By: Ahmed Zawitey, Director General of Kurdistan 24 Media Foundation

Kurdistan’s Territory and Population

I am not merely referring to Greater Kurdistan, which extends between more than four countries in the Middle Eastern region: Turkey in the southeast, Iran in the northwest, Iraq in the north, and Syria in the northeast. It also extends, accordingly, into parts of Azerbaijan and Armenia.

These areas encompass nearly half a million square kilometers. However the global Kurdish population, inclusive of Europe and America, exceeds 45 million, per legitimate Kurdish sources.

For the purpose of brevity, my focus in this article entails the area of the Iraqi Kurdistan region, which is almost half its real size in area and population in this country, more specifically, the areas under the administrative governance of the Kurdistan Regional Government of Iraq.

The area of this region is 45 thousand square kilometers, and its population is nearly 7 million, not including the so-called disputed areas between Baghdad and Erbil, according to Article 140 of the Iraqi Constitution. Such areas are in close proximity to the region administered by the Kurdistan Regional Government.

Amidst Complex Geography and Tense Security

When reflecting upon its narrow border, the Iraqi Kurdistan region, which is geographically complex, politically and security tense, threatened by all its neighbors, north and south, east and west, a startling truth presents itself regarding how the region has been exposed for more than seventy years to twentieth century wars between the Kurdish movement demanding its rights to self-rule in Iraq and the successive ruling regimes in Iraq. Such struggles spanned from the monarchy in the forties and fifties, through the two slaves, Karim Qassem and Salam Arif in the sixties, and then Saddam Hussein in the seventies and eighties. Upon further scrutiny of historical turmoil, a question emerges – How did this region manage to endure for more than 32 years?

Despite acute obstacles, it transformed into the most stable region in Iraq, in terms of security and economic development, particularly after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein’s regime in 2003 by American forces. In Iraq, this metamorphosis involved rebounding from a war diverse in its complexity – from resistance against the occupier, to terrorist operations targeting every urban area (including land and people), a sectarian struggle, the collapse of prominent Iraqi elites (mainly Sunnis) to the era of ISIS, which occupied a third of Iraq and left it a devastated area, between 2014 to 2017.

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The Kurdish of the Present Remember History

After the end of the war on ISIS and Baghdad’s resulting euphoric feeling of victory, as the government, the army and armed militias were at the height of their power.

Historically, Saddam and his army after the end of the eight-year war with Iran in 1988, felt similar levels of euphoria. However, he carried out the Anfal operations, consisting of invading Kurdistan, bombing it with chemical weapons, destroying 4,500 villages, and kidnapping more than 180 thousand Kurdish citizens. Said citizens were buried alive in the deserts of the center and the south. Legitimate Kurdish sources convey the armed Kurdish movement was obliterated in totality.

When the Kurdish side is not strong in many aspects, it remains strong in terms of its historical memory, which preserves images of tragedies that are replicated from one decade to another, a memory that led him to feel that a threat similar to what happened in 1988 was returning again from the south. Hence the hastened step to proceed with a referendum on its independence from Iraq on September 25, 2017 was to eradicate this ever-present threat. Unfortunately, Kurdish expectations were proven wrong, unsurprising however if we consider the lack of international support and threats from neighboring countries who sought to strangle the region within itself! After the referendum, initiatives were taken in order to preserve what remained of the region and its powers, but hostile steps by Baghdad against the region continued and intensified, resulting in the following results:

1. The Kurdish role in Baghdad was weakened by comparison to the strengthened of the role of the Shiite parties which dealt hostilely with the Kurdistan region.

2. The Federal Court took negative measures against the region and withdrew its powers. The negative impact of these decisions involved:

* Canceling the Kurdistan Parliament’s ability to hold elections, the date of which has not yet been set. Indeed, the court, itself, is postponing the holding of these elections under various pretexts, and thus, the Iraqi Kurdistan region is currently undergoing a period of legal vacuum.

* Preventing the Iraqi Kurdistan region from exporting its oil, thus leaving the region without a budget.

3. Not disbursing the Iraqi Kurdistan region’s share of the Iraqi budget, including disbursing employee salaries, thus harming the economy in the region, which was in a better condition than the rest of the Iraqi provinces more than a decade ago.

Pretexts to Disturb Stability

The process of hostility towards the stable, safe, and most developed region in Iraq did not stop at what happened above. Rather, it reached the most precarious step threatening this region, which is the bombing of it and its civilian facilities by bomb-laden drones via militias affiliated with Iran. The matter escalated to a more dangerous level through Iran’s strategic targeting, i.e., the regional capital, Erbil, was attacked with ballistic missiles under the pretext of Israeli Mossad sites.

The Kurdistan region vehemently denied Mossad affiliation in detail, and its position was confirmed by the security and parliamentary investigation committees which were formed in Baghdad. These committees confirmed that the bombed site was the home of businessman Peshraw Dizayee. Of note is that businessman Sheikh Baz, whose residence was also identically bombarded by ballistic missiles a year and a half prior, had likewise been accused of Mossad affiliation.

Peshraw Dizayee, however, succumbed from the attack, along with members of his family. Sheikh Baz survived his attack due to him not being present during the strike on his house. Peshraw Dizayee held a predominant role in transforming Erbil into the most developed city in Iraq in the last twenty years.

The second accusation leveled at Erbil by Iran and its allies in Iraq is the presence of American bases in the region, but what is conspicuously striking is that no drone directly targeted these bases they are referring to. The casualties were centered on Erbil and its citizens.

Iran’s Deceptive Targeting of Erbil

In short, the Kurdistan Regional Government (the KRG) is the only region in Iraq which has not yet submitted to Iranian-directed demands, as opposed to the Shiite and some Sunni groups in Iraq; also, despite the submission of a Kurdish party competing with the administration of Erbil, namely the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, Talabani’s party (in Sulaymaniyah). Erbil, specifically the Kurdistan Democratic Party, headed by the leader Masoud Barzani, has eluded Iran until now.

Iran’s broadcasted reasons for its basis of bombing purported Israeli Mossad headquarters are misleading. Rather, it knows before anyone else that they are not Mossad sites. In fact, it could be argued that if such Mossad sites existed, Iran would not have dared bomb them.

Behind its apparent declared messages are other secret messages, which are to forcefully align Erbil, specifically the Kurdistan Democratic Party and its head, Masoud Barzani, to its side, just like other Iraqi Shiite and Sunni leaders. When Iran achieves this, it will ensure the formation of the Shiite crescent extending from Qom, through Iraqi Kurdistan, all the way to Qamishli in Syria.

Iran’s intent is the crescent will have safe passage, which cannot occur if this crescent passes through central or even southern Iraq. Reaching the Mediterranean Sea thus severs Turkey’s influence and influence in Iraq through Erbil and through the Kurdistan Democratic Party, in addition to inflicting a loss on America by removing its strong local ally, which is the Kurdistan Democratic Party.

Killing Two Birds with One Stone

By bombing Erbil, Iran aims to kill two birds with one stone. Its reasons are two-fold. It regards the Iraqi Kurdistan region to be an impediment to its desire for regional control. Secondly, it sends a posturing message to the Americans about the range of distances that Iranian missiles can travel and the accuracy of the target of these missiles. These missiles fell less than one kilometer from the American Consulate in Erbil, which is considered the largest American consulate in existence, and less than five kilometers from the American military base inside Erbil Airport.

A Diplomatic Message in response to a Military Pronouncement

Iran’s military message led the United States to deliver a diplomatic message to Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein, the content of which has not yet been revealed, but leaks indicate that the message is about the ongoing negotiations between the two sides regarding the steps of the American withdrawal from Iraq, and the threat of the return of ISIS if that occurs, and the transformation of the relationship between the two parties, from being a relationship of allies, and the Americans militarily supporting the Iraqi side, to a normalized relationship between the two countries. The American message to Iraq, so quickly and coincidentally after the bombing of Erbil, is indicative of a response to the Iranian threat to its forces in Iraq.

The Iraqi Foreign Minister exhibited great interest in this message, declaring that it was an important message, which subsequently was followed by a meeting of the Iraqi Council of Ministers. This means that the Iraqi and American sides gave positive signals about the negotiations to shift the mission of the American forces from the fact that the two parties are allied and that the American forces are present at Iraqi request to merely establish bilateral relations between two countries.

The Iraqi governments, firstly, and the American governments, secondly, wanted, with their positive signals, to reassure the Shiite groups that are demanding the withdrawal of American forces from Iraq, as well as to reassure the Iranian side in order to stop sending drones and missiles towards American targets in the region, until the withdrawal steps are achieved, which will take time.

Iranian Proxies Decline the Message

The armed militias inside Iraq, which send explosive drones to the regions they consider allied with the Americans, in Iraq (Kurdistan Region) and Syria (self-administered areas), showed that they did not receive the American message positively, announcing they will not follow this message and will not give it credence, and shall continue targeting American sites.

It is an indirect message from Iran to the Americans that establishing normalized bilateral relations is not enough. Iran’s goal is more than that – to perhaps to scare the Americans away from taking any preventative measures against Iran or bombing Iranian sites.

Thus, an indirect war ensues (which exceeds the limits of the Cold War) – between Iran and the Americans. It takes place on lands which do not belong to either of the two countries, but rather on land that is considered the weakest link at the center of the conflict between the two major powers. Iran may want to preoccupy the Americans, exhaust them, and exhaust them with the intent of keeping them away from a direct war with Iran or strikes inside Iran, and it has succeeded in doing so thus far. Nevertheless, it perceives its easiest and ultimate goal to entail the complete surrender of the Kurdistan region to the Iranian will.

The Return of ISIS

For the Americans, the matter is not limited to this. When Iran is able to forcefully send direct and indirect threatening messages, the Americans also have their own way of responding. In the message they sent to Iraq alluding to the danger of the return of ISIS, this is interpreted to mean that if the Americans withdraw their forces from Iraq and the phase of the alliance between them ends, then the Americans are paving the way for the return of ISIS! Or we can call it the second phase of ISIS.

In the eyes of the Americans, just as Iran is confronting them with loyalist groups and an indirect war, they can take a similar step, which is to pave the way for the return of ISIS to fight the groups loyal to Iran, and perhaps in the future, an ISIS war inside Iran itself, similar to the last operation that killed more than a hundred people inside Iran. Perhaps there are signs in this meaning. When ISIS returns, the Americans and the international coalition will not intervene as they did previously. They will leave it to ISIS to do what it wants without air defense against it. The Americans will say to both sides: Go and fight each other. We remain on the sidelines.

What about Iraq and the Kurdistan region?

The longer the political and security situation between the Americans and Iran remains as status quo, the more this will affect the Iraqi internal situation, and the problems that exist between Baghdad and Erbil will continue sans a solution. Therefore, the Iraqi Kurdistan region finds itself a victim of this situation, as the region has reached its weakest stage in comparison to more than ten years ago.

But if a cat is trapped in a narrow corner, beaten and hurt, and does not find a way to escape, it will inevitably jump towards its attacker’s face. The region also sees itself as being trapped in a tight corner and exposed to material, moral, military and political blows. It has started waving the cards it possesses, as it always declares that it possesses them. Among these cards may be the threat of ending the freezing of the results of the referendum that took place seven years ago, in which more than 90% of the region’s citizens voted. The citizens are in favor of independence, but this will depend on several factors, the most important of which are:

1. The Americans support this option, and this is not excluded if the Iraqi government continues to request the Americans to withdraw, and Iran and the Iranian militias continue their policies towards the region and the Americans.

2. Turkey’s support for this option in exchange for signing alliance cooperation between Turkey and the region, so that the region fully joins the Turkish decision to adopt its agendas in the region. There is no choice left for Turkey if Iran continues its hostility to the region, except for the region to withdraw to its side because the region represents an important depth for Turkey.

3. International, American, and perhaps Turkish permission for the region to re-export its oil for Baghdad has continued to prevent the export of this oil and the region has remained without a budget.

(This article was written by Hermann Tertsch and appeared in El Debate. Pánico y mentira)

They are in panic. So is the current majority in the European Parliament, that social-democratic two-party system of the People’s Party and the Socialists which, together with the Greens and some other invited leftist, has held the total, never-questioned hegemony in the institution’s history.

They are in panic in the European Commission and in the governments of the countries that have always controlled EU policy and that are reeling from one failure to another, as is the case with Germany and France.

In Germany, the three parties of the Berlin government (SPD, Greens and FDP) today barely add up to 20% in the polls. And in the three states holding elections in September, all three could vanish from the parliaments. Meanwhile the advance of the AfD seems unstoppable; in some states it is already the leading force and in the rest the second, behind the CDU.

And in France there are already polls giving victory to Marine Le Pen of the Rassemblement National (RN) even in the second round. Both the AfD and RN are in the Identity and Democracy group, which sits to the right of the ECR, the European Conservatives and Reformists, the group that includes VOX, Fratelli d’Italia and Poland’s Law and Justice party.

Exactly four months before the European elections of June 9, these two groups, ECR and ID, are the only ones growing while all the others lose seats — the European PP, Socialists, Renew, Greens and Communists. The fall of some is dramatic. And the growth forecast for ECR and ID is spectacular.

That being so, the traditional parties, all of social democracy — in which one must include the People’s Party which, as Esteban González Pons says, «governs Europe in coalition with the Socialists and the Greens» — are desperately looking for ways to confront conservative forces that, for the first time in history, threaten their hegemony.

They did not expect this conservative tsunami and now they seek weapons to try to keep dictating everything in the EU — they, the signatories of the Green Deal, that piece of social-engineering nonsense against which, of the Spanish votes, only those of Vox were cast.

They are aligned in defense of Agenda 2030, «our gospel» in the emphatic expression of another MEP and leader of the Spanish People’s Party, former minister José Manuel Margallo.

Cordons sanitaires work against minorities, but not against governing parties. And that business of calling everyone who is fed up with the policies made by the majority parties «far right» no longer works either.

Not even against the AfD have the government campaigns in Germany taken effect — campaigns that have resorted to unheard-of fabrications of supposed coups d’état and fanciful conspiracies of deportation plans, all grotesque for being implausible.

They have even called government demonstrations «against the far right», cheered and celebrated by the chorus of the German media that march out their talking points with Prussian discipline.

They want to try censorship, and the European Commission is assembling a sinister set of arguments to try to veto or amputate the networks that do not apply the filters they want.

They have it in for X, the former Twitter, where Elon Musk, after buying it outright, abolished the iron-fisted leftist censorship that prevailed.

Thierry Breton, the great chieftain of the French and European telecommunications industry, now turned Commissioner for the Internal Market (someone will have to tell me how such conflicts of interest are digested in a man who regulates for all the big companies of his friends, his former partners and employees), has become a Savonarola of social-democratic political correctness who threatens every dissenter.

Now they want to turn what they dislike into hate crimes. Criticizing illegal and uncontrolled immigration could be a hate crime, as could denouncing the evident and brutal relationship between illegal immigration and crime, or condemning the policy that promotes sex-change operations among children and adolescents.

Alongside defamation, the cordons sanitaires, censorship and the hate crime, they have set in motion another device — of course also a trick — which they intend to intensify ahead of the elections.

It is their supposedly well-intentioned «fight against antisemitism and Islamophobia». The farce is complete because antisemitism and Islamophobia are presented as if they existed equally and were the same thing to be combated. Which is radically false.

It is true that Europe has a very grave problem of antisemitism which, to everyone’s shame, once again makes Europe a continent where grave dangers lie in wait for Jews for the mere fact of being Jews.

But European antisemitism today clearly has two origins. One antisemitism we import daily, with borders open to the illegal and uncontrolled entry of millions of haters of Jews. Who are, by the way, also consummate haters of Christians, though they display that less where they do not hold sway. The persecutions of Christians do not for the moment take place in Europe, though they are numerous and monstrous in their death toll, for example in Africa.

But the imported antisemitism has already lost all barrier of shame in Europe, and in the past months we have seen crowds of Muslim immigrants in the streets of the big cities demanding the extermination of Jews and the destruction of Israel.

Then there is the modern antisemitism of the left, disguised as anti-Zionism but as aggressive and fanatical as the other.

It springs from unconditional hatred of Israel, is allied with all the enemies of the Jewish state and has become widespread in the parties of the left.

In the past there was a democratic left so favorable to Israel that it even held it up as a model; today that left no longer exists.

In an inverse development, the antisemitism of the Catholic right, very widespread in the past among the popular classes, is today marginal, confined to fundamentalist and obscurantist groups.

In the Spanish left that antisemitism has soared, and there are flagrant examples such as the professional Israel-haters that are Pedro Sánchez, celebrated by the Hamas terrorists, or his minister Sira Rego, who leads pro-terrorist demonstrations in Madrid in favor of the disappearance of Israel.

And here is the trap that the European Commission and the entire shrinking and terrified social-democratic majority wants to spring ahead of the European elections.

With the mendacious and intellectually contemptible equating of the really existing antisemitism with the supposed Islamophobia, they want to strangle what is the crucial debate ahead of the elections, alongside social engineering, the Green Deal, the lack of democracy and subsidiarity in the EU, and the meddling, authoritarian drift: immigration and the identity of the European nations.

«Islamophobia» as a problem is precisely an invention of that antisemitic left, to intimidate Europeans and thus prevent their reactions and protests against the invasion they are suffering.

If the stigma of «fascist», «far-rightist» or «Nazi» has always served the left very effectively to intimidate and silence truths, Islamophobia is the war cry to stop European societies from reacting and taking measures and decisions in defense of their identity.

They want to force them to accept the unacceptable with this invasion. And they want to discredit this struggle for security, legality and Western civilization. In Europe there are no assaults by Christians on Muslims. There is daily news of crimes and violence or intimidation against Europeans by immigrants arrived from the Muslim world.

It is a fact that millions of immigrants have not come to integrate but to a territorial conquest that in some European regions is well advanced. Many Muslim leaders already take it for granted, and it is carried out by way of both the birth rate and open borders.

And if Bumedian said it decades ago, today Erdogan says it about «his armies» in Holland or Germany, and they say it in the mosques in the Middle East as in London, Paris or Brussels.

Let us all be very clear, in the face of these traps of a social democracy in panic, that the rejection of invasive attitudes is not hatred of any ideology or religion. It is the self-defense of those who are invaded and are not defended by their rulers, who cheer on, finance and open the doors to the invader.

The struggle of self-defense is therefore directed today not against the immigrant but against the false defenders of the nations, who are the rulers that betray their interests and practice a policy of conscious destruction of national identities. And that is what is at stake in the June elections.

Hermann Tertsch is a Distinguished Fellow (Honorary) at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) now warns that Iran has enough nuclear material to make several atomic bombs. Iran is the only non-nuclear weapon state to enrich uranium to near full weapons-grade levels. Iran continues to deny inspectors access to its facilities to verify that Iran is, as it claims, complying with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT)—to which it acceded under Iran’s last Shah, Reza Pahlavi.

In 2012 I published a scenario titled The Day America Died. Set in April 2013, it had Iran destroy Tel Aviv and Haifa (intentionally), and render all Jerusalem uninhabitable (unintentionally; it only wanted to destroy West Jerusalem). Israel launches a retaliatory nuclear strike. The first-ever nuclear war sets off mass panic in Western capitals, causing a global economic crash, disintegration of our alliances, and spurring rapid nuclear proliferation. The likely effects of such an attack are supported by this summary of the radii of various kinds of destruction generated by detonations of atomic (A-bomb) and thermonuclear (H-bomb) weapons.

I intended my scenario as a warning to anyone who might think that the U.S. would survive the destruction of Israel largely intact, showing in graphic detail how America would be irremediably devastated. Recent events show that the risk of an Iran nuclear strike against Israel are growing, with no effective action being taken by the Biden administration.

Consider:

(1) Team Biden undermines an Israeli prime minister it detests, whilst making no effort to bring down the Iranian clerical fascist regime;

(2) Team Obama hailed the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) as blocking all of Iran’s four paths to a nuclear weapon;

(3) After U.S intelligence discovered Iran’s violations of the JCPOA, President Trump withdrew from the deal;

(4) The belief that a nuclear-armed Iran can be deterred is highly dubious;

(5) Israel’s small size and population—its consequent lack of geostrategic depth—means it cannot survive as a functioning country after even a small number of nuclear detonations on or over its major cities;

(6) Iran’s threat to Israel is real and growing (see my recent TAS article), and thus Iranian leaders may vastly underestimate the devastation they would face after a nuclear attack on Israel, tempting them to strike;

(7) It is hardly coincidental that Iran accelerated its uranium enrichment in November 2020, after Biden won the 2020 presidential election.

No American leader will say, openly, that America would survive the destruction of Israel. But allowing Iran to arrive at the cusp of nuclear weapons status, given the fallibility of assessments as to clandestine advances in nuclear weapons development, recklessly risks America’s future as a free, prosperous, society. If our country seems divided now, after a nuclear Holocaust in Israel our country will be torn asunder.

Let Israeli prime minister Netanyahu have the last word—which should be taken as a final warning:

Our fight is your fight.. . . part of the larger struggle between the pro-American forces in the Middle East and the anti-American terror axis led by Iran. [If Iran gets nuclear weapons], every American will be held hostage to an ideological enemy with an implacable hatred for America. If we lose, you lose. If we win, you win.

Bottom Line. It increasingly appears that the administration intends to pursue its twin Mideast obsessions: making a deal with Iran, and forcing Israel to accept a West Bank + Gaza Palestinian state, run by the Palestine Authority or its successors. Two terrorist statelets and Iran’s longtime proxy, Hezbollah, effectively controlling Lebanon will collectively surround Israel. It will fatally undermine America’s security position in the Mideast, and hand Iran an unearned spectacular triumph. This will end any serious efforts to prevent Iran from crossing the nuclear weapons threshold, and possibly lead to the full horror detailed in my 2012 scenario. If such comes to pass, America will never recover its position as leader of the free world. Hell will break loose globally, with sauve qui peut the emergent disorder of the day.

John Wohlstetter is author of Sleepwalking With the Bomb (Discovery Institute Press, 2d. ed. 2014)

(This article was written by Hermann Tertsch and appeared in El Debate. La farsa antifascista ya no funciona)

In the German state of Saxony, the new parliament and government will be voted on in September. Current polls give figures that keep the federal government and the German and European Union social-democratic elites from sleeping. Because, according to all of them, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party would win 35% of the vote and keeps growing.

Meanwhile the Social Democratic Party (SPD) of Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz would get 6% and falling.

Faced with such a situation, the best idea that occurs to a part of the SPD and to the shrewd analysts of the “progressive” media — which since the era of Angela Merkel are already 98% of all the country’s media, with a uniformity that recalls terrible times — is that the party 36% of voters want to vote for must be banned, in order to prevent the disappearance of the one that has 6% and that perhaps is already at 3% today and without parliamentary representation.

It is true that in the AfD there are far-right elements. In some regions more than in others. Although, as a member of parliament from this party told me last week, “the radicalization is not taking place within the AfD but throughout German society.”

It is the betrayed voters of the big parties, both the CDU and the SPD, who increasingly join a party that has neither a leadership nor a very developed program but that defends the exact opposite of what the traditional parties are doing.

That is enough for more and more Germans. Because the massive impositions, restrictions and regulations of the social engineering advocated by the social-democratic majority of the two-party system of Berlin and Brussels has definitively led to the rupture of the consensus that, for better or worse, German society had maintained since the postwar period.

The sacrifices demanded of the population and the destruction that immigration, eco-climatic fanaticism and the consequent social, business and economic degradation have caused have already broken that basic agreement of the federal republic. “In Germany anything can now happen.”

That is why the political and media class and the big corporations that had adhered to the ideological drift imposed by parties initially in the minority on the two big ones, CDU and SPD, are in panic. And with the entire left in free fall, they pull out of their sleeve the option of a ban.

Fortunately there are still judges in Germany, as was said long ago after the Reichstag trial. There are also still jurists who are something more than the Bolaños gang that has invented cuddly terrorism.

They have already warned the public and political powers of the CDU/SPD/FDP and Green social-democratic consensus that trying to outlaw the AfD is going to cause them many more problems than it supposedly solves.

In the AfD there are ultra-rightists, but there are no terrorists, nor do they carry murderers on their lists, nor do they have convicted and pardoned coup-plotters, nor embezzlers, nor defendants accused of wanting to destroy the federal republic with the Kremlin’s help.

The German basic law has many defects, as has been seen in Germany itself and in all the countries that have gone on copying it, such as Spain.

As a principle it is inadvisable to copy the laws of defeated countries that are still partially or totally occupied, because they may have little respect for voters. And that is what happens with the party state, in which the guardians of the parties are protected from the opinions, options and real will of the people.

Those who ruled Germany when that text was drafted did not trust the German people much. The truth is that outlawing a party is difficult if it has not committed proven and serious crimes as an entity.

And although the German secret services devote themselves with relish to searching for such offenses on the government’s orders, the truth is that when they want to stir up sentiment, with the help of the media, against the AfD, they have to invent, exaggerate and manipulate some very peculiar stories. Whereby they demonstrate how weak their arguments are beyond the artificial “anti-fascist” hysteria that, through governmental channels, journalism is tasked with generating.

As has been the case with last weekend’s demonstrations, called by parties and media against the supposed “monstrous” conspiracy meeting of some “ultra-rightists,” among them two members of the AfD, who near Berlin were talking about the deportation of immigrants.

The meeting, which an obscure outlet — now known to live on official funding and to have fed on material from the intelligence services — has tried to present as “the secret Wannsee meeting,” when it was not at Wannsee and was private, not secret, in an obscene evocation of the Wannsee Conference at which in 1942 the Nazi leadership decided “the final solution,” the extermination of European Jews.

The truth is that while the media had tried to hide or minimize the massive farmers’ demonstrations for a whole week in an unprecedented mobilization, the pro-government demonstrations against the AfD were modest and did not exceed the usual left-wing ones.

And the AfD has kept rising, and a spectacular increase in memberships is being recorded of people who support the AfD out of rejection of the other parties and of everything Olaf Scholz’s three-party government does.

And Olaf Scholz’s government is a sleepwalking body that has neither objectives nor plans, nor agreements nor cohesion nor scarcely any hope of finishing the legislature. And European elections are coming in which, for the first time in history, a broad majority to the right of the socialist party is being forecast. In a parliament in which the European People’s Party will no longer have the pretext of having no alternative but to always vote with the left.

In the last Strasbourg plenary the People’s Party and the socialists went together in 94% of the votes. From June 9 on, the members of the EPP will have their existential dilemma open: whether they are going to vote with a broad right with the ECR groups (European Conservatives and Reformists) and ID (Identity and Democracy) or go definitively over to social democracy and accept the loss of parties and voters who do not want to follow them on that adventure.

Hence the German panic is being transferred to other capitals and also to Brussels. We are entering a new era and, of course, the social-democratic elites are not going to save themselves by banning the large majorities that are being generated in most European nations of very dedicated and active resistance against the leftist, eco-climatic hysterical drift of Agenda 2030, of woke fanaticism and anti-Western and anti-national fury.

If they attempt that path, a scenario of extensive civil conflict quickly opens up.

Hermann Tertsch is a Distinguished Fellow (Honorary) at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.

(This article was written by Hermann Tertsch and appeared in El Debate. Pseudoperiodismo y pseudodemocracia)

Many scenes are deeply shameful in Spain today. Every day we are served images that look like set-ups designed to humiliate and embarrass Spaniards. Starting with any appearance by the President of the Congress, Francina Armengol. But one that ought to generate, besides shame, a great deal of horror is without doubt one that has been repeated, in which we see in the Parliament’s press room a young journalist ask a question of a government official. Or of that grotesque figure, unfortunately representative of his kind, who is Pachi López. And immediately afterward we see the majority of colleagues get up after hearing the questioned politician hurl some disqualification, insult or impertinence at the journalist who asked the question.

All as one, they obey the dictate of the politician who declares the press conference closed with the act of contempt toward a colleague whom none of the other journalists support or stand by. When the last question, that of the scorned one, being the most uncomfortable, is always the most pertinent of all. Before this scene, and for probably half an hour, one after another the journalists have asked the questions the politician expected and that they brought on assignment, and some will have helped the member of the government to place his message better on his preferred terms.

Now the government “asks for protection” from the Press Associations so that they shield the executive from what it calls “pseudo-media.” To be clear, “pseudo-media” are the ones that have those solitary journalists who ask the questions that are not welcome. There was a time when it was understood that true journalism was to publish what power did not want published. Today the journalism of the majority is to publish what power dictates so that the company can know it will receive its slice of the public-money pie to pay the staff and allow itself some indulgence. But it is also to denounce, accuse and harass the colleagues who still hold that concept of journalism, which is to ask power what it does not want to hear and to expose everything power wants to hide.

Thus official journalism has already gone, after many years of being a flock of parrots repeating what their masters say, to being a gang of informers for power who help it in the repression, in the reprisals and the threats against those journalists who have not sunk as low as they have, and against those political forces that are neither power nor a consented and controlled opposition.

With honor abolished, there are television programs in which people compete to be the most snitching, groveling and villainous in demanding total submission to the government’s messages. If this is always a baseness and an infamy, it is even more so when practiced as informers and accomplices of a coup-plotting government allied with all kinds of forces hostile to democracy and to the nation. The acts of indignity multiply. There are the associations that were created to protect journalists against power, scolding journalists on power’s orders.

The Association of Parliamentary Journalists, which is the Association of Parodists of Journalists of a parliament that, for the rest, no longer exists in its democratic sense, recently gave proof of the abysmal degeneration I am referring to at an event that defines the regime, its parrots and also its lackeys. There they gave an award, for being likable, to a woman who not so long ago used a newspaper to tell the murderers where the shots should go. And the shots went there. But who remembers today the dead that the Pachi-Lopezes buried in the mornings after having been at cozy dinners in farmhouses negotiating peace deals between fish and steaks with those who were killing them?

These gangs, which are more and more the mop-wielding hacks of a government that lives solely and exclusively off and for the lie, the abuse and fiscal plunder, increasingly recall that Association of Soviet Writers that Mikhail Bulgakov so wonderfully described in “The Master and Margarita.” It is not only in Spain that we now have a press turned into cheap servitude, with some exceptions such as this newspaper, which has the independence of its solvency and allows me to publish this reflection.

In Germany, all the national media that once had reputation, dignity and a commitment to the truth are humiliating themselves by turning a pseudo-item from an obscure outlet about a private meeting of right-wing people, including some member of the AfD, an informal gathering to exchange opinions where someone had a somewhat heated comment about how to combat immigration, into a terrifying conspiracy that they compared to nothing less than the Wannsee Conference, no less, at which the Nazi leadership decided the extermination of European Jews. They spoke of deportations, something the French

Macron and German politicians in general have done. But here it is a monstrous conspiracy according to the entire press. This is not merely trivializing monstrosities. It is one more proof that European social democracy, under whatever initials — because in Poland it is under a President Donald Tusk — who belongs to the European PP group, is in full offensive to have the whole press subdued and to close the cracks that might allow alternative messages to emerge. And the truth, which is what they fear most.. And if the media do not submit, they are physically stormed, as happened in Warsaw a few weeks ago.

It is about leaving no opening for the truth, because the unified and seamless message must be that of the struggle against those truly national and conservative forces — not of electoral pretense — which in every European country grow in vitality by the day. And ahead of the June 9 elections, panic is spreading in many capitals and now nothing shames them anymore. In Spain the government asks the press associations to armor-plate its messages against some intrepid journalist eager to know the truth.

In Poland the new government that came to power thanks to the massive interference of Brussels and Berlin and the agitation of the German-owned media, which the naïve members of the previous Polish government failed to combat or counter, is trying to criminalize the conservatives who governed for eight years with much success and little public relations or media skill. And everyone, as in Germany, invents the return of Nazism or fascism, when what they have in front of them are societies fed up with lies, with failures and with an ideology that makes them ever less free and more poor. And it organizes within the national-conservative parties to confront and thwart the plans in Davos that aim to turn Europeans into subjects of a socialist mega-state with the same rights as the Chinese and the same Chinese controls, because it is cheaper and does less harm to the planet.

These plans, which a few years ago they believed were already fully on track and without any opposition, are beginning to crack because of the massive resistance in the nations that are becoming aware of the threat and are willing to make it fail. And for that, the essential thing is to stop listening to the snitch journalists and to attend to the questions of the marginalized.

Hermann Tertsch is a Distinguished Fellow (Honorary) at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.

The strategic significance of the Red Sea, a crucial conduit for global commerce and connectivity, cannot be overstated. The disruptive impact of Houthi attacks on shipping in this area not only poses a direct threat to regional security but also has ripple effects on international trade and commerce. The U.S. initiative to draft a resolution condemning these assaults is a testament to the collective endeavor to preserve the safety and stability of essential maritime routes. However, Algeria’s decision to abstain from this resolution represents a significant challenge, necessitating a robust U.S. response to uphold the efficacy of this vital initiative.

Algeria’s rationale for its abstention, which revolves around concerns about the situation in Gaza, invites scrutiny regarding the selective approach of its foreign policy. While the global community recognizes the imperative of addressing humanitarian crises, the focus of the Security Council’s resolution was explicitly on the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea. Algeria’s abstention, citing reasons disconnected from the resolution’s primary aim, suggests a misalignment between the resolution’s objectives and Algeria’s stated rationale.

The significance of addressing global humanitarian issues, including the situation in Gaza, is unquestionable. Nonetheless, the Security Council is a forum designed to tackle a multitude of global challenges, each necessitating dedicated attention. The U.S.-proposed resolution on the Houthi attacks was crafted to confront a distinct security threat. Effective multilateralism mandates that nations address individual issues while collaboratively engaging with broader humanitarian challenges. A decisive U.S. response is imperative to reinforce the principle that peripheral problems should not derail resolutions targeting specific threats.

The ongoing Houthi insurgency in Yemen has extensive implications for regional stability, especially in the strategically pivotal Red Sea. The Security Council’s resolution, aimed at condemning Houthi aggressions, aligns with the overarching objective of maintaining regional peace and security. Algeria’s abstention from this resolution not only undermines these goals but also jeopardizes efforts to ensure unfettered navigation in a critical global waterway. The United States, as a champion of international security, must respond decisively to safeguard the interests of nations dependent on secure maritime transit.

The efficacy of the United Nations Security Council hinges on its members’ commitment to confront distinct challenges with targeted resolutions. Algeria’s abstention, motivated by concerns unrelated to the resolution’s focus, sets a troubling precedent that could weaken the credibility and decision-making efficacy of the Security Council. A forceful U.S. response is crucial to underscore the seriousness of such actions and to uphold the integrity of the Security Council as an essential body for global governance.

In light of Algeria’s abstention from the U.S.-proposed resolution condemning the Houthi attacks in the Red Sea, a vigorous response from the United States is warranted. The necessity to counter maritime security threats, preserve regional stability, and maintain the Security Council’s credibility calls for a firm stance. While acknowledging the complexities of regional conflicts and humanitarian crises, the United States must underscore the urgency of targeted resolutions and the importance of collective action in addressing specific challenges, without undermining the broader objectives of international cooperation and security.

(This article was written by Hermann Tertsch and appeared in El Debate. El «Síndrome de Trastorno Mental por Trump»)

We enter the year of the elections in the United States, and it is already clear that we are returning fully to a pandemic of TDS, the “Trump Derangement Syndrome,” which we could translate as Síndrome de Trastorno Mental por Trump.

In Europe it will be as delirious as on the very stage of the electoral campaign, and all sorts of extravagances will be said that are deemed necessary to generate more rejection toward the one who is, good heavens!, once again the favorite to be the Republican candidate, Mr. Donald Trump.

The primary campaign begins on January 15 with the Iowa Caucus and concludes in a March with Super Tuesday on the 5th of that month, on which a candidate is chosen in the majority of the states. After that, pure campaign until November, with the candidates who win.

No one knows whether Joe Biden is going to run, although it seems ever more likely that his party will decide to send him into the retirement where he would have been for some time now, were he not such a comfortable puppet for the real powers behind this presidency, whose most prominent representative remains Barack Obama.

And no one has any guarantees today that Donald Trump will finally be the Republican candidate, despite the fact that in the polls he has a lead of more than 30 points over the second-place candidate, and no one has lost the primaries with the numbers that Trump has today in those polls.

But we already see in every media and political corner of the West that, just like antisemitism, that other illness that already has the entire left infected, the TDS syndrome resurges with the same or greater virulence than in 2016.

The Frankfurter Allgemeine, a serious and rigorous German conservative newspaper until it sank catastrophically into social-democratic vulgarity during the disastrous Angela Merkel era, warned yesterday against a Trump dictatorship. Once again.

A newspaper that is barely irritated when in Spain, an important partner of Germany, a band of malefactors perpetrates a coup d’état, declares itself alarmed at a Trump dictatorship in the U.S.

When Trump was an absolutely law-respecting president, even in the last year in which the left set fire to the North American cities and caused dozens of deaths in a broad operation of urban violence on the pretext of a death of a drug-addicted delinquent during a police operation.

The operation turned out no doubt perfectly for those who, in those months of brutal environmental pressure, devoted themselves to “vote harvesting.”

That is, to harvesting votes mobilized by the most mendacious victimhood, but colossally promoted by that great alliance of the left, including the most extremist, racist and communist, with the media, corporate and financial elites, all of them products of the universities in the hands of the disciples of the Frankfurt School, which at first were the Ivy League, but today are practically all of them.

They want to prevent the potential dictator from reaching the presidency, and the best way seems to be to prevent, at all costs and above all, North Americans from voting for him.

But the fact is that all the indications are that the electorate is ever more determined to vote for him, not only in the primaries but also in the presidential election; one need only look at the polls in the states that tend to be decisive.

In Nevada, Trump leads Biden by eleven points, in Georgia by six, in Arizona by five, in Michigan by five, and even in Pennsylvania, in Biden’s state, Trump leads by four.

Faced with this situation, a left terrified at the possibility that Trump may come to power and treat it the same way it has treated Trump’s voters over these four years is prepared to do anything.

And anything is to make it impossible to vote for Trump by seeking to disqualify him without his being disqualified. Erasing him from the electoral lists over his supposed “insurrection,” which is an accusation that has neither been tried nor, much less, proven.

In two states, Colorado and Maine, the local politicians have for the moment allowed themselves the bravado of inducing state judges to erase Trump from the primary list. For being an insurrectionist. Without any conviction whatsoever.

We are facing an offensive by the same people who celebrated and in large part financed the fires and pogroms of the terrorist gangs of Black Lives Matter, in order to prevent North Americans from voting for Donald Trump.

And they want a few friendly judges in their state to be the ones who decide who may run in the elections and who may not. And they disqualify the one they do not like with an accusation they do not have to prove to anyone.

As in so many other Western democracies, we are witnessing a general offensive of the cynicism of a totalitarian left allied with the powers of the administration and of globalism, the friends of Mr. Klaus Schwab’s Davos Forum, which intends that the salvation of the world be directed by a few chosen by the gods in alliance with a few real dictators, see Xi Jinping.

The North American administration already sabotaged Trump’s presidency from the CIA, the FBI, the State Department and the apparatus in general. Now they are in a panic because democracy might function and North Americans might decide that Trump is the man they want as president.

And they want to skip over all the laws in order to supposedly prevent the dictatorships of those who abide by them. It is to be hoped that the Supreme Court in the U.S. will put an end to this sinister joke. But there are no longer any certainties.

As now happens with Javier Milei, no more, no less. A ridiculous editorial in El País speaks of Milei’s authoritarian drift when the Argentine president returns not only freedom to Argentines but respect for the law.

And that is what those who only know how to live off arbitrariness fear, like the leftists in Colorado and Maine, like the Kirchnerist thieves in Argentina, and like the malefactors of the illegal, unconstitutional and coup-plotting amnesty in Spain.

Hermann Tertsch is a Distinguished Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.

(This article first appeared on Arab News at https://arab.news/yxwte)

What are the predictions for the performance of the US economy in the year 2024? Will it be a year of economic growth or recession? And how will the status of the US economy next year affect the outcome of the presidential elections in November?
The American economy is likely to slow in early 2024 because consumer spending is going to score low figures. Inflation is still high. Inflation this year was less severe than the previous year. However, it is still burdensome on the income of most US households. The typical economic rule is that when inflation is high, consumers slow their spending to save money. Weak consumer spending relates to negative or low rates of economic growth, according to a study conducted by the US.
From the US Chamber of Commerce: “The economy grew over 5 percent in the third quarter of 2023 and is tracking to grow over 1 percent in the fourth. Growth is projected to slow even further in 2024. For instance, the chamber projects the economy will grow a scant 0.2 percent and 0.4 percent in the second and third quarters, respectively. That is a far cry from growth in the third quarter of 2023.”
Yet, other economic reasons could deepen the sense of economic malaise in 2024. Many Americans were able to save money during 2020-2022. This was during the COVID-19 pandemic that caused a state of national and worldwide shutdown. People saved money by working from home, economizing their energy and transportation expenses, and benefiting from several federal and state benefits that were given to American households to help them fight the economic hardships of that epidemic. Unfortunately, most US economists believe that the pandemic-era savings are completely spent. As a result, credit card debts will rise sharply in 2024. More credit card debts entail higher interest rates. This could slow down further consumer spending.
Inflation is still more than the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent benchmark. It is a remote possibility that Fed Gov. Jerome Powell will take the measure to lower interest rates. This means that money borrowed from banks and other financial institutions will be paid through higher interest rates. The Fed Reserve has not found an ideal way yet to control and tame inflation.
High inflation in the US economy is related to many factors. Foremost among them is the worker shortage. This influences the supply of commodities and services. Little supplies of items to be bought mean a bigger demand and higher prices. The US economy is not expected to produce enough employment to compensate for this workforce shortage in 2024.

American politics is not helpful to the state of the current US economy. Congress must pass the budget for 2024 and 2025. Any failure to conclude a budget deal, especially in reaching an agreement on how to raise the debt limit before January 2025 could have very negative repercussions for the US economy.
In addition, there are other negative forecasts for the US economy. The real estate market could see plummeting economic indicators. Office space is being rented now at a much lower rate than what was the case before the pandemic. These real estate companies owe banks money. This could deepen the credit crunch further. Most of these banks loan money to small and middle-sized businesses. If banks are loaning people and institutions less money, the Fed must intervene to prevent the collapse of more banks and to dismiss any lack of confidence in the US economy.
Business investment is expected to be slow. According to a study by the investment bank, Goldman Sachs, business investment is expected to grow 1.75 percent in 2024. Mainly, the CHIPS Act and Inflation Reduction Act are the two congressional acts that are the biggest drivers for business investments. The CHIPS and Science Act is a US federal statute signed into law by President Joe Biden on Aug. 9, 2022. The act earmarks around $280 billion to help investment in high-tech manufacturing items, especially those related to investments in semiconductors. Therefore, the status of the US economy depends on how successful these Federal investments will be in generating new jobs and in creating good economic opportunities in general.
Geopolitics could have ramifications for the American economy. No one knows what the future holds for the war between Russia and Ukraine. If it continues, it will hurt the global economy due to the low supply of wheat and other essential agricultural products. Worse, is the absence of any clear sign of when Israel’s war of aggression against Gaza will end. These two critical developments are very serious handicaps to having a healthy global economy and a well-performing American economy next year.
The American people’s experience in the next few months will be one of living with a slowing economy. This will not be helpful to Biden and the Democrats. They could face a big political defeat if the American people judge the economy of their nation as struggling through a recession that must end.

• Maria Maalouf is a Lebanese journalist, broadcaster, publisher, and writer.
X: @bilarakib

(This article was written by Shea Bradley-Farrell and appeared in RealClearPolitics. Will Your Sons and Daughters Fight in Central Europe?)

Who bears the responsibility for the war in Ukraine? According to Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, members of U.S. Congress, and even U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin, it is the American people.

Recently, Secretary Austin told America that if Congress fails to pass another $60 billion in aid to Ukraine, it will “most likely” result in American troops fighting in Europe. The additional aid to Ukraine has been stalled by members of Congress who want assurances that our own U.S. southern border will be protected first. According to the U.S. Department of State, the U.S. has already provided Ukraine with our largest foreign assistance package in Europe since the Marshall Plan at the end of World War II.

Congress is right (and long overdue) to fight to secure our own border, yet Zelensky had the audacity to warn the American people that our “unresolved issues on Capitol Hill” inspire Putin to continue the war. How dare he? The U.S. is by far the largest donor of money and weapons to his country, and much like U.K. Defense Secretary Ben Wallace, counseling Zelensky in the wisdom of “gratitude,” told him – we are not Zelensky’s “Amazon delivery service.”

Why should America be the main bearer of this war? As often as Mike Pence, Niki Haley, and other war hawks in D.C. ambiguously claim that Putin’s next move is to take over NATO countries, don’t believe it. Putin cannot consolidate a victory in four eastern Ukrainian provinces – how could he possibly launch an armored assault through the fabled Fulda Gap? It is preposterous.

In addition, Putin does not want to turn 31 (NATO) countries against him. One could reasonably argue his invasion of Ukraine was provoked by the threat of the expansion of NATO along his own borders. Imagine if Russian troops performed military exercises along the U.S. southern border the way NATO does along the Russian border – it would be seen as a threat to U.S. national security.

And which is it? Are Russian troops strong enough to take on all 31 countries of NATO, or has Russia been severely weakened by the Ukrainian soldiers? One cannot have it both ways. If, as I have, you’ve watched the (non-U.S.) news from Central Europe this year, you’ll see the real story – not the leftist propaganda seen in America and Western Europe. Over 400,000 Ukrainians have been killed, necessary infrastructure has been devastated, and the counteroffensive is not working. Russia spent months building a layered “defense-in-depth” system against the counteroffensive, and the large number of minefields in this system resulted in “horrific casualties” for the Ukrainians.

Last year, I spent time in the Ukrainian refugee center in Hungary and was saddened by the plight of almost six million refugees who have fled the war and devastation of their country. And this is one of the main points: We are enabling a war that will not stop until more devastation has happened and more Ukrainians are killed. Russia will not stop; it is relentless (think of the decade of destruction in Chechnya). Even now, with the death of thousands of military-age men and those who fled instead of fighting, the average age of a Ukrainian soldier is 43. In addition, western sanctions have benefited Russian coffers and China’s energy reserves, and strengthened Putin’s ties with China.

And what about Americans? The average citizen has had to pay $7,000 to $10,000 more this year to maintain the same standard of living. For many, this is the difference between having enough food, paying the light bill, and paying the monthly mortgage. Yet, Zelensky, the White House, and congressional war hawks continue to ask for unlimited funding, with no end in sight, without giving clear strategies and objectives as to what we are trying to achieve. U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen has made it clear we will also rebuild Ukraine after the war. The cost of that project is currently at $411 billion.

We must ask – what pushes the Biden administration’s seeming obsession to appropriate more and more billions of American taxpayer dollars, to threaten us with U.S. troops on the ground, and to enable an ongoing war with absolutely no talk of peace negations or ceasefire? Representative Paul Gosar says he has a “firm belief that the bribes paid to Joe Biden by Ukraine are the reason the United States is now engaged in a proxy war with Russia at great financial cost to Americans (over $100 billion and counting) and at great cost in lives lost of young men.”

Is that why Zelensky, who recently fired all his top defense officials for skimming money off troop ration funds (among other corruptions), whose government ranks the second most corrupt in Europe, who has nationalized the media and outlawed political opponents, is spoken of and treated like former Prime Minister Winston Churchill by the Biden administration? Zelensky, the leader of a corrupt government, is the same man who told the world he is “fighting for global democracy.” In spite of all the propaganda, Ukraine is not ready for NATO or European Union (EU) membership.

We can stand with the people of Ukraine fighting for their sovereignty. We can give money and select weapons within reason. We can offer humanitarian assistance. But the burden of this war is not America’s, and it will not be America’s burden in the future. We must secure our own national interests, first and foremost.

Shea Bradley-Farrell is a Senior Fellow at the Gold Institute for International Strategy, a Washington D.C.-based foreign policy and defense think tank.