ground invasion of a theatre as large, and against a population so numerous and spread out, is a huge undertaking absolutely fraught with pitfalls. And in Donald Trump's case, it truly flies against everything he was elected on. The Israeli's have absolutely skewered him and no mistake.

-----0-----

Okay scrub all that, the two week window was apparently a bluff. America has made the strike. Now it's game on. I'm going to go do some reading and come back with some further commentary about what is known etc. (Macgregor was right then.)

[peter]

Right.

Continuing from above, it seems that Fordo has been struck, along with a number of other sites involved in the Iranian nuclear program.

Needless to say, Donald Trump is crowing about the "spectacular military success" of the mission and the Iranians are playing it down as minor damage having been done. Trump now warns the Iranian administration that it must seek peace or the next attack will be "far greater".

It's academic really, insofar as it will not impact Iran's ability to prosecute its ongoing exchanges with Israel in the slightest. But what now of the days to come? If America sticks to its claim that the capability of Iran to 'build a bomb' has been ended or at least set back by a few years, then the driving force behind Israel's decision (by its own account) to prosecute a war with Iran, is gone. Unless it is that Israel now changes its major goal to regime change and decides to continue on that basis (in which case it all but confirms that the nuclear threat argument was a ruse from day one, which of course we know it was).

Or Israel could go along with Iran against the word of Trump, and say that it doesn't accept that the nuclear threat from Iran has been neutralised. I don't see America being ready to join a protracted war for the purpose of achieving regime change as yet - but this could change. This strike that it's made is certainly limited to the nuclear business and has gone no wider in its targeting. But if Israel continues to strike Iran and becomes threatened thereby, then Trump would have no choice but to step into the wider conflict, such is the power that the Israel lobby has within the US. (Nb. It has the same power in the UK, so if America goes in, we go in as well.

Or perhaps the whole thing could even be a great big bluff on the part of both Israel and the USA, in order to give Israel an 'out' before it is completely destroyed. If it goes along with Trump and says, "Job done. Now we can stop with the attacks on Iran," then maybe this serves the purpose it needs. Everyone will know it has recieved a drubbing and has had to throw in the towel, but at least it will survive. Damaged yes - but alive. America would have made a token poke at Iran, Israel could call it a day, and the world could breathe a sigh of relief.

This is of course the good scenario.

Bad scenario; Iran takes the strike on its installations badly (as it said it would previously) and decides to respond in type with strikes against American assets in the region. What are we talking? Bases in Syria or Iraq? Shipping in the Gulf? Closing off the Straits of Hormuz? Going wider, attacks on oil infrastructure of American client states in the region? Then the whole blows up and it goes where it goes.

Currently Benjamin Netenyahu is sucking Donald Trump's metaphorical dick for his action: "His name will be written in gold," in the history books, says Israeli foreign minister Gideon Sa'ar.

Well, we'll see about that: currently it's scratched onto a dog turd stuck on the sole of the world shoe if my perspective is anything to go by, but that's just me I suppose.

One last point, assuming that Israel and the US wanted to consider the matter closed (America in order to prevent itself from having to embark on yet another likely to be disastrous foreign adventure, and Israel in order to literally save itself), can we assume that Iran will be prepared to let it go? I think so. There's no indication that Iran wants to have a major war with the USA and if it continued in order to secure the destruction of Israel that would be the ultimate end point whether it wanted it or not. And it's already said that it's perfectly happy to return to the negotiations with the USA as long as Israel stops attacking it. So on these bases it seems unlikely that Iran would continue to prosecute a war with Israel if the latter stops attacking it.

So in short, this thing might be over - the snake wrestled back into the bag. Or it might not be. It might be just beginning. Let's see what the next few days has to bring.

(Update: Reports of heavy missile barrages over Jerusalem this morning with the IDF requesting civilians in the area to "seek protected spaces" wherever possible. Also some kickback in the States where complaints are being voiced that Congress was not consulted before these strikes were made. Don't suppose that'll worry Trump overly much, but worth noting anyway.)

Just so that we can be clear on the nature of the regime in Israel that we are supporting (quite possibly militarily in the very near future), I urge people to watch the Sky News report Gaza: Doctors on the front line in which special correspondent Alex Crawford follows two British doctors working to save lives in the occupied territory. It's harrowing stuff and not for the faint hearted, but absolutely necessary viewing for all those concerned with what is being done to the Palestinians while our attentions are being otherwise diverted by the events in Iran. Note - a similar documentary previously intended to be shown by the BBC has been permanently shelved by that ever so brave organisation. Needless to say, no coercion by the Israel lobby involved in that decision.

[peter]

L'E'tat, c'est moi!

Translated as 'I am the state!', this was the absolutist attitude of Louis XIV, in which he meant, "There's me and there's God....and there's no other."

When Donald Trump responded to that question on Airforce 1, about what Tulsi Gabbard had said in her report on the strategic intelligence review, that there was no evidence that Iran was producing a nuclear weapon, he essentially said the same thing. "I don't care what she said, was his abrupt reply.

Again later in the same exchange he was pressed that his strategic intelligence advisors had said the same thing, he came back with, "Well, they're wrong," as though what he thought, and only what he thought, was what mattered.

This has been overlooked as just Trump being Trump, and it's true. But only in the sense that it's him being his own stupidly obstinate and uneducated self, and not actually being the President of the United States of America. But over and above that, it represents an institutional crisis in the USA, that was made manifest in that single statement.

Because strategic intelligence is important. Really important. It underpins the rational decision making process of government, lifting it above that based on mere whim and fancy. It separates those administrations that operate in a rational formalised way, from those that are erratic, operating in essentially a 'banana republic' like manner, with decisions being made simply on the beliefs, unfounded by evidence, of a single autocratic leader, and a few like minded henchmen.

And this now, is the basis upon which it is likely that the Americans go into war - full-blown war - with Iran.

So this is the first problem we have with this situation.

The second is the legality of what America has done.

Questioned on Sunday Morning television, the Labour business secretary Jonathan Reynolds was immediate in his response that the UK government supported what America had done - bombing the three nuclear sites in Iran during the course of the previous night - but was unable to give a comment on the legality of the action. The interviewer was incredulous. "We support something that we can't even say is legal," he responded. "How can we ever again upbraid another country for breaking international law when we support America for potentially doing just that?"

The minister was unable to respond except by some mumbled bluster which simply avoided the point. Worse than that he actually lied that Iran had refused to be involved in talks regarding its nuclear program, when everyone knows that Israel bombed them while they were at the negotiating table (not literally, but due to sit down the following day) in order to scupper those very talks before they happened. Not only reason, it seems, can be sacrificed with impunity these days, but truth as well.

As to the legality of the American attack, there seems little doubt on the matter. Under international law a country may only attack a second country in response to an armed attack on itself by that second country. Not because it feels threatened, or because it is helping another country that feels threatened. These preemptive strikes are illegal, and thus place the actions of both Israel and America outside the framework of international law. In doing what they have done they become essentially rogue states. That the nuclear sites they have targeted are not military, but civilian sites, is merely to compound their crime. Further compounding their guilt is of course the fact that the very premise that they have made the attacks upon - that Iran is building a nuclear weapon - is in itself denied by the very international body set up to make such judgements.

The third, and most probably the most significant problem, is the effect that this action by both Israel and the USA has on the international order, the rule of law, the internationally agreed framework that prevents the world from descending into chaos. As a member of the United Nations Security Council, America has a special responsibility in supporting this order, but appears to believe that it has not only a veto on the rulings of that Council, but on the very remit of the international order itself. In other words, the rule of international law only applies when it says it does. And it (and Israel) are bound by those rules, those laws only when it (they) choose to be.

Thus in one stroke, one strike, does America tear down the very international order that it helped to create - to create, just so that such injustices as were seen prior to its creation should never happen again - those many years ago. How ironic that the short period of world order should be book-ended at both ends by a genocide, a Holocaust, and even more so that the victims of the first should be so instrumental in the perpetration of the second.

And unless anyone should interpret the last phrase as being antisemitic, let me tell you what is antisemitic. What Israel is doing to the Palestinians is the second worst practical demonstration of antisemitism that the world has ever seen. Because it is the millions and millions of innocent Jewish people - people who will be as absolutely horrified by what is being done in Gaza, the West Bank, as the rest of us - who will carry the burden of this down through the centuries. It is they who will be judged for what Netenyahu has done in the Occupied Territories, and they who will be stained by his actions in prosecuting a genocide. So never presume to lecture me on antisemitism, not while my own government supports and facilitates this awful crime as it unfolds (and don't dare, Jonathan Reynolds - yes I'm talking to you - ever pretend again that you are not supporting this, by wheeling out the few pathetic lip-service measures you have taken, while still supplying both the material and intelligence support on which the genocide has and is dependent). Foe this I will not stand!

Thanks to Glen Deisen and his guest, Jaques Baud (ex Swiss Strategic intelligence and Nato advisor) for the content above. We rely on the informed content of substacks like this to redress the failings of our main stream media.

[peter]

I took a drive with my wife yesterday morning, during the course of which I said to her that anyone who thought that Israel had gone to all the trouble it had simply in order to watch the entire war fizzle out following a few desultory strikes, largely ineffectual, on Iranian nuclear enrichment sites, was living in cloud cuckoo land.

If Iran didn't strike back at Western assets in the region itself, I said, you could be assured that Israel would do it for them. False flag operations are the easiest thing in the world for getting things started or indeed scuppering intended peace plans, and you can be assured that Israel would be perfectly capable, both operationally and guilefully, to execute such a manoeuvre.

As it happened, it wasn't necessary.

As I sat down to watch the 6 o'clock news, reports were coming in of a strike on the American airforce base at Al Udeid, which though ongoing, was not seeming to do much damage on the ground and for which the Iranians were seemingly accepting responsibility. There was even a slight suggestion in the report that Iran had perhaps given the Americans forewarning of the attack, which implied it was more of a demonstratory action than one really intended to do damage. This was supported by the information that Iran had said that the number of missiles fired, 6, would be precisely that fired at the Fordo nuclear site.

This was the Iranians saying then, "This is what we can do if we choose. This time it's symbolic: next time it won't be."

News was also filtering through that the Iranians were intending to close the Strait of Hormuz - a possibility that was sending shivers down the backs of every economic commentator on the planet. Especially so given the recent experience of the economic effects of the Ukrainian war on the global economy, and the liklihood that a closing of the Strait through which so high a proportion of the world's oil passes, would cause massively greater damage than that.

And now we come to this morning and the news that suddenly, as the song goes, 'Love is in the air.'

Donald Trump announces a ceasefire, commends both Israel and Iran on their "stamina, courage and intelligence" (spelled out in capital letters as is the President's normal wont) in ending the conflict. He peppers his commentary with references to the American success in "obliterating" the nuclear sites and pokes a few insults at the Iranian response ("Very weak"), but then thanks them for giving them advance notice of the strike. As an additional piece of information, it seems that America has asked China to use its influence with Iran (from whom it purchases much of its oil) to persuade them not to close the Strait of Hormuz, and thus avert the economic tsunami that this would cause.

So what are we to make of this?

Iran's limited response to the American attacks on its nuclear program seem to indicate that it would like to see this whole situation rowed back to a more manageable level. It's being presented (as it would be) in our media as 'Iranian weakness', but to me it's very cunning. They've responded to the American attack on their territory - a domestic imperative from their point of view - but done so in a way that de-escalates the situation and doesn't demand a further American response. They exhibited a similar level of strategic nous when they attacked Israel last year, following the Israeli attacks on their embassy buildings in Damascus. That response, if you remember, like this one, was telecast well in advance, allowing Israel to prepare its defences and not to suffer excessive damage. This Iranian patience in response to aggression directed against it is serving it well. It looks good on the international stage and prevents it from opening the door to full scale attack by its enemies. Far from being weakness, it displays a wilyness that neither Israel nor America can match.

And you can be sure that Benjamin Netenyahu will be furious at this turn of events. Far from getting the full scale war he was banking on, he's finished up wasting his country's valuable air defences and other assets on an adventure that hasn't even broken the Iranian nuclear program let alone accomplished his true aim, regime change in Iran. No suprise then that there has been no Israeli comment on the Trump declaration of a ceasefire.

But Netenyahu is a past master of the art of breaking ceasefires. This we know. He's done it in Gaza, he's done it in Lebanon, and you can bet your bottom dollar he'll do everything in his power to do it here. Prepare for a false flag operation or a manufactured reason to attack Iran once again.

I think that the hastily announced ceasefire is a reflection of Trump's realisation that if this thing isn't stopped - well - there's no predictable end to it. At the vert least it'll be a crushing experience for America both domestically and in terms of their power projection abroad. Iran has proven a much tougher nut to crack than it was believed it would be, and the self-harm that would be experienced by allowing the full scale war to burst forth, is beginning to be understood. There must have been huge back-channel diplomacy going on, most probably to simultaneously orchestrate the highly choreographed Iranian attack on Al Udeid and prepare the announcement of the ceasefire that has followed hard on its heels. That the two have been 'prepared' simultaneously by American Iranian behind the scenes diplomacy is undoubtedly the case. The question is whether Israel has been involved in this or not?

It should be remembered that Israel effectively coerced America into this war whether they wanted it or not. When they made their first strike, we had the theatre of one side of the American government saying it was nothing to do with them and then Trump - not wanting to appear as if he had been bypassed - implying that he had been involved. Involved or not (probably not), the Israeli attack put him in a difficult spot; he'd come to his presidency on a 'no-war' ticket, but his donor backers in the Israel lobby absolutely expected him to come to Israel's aid, particularly if things looked like getting rough.

And they did. As Israel was pounded by Iranian missiles, it became clear that Trump would have to do something. Between a rock and a hard place, voters vs donors, what was he to do? Well we all know what he did. The token attack on Iranian nuclear facilities was made with the stress being made that that was where it would begin and end. The token return attack by Iran and now the ceasefire has played Netenyahu's game right back to him. Trump's revenge if you like, for being dragged into a hostile situation with Iran that he neither wanted nor needed. Domestically involvement in a foreign adventure was a nightmare with his voter base, costing him dear, and militarily it was a potential disaster waiting to happen. But in fairness, this morning he looks to have navigated his way through it.

But what of Israel? Did it want an 'out' as a result of the drubbing it was receiving at the hands of Iran? Is this ceasefire done with the blessing of Netenyahu (though, my God, he will hate it).....or is it done against his wishes? Has the realisation hit home, that if he doesn't rein this thing in then there won't be an Israel left for him to administer? Or is he this morning, sitting fuming that Trump has gotten the jump on him, and brought his war to an end before it's achieved anything like what he wanted from it (that being regime change and nothing less)? Trump may have been backed into this war (advance knowledge or not, not withstanding) against his will - but has he slithered out of it against Netenyahu's will, or with his compliance (or even at his requesting)? Who knows.

But either way, the public reasons for continuing to prosecute the war have been eliminated. The nuclear threat has, by Trump's claim, been neutralised ("It was a spectacular military success!"), so Israel's reason to continue there is gone (unless Netenyahu is to publicly contradict Trump's words and effectively denounce the man who he spoke of in so glowing terms but a couple of nights ago). Or unless he now publicly comes out and says that he's not prepared to stop fighting until regime change is achieved. Or unless he can contrive, behind the scenes, by hook or by crook, a means to justify the continuation or restarting of the conflict. But a ceasefire is a ceasefire and it'll at least give him (Netenyahu) a chance to take stock and decide what to do next. Either he'll decide that going to war with Iran was not the clever idea it seemed at the time and let things rest: or alternatively he'll contrive a way to keep things going. It's even possible that he might himself fall if the Israeli people are sufficiently pissed at him for what he has brought on them.

Netenyahu is a man with significant problems and how he decides to deal with them could be the driving force behind the whole future of the Middle East and world. Not a particularly comforting thought.

[peter]

Such is the bizarre, topsy-turvey nature of the world we live in today, that it becomes almost impossible to report on it, let alone actually make sense of what is going on.

But in the belief that this is entirely deliberate, that the people with their hands on the wheel really don't want us to get it, I'm going to try to lay it out in a coherent way - just what has happened since I last posted (because this has to be taken in small bites if one is going to stand even a chance of making anything like order out of the chaos of conflicting information being thrown at us) - and then we'll see where we are.

I reported yesterday that Donald Trump had announced a brokered ceasefire deal mere hours after the Iranian attack on the American airforce base at Al Udeid. I pontificated on what this might mean and on how things might play out. This was around 7.00 am and my main thrust was that I doubted Israel would wear a ceasefire after all the work it had put in towards getting a war started.

At 10.00 I listened to James O'brien on his LBC show, and he, like me, was also struggling. With known liar Donald Trump, and devious manipulator Benjamin Netenyahu as your source of information, presented through the prism of the Western media outlets which he was clearly beginning to realise weren't actually terribly reliable sources of truth (no complaining now James - you were part of its degrading yourself), how could one even believe the truth of what one was hearing. He granted that the media wasn't reporting that a ceasefire had been negotiated between Iran and Israel, but that Donald Trump was saying that a ceasefire had been negotiated, which were very different things. Still, he acknowledged, Donald Trump for all whatsoever he is known to be, was still the president of the United States of America, and what he said was bound to be reported. - or rather the media was bound by this fact, to report what he says.

In other words he was casting doubt on the fact that there was a ceasefire at all. He was as confused as I was as to how this seemingly impossible deal could have been spun out of thin air and immediately on hearing this I too began to question it.

Then at 12.00 o'clock lunch time, the news came in that Israel had already broken the ceasefire (this would tie in with my predictions of yesterday....assuming that the ceasefire deal was actually real) claiming that Iran had broken it by firing missiles into Israel. Iran, they (the BBC) reported, denied this.

So the ceasefire that might or might not actually be, had already broken down.

As the day progressed details began to slip out; it appeared that the ceasefire had been brokered with Iran (with Israel we weren't told) by America and Qatar.

Later I saw a furious Trump being shown on 'Democracy Now; the war and peace report' (hosted by Amy Goodman). He shouted that "A ceasefire is negotiated by the USA and Qatar and Israel drops a load of bombs - a huge load - within an hour of it being agreed." I'm not happy with Israel, he said, not happy at all.

By 6pm on the BBC news this blaming of Israel by Trump had morphed into his blaming both Iran and Israel for breaking the ceasefire - but it was holding, he (Trump) said. He was shown loosing his temper, saying that the two countries had been fighting so long that neither knew what the fuck they were doing (his words, not mine). The morphing, I'm guessing, was the BBC attempt to never allow Israel to be blamed for anything- or at least anything that could be skewed another way by presenting the facts in a different way.

The BBC managed to cobble up some confusing mishmash about the timings of the firing of the missiles being while the ceasefire was actually just coming into effect - it was a nice muddying of the waters, a way to sort of implicate Iran as the breaker of the deal (or at least that was what it implied to me at least). And they continued by a repetition of the fact that Iran had been accused of being within a stones throw of developing a nuclear weapon and that this could not in the government's opinion, be allowed to happen.

So this is where I left it. I haven't even looked at this morning's news yet because I really want to make a few points clear before I confuse matters even further. Who knows what has happened overnight, so fast are things developing.

First, as Michael Walker from Novara Media pointed out, we are being gaslit on an industrial scale in respect of the blame for walking away from a nuclear deal lying at Iran's door.

Far from walking away, Iran were at the table when Israel scuppered the talks by attacking them. "They are being told by our UK politicians," Walker said, "to return to the negotiating table when it was Iran themselves who'd been attacked! They are being repeatedly blamed for walking away from nuclear limitations talks when nothing could be further from the truth.

Further more, Iran had been party to nuclear limitations agreements for years, successfully being inspected and verified as sticking to the terms of those deals until Trump tore up thedeal and walked away. Journalist Richard Medhurst has produced a YouTube video listing everything surrounding the Iran nuclear industry and enrichment, from the signing of the successful JCPOA agreement, to Trump's tearing it up (at Netenyahu's request) ; how Iran did not engage in further enrichment for 3 years before, crippled by the sanctions that Donald Trump had imposed, they began to assert pressure on the USA to return to the deal, by incrementally increasing enrichment year on year, always informing the IAEA exactly what they were doing.

The talks that Israel destroyed by their attacking Iran would have been the sixth round since Trump reinstated them on taking up his presidency. He, Trump, believed that they were close to a new agreement, Iran were ready to sign and then Israel attacked. Yes there were issues to be ironed out - but Iran were at the table! This continuous claim by our politicians that it is Iran that should return to the negotiations is simply not a reflection of the true situation. That our media continues to peddle this line (right across the EU - not just in the UK) rather than to challenge this completely erroneous implication that the fault is Iran's, is a reflection of how far it has fallen in the service of mendacious administrations. Topsy-turvey does not cover it. Truly is there something rotten in the state of Denmark (as Hamlet would have put it).

So let's be clear on this. We are being lied to when we are led to believe that Iran are the guilty party in the nuclear proliferation situation in that country. By the assessment of the various organs of the American intelligence services (as reported by Tulsi Gabbard to Congress in March), by the assessment of the IAEA, and by the word of the Iranian administration themselves, they are not, and have no intention towards, building a nuclear bomb. The constant refrain from government and the media that, "Iran must never be allowed to build a nuclear bomb," is a ruse. It's a lie, gaslighting, call it what you will. It simply isn't true.

And lastly, and more importantly than anything, Israel are killing Palestinians by the score on a daily basis in Gaza. It might constitute a genocide, it might be a Holocaust, it might just (just ) be an inhumane slaughter - these are simple words and while words matter, they don't matter nearly as much as corpses on the ground. And what is being done is that Palestinians are being herded, and shot at and starved, and poisoned and murdered in numbers by the day in Gaza. Israel are doing this and we are supporting them. Our government, the people we elect to represent us, are part and parcel of it.

Nothing can be more important than the recognition of this, the shouting of it from the rooftops, the posting of it on every billboard and forum that can be accessed. We are complicit in the killing of a people and our government which has the power to stop this chooses not to do so.

While we look at Iran and Israel and Trump and everybody else from God down to Mickey Mouse, the Palestinians are being killed by Israel. And we are letting it happen.

This one truth in this whole fucking awful mess is paramount and we must never loose sight of it. Now I go to plunge back into the fray and do battle by no more simple an act than opening the morning papers.

[peter]

Yesterday James O'brien quoted a line from Orwell's 1984 about how the Party's final and most essential command was that you reject the evidence of your eyes and ears.

It was a very apt quotation for the current situation we face in respect of Gaza, when we are told that Israel are not committing genocide in Gaza (although those maintaining this line are fewer and further apart than at any time previously, with the exception of course of the voices from within Israel itself).

But it applies to other situations as well.

When for example, you start designating organisations as terrorist, when they don't appear to have done anything that meets the definition of the word. Or when you claim that operations are a "terrific success", when all the evidence points to their impact being limited in the extreme.

Focusing on the latter case, we had President Trump claiming that the Iranian nuclear facilities recently bombed were "obliterated", and his defence establishment assessment saying that the damage was minimal. The President was apparently wild when the document was leaked that contradicted his account (I'll bet it was received with smiles in Israel - I'd take a bet on who's hand was involved in that leak) and said that the damage would slow the Iranian nuclear program up by "a few months" at most.

But Donald Trump insisted yesterday that his version was true, and no doubt some people will swallow it.

Another interesting phenomenon pointed out by O'brien (apt name for any comments involving 1984, I just realised) was the distorting effect, that simply being around someone like Trump has on people.

Take that guy Mark Rutte, Secretary General of NATO. He sent Donald Trump this message, presumably meant to be private, in which he praised Trump's actions in the Iranian attack in the most grovelling sycophantic terms - embarrassing in their effusiveness - and even going so far as to follow Donald Trump's example of using capital letters to emphasise words that he wanted to stress. Like a child messaging another child.

How he must have crawled inside when Trump, being the sponge for praise that he is (and having a desperate need, like all nariscissists, for praise about himself to be seen by all and sundry), immediately posted the message for public viewing.

Rutte was of course desperate to keep Trump onside with NATO, and this explains his crawling message.

But Kier Stamer, as O'brien points out, exhibits the same phenomenon. He clearly has reasons of his own for not wanting to aggravate the capricious man-child which is Trump, not least his desperation to get a trade agreement of sorts over the line, but to be prepared to genuflect in abasement before one who is at best one's equal, is, well, degrading.

But this is where we are. Trump is what he is and all around him must bend to it. It's unseemly. It's embarrassing. But it's necessary. The people who deal with Trump have no choice. (Nb Word has it that Stamer has pulled forward the UK state visit in order to pour cream and honey over the President and flatter his ego yet further, and also that the King is less than pleased about it. Good on you Charles: tell him what you think at your next meeting with the slimeball.)

O'brien finished his monologue with a final Orwell quote, "There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth even against the whole world then you were not mad."

Again, it's an apt one, because it's becoming increasingly difficult to hold on to your moorings in this surreal landscape that our leaderships have created. Who can look at Vladimir Putin or Chinese leader Xi Jinping and not but envy (just a little bit) how - well - sane they appear in comparison to our lot. So much more grounded in reality. Even the blimmin' Ayatollah guy sounds rational when putting him up against Bibi Netenyahu or Donald Trump. And Sergey Lavrov vs David Lammy?

I even felt a bit sorry for that Jonathan Reynolds guy - the Business Secretary who was wheeled out to lie about Iran having declined to be part of the nuclear negotiations. He seems like a nice guy. How do you get a guy like that to compromise himself by telling what even he must know is the direct opposite of the truth? It must, I suppose, be down to the desire for advancement, or to protect your career, being placed over the consequences of telling a direct lie, which now, let's face it, are negligible. Honour is a commodity a politician in the UK can no longer afford. It doesn't pay enough.

And I suppose it's the same for the MPs. Most Labour MPs are newly elected, at the beginning of their political careers. To step up to the plate and call Israel out for the genocide is to kill their careers off right at their beginning. The benefits vote they can get away with being seen as rebelling against - for a Labour MP it's almost a badge of honour - but over Israel.....no. The Israel lobby is way more powerful than Kier Stamer and will be around long after he's gone. If those MPs want to have a career in politics, the one issue they will go nowhere near is the genocide in Gaza.

And so it's left to the public and the few political names who can get away with it to call out what is happening. Gaza has all but dissapeared from the news cycle, and what you do see is sanitised in a way that the full horror is disguised. Go on YouTube and you'll find on Double Down News, on Novara Media, on Owen Jones, videos showing the true chaos and carnage of the food distribution camps (and that's a ridiculous description of what is essentially a turkey shooting exercise for the IDF). People in their thousands running screaming, this way and that, as food trucks go one way amid the dust and muck and the bullets fly the other. Not the rehashed scenes limited to the doling out of ladles of slop into pails and buckets held in the outstretched arms of children.

So that's it people. That's the message of today. Eyes and ears. They were given to you for a reason so go use them.

(Nb. Forgot to say above, Kier Stamer is about to attempt to push through his changes to the Welfare system, estimated to reduce the welfare bill by about 5 billion. It looks like Labour MPs are ready to rebel en masse and he may have a fight on his hands. Hence the reference to welfare rebellions above. )

[peter]

Let's just have a brief look at post war Iranian history.

In 1953 a coup d'etat organised by the CIA and MI6, oversaw the ousting of the parliamentary Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddegh, who had been unwise enough to agitate for nationalisation of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (later to be renamed BP) such that profits from Iranian oil might be retained for the benefit of the Iranian people.

The hated Shah, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi was returned from exile, after which followed a period of autocratic rule under his brutal heel, supported by the British and Americans. Killings were commonplace and hundreds of people were massacred in the streets in the 1978 Black Friday protests against his rule.

On February 1st 1979, amid great fanfare and celebrating of the people, the exiled religious leader Ruhollah Khomeini returned to the country while Shah Reza Pahlavi was abroad undergoing treatment for cancer. The monarchy fell some two weeks later and the Islamic Republic of Iran was established.

The Western reaction to this was to demonise Iran and introduce crippling sanctions from the outset. These have been maintained and tightened in successive years through the 80's and 90's, with the EU tightening their own in 2012 and restricting Iranian access to the SWIFT financial messaging service for certain Iranian banks.

The resulting sanctions package is the tightest net of restrictions ever utilised against a country, limiting even the availability of medicines and essential foodstuffs, although these are supposed to be exempt under international humanitarian law. Certainly any technological goods are restricted and such is the American viciousness in applying the sanctions that it also punishes countries that deal with Iran with sanctions of their own.

As a result of this history, the coup followed by the depradations of the Shah, then the crippling sanctions regime, it will be understood why Iranians, particularly of the older generation, have no love for the West. Having had their wealth rinsed out by the British, placed under the heel of a brutal dictator and then seen their country held back by sanctions (think a Cuban style slow down of progress as it was starved of resources and trading opportunities), older people understand what has been done to them. They understand that the country is not what it should be, and why.

The younger generation however, being simply used to the way their country is, being exposed to the 'freedoms' enjoyed by the people they see in the West, don't (or at least didn't) understand the degree of Western responsibility for their circumstances. They see the religious stricture under which they live, the theocracy and repression as responsible for their circumstances. They understand not the degree of aversion that the West holds for their society, their faith, the hollowness of any words of sympathy for their condition that the West might express, most recently in the most cynical fashion, as the American and Israeli bombs rained down upon their heads.

And for the West, we are being sold the pup that all it will take is a little push, just a little shove in the right direction, and the people will rise up and overthrow their oppressors and we shall see yet another tame client government installed, or see another chaotic descent into collapse, rendering the 'threat of Iran' neutralised either way.

But it's bollocks. Because we just did the one thing guaranteed to ensure that won't happen. We opened the eyes of the young generation to what we are. Now they see exactly just how well intentioned we are towards them. As we destroy their homes and kill their brothers and sisters, their mothers and fathers, sons and daughters. And with the leering ghoul of Benjamin Netenyahu speaking over the airwaves, on their tv screens, telling them how much he cares for their wellbeing.

And the results of this are, contrary to what our media is telling us, there for all to see. The Iranian people are pulling together tighter than they have ever been. They are not going to rise up against the Ayatollah, against the theocracy that while such anathema to us, is something that resonates in their culture in ways we could never understand. Iran is emerging with a new found confidence from this failed attempt to bring their country to heel, to its knees. The people suddenly emerge from the conflict, dusting themselves down and realising that they won! Not only did they survive - they actually won.

And this was not part of the Israeli playbook at all. It was their intention to see Iran reduced to rubble and chaos. Another Syria to chalk up to their tally. This is why Israel is so supportive of the Kurdish struggle for independence. It recognises that if the Kurds achieve this, great chunks of territory in Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey all pass out of the hands of the states that currently hold them. This in turn promotes fragmentation of the remaining territorial holdings, and the tendencies of each of these countries towards ethnic and sectarian division is advanced. To the benefit of the Greater Israel Project. One ring to rule them all style of thing. As such the new found confidence of Iran in the wake of their defeat of Israel (which will never be acknowledged by our media, but why else would the Israeli's be stopping now) plays exactly against Israeli requirements.

Certainly this thing is not over, but in the actions of the last week, Iran has not been humiliated or weakened or reduced in any way. On the contrary they have earned a respect that the other countries of the region will recognise, and who's populations will no doubt be wishing it was their countries that had shown such courage and determination in the face of Western attempts to interfere with their sovereignty. Iran will step up onto the table with countries of the global South having earned their place with honour. By their own efforts and against a backdrop of ever increasing Western attempts to stymie their development, they have clawed their way up, and now on their own merits and theirs alone, stand almost alone alongside the Houthis, in being prepared to risk all in actively aiding the Palestinians. The world sees this and is not so blind that, despite all the West would do to hoodwink it, it cannot recognise it.

Maybe there's a lesson there for Israel and the West to learn......

But I won't hold my breath.

[peter]

Post 2.

It was entertaining to see past footage of Home Secretary Yvette Cooper standing in the House of Commons, wearing the rosettes and colours of the suffragette movement (it was an anniversary of their successful campaign to achieve sufferage for women or something), an activist group far more extreme in its actions than the group Palestine Action, recently proscribed as a terrorist movement by Cooper herself.

The group - Palestine Action, not the Suffragettes - has damaged property in the pursuit of their cause, most lately the spray painting of an airforce jet at the Brize Norton airbase. UK jets have been used for reconnaissance flights over Gaza in the last 18 months - a fact that the government would rather we didn't talk about. Thanks to Owen Jones for digging that clip up.

I don't condone such activities, I don't think they achieve anything of value, but I can't see them as qualifying as 'terrorist'. Put these school teachers and students in a basket alongside Al Queda and Isis? Seems a bit....heavy handed.... to me. (Still - given the glowing approval our media and polity gave to the head-chopper now running Syria, it seems that our perspectives on these things are now somewhat different than they were previously. )

On the same footing, Kier Stamer himself has opened the door on accusations of hypocrisy.

It was our Prime Minister himself who represented (in his former days as a lawyer) one of the 'Fairford Five' - a group of activists from the Stop the War coalition who damaged a plane on a UK airforce base in 2003, during the second Gulf War.

It seems that these two worthies at least, find a different set of principles to apply to active protest and it's acceptability, depending on whether they support the cause or not - or more importantly, whether the Western liberal establishment supports it or otherwise. Votes for women in: genocide of Palestinians in Gaza, out, or so it would seem.

Of course it didn't help Palestine Action that they had previously targeted a golf course belonging to Donald Trump (in Scotland, I believe) with the words 'Palestine is not for sale!' Such terror as could be engendered within the aging millionaires playing the greens can hardly be imagined. I mean damn: it's almost enough to put one off one's caviar!

Incidentally, I have to stress my not condoning or supporting Palestine Action in any way (which I don't), because as of Monday not to do so could land me in prison.

Incidentally, James O'brien was asking why Kier Stamer is getting things so wrong that he's had to U turn on two of his big policy decisions since coming to power.

Answer; because he had absolutely no ideology of his own, no plans beyond securing power. He lied and dissembled his way into office and now his true colours are being exposed people don't like them and know they fly exactly opposite to the reason they either voted for him, or indeed became Labour politicians in the first place.

Not, as they say, rocket science.

[peter]

Norwegian tourist Mads Mikellsen was detained by border officials for five hours when he attempted to enter the USA on holiday, before being refused entry and returned home.

His sin it appears, was that the immigration official processing him spotted a meme on his phone depicting J D Vance as a baby.

He was questioned as to why he had the image saved and explained that it was just a comedy meme: it wasn't there for any significant purpose.

The questioning he received also involved his cannabis use, during which he had admitted to smoking the drug twice in legal circumstances. There was also, said the immigration officials concerned, a question as to whether Mikellsen was going to attempt to dissapear into the crowd and then seek illegal employment in the country.

By the time Mikellsen was put on a plane home, he said, he was traumatised by his experience and simply wanted to return home anyway.

The question for me is not so much why this happened, but why he wanted to go to the beastly place in the first place. For me it's something like that Groucho Marx quote about not wanting to belong to any club that would have him as a member. I'd think that the desire to go there would almost automatically disqualify one from being the kind of person that they'd want to enter. But who knows - perhaps the opposite is true. Perhaps if what you see on the media concerning the place - the bundling of people into vans while their children are left on the street, feral groups of uniformed ghouls roaming the streets or bursting in through your doors, lying politicians and rabid extremist commentators running the show - appeals to you, then you are exactly the kind of person they want to allow entry to.

All I can say is that I'll never know - because I'll never be trying to enter the mother ****er!

-----0-----

Kier Stamer saw off the rebellion by his back bench MPs on the changes he proposed to welfare payments to the long term sick and disabled, by changing his policy.

Where the criteria needing to be satisfied in order to qualify for the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) was to be tightened up, demanding a reassessment of all people currently receiving the benefit, the revised proposals which it seems that the Labour MPs will accept, is that only new applicants will be subjected to the new assessment scheme.

But this will create a system whereby two individuals with the same condition will receive different amounts (or indeed perhaps one will not qualify for payment at all) on the basis of the date at which they applied for their assessment. This surely is a nonsense? The criteria warranting payment of a PIP were surely carefully thought out at the time that the scheme was introduced, and nothing will have changed in the intervening time between then and now. The payments are made to allow people with disabilities to partake of as fully an independent life as possible in the face of their conditions.

Take transport as an example; a person with mobility issues might receive money for taxi services in order that they can get direct transport from their home to work or the shops. Nothing will have changed about either their mobility or the need they have for the transport between the original assessment criteria being established and now, and thus to alter the criteria to make them more stringent would be to say, "Well, we can't help it that you have difficulties, but we have a shortage of money so you will needs have to suffer because of it." This is surely not good enough?

In fact I've got a better idea. Increase the tax on the section of society most able to pay a fraction more, and the whole society benefits from it. The quality of life of those suffering with conditions no fault of their own is maintained, and society is improved in the whole in result.

Somehow I don't see Kier Stamer going down this route though. I'm thinking that he'll most likely do it the way it's been suggested (nonsense though it is) and that most Labour MPs will be so happy to be let off the hook by their constituents. Because the ones that have been approaching them are the ones who would likely have lost their payments and were worried sick about it - these will now be appeased, but the future ones who will miss out, well they don't exist yet and so they can't make life difficult for their MP by virtue of this. So the MPs will soak up the two-tier system despite its being a ridiculous and unfair solution. Kick the problem down the road and let someone else deal with it in the future. Yeah - that works!

[peter]

It's a thin Sunday for news when the most eye catching headline across the press is Werewolf Spotted in Bridlington, but there you have it.

Entirely predictable was the pompous outrage at the BBC for its partial broadcast of the Northern Ireland rap band Kneecap set from Glastonbury. Less so was the equally incandescent rage of the establishment at the broadcasting of the previous set, that of rap duo Bob Vylan, who stirred up a hornets nest by getting the crowd to chant "death, death, to the IDF."

I think it's in poor taste to instigate such chanting - grandstanding for effect, but silly rock performers have been trying to present their radical credentials in this manner for an age. Anti-establishment chanting is a thing at such events, and should neither suprise nor exite anyone over much, but I think calling for anyone's death - even the reprehensible soldiery of the IDF - is uncalled for. It's to lower yourself, not clearly to the level of those doing the murdering who you rail against, but to a place where you allow your the baser elements of your nature to sully the good elements that cry out in anguish at the horror that is driving your protest.

As for the anti-establishment thing - Glastonbury is about as establishment as you can get. Just to be on its play-set, to be involved with or even going to the rotten thing is to partake in a sort of upside-down snobbery. That the BBC are there, with their aging but still ever-so-hip radio DJ's giving their establishment take on the self-congratulatory smugfest says it all. If there were one true bone of radical dissent amongst the whole affair, the police would have been in there with their battons like back in the 1970's (I know - I was at the Windsor Free Festival of 1973 which saw the beginnings of the Wally's, the New Age Travellers, and which the police unceremoniously broke up by wading through tearing up tents and raining down blows on the heads of sleepy (and stoned) hippies on the morning of the fourth (?) day).

Still, at least it keeps the Gaza genocide in the news (which otherwise would be completely sidelined by important stuff like who was attending Jeff Bezos' multi-million pound (billion pound?) wedding in Venice. ("I'm the luckiest woman in the world," simpered his plastic-doll like manakin of a wife. No dear - just the richest. Not the same thing. ) The crowd at Glastonbury, complete with keffiyeh's and Palestinian flags did their bit, following the chants as instructed and waving their flags. The wollen balaclava'd front man of Kneecap cast his eye across the crowd appreciatively. "The BBC are going to have a problem editing this show," he crowed, presumably in reference to all the Palestinian flags, the displaying of which is certainly frowned upon if it isn't even illegal. (I tried to search out the answer to the last question. Oddly [ ] Google doesn't seem to want to give an opinion.)

No - the BBC won't have any problem editing it at all. They'll just cave in to the Israel lobby, the government, the media, or whoever happens to put pressure on them first and chop out any signs of mass flag waving from the footage. They've stopped even showing footage that shows any kind of dissent on the government policy towards Israel, and this will be no different. Footage of the brutal policing of a demonstration against the proscription of the activist group Palestine Action never even made it into the news round - only Double Down News actually showed it at all (and more power to comedian Alexi Sayle for being there and narrating the documenting of this stamp-down on our right to protest such government actions. Eat your heart out Jo Brand and Ben Elton).

And so on it goes. Glastonbury will drag itself through its final dull day (no doubt some aging has-been will embarrassingly 'groove their way out' onto the stage for the swansong event of their career (the one that should have ended 20 years ago) and the BBC DJ's will cool their way through until the end when they will pronounce it as being "the best one ever," until of course, next year's overtakes it, and then is eclipsed in its turn by the one after that.

Thankfully next year is actually the traditional Glastonbury gap-year (which happens every four or five years) so hopefully by then something more actually radical will have been cooked up to fill the gap. I live, like Windsor Free Festival organiser Wally Hope in, well, hope - but it's pretty thin gruel at the moment.

Love and prayers to the people of Gaza. I haven't got a flag and I didn't get to Glastonbury, but I do feel for you nevertheless. Hope for a better day tomorrow.

[peter]

Let's have a look.

Time must be given for broadcasters to claim biological men are women, says broadcasting regulator Ofcom. Fair do's. The moon might be made of green cheese, but either way claiming it or otherwise won't make it so.

My belief is that when you have an essentially infinite gender list, then gender ceases to be a thing in itself anyway - it sort of dissipates itself out of existence, leaving just the two biological sexes behind. You just finish up with people. It's not a big deal, but I'm allowed to 'broadcast it' in my own way I suppose. Whether time should be especially allocated for me to do so is somewhat different however. Frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.

Moving on.

Iran says it won't return to diplomatic talks while it remains under threat of renewed strikes from America. Fair comment. Iran has been a signatory of the Nuclear Non-prliferation Treaty since its earliest days, and has allowed inspection of its nuclear facilities under the rules of the treaty. Israel on the other hand, is not a signatory, allows no such inspection and possesses nuclear weapons that it will not admit to having. Iran has no such weapons, not is there evidence that it is trying to produce them (excepting by some AI generated nonsense that Trump has been sold to this effect - nonsense that can be achieved simply by setting the parameters of the AI algorithms that produce it). Why should it talk to anyone trying to bomb the shit out of it while simultaneously refusing to hold Israel to account for its nuclear activities.

Express, Mail, Sun, Telegraph - usual suspects all screaming out for the BBC to be face charges/be censured/be hung up by the balls etc, for not pulling the plug during the live broadcast of some rap duo chanting 'death, death, to the IDF'. Well maybe they should have, but it shows if nothing, that the people are very pissed at what Israel is doing in Gaza. The Israel lobby are terrified of loosing control of the narrative (too late for that boys) and will be pulling out all the stops to take a hold once again. "Nasty rappers! Bad rappers! Naughty BBC!" Never mind the corpses of children piling up in Gaza: don't look there,whatever you do. Concentrate on Glastonbury and the silly crowd, the bad-boy acts and the weak-kneed BBC. (The BBC who still talk about "the war in Gaza" - what war....it's a slaughter house, not a war - who claim that "it's not known if Israel has a nuclear weapon," - Mordecai Venunu spent 18 years in prison for releasing the pictures of it, you dickheads - and won't show the actual pictures that show in graphic detail the genocidal campaign in which a true life version of the Squid Game is played by the IDF with people desperately trying to get food from the deliberately massively limited food distribution points (more on which tomorrow).

Telegraph; "NHS will use AI to prevent another Lucy Letby scandal." What scandal is that? The travesty of the 'fair trial' she was given, or the fact that the 'monster Letby could go unnoticed on such an extended killing spree'? I haven't an idea which angle the story is coming from because I haven't bothered to read it. It's entirely possible that an innocent woman is languishing in prison and until she is brought back to court and given a proper trial I'm not interested. It's the British legal system on trial here - the way her first trial was conducted was a disgrace. I have no idea whether she did those things or not, but I recognise a miscarriage of justice when I see one and that trial, her presumed guilt in the media and the nauseous morbid coverage in the media most certainly was a miscarriage of the way justice is supposed to work. Forget Glastonbury - this really was (like their Gaza coverage) a BBC scandal.

And we're told we're in for a scorcher with the temps flying around 35 degrees C. Orange weather warnings and all that bullshit. I'm looking out my window and it's cloudy and (frankly) feeling rather cold. Ah well, this is Cornwall, and Cornwall is contrary at the best of times! Sorry it's a bit bitty this morning; to be honest I can't really be bothered to read all the crap we're being fed, so I haven't really done much of a job. Tomorrow, I'll try to do better.