Wikipedia is the largest and most read reference source in the world. Billions rely on it every day for unbiased facts and truthful information. Unfortunately, what they often get are slander and lies. This poses an existential threat to society, because lies and slander corrode the fabric of society and harm all of its citizens, no less than they harm the ones who are lied about and slandered.

If Wikipedia were a marginal website with little influence, it could be regarded as harmless, just as you might regard it as harmless to be bumped by a toddler on a tricycle traveling at a snail’s pace – but not if you were run down by a pizza delivery boy on an electric bicycle travelling at 30 mph. Because Wikipedia dwarfs every other reference source on the face of the earth not only in size but in influence, what is at stake is the very pollution of knowledge itself. What shall we do about it?

Should Wikipedia be censored to prevent it from publishing lies and slander? Absolutely not. There must be no pre-publication censorship in America, not even for lies and slander. On the other hand, neither should their be immunity from the consequences of deliberately publishing lies and slander, especially if it harms innocent people.

That is why we have libel laws.

If Encyclopedia Britannica or the New York Times or NBC or Netflix or any other media platform not only published lies about someone, but also refused to correct those lies when given the correct information, they would be faced with a libel suit – which they would almost certainly lose and be forced to pay millions of dollars in fines.

So how can Wikipedia get way with committing such brazen abuses of truth? How can Wikipedia deliberately lie about distinguished scientists, physicians and scholars – often ruining their careers – without facing multi-million-dollar libel suits?

Because, curiously, Wikipedia is immune from libel suits. Under Section 230 of the Federal Communications Decency Act (CDA) of 1996, Wikipedia is classed as a “service provider,” not a “publisher.” Which means it is protected from liability for articles contributed by its “third-party” authors, whom the law naively presumes to be independent of control by Wikipedia ownership.

But that is a legal fiction.

Articles submitted to Wikipedia are edited and often totally rewritten by Wikipedia’s “editors” to reflect the biases and agendas of Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, as well as the biases and agendas of the powerful corporations and government agencies with whom he colludes.

[…]

At present, judges continue to entertain the fiction that Wikipedia is a “service provider.” This protects it from libel suits. But as more articles like this one appear, the courts may reconsider Wikipedia’s status and reclassify it, more correctly, from “service provider” to “publisher”; much the same way that courts, after 1970, reclassified husbands who forced their wives to have sexual intercourse — from “spouses” to “rapists.”

[…]

Wikipedia has achieved the top position for being the most viewed and referenced encyclopedia in the world. As of May 2024, the English Wikipedia contains over 6.8 million distinct entries and is increasing at a rate of 534 new entries daily due to its army of over 800,000 registered voluntary editors. While countless people around the world benefit from the breadth and scope of knowledge the encyclopedia provides, for almost two decades it has equally been the target of growing criticism for its biases and lack of objectivity on many subjects that have a direct impact on people’s health and well-being.

There are over 200,000 health and medical-related topics. Although the majority of medical entries do not draw controversy and provide relatively accurate and clear encyclopedic definitions for the biology and the etiology of diseases and medical conditions, there is a significant quantity of approximately 700 pages that directly concern Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM) therapies and natural health modalities, including Chiropractic, acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), naturopathy, homeopathy, orthomolecular medicine, energy medicine, etc.

This grouping of articles is separated off from the medical arts and sciences and intentionally marginalized under the heading of “pseudoscience” and quackery – highly prejudiced and derogatory terms that do not belong in a legitimate encyclopedia.

[…]

Unlike other medical pages, there is an apparent lack of reputable medical professionals successfully editing these pages. The majority are anonymous amateurs who consistently rely on Skeptic websites and publications as primary reference sources. Despite the volumes of peer-reviewed studies and articles cataloged in the National Institutes of Health’s National Library of Medicine and other research databases confirming the efficacy of these non-conventional therapies, Skeptic editors rely solely upon those studies that may be used for censure and defamation. Since Skeptics now control and monitor these health subjects there is no opportunity for transparency and honest debate to correct gross errors are more often than not systematically shut down.

When looking for information about alternative health issues using legitimate, highly respected encyclopedias such as the Encyclopedia Britannica we find fair, balanced, and scholarly reviews based on reliable objective sources and professional expertise. Britannica and other comparable encyclopedias name the editors and their professional credentials in any given subject. There is no debasement. There are no attacks. At no point in these highly revered encyclopedias is there character assassination, ridicule, mocking, or disparagement of people supporting an alternative and complementary medical approach at variance with medical orthodoxy. The process for crafting a subject entry is transparent, and instructive. Therefore, due to the lack of subjective biases and prejudices, users benefit from the information provided by being given the liberty to make up their own mind about an entry’s veracity.

Now let’s compare that to an experience on Wikipedia which calls itself an encyclopedia, but fails even the most rudimentary challenges. Most of the editors are anonymous with no reliable curriculum vitae to see if they have expertise in the area they are editing. Their use of words such as “charlatan,” “quack,” “lunatic,” “fringe,” and “pseudoscientific” are not uncommon. There is zero transparency. One feels an oozing sense of condescension viewing the biographies of highly respected and professional people who criticize conventional medical newspeak. They are held in utter contempt, and their expertise is pre-judged as having no legitimate value. Worse, they are condemned as quacks, charlatans, opportunists in Wikipedia’s virtual reality of Stalinistic show trials—condemned without an opportunity to respond to the allegations.

Everyone should be greatly concerned that Wikipedia’s articles about alternative medical modalities to prevent and treat disease have been expropriated by an army of compromised editors whose sole mission is to undermine the therapeutic credibility and scientific evidence of these therapies. Practically all of these non-orthodox medical entries are dominated by people who are intent on preserving the pro-pharmaceutical status quo. Anyone can spend a little time searching through Wikipedia articles about homeopathy, chiropractic, popular herbal supplements and vitamins, etc and quickly discover that favorable peer-reviewed research are unwelcome. If anyone doubts this and feels game, register as an editor and try to make a constructive truthful edit about the medical efficacy of any of these alternative treatments, supported by an irrefutable medical reference,  and it will be quickly removed within hours. Continue to make the same edit and you will eventually be banned.

Let’s take an example. The National Health Federation (NHF) founded in 1955 is an international consumer, health freedom organization dedicated to protecting citizens’ rights to consume healthy foods over-the-counter access to dietary supplements and access to alternative medical therapies. In the past NHF has had a formative role in getting chiropractors legally licensed in the United States, the recognition of acupuncture as a viable treatment and the passage of the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act that enables Americans access to dietary supplements under the assurance of government quality controls and good manufacturing practices. 

Moreover, the Federation is recognized by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) with UN observer status and has a seat on the FAO-WHO’s Codex Alimentarius Commission, which establishes international food standards and guidelines including the use of pesticides, food additives, preservative, contamination levels, etc. In fact, with membership now representing 22 nations, the NHF is the sole consumer advocacy organization on the Commission uncontaminated by any individual government and the private interests of large food manufacturers, agro-chemical companies such as Monsanto, the pharmaceutical giants and their lobbyists. In other words, NHF is a highly esteemed consumer protection organization with a 70-year history of protecting individual health freedoms.

In 2007, NHF board members conducted a small experiment to test Wikipedia’s neutrality. NHF had no entry in Wikipedia; therefore, an entry was created that was kept very neutral without noting any unreasonable or questionable claims. After a period of time, the entry was radically modified to portray the federation in a negative light. Positive references were replaced by anti-natural health references. All attempts by the organization to restore the page’s original entry were rejected. An outside attorney’s effort to correct NHF’s page were met with threatening cease and desist notices.

NHF’s current Wikipedia entry describes the Federation as “an alliance of promoters and followers who engage in lobbying campaigns… uses the words ‘alternative’ and ‘freedom’ for its own purposes” and is “antagonistic to accepted scientific methods as well as to current consumer protection law.” However, these Wikipedia quotes are sourced back to a militant anti-alternative medicine organization, Quackwatch, which has a long history of harassing natural health practitioners and practically every modality of alternative medicine in order to further advance its drug-based and corporate food agenda.

[…]

There are numerous other examples of board certified physicians advocating for alternative medical therapies and professional health associations experiencing similar obstacles.

[…]

What type of person would attack medical doctors and individuals whose contributions to society have positively impacted the lives of so many people by non-orthodox means? Perhaps, psychologically under-developed ideological trolls.

[…]

Whether the pro-pharmaceutical editors are trolls, cyberbullies, or even professional medical ideologies such as the legion of doctors and professors in Skeptic organizations such as the Center for Inquiry, Evidence Based Medicine, the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, the James Randi Educational Foundation and Quackwatch, there is no denying that the majority of anonymous editors on Wikipedia’s pages about alternative and complementary medicine, and natural health advocates are engaging in the character assassination. These organizations are adamant that research spent on investigating the efficacy of alternative medicine is a dangerous foe to their narrow definition of science.

[…]

Skepticism’s assault against CAM therapies has become a counter-insurgent effort to delegitimize contemporary trends in medicine. In 2019, the World Health Organization reported, “traditional and complementary medicine is an important and often underestimated health resource with many applications, especially for the prevention and management of lifestyle-related chronic diseases and in meeting the health needs of ageing populations.”

The number of American medical schools offering courses in complementary and alternative medicine has been increasing rapidly. The most prestigious American medical schools now have departments for CAM or include these subjects in their curriculum including acupuncture, hypnosis and herbal remedies according to a recent US News article. A joint 2024 NIH-Johns Hopkins paper reported that alternative health approaches increased to 38 percent in 2022, and 49 percent of Americans use complementary therapies for pain management.  Another government survey estimates that 62 percent of US adults use some form of alternative medicine annually. On the other hand, Wikipedia feels threatened by this trend as its editorial animosity continues to become more hostile.

It is crucial to consider the Wikimedia Foundation in the larger context of international corporate globalism and its imperialist agenda. As a nonprofit organization, the Foundation doesn’t act independently from many of the largest federal and international globalist entities, including private mega-corporations.  Its largest declared donors include Google, Microsoft, Intel, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bloomberg, Boeing, Goldman Sachs, Chevron, Merck, Oracle, and Bank of America. Despite giving a wink and nod to the Constitutional rights of free speech, it has equally acted in favor of censorship.

[…]

Via https://www.globalresearch.ca/wikipedia-failed-experiment-democratize-knowledge/5858943

The Blogging Hounds

194 World Health Organization (WHO) member states have agreed to begin arresting and prosecuting citizens who speak out against the Bird Flu vaccine, as part of tough new measures designed to stomp out so-called ‘misinformation’.

The World Healthy Assembly this week adopted amendments to the controversial International Health Regulations without any fanfare from the mainstream media. These amendments abolish the national sovereignty of countries, grant the WHO sweeping powers to pass laws in western nations, and criminalizes speech that the WHO says undermines the official narrative.

Expose-news.com reports: The following are brief descriptions of articles, podcasts and press conferences from various sources in recent days.  Some of the concerns are the agreement for governments to “address” misinformation and disinformation, and the wording that further strengthens surveillance – thus laying the groundwork for the surveil-declare-threat-lockdown-coerced mass vaccination approach.

It is important to note that countries have 10 months to reserve or reject provisions, except those countries which rejected the 2022 amendments and so have 18 months.  We must, therefore, keep raising awareness and put pressure on our governments to reject the amendments before the end of March 2025.

At the end, we have included an article about the World Health Organisation’s Science Council, a “group of unelected people who will control your future.”

Tedros Declares Victory, 1 June 2024

In a media briefing on the pandemic, preparedness and response and other developments at the 77^th World Health Assembly, WHO Dictator General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said:

“Today the nations of the world made history at the World Health Assembly. After 2 years of negotiations, they adopted a strong package of amendments to the International Health Regulations based on the lessons learned from the covid-19 pandemic. The IHR was last updated 19 years ago. The amendments adopted today strengthen global preparedness, surveillance and response to public health emergencies including pandemics.

“And although the Pandemic Agreement has not yet been finalised the Health Assembly has charted the way forward. It has agreed to extend the mandate of the Intergovernmental negotiating body to finalise negotiations on the Pandemic Agreement as soon as possible and by next year’s World Health Assembly at the latest.

“The success of the IHR amendments demonstrates that in our divided and divisive world countries can still come together to find common cause and common ground.”

The 30-minute media briefing was posted live on Twitter on 1 June 2023.  You can watch the full briefing HERE.  And you can watch the full closing session of the 77^th World Health Assembly on WHO’s website HERE.  In the video labelled ‘Ninth Plenary Meeting’ Tedros the Terrorist’s speech begins at timestamp 1:33:36.  He begins by saying “I hope you’re not tired of me.”  The answer from us is: “Yes, we are tired of you.”

World Health Organisation Press Release, 1 June 2024

The World Health Assembly, the annual meeting of its 194 member countries, today agreed a package of critical amendments to the International Health Regulations (2005) (IHR). The new amendments to the IHR include a definition of a pandemic emergency; a commitment to solidarity and equity; the establishment of the States Parties Committee and the creation of National IHR Authorities.

Countries agreed to continue negotiating the proposed Pandemic Agreement. WHO’s Member States decided to extend the mandate of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Body, established in December 2021, to finish its work to negotiate a Pandemic Agreement within a year, by the World Health Assembly in 2025, or earlier if possible at a special session of the Health Assembly in 2024.

Reject the WHO’S Illegal Power-Grab: Tedros Violates His Organisation’s ‘Constitution’ in Order to Threaten Ours, 4 June 2024

In Geneva late Saturday night, the Biden administration, China and other co-conspirators lawlessly launched a new mechanism for foisting “global governance” on all of us. In the process of illegally amending the World Health Organisation’s International Health Regulations (IHRs) in a bid to give its Director General, Tedros Ghebreyesus, unprecedented power to trample our sovereignty and freedoms, the WHO served notice that such power will be tyrannically abused, including via the violation of those very regulations.

Tedros ignored the IHRs’ Article 55.2, which requires that any amendments thereto must be made available “at least four months” before they are eligible for adoption. Then, the Director General declined to conduct a roll-call vote to adopt the legally binding international agreement. Instead in a room described as having roughly 30 per cent of the member states – far fewer than the necessary quorum – Tedros announced that a “consensus” existed for the IHR amendments’ adoption.

WHO IHR Modifications Were Illegally Approved, 5 June 2024

The World Health Assembly (in close cooperation with the US HHS/Biden administration) has been working on “updating” the existing (2005) International Health Regulations (IHR) agreement.

In blatant disregard for established protocol and procedures, sweeping IHR amendments were prepared behind closed doors, and then both were submitted for consideration and accepted by the World Health Assembly quite literally in the last moments of a meeting that stretched late into Saturday night, the last day of the meeting schedule.

The requirement of four months for review was disregarded in a rush to produce some tangible deliverable from the Assembly. There was no actual vote to confirm and approve these amendments. According to the WHO, this was achieved by “consensus” among this unelected insider conclave rather than a vote.  Representatives from many WHO member nation-states were not in the room, and the ones that were there were encouraged to keep quiet.

This was clearly an insider clique acting unilaterally to circumvent normal process and mirrors a similar process used to confirm the re-appointment of Tedros Ghebreyesus to the Director-General position.

Amendments to International Health Regulations have been adopted, ‘We the People have suffered a stunning defeat’, 2 June 2024

“The 77th World Health Assembly HAS adopted a substantial package of amendments to the International Health Regulations. We the People have suffered a stunning defeat. The battle continues,” James Roguski said.

“The recently adopted amendments will facilitate an enormous global build-up of the Pharmaceutical Hospital Emergency Industrial Complex which seeks to trigger ongoing ‘pandemic emergencies’ that will be made even worse by ‘relevant health products’,” Roguski added.

Former Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, who has also closely followed the negotiating process at the WHO World Health Assembly, had this to say in an email alert this morning: “The bottom line is the WHO changes from a global advisory-only body to an international enforcer of its mandates.”

[…]

Via https://thepeoplesvoice.tv/194-who-countries-agree-to-arrest-citizens-who-oppose-bird-flu-vaccine-media-blackout/

By Susanne Rust

For more than 160 years, pasteurization has been heralded as one of the most effective and efficient forms of ensuring public food safety. But as health officials scramble to ascertain and contain the spread of bird flu in the nation’s dairy cattle, a growing number of state governments are turning their back on this gold standard of public health.

In the last four weeks, Iowa, Louisiana and Delaware have either passed legislation or are in the process of moving bills that would legalize the commercial sale of raw milk for human consumption within their borders.

The commercial sale of raw milk in California is legal, although not all stores choose to sell it.

[…]

State lawmakers pushing for raw milk access say they are more concerned about “food freedom” and the potential benefits that would come to dairy farmers — i.e., being able to charge more money for their product — than a problem they don’t see discussed in the news.

“There is very real evidence to say that this space is safe… and I haven’t seen those deaths… across folks that use raw milk,” said Delaware state Sen. Eric Buckson, who was the author of a bill that would allow consumers to purchase raw milk from farms. “Certainly, there are those that can get an upset stomach or get sick from it. They recover rather quickly from it.”

Because of uncertainty about how widespread the infection is within U.S. dairy herds, and the announcement of the third human case of H5N1 earlier this week, officials are warning people to avoid raw milk and products made from raw milk.

Buckson, the Delaware lawmaker, said he understands the concern, but when he looks around, “we know that 30-plus states actively permit the use of raw milk, and we do not have a pervasive breakout or outbreak of avian influenza,” he said.

[…]

Via https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2024-06-04/as-bird-flu-pandemic-widens-state-lawmakers-push-to-legalize-raw-milk

By Chris Menahan

Miriam Adelson, the wife of the late Israel First GOP megadonor Sheldon Adelson, is reportedly donating at least $100 million to Donald Trump and wants his support for Israel annexing the West Bank in return.

That’s according to a new column from the Israeli paper Haaretz titled, “Trump is Desperate for Miriam Adelson’s Cash. Her Condition: West Bank Annexation” (Archive):

After five months during which he refused to make clear his position on the Israel-Hamas war, instead sniping at Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, thanks to [pressure from Miriam] Adelson [withhold donations], Trump finally expressed unequivocal support for Israel. However, according to [New York Magazine’s Elizabeth Weil’s recent article on Miriam Adelson], Trump made a tactical error that distanced him from the money he so desperately wants. “You have to finish up your war,” he said. “You have to finish it up. You got it done. And I’m sure you’ll do that. And we got to get to peace.” Adelson, a resident of Herzliya and a megadonor for settlement development in the West Bank, did not wish to hear Trump yearning for peace. She didn’t want to hear anything that could have been construed as criticism of Israel. According to the report, what she really wants from Trump’s second term is an Israeli annexation of the West Bank and a U.S. recognition of Israeli sovereignty in all the regions of the land. Under these conditions, there’s no room for the Palestinian Authority, and nobody to sign a peace accord with.

The New York Magazine story ends with an implicit threat to Trump: “The presidential election is five months away. Adelson continues to sit out the race.” Within just 10 days, Politico reported that the former president and Adelson met and spoke on the phone several times since that March dinner. What they talked about remained unreported, but Trump’s give-and-take relationships with his billionaire donors tend to replicate themselves.

Adelson is not the only major donor; others also come with their lists of demands. The Washington Post recently reported about another meeting between Trump and some donors, a group which, Trump said, included “98 percent of my Jewish friends.” During this meeting in New York on May 14, donors asked Trump about students demonstrating against Israel on campuses, and he replied: “Any student that protests, I throw them out of the country. You know, there are a lot of foreign students. As soon as they hear that, they’re going to behave.” When one of the unnamed donors complained that students and professors could one day hold positions of power, Trump called the demonstrators part of a “radical revolution” that he vowed to defeat. “If you get me elected, and you should really be doing this, … we’re going to set that [pro-Palestinian] movement back 25 or 30 years.”

During Trump’s first term, he did everything Sheldon Adelson wanted and more for Israel while fulfilling only a few of the promises he made to his own voters.

To help Israel, Trump:

– Pulled out of the Iran nuclear deal
– Appointed Nikki Haley to fight for Israel at the UN
– Pushed forward with a bill to give Israel $38 billion from US taxpayers
– Put maximum sanctions on Iran
– Endorsed the expansion of settlements
– Moved the US embassy to Jerusalem
– Cut all US aid to the Palestinians
– Backed Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights
– Outlawed criticism of Israel on college campuses by executive order
– Gave speeches commanding Americans to “love Israel”
– Assassinated Iranian General Qassem Soleimani
– Pardoned a host of Chabad-linked supercriminals

Trump is now promising Jewish megadonors he will crush pro-Palestine protests and deport demonstrators and he’s talking about bringing Nikki Haley onto his “team” if he win the White House.

[…]

Via https://www.renegadetribune.com/miriam-adelson-wants-west-bank-annexation-in-return-for-100m-donation-to-trump/

By Steven Sahiounie

The Emir of Qatar, Tamim al Thani, recently said that he supports the street protests in Idlib, where people are protesting the dictatorial rule of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) terrorist group.

This marks a monumental change in policy for Qatar, and maybe the first step toward restoring diplomatic ties with Syria.

Beginning in 2011, and the Obama administration’s US-NATO war on Syria for regime change, Qatar has been a close and loyal ally to the US, and was used as a financial backer of the various terrorist groups brought into Turkey, and trucked across the border to Idlib.

Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber bin Mohammed bin Thani Al Thani, former Prime Minister of Qatar, and foreign minister until 2013, gave an interview in which he admitted Qatar provided the money to bankroll the terrorists in Syria as they attacked the Syrian people and state. He made it clear that the cash delivered was sanctioned, and administered by the US in Turkey. Qatar was not working alone, but under a strictly controlled partnership with the US government.

In 2017, President Trump shut down the CIA operation Timber Sycamore which ran the failed project to overthrow the Syrian government.

Qatar is now turning their back on the terrorists who occupy Idlib. Mohamed al-Julani is the leader of HTS. He is Syrian, raised in Saudi Arabia, fought with Al Qaeda in Iraq against the US, aligned with ISIS founder Baghdadi, came to Syria from Iraq to develop Jibhat al-Nusra, the Al Qaeda branch in Syria.

Once Jibhat al-Nusra became an outlawed terrorist group, Julani switched the name to HTS in order to preserve his support from Washington, DC. Even though the US has a $10 million bounty on his head issued by the US Treasury Department, he is safe and secure in Idlib, where American journalists have visited him for interviews, in which he has sported a suit and tie, wishing to present himself as a western-leaning terrorist that the US can count on.

When the Syrian Arab Army and the Russian military would fire a bullet towards the terrorists in Idlib, the US would denounce it as an attack on innocent civilians. This kept Julani safe and secure, and in charge of humanitarian aid coming across the border from Turkey. The aid was from the UN and various international charities. While the 3 million people living in Idlib are not all terrorists, all the aid passes through the hands of Julani and his henchmen. If you bow down to Julani, you get your share of rations, but if you have complained, you are denied. Those who are cut off from the aid can buy their supplies from Julani at his Hamra Shopping Mall, which he built in Idlib, where he sells all the surplus aid sent to Idlib.

The civilians in Idlib have taken to the streets protesting the rule of HTS. Many people have been arrested by HTS, some tortured, and others killed. The people are demanding that Julani leave.

They are asking for freedom and a fair administration. The various aid agencies have complained that HTS will not allow any free programs for women, such as learning employable skills. Women there are not allowed to seek employment, except in places which are only female. HTS rules with a strict form of Islamic law, which they interpret to their benefit.
Saudi Arabia and Syria have established full normal relations, with an exchange of ambassadors. At the Arab League Summit in May in Bahrain, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, Mohamed bin Salman (MBS) met personally with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. They also met at the previous Arab League Summit in Saudi Arabia.

MBS recently announced a humanitarian grant to the UN to repair 17 hospitals in Syria which had been damaged in the 7.8 earthquake which killed 10 thousand in Syria.

MBS also sent spare parts for the Syrian Air commercial planes, which had suffered under US sanctions and were prevented from maintaining their safety by Washington. Recently, the very first planes of Syrians began flying to Saudi Arabia for the first time in 12 years, to perform the Haj pilgrimage.

On May 30, the leader of Iraq said he hopes to announce a Turkey-Syria normalization soon. Turkey, like Qatar, had been supporting the various terrorist groups in Syria in cooperation with the US.

Turkey also has made a turn-around in their position, and has been looking for a way to exit Idlib and the other areas it occupies in Syria, in preparation of a re-set with Damascus.

The relationship between the US and Ankara has remained tense after the US partnered with the Syrian Defense Forces (SDF). Turkey considers the SDF as a branch of the PKK, the outlawed international terrorists group who has killed 30,000 people over three decades, while wanting to establish a Kurdish State.
The SDF are planning to have elections on June 11 in an effort to gain western support for a Kurdish State. Erdogan has stated Turkey will never allow this to happen.

If the SDF were to lay down their arms, they could repair their relationship with Damascus, and at the same time Turkey could then withdraw their occupation forces from Syria. With Turkey out of Syria, their normalization process could begin.
When the SDF have repaired their broken relationship with Damascus, and the Turkish threat no longer exists, then the US military can withdraw their 900 occupation force from Syria.

Recently, General Mazloum, the leader of the SDF, said that the problems between the Kurds and Damascus are internal problems, and cautioned against any foreign interference, especially from Turkey.

The situation is changing rapidly in Syria. The economy is collapsed, with the inflation rate over 100% in the last year due to crippling US sanctions. Because the US military is occupying the largest oil and gas field in Syria, this prevents the production of electricity for the national grid, and Syrian are living with three hours of electricity per day.

US sanctions prevent some of the most vital medicines from being imported, as western medical companies are fearful of running afoul of the US sanctions, and has produced a culture of over-compliance, which deprives Syrian citizens’ life-saving medicines and medical supplies.

The battlefields have been silent for years, and the silence grew into a status-quo, where the American and Turkish foreign policy prevented a resolution to the conflict that has destroyed lives and prompted the largest human migration in recent history as Syrians have sought work abroad.

Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar all played significant roles assigned to them by the US State Department under the Obama administration. There is a light at the end of the tunnel with the reversal of policies toward Syria, and Qatar and Turkey are set to play major roles in the recovery process in Syria. These reversals are also significant as they mark a change in the relationship between the US and several regional countries. This is part of the ‘New Middle East’ that Washington called for, but the role the US played has left them the loser.

[…]

Via https://mideastdiscourse.com/2024/06/03/syria-on-the-brink-of-recovery-as-qatar-and-turkey-change-their-policies/

As the Israeli army faces severe personnel shortages, fatigue and desertion, and the political leadership focus on their survival, a top Israeli general predicts the end of Israel is near.

Episode 29 Ramesses the Great: The Later Years

The History of Ancient Egypt

Professor Robert Brier

Film Review

In Year 8 of his reign, Ramesses once again invaded Syria. As with other pharaohs who “conquered” foreign region, he never left behind an occupying army there because any Egyptians who died outside of Egypt were denied access to the afterlife.

Having abandoned his military ambitions,* in year 21 (1259 BC) of his reign (at age 44), he finally signed a peace treaty with the Hittite king who ruled Syria, as well as inscribing it on several temple walls. Brier believes it was the first peace treaty in the history of the world. It committed Egypt and Syria to non-aggression towards each other, mutual support and commitment to trade treaties. It also committed the Hittite king to send Ramesses II a Hittite bride with a massive dowry that included precious and semi-precious stones (the Egyptians had no precious or semi-precious stones of their own),

Ramesses II signed the Hittite peace treaty one year after his chief wife Nefertari’s death and four years after the the death of his oldest son. He would marry a second Hittite bride in year 44 of his reign.

The Hittite king’s son subsequently requested the services of Egypt’s world-renowned physicians (which included specialists such as eye doctors and gynecoogists) to help his sister conceive.**Ramses the Great The Later Years

After making peace with the Hittites, Ramesses II would focus on building the great temple of Abu Sindel South of Aswan. Brier believes the presidential faces carved into Mount Rushmore were modeled on the statues he had carved into the mountain at Abu Sindel.

.As others of his 100 children began dying, Ramesses II began building tombs instead of monument’s. In building his own tomb, He created an entire city to house the crews that worked on it (Deer Op Medina). Studying the messages his workmen left one other, has provided invaluable insights into how the work was organized. For example, all the sculptors had to have their bronze chisels weighed as they entered and left the site to make sure they weren’t shaving bronze filings from their chisels.

*Brier believes Ramesses Ii abandoned his military ambitions in later life due to the death of his beloved wife Nefertari and his eldest son.

**The process of conception was poorly understood until the Middle Ages.

Film can be viewed free with a library card on Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/or semiideo/1492791/1492857