Whoever wins, we’ll be a fundamentally changed Israel when this election is over

It’ll be Bibi. Or maybe it won’t be Bibi. But our next leadership and legislature will be unprecedentedly right-wing. Unlike in the US, our political pendulum has stopped swinging

For the first time in Israeli history, our next election will be a battle fought overwhelmingly on the right wing of the political spectrum.

It will, however, have almost nothing to do with ideology. It will, rather, be all about that one man, again.

And yet whoever wins, it will result in a profoundly changed Israel.

The center-left Labor party, which led modern Israel for its first three decades, is almost certain to disappear from the political map. The Blue and White alliance, to which Benny Gantz drew hundreds of thousands of center-left voters by pledging repeatedly that he would not join forces with a Benjamin Netanyahu facing corruption charges, will vanish too.

Some of the voters Gantz abandoned will remain in the center-left, voting for Yair Lapid’s Yesh Atid. But most, the surveys indicate — including at least some of the masses who have for months been demonstrating nationwide against Netanyahu — are heading toward the latest champions of the “anyone but Bibi” movement: the Orthodox-nationalist Naftali Bennett’s resurgent Yamina, and the hawkish Likud rebel Gideon Sa’ar’s newly formed and remarkably popular New Hope.

If our last three rapid-fire elections largely revolved around the question of whether Israelis wanted Netanyahu as our prime minister any longer — pushing to the margins what had once been core electoral issues such as the Palestinian conflict, settlements, the powers of the Supreme Court, and military service for the ultra-Orthodox — the March 2021 vote is all about whether Israelis want Netanyahu as our prime minister any longer.

Bennett and Sa’ar are soaring not because of their political ideology, but because, just as Blue and White claimed it did, they have made supplanting Netanyahu their flagship cause

Bennett seeks to annex most of the West Bank; Sa’ar opposes a two-state solution; both want to curb our justices’ authority; both would happily partner with the ultra-Orthodox parties. Yet while Bennett’s party won just six seats in the March 2020 election, and Sa’ar’s was just a twinkle in his eye, together they are now heading for a hefty 30-35 seats — soaring not because of their political ideology, but because, just as Blue and White claimed it did, they have made supplanting Netanyahu their flagship cause, “the order of the day,” as Sa’ar put it when announcing his breakaway two weeks ago.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/whoever-wins-well-be-a-fundamentally-changed-israel-when-this-election-is-over/

Russian lower house approves bill on recognizing political groups as foreign agents

Non-registered public groups involved in political activity and receiving foreign funding will be considered foreign agents, along with individuals involved in politics in the interest of foreign actors that provide them with funds

MOSCOW, December 23. /TASS/. The Russian State Duma (lower house of parliament) has approved the third reading of the bill regulating the activity of foreign agents developed by Russian parliamentary commissions to avoid foreign interference in Russian affairs.

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Bill submitted to Russian parliament on labeling individuals as foreign agents

Non-registered public groups involved in political activity and receiving foreign funding will be considered foreign agents, along with individuals involved in politics in the interest of foreign actors that provide them with funding. The individuals considered foreign agents may also be involved in collecting information in the sphere of Russia’s military or military-technical activity, if such data can be used against Russian security by a foreign source.

Such political groups and individuals will be obligated to register as foreign agents and report their activity to the Russian Ministry of Justice, providing data on the spending of their funds and property received from foreign sources. Individuals considered foreign agents will be unable to work for the federal and municipal government, and they cannot be given access to state secrets.

The forms of political activity that allow the Russian government to brand individuals and groups as foreign agents include: rallies and public debates, spread of opinions on state policy, actions aimed at getting a certain result in elections or during a referendum, election observing and activity within political parties, provided that this activity is carried out in the interest of foreign sources. Charity work, as well as activity in the spheres of research, culture, art, healthcare, social services, social support, sports, environmental protection and so on cannot be considered political.

The list of foreign agents will be available online. The media will be obliged to mark individuals and groups as foreign agents in publications about them. This demand will not apply to publications by Internet users, including bloggers. Besides, individuals and political groups considered foreign agents will have to mark their materials themselves.

This bill takes on the central role within the package of initiatives dedicated to regulating the activity of foreign agents. The corresponding bills from the package developed by Russian MPs and senators contain amendments to electoral legislation, the Criminal Code and the Code of Administrative Offences of the Russian Federation.

https://tass.com/society/1238805

The war between China and the United States has already begun, and America is the battleground

A confidential report on foreign election interference that was supposed to have been released late last week was delayed after John Ratcliffe, Director of the National Intelligence Agency (DNI), indicated that new “relevant reports” have emerged since the election that many departments have not yet been able to coordinate.

There is an apparent dispute within our nation’s intelligence community over whether China or Russia is primarily to blame for our fraudulent elections. The political left hates Russia and always blames it for everything, while the political right has been ramping up the rhetoric against communist China.

Could it be that both countries have an anti-American agenda, or is one or the other the culprit? This is the space between a rock and a hard place where our nation currently finds itself, and Ratcliffe has no plans to sign off on the report until it takes into account the national security threat that is the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).

Many in President Donald Trump’s cabinet, including National Security Adviser Robert O’Brien, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and former Attorney General William Barr, along with Trump himself, have all stated at one point or another that they believe China is a bigger threat to the United States than Russia.

Democrats, however, never talk about China and are always trying to convince us that Russia is responsible for everything “bad” that happens.

Only communist China has the power and influence to subvert entire nations

What we know thus far, according to whistleblower Guo Wengui, is that the CCP’s plan to subvert the U.S. dates back decades. China’s plan has long been to control all information, money and politics in our country in order to weaken it to the point of total collapse.

https://www.dcclothesline.com/2020/12/23/the-war-between-china-and-the-united-states-has-already-begun-and-america-is-the-battleground/

California doctor fired after writing letter questioning county's coronavirus lockdowns

He says data shows it's safe to open schools

A California doctor who was fired after questioning his county’s coronavirus stay-at-home orders spoke out to Fox News on Wednesday.

Dr. Michael Deboisblanc was removed from his post as trauma medical director for John Muir Health after writing a letter to health officials in Contra Costa County, Calif., that questioned the effectiveness of the county’s lockdown measures.

Deboisblanc told "America’s Newsroom" Wednesday a group of parents advocating for the reopening of schools in the area asked him to write the letter.

"All the data that I am aware of, looking at children and the virus, shows that it’s safe" to reopen schools, Debloisblanc told Sandra Smith. "There are many other states now that have months of track records showing that it’s safe for their kids to go back to school. And the state of California and the county is just not making that possible."

Deboisblanc wrote the letter along with Dr. Pete Mazolewski and Dr. Brian Hopkins. "The science is clear that more lockdowns lead to much more non COVID morbidity and mortality," the letter reads in part.

The letter also contained questions about the county’s small business and restaurant shutdowns, Deboisblanc said.

"These are restaurants that are just trying to survive, and keep their doors open," he said. "It’s been very difficult for them."

John Muir Health released a statement to NBC Bay Area in response to Deboisblanc’s firing, Smith said.

"The doctor is employed through an outside contract," said the statement, read by Smith on-air. "And after careful consideration, John Muir Health is not continuing with Dr. Deboisblanc in that position."

Despite his firing, Deboisblanc praised his former colleagues for working hard to fight the pandemic.

"That’s a great hospital, they are doing amazing things," Deboisblanc said. "The doctors and nurses there taking care of COVID patients are risking their health every day. They just got the first round of the vaccine. And let me tell you, it’s a big relief for them."

https://www.foxnews.com/health/california-doctor-fired-questioning-coronavirus-lockdowns

Lead Netanyahu trial judge infected with coronavirus

It is unclear whether her condition will impact the January 13 hearing.

Jerusalem District Court Judge Rivkah Friedman-Feldman, the lead on the panel handling the public corruption trial of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has been infected with the coronavirus.

A statement from the court spokesperson's office said on Wednesday that she would need to quarantine at minimum until January 1.

The statement added that at the present time, Friedman-Feldman was having a light case in terms of symptoms.

In addition, the spokesperson said that an epidemiological probe was being performed, but it was unclear at press time whether her infection would impact other judges on the Netanyahu panel which had not held a public hearing since early December.

It was also unclear whether her condition would impact the January 13 hearing which is supposed to be the final pretrial date leading into calling witnesses set for February.

Earlier Wednesday, the state prosecution issued a range of indictments in the Bezeq case before the Tel Aviv District Court which is parallel to Case 4000 against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu before the Jerusalem District Court.

Wednesday’s decision confirmed the September 2019 announcement by the Tel Aviv Economic Crimes Division that it intended to indict former Bezeq owner Shaul Elovitch, his son Or and a range of other top Bezeq and YES company officials for a range of fraud, insider trading, illegal reporting and obstruction of justice issues.

In addition, the prosecution decided to indict Walla in Case 4000 and Yediot Ahronot in Case 2000.

Originally, the Bezeq case in Tel Aviv was a story about an illegal merger between Bezeq and YES, being that Shaul Elovitch had powerful interests in both and that he allegedly used illegal messengers to infiltrate the merger talks which he was supposed to be kept away from to avoid a conflict of interest.

The prosecution also indicted Amikam Shorer, YES CEO Ron Ayalon, Linor Yochelman, Miki Neuman and various sub-entities of Eurocom which were under Shaul Elovitch’s control.

Yochelman was tasked with ensuring that Elovitch did not receive information relating to the merger talks and to make sure he could not influence them, due to his ownership interests in both companies.

Instead, Yochelman allegedly leaked just about everything that Elovitch needed to manipulate the outcome of the negotiations to his benefit.

Elovitch eventually benefited to the tune of around NIS 968 million.

https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/lead-netanyahu-trial-judge-infected-with-coronavirus-652984

Evidence for Vitamin D in Prevention and Treatment of Coronavirus (SARS CoV 2)

Can Vitamin D be an effective therapeutic and prophylaxis against seasonal respiratory illnesses including COVID-19? With each passing week, the body of evidence supporting this conclusion continues to grow. After the completion of a number of scientific peer reviewed studies, an even stronger argument is now emerging about how this approach to therapeutics and prophylaxis can deliver much better results than with pharmaceutical interventions.

In this video, host Professor Roger Seheult, MD explains the crucially important role Vitamin D may have in the prevention and treatment of COVID-19. Dr. Seheult illustrates how Vitamin D works, summarizes the best available data and clinical trials on vitamin D, and discusses vitamin D dosage recommendations.

Dr. Roger Seheult, MD is the co-founder and lead professor at https://www.medcram.com He is an Associate Professor at the University of California, Riverside School of Medicine and Assistant Prof. at Loma Linda University School of Medicine Dr. Seheult is Quadruple Board Certified: Internal Medicine, Pulmonary Disease, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine. Watch:

https://21stcenturywire.com/2020/12/22/evidence-for-vitamin-d-in-prevention-and-treatment-of-coronavirus-sars-cov-2/

U.S. Announces That Ukraine Will Dismantle All Huawei Equipment From Government Buildings

If one has no ready answer, then humor this suggestion:

Of course, when your democracy is in danger, or you’re about to making a mistake, they will use their authority over you to force you into a decision that you may not want to make.

That is a sign of true friendship and care.

That is why, US Deputy Secretary of State Keith Krach announced that the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry plans to dismantle all the equipment of the Chinese company Huawei installed in departmental buildings.

After all, why wouldn’t the US deputy Secretary of State speak on behalf of another country.

“The Foreign Ministry has decided to remove all Huawei equipment from its buildings, and several other government agencies will follow suit,” Krach said following a meeting with Ukrainian Prime Minister Denis Shmygal.

Keith Krach also recalled that recently the Ukrainian authorities refused to cooperate with Huawei in the project of creating a “smart city”, preferring the American Cisco.

According to him, Ukraine has also expressed interest in the “Clean Network” initiative, whose members refuse to use the services of Chinese telecommunications companies in the development of 5G networks for information security.

Recall that in the summer of 2020 in the United States, Huawei and ZTE were recognized as a threat to national security.

This was explained by the fact that since Chinese companies are subject to Chinese law, the American side does not rule out that they may be obliged to cooperate with the intelligence services of their country.

In 2019 the Chinese Huawei estimated the damage from US sanctions at $ 30 billion.

It is interesting to find out if whether Ukraine really played any role into the decision-making process, or the order to do so was given from above. It appears that Krach simply said what Ukraine would do, while the Ukrainian Prime Minister simply stood there and nodded in submission.

In return for all of this support, and one-size-fits-all democracy that’s essentially being dropped from above, Ukraine is expressing its unending (and illogical) support to a US ally – Great Britain.

Despite the actions of all European countries, Ukraine decided not to cancel any flights to the UK, despite the new, more infectious strain of COVID-19 being discovered there.

“We have a visa regime with the UK which limits the number of passengers traveling between our countries. Currently, flights are performed mainly for Ukrainians studying abroad to return home for the Christmas holidays,” Minister of Infrastructure of Ukraine Vladyslav Kryklii posted on Telegram.

The minister noted that Ukraine will monitor the situation with COVID-19 in the UK and change this decision if necessary.

It is, however, refreshing to see how much one’s friends care for him, and it’s also showing how little democratic elections make a difference when the decision-making mechanisms aren’t even present in the country, but rather decisions are “imported” from abroad.

https://southfront.org/u-s-announces-that-ukraine-will-dismantle-all-huawei-equipment-from-government-buildings/

Crew Of Russian Tu-95MS Strategic Bomber Successfully Control Drones During Flight

During recent exercises, the crew of a Russian Tu-95MS strategic bomber practiced in-flight guidance of an unmanned aerial vehicle from the cockpit.

This was reported by TASS, citing an unnamed source.

“Recently, flight tests were carried out, during which the interaction of the Tu-95MS with the drone was worked out, that is, the drone was controlled from the aircraft,” the source said.

He clarified that for these tests, a combatant Tu-95MS was involved, retrofitted with special equipment to control the drone.

According to the source, such interaction in the future may find application for additional reconnaissance of the location of moving targets when the strategic bomber is already in the air. It is also possible to use the drone as a decoy air target to divert enemy aircraft and air defense forces from the aircraft itself.

The anonymous source did not specify which drone was involved in the tests. He also did not confirm whether such tests were carried out with the Hunter heavy shock stealth drone, but did not rule out the possibility of such tests in the future.

“The main thing is to work out the interaction, and it doesn’t matter what the machines will be,” he stressed.

Every year on December 23, the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation celebrate a memorable date – the Day of Long-Range Aviation of the Russian Air Force.

It was introduced in 1999 by order of the Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Air Force (Air Force) Anatoly Kornukov.

Long-range aviation of the Air Force is part of the Aerospace Forces of the Russian Federation and is a strategic reserve of the Supreme High Command and one of three (along with the Strategic Missile Forces and Strategic Naval Forces) components of Russia’s Strategic Nuclear Forces.

On August 12 of this year, in an interview with the Krasnaya Zvezda newspaper, Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Aerospace Forces, Lieutenant General Sergei Dronov, said that the Russian Defense Ministry plans to provide crews of combat aircraft with the ability to control drones in the future.

Russia’s Okhotnik heavy attack drone developed by the Sukhoi Design Bureau performed its debut flight on August 3, 2019.

The flight lasted over 20 minutes under an operator’s control. On September 27, 2019, the Okhotnik performed a flight together with a Su-57 fifth-generation fighter jet. The drone maneuvered in the air in the automated mode at an altitude of around 1,600 meters and its flight lasted over 30 minutes.

The Okhotnik features stealth technology and the flying wing design (it lacks the tail) and has a take-off weight of 20 tonnes. The drone has a jet engine and is capable of developing a speed of around 1,000 km/h.

According to the data of Russia’s Defense Ministry, the drone has anti-radar coating and is outfitted with equipment for electro-optical, radar and other types of reconnaissance.

Additionally, on December 22nd, Russian and Chinese bombers flew a joint patrol mission over the Western Pacific.

The Russian military said that a pair of its Tu-95 strategic bombers and four Chinese H-6K bombers flew over the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea.

The Russian Defense Ministry said in a statement that the joint mission was intended to “develop and deepen the comprehensive Russia-China partnership, further increase the level of cooperation between the two militaries, expand their ability for joint action and strengthen strategic stability.”

The ministry added that the patrol flight “wasn’t directed against any third countries.”

Earlier, in October, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the idea of a future Russia-China military alliance can’t be ruled out — a signal of deepening military cooperation between Moscow and Beijing amid growing tensions in their relations with the United States.

https://southfront.org/crew-of-russian-tu-95ms-strategic-bomber-successfully-control-drones-during-flight/

Left-Wingers in Disarray

Progressive efforts to staff the nascent administration backfire

On Nov. 2, before the first votes in the presidential election had even been tallied, the foreign policy "experts" from the Blame America wing of the Democratic Party laid out their demands. Foreign Policy described their "wish list," which included above all else their pick of jobs in the expected Biden administration.

They’d kept their mouths shut for six months and now they wanted their reward. Or, as Foreign Policy put it, they were preparing to "take off the gloves, setting the stage for a public brawl for the party’s soul over policy and political appointments to the most senior positions."

But Biden’s victory was less sweeping than expected, and as early as Nov. 6, Foreign Policy was reporting that progressives were panicking that the election results would "ease pressure on Biden to offer progressives key positions in the new administration."

Still, the nomenklatura have pressed on, presenting the Biden transition team with a list of 100 names they must consider for senior jobs in the new administration.

The list’s existence was first reported by Politico, but the Washington Free Beacon obtained the document and published it in full. It includes a rogue’s gallery of fringe figures—anti-Semites, operatives with deep ties to unsavory regimes, and the merely unserious and unqualified.

And it quickly became clear that the organizers did not want the list to see the light of day. The Free Beacon’s publication of the dossier elicited recriminations and finger pointing. List organizers accused the mainstream reporters with whom they'd shared the list—presumably, an accurate one—of leaking the document to their enemies (us). At the same time, they told us we'd obtained an inaccurate copy, representative only of "research materials." False, unless they were bamboozling us all.

The contretemps is revealing of how quickly the Democratic Party’s progressive wing went from demanding to begging, and of the disorganization and unseriousness of its efforts. Turns out, one mainstream reporter said, that list organizers hadn’t even consulted with several of those named on the list before including their names and résumés without their permission.

Vanquished in the primaries and now at risk of exclusion from the new administration, they are in disarray. A compelling story, if anybody cared to cover it.

https://freebeacon.com/national-security/left-wingers-in-disarray/

Irony and SolarWinds

We live in an age of irony. Even the ironies have ironies.

Take Donald Trump. After four years, there’s not the slightest doubt that the man is an ultra-rightist with pronounced authoritarian tendencies. This is why 81.2 million Americans voted against him: because Joe Biden couldn’t help but be better despite his obvious shortcomings.

But they were wrong. Trump has engaged in the most outrageous bullying of small nations like Iran, Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. Ironically, however, he’s actually been more cautious when it comes to launching the endless wars that are a Democratic specialty. Now that he’s nearly out the door, Democrats are therefore celebrating by pounding the war drums for a showdown with their all-time favorite enemy, Vladimir Putin.

The pretext is cyber security. The fuss began a couple of weeks ago when a company called FireEye disclosed that it had been hacked. Given that FireEye is a leading Silicon Valley cyber-security firm, this was the equivalent of thieves breaking into a police station and making off with weapons and files. But even more sensational was FireEye’s claim that the break-in was the work of “a nation with top-tier offensive capabilities.” Rather than corporate espionage, it was now a matter of national security.

That was on Dec. 8. Six days later, another high-tech firm, SolarWinds of Austin, Texas, announced that it had been hacked as well and that, worse, the invaders had succeeded in inserting malware into one of the periodic software updates it sends out to clients to help them manage their computer networks. One hack had thus led to as many as 18,000 others, affecting everyone from Fortune 500 companies to government agencies.

This is sensational stuff, and politicians and reporters did not hesitate in pointing the finger. The New York Times immediately charged that the responsible party was “almost certainly a Russian intelligence agency” while Richard Blumenthal, the Democratic senator from Connecticut best known for lying about his Vietnam military service, tweeted that “Trump’s failure of deterrence & continued denials have emboldened Russian hacking & put it at the door of our deepest national secrets.” Once again, Trump had aided America’s number-one foe. Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, also a Democrat, went Blumenthal one better by telling CNN that “Russia is relentlessly trying to invade America’s cyberspace” and “this is virtually a declaration of war by Russia on the United States.”

Finally, Joe Biden weighed in on Dec. 17 with a vow to impose “substantial costs” on whoever is responsible. “A good defense isn’t enough,” he said; “we need to disrupt and deter our adversaries from undertaking significant cyberattacks in the first place. … I will not stand idly by in the face of cyber assaults on our nation.”

From a hack to preparations for a counterattack in a little over a week – surely this is some sort of land speed record. But two things had gotten lost amid the rush to war. One is that we have no evidence, at least none that’s been made public, that Russia is guilty. The other is that what high-tech corporate officials have said so far about the breach is so contradictory and nonsensical that it’s pretty clear they don’t have a clue as to who’s responsible either.

https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/12/23/irony-and-solarwinds/

Deal or No Deal: Conflicting Reports Abound Over UK-EU Trade Agreement After Brexit

Earlier, a senior EU diplomat told Reuters that a Brexit trade deal between the UK and the EU may be agreed as early as Wednesday evening.

Britain has made "huge concessions" in Brexit trade talks in the past two days, Reuters reported, quoting an anonymous French official.

According to the source, the concessions are primarily related to fishing, with the latest British position being "far" from what London offered last week (three-year access to British waters and 80 percent reduction in quotas).

Earlier in the day, conflicting reports emerged in British media with Sky News saying that the Brexit trade deal has been achieved, citing a source at No 10 whereas the BBC political editor said the agreement was not "signed and sealed".

She took to Twitter to update her audience on the latest news from Brussels where the negotiations have been continuing.

David Frost and EU’s Steph Riso are still in negotiating room in Brussels - deal is NOT finalised - seems very likely it’s heading that way tonight but not signed and sealed

— Laura Kuenssberg (@bbclaurak) December 23, 2020

A source in the European Commission told Reuters that the talks are in their "final stages".

​Earlier, Reuters reported, citing a senior EU diplomat that a Brexit trade deal between the UK and the EU may be agreed as early as Wednesday evening.

A sign is seen outside a surgery in Wolverhampton, Britain that is delivering the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine, 14 December 2020

© REUTERS / CARL RECINE

'Days Away From the Cliff Edge': NHS Calls on UK PM to Extend Brexit Transition Period

Since the deal is to come into force from 1 January, EU member states will have to approve a provisional application of the agreement so that the European Parliament would have enough time to ratify it, according to the diplomat who was speaking to Reuters on condition of anonymity.

Recently, EU chief negotiator Michel Barnier said that Brussels and London have been making a "final push" to reach a deal before the 31 December deadline. Major differences are over fishing, especially access to UK waters by EU boats, as well as competition rules and mechanism to settle future trade disputes.

https://sputniknews.com/europe/202012231081550450-Deal-or-No-Deal-Conflicting-Reports-Abound-Over-UK-EU-Trade-Agreement-After-Brexit/

“They Don’t Want Results To Get Out”- Trump Blasts “Slow Walking” Of Georgia’s Signature Verification

President Trump is exposing the “slow walking” of Georgia’s signature verification.

They don’t want the results out before January 6th.

The Epoch Times reported on what the Trump campaign expects out of the audit:

A lawyer for Trump on Dec. 1 wrote to Secretary of State Brad Raffensberger for the “immediate audit” of tens of thousands of ballots.

“The Trump Campaign estimates that between 38,250 and 45,626 illegal votes from the absentee ballots alone were cast in the state of Georgia—far beyond the Biden-Harris ticket’s current margin of 12,670 votes,” according to a news release from Trump’s team at the time.

Why are Republicans slow walking signature verification in Georgia?

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/12/dont-want-results-get-trump-blasts-slow-walking-georgias-signature-verification/

FBI Reportedly Blames Iran for Hit List of Officials Who Rejected Trump’s Vote Fraud Claims

This is the second time Iran has been accused of ‘meddling’ in the 2020 US election.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has concluded that Iran was responsible for an online ‘Enemies of the People’ website listing the names, pictures, home addresses and other personal information of federal and state officials who rejected President Donald Trump’s election fraud claims, the Washington Post has reported, citing anonymous sources.

“We have known since day one that foreign actors seek to undermine trust in the United States’ elections process,” one source told the newspaper. “President Trump has perpetuated a false narrative that has allowed this type of foreign attack to penetrate the minds of American citizens,” the source added.

The website, created by a shadowy group and since taken down, proposed the assassination of senior officials and leaders of both the Republican and Democratic parties, as well as election officials, whom they alleged were complicit in manipulating the 2020 election in Joe Biden’s favour.

Among the targets were FBI director Christopher Wray and former Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency chief Christopher Krebs, the governors of the battleground states of Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Nevada and Michigan, voting machine company executives, and others, such as Georgia Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.

The virtual campaign also reportedly used the Twitter hashtags #remembertheirfaces and #NoQuarterForTraitors, although a cursory search of the hashtags shows them to have been used long before the 3 November vote, and for a variety of purposes unrelated to the hit list.

One state official told the newspaper that the FBI called individuals whose names appeared on the website and told them that Iran was behind the website.

This is the second time US officials have blamed Iran for meddling in the 2020 vote. In October, Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe claimed Iran had sent incendiary emails to Democratic voters posing as a pro-Trump extremist group and threatening to “come after” anyone who votes Biden.

Iran has yet to respond to the ‘Enemies of the People’ site claims, but blasted the earlier allegations as “malign and dangerous.”

“Unlike the US, Iran does not interfere in other countries’ elections. The world has been witnessing the US’s own desperate public attempts to question the outcome of its own elections at the highest level, Alireza Miryousefi, spokesman from the Iranian Mission to the United Nations, was quoted as saying at the time.

https://sputniknews.com/world/202012231081548312-fbi-reportedly-blames-iran-for-hit-list-of-officials-who-rejected-trumps-vote-fraud-claims/

Google Orders Scientists To 'Strike Positive Tone' Over AI, Other Technologies

Google is demanding that its scientists 'strike a positive tone' when discussing artificial intelligence and other company technologies, according to Reuters.

The Alphabet Inc. subsidiary has launched a "sensitive topics" review procedure, which requires researchers to consult with legal, policy and public relations teams before researching topics such as "face and sentiment analysis and categorizations of race, gender or political affiliation," according to internal documents explaining the policy.

"Advances in technology and the growing complexity of our external environment are increasingly leading to situations where seemingly inoffensive projects raise ethical, reputational, regulatory or legal issues," reads one of the documents designed for research staff, which current employees said was rolled out in June.

The “sensitive topics” process adds a round of scrutiny to Google’s standard review of papers for pitfalls such as disclosing of trade secrets, eight current and former employees said.

For some projects, Google officials have intervened in later stages. A senior Google manager reviewing a study on content recommendation technology shortly before publication this summer told authors to “take great care to strike a positive tone,” according to internal correspondence read to Reuters.

The manager added, “This doesn’t mean we should hide from the real challenges” posed by the software. -Reuters

According to four staff members including AI researcher Margaret Mitchell, Google is starting to interfere with crucial studies of potential harms from technology.

"If we are researching the appropriate thing given our expertise, and we are not permitted to publish that on grounds that are not in line with high-quality peer review, then we’re getting into a serious problem of censorship," said Mitchell, who was part of a 12-member team focusing on ethics in artificial intelligence software.

Tensions erupted earlier this month when Timnit Gebru, Mitchell's team lead, abruptly left the company after she says Google fired her for questioning an order not to publish research claiming that AI which mimics speech could disadvantage marginalized populations. In short, Google quashed internal criticism that violates one of the tenets of wokedom.

According to Google Senior Vice President Jeff Dean, Gebru's paper 'dwelled on potential harms without discussing efforts underway to address them," adding that Google supports AI ethics scholarship and is "actively working on improving our paper review processes, because we know that too many checks and balances can become cumbersome."

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/google-orders-scientists-strike-positive-tone-over-ai-other-technologies

Tyrannical Contagion: France Eyes Banning Anti-Vaxxers From Public Transportation

With 59 percent of French citizens refusing the vaccine, French Technocrats will make a deal that they cannot refuse: get jabbed or give up public transportation. This kind of extortion is being observed all over the world, including the U.S. ⁃ TN Editor

People who fail to get a Covid-19 vaccination could be banned from using public transport in France, according to a draft law sparking angry protests from opposition politicians on Tuesday.

Prime Minister Jean Castex on Monday got his cabinet’s backing for a bill that is designed to provide a legal framework for dealing with health crises, including the coronavirus pandemic.

According to the text, which will now be submitted to parliament, a negative Covid test or proof of a “preventative treatment, including the administration of a vaccine” could be required for people to be granted “access to transport or to some locations, as well as certain activities”.

The government’s vaccination campaign is to start on Sunday, and officials already face widespread resistance to a treatment developed in record time since the outbreak hit Europe early this year.

A recent poll by the Journal du Dimanche newspaper found that 59 percent of respondents said they would not get a Covid shot, one of the highest rates in the European Union.

President Emmanuel Macron has promised that coronavirus vaccinations, though strongly recommended, will not be mandatory, a pledge reiterated by Health Minister Olivier Veran on Tuesday.

“I say it once again, vaccination is not mandatory,” Veran said, while also appearing to leave the door open to modifications of the bill as it “matures” during parliamentary debates.

But opposition politicians condemned the draft law, with Marine Le Pen, leader of the far-right RN party, calling it an “essentially totalitarian” measure

“In a backhanded way, this bill does not aim to make vaccinations mandatory, but will prevent anybody who doesn’t comply from having a social life,” she said.

https://www.blacklistednews.com/article/78837/tyrannical-contagion-france-eyes-banning-antivaxxers-from-public.html

Another Flawed Data Model from Imperial College to Blame for Latest UK Lockdown

The source behind the claim that a new COVID-19 strain in the UK is 70% more transmissible, Dr. Erik Volz of Imperial College, admits that the model that produced that statistic is flawed and that it is “too early to tell” if the strain is more easily spread.

On Saturday, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced extreme new measures just before the holidays due to the emergence of a new COVID-19 variant. Per Johnson, as well as the UK’s Chief Medical Officer Chris Whitty who also spoke at Saturday’s press conference, the new strain – nicknamed VUI-202012/01– is around 70% more transmissible, but no evidence shows it to be any more severe or deadly than previous strains.

According to the BBC, Johnson’s assertion that the new variant “may be up to 70% more transmissible,” was based on the information discussed the day prior by the UK government’s New and Emerging Respiratory Virus Threats Advisory Group, or NERVTAG. Yet, as the BBC notes, this figure apparently comes from a single source, a 10 minute presentation delivered by Dr. Erik Volz of Imperial College given last Friday, the same day as the NERVTAG meeting.

Volz – a close colleague of the discredited Neil Ferguson – delivered the presentation to COVID-19 Genomics UK (COG-UK), a research consortium largely funded by the UK government and the Wellcome Trust and, in particular, the Wellcome Sanger Institute. The Wellcome Sanger Institute recently came under fire for “misusing” the DNA of Africans to develop a “gene chip without proper legal agreements” and an upcoming Unlimited Hangout report will detail the ties of the Wellcome Trust to the UK eugenics movement, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine. Notably, the Wellcome-funded scientist behind that vaccine candidate, Adrian Hill, was recently quoted by the Washington Post as saying that “We’re in the bizarre position of wanting COVID to stay, at least for a little while…But cases are declining.” The UK government, Google and other powerful stakeholders are positioned to profit from sales of that particular vaccine candidate.

According to Volz’s most recent publication, COG-UK “has resulted in the generation of >40,000 SARS-CoV-2 sequences from the country in <6 months (approximately half of all genomes sequenced globally as of 7 July)” and “has facilitated the usage of robust and systematic sampling and shared bioinformatic and laboratory approaches and the collection of consistent core metadata, resulting in a large, high-resolution dataset capable of examining changes in virus biology in the United Kingdom.”

https://www.naturalblaze.com/2020/12/another-flawed-data-model-from-imperial-college-to-blame-for-latest-uk-lockdown.html

Second mutant strain of coronavirus has already been found in the North AND London after being brought from South Africa - as infections soar again to new record of 39,237 with 744 more deaths and millions MORE are plunged into Tier 4 from Boxing Day

Two cases of the South African variant of the virus — called 501.V2 — have been detected so far in the UK

Second mutated strain to be found in as many weeks and this version is even 'more transmissible' than first

Matt Hancock said discovery was 'highly concerning' and slapped immediate travel bans on South Africa

Unrelated cases found in London and the North West suggest the virus is likely all over England already

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9082981/Matt-Hancock-plunges-parts-England-Tier-4-Boxing-Day.html

Predicted by many as soon as the Vax comes out a new strain will appear, like clockwork

Attorney Marc Elias Leads Democrat Effort to Overturn House Race in Iowa’s 2nd District

Attorney Marc Elias filed a request Tuesday on behalf of Democrat Rita Hart that asks the U.S. House of Representatives to overturn the election result in Iowa’s second congressional district, which was won by Republican Marianette Miller-Meeks.

Elias, a partner at the Perkins Coie law firm, was responsible for hiring Fusion GPS in 2016 to compile the “Russia dossier” that led to FBI surveillance of the Trump campaign and the subsequent investigations into supposed “Russia collusion.” He frequently represents Democrats in challenges to election results, and filed lawsuits nationwide to expand vote-by-mail in 2020, including the ongoing runoffs for U.S. Senate in Georgia.

Though he styles himself as a defender of voters’ rights, Elias is often involved in efforts to overturn the official results of elections, including Hart’s challenge to the Iowa result.

🚨UPDATE: Notice of Contest To Be Filed Today with U.S House Shows Uncounted Votes Will Affirm Rita Hart Winner in IA-2 District Racehttps://t.co/KmjAqIuu9H

— Marc E. Elias (@marceelias) December 22, 2020

Miller-Meeks’s victory was certified by the state’s canvassing board. Hart is hoping that Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and her party will use the House Administration Committee to overturn a contested House election for the first time since 1985.

In his filing, Elias claims that state election officials excluded 22 valid “curbside and absentee” ballots, 18 of which were supposedly cast for Hart. He also says that some recounts at the county level failed to “conduct a hand review of ballots that were recognized as ‘overvotes’ or write-in ballots by the [voting] machines.”

He cites the same Equal Protection Clause arguments that he has opposed elsewhere in fighting challenges by President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/12/23/attorney-marc-elias-leads-democrat-effort-to-overturn-house-race-in-iowas-2nd-district/

Coronavirus Stimulus Package Specifically Blocks School Choice

The 5,600-page coronavirus stimulus bill passed by Congress Monday evening specifically blocks governors from using emergency education relief funds for school choice programs.

Page 1,865 of the 5,600-page bill states under “Restrictions” for the use of the $2.75 billion allotted for the Governors Emergency Education Relief (GEER) fund, created in the earlier coronavirus relief bill in March:

Funds provided under this section shall not be used … (B) to provide or support vouchers, tuition tax credit programs, education savings accounts, scholarships, scholarship programs, or tuition-assistance programs for elementary or secondary education.

Eric Boehm wrote at Reason Tuesday the new restrictions on GEER funds come “seemingly in response to the fact that several governors used the first round of GEER funding to launch or expand school choice programs.”

The pro-school choice American Federation for Children (AFC), said in a statement that, in passing the bill with that restriction on governors, Republicans and Democrats who voted in favor of the legislation are largely promoting the “status quo in education.”

“At a time when families are extremely frustrated and 77 percent of parents with school age children in public school want more school choice, Congress will pump $54 billion into the K-12 system and remove the flexibility afforded to Governors under the previous CARES Act,” AFC said, noting further:

Democrats in Congress at the behest of the teachers’ unions forced a retreat from the one innovative education policy that was included in the CARES Act – the Governors Emergency Education Relief (GEER) fund. Congress has restricted the use of those funds to prevent Governors from using them to create or augment educational choice programs in their states.

John Schilling, AFC president, said in a statement America’s non-public schools “have worked hard to safely and responsibly re-open, incurring significant costs to do so”:

The same cannot be said for too many traditional public schools. We urged Congress to think boldly in this time of crisis by including Sen. Tim Scott’s School Choice Now legislation, which would have channeled non-public school relief directly to families and created a federal tax credit that would have provided much needed flexibility and choice for public and non-public school families alike.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/12/23/coronavirus-stimulus-package-specifically-blocks-school-choice/

Exodus Continues as Former Netanyahu Loyalist Resigns, Joins Rival Sa'ar

Ze’ev Elkin, who served in a range of posts including Netanyahu’s coalition head, blasts ‘cult of personality’

Minister of Higher Education Ze'ev Elkin resigned from the government Wednesday evening and is expected to join Gideon Sa'ar's New Hope party, abandoning Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Likud.

In his resignation letter to Netanyahu, Elkin wrote, "I can no longer call on the citizens of Israel to vote for you and trust that you will work in their interests."

https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/elections/.premium-exodus-continues-as-former-netanyahu-loyalist-resigns-joins-rival-sa-ar-1.9396628

Sorry, America, You’re Wrong, the Jews Did Not Kill Jesus

A poll released last week by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) reports that twenty-six percent of the American public continues to believe that “Jews were responsible for the death of Jesus.” Although the number has dropped from 31% in 2011, the ADL described it as “surprisingly large.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/sorry-america-youre-wrong-the-jews-did-not-kill-jesus

>>12147908

1 Thessalonians 2:13-16

13 And we also thank God continually because, when you received the word of God, which you heard from us, you accepted it not as a human word, but as it actually is, the word of God, which is indeed at work in you who believe. 14 For you, brothers and sisters, became imitators of God’s churches in Judea, which are in Christ Jesus: You suffered from your own people the same things those churches suffered from the Jews 15 who killed the Lord Jesus and the prophets and also drove us out. They displease God and are hostile to everyone 16 in their effort to keep us from speaking to the Gentiles so that they may be saved. In this way they always heap up their sins to the limit. The wrath of God has come upon them at last.[b]