BBC Hands Islamic State Terror Bride a 10-Episode Podcast

The publicly-funded British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has again been accused of wasting taxpayer money after handing an Islamic State bride a 10-part podcast series.

Shamima Begum, who travelled from the United Kingdom to Syria in 2015 to defect to the Islamic State and was later stripped of her British citizenship, has been given a 10-part podcast series on the BBC to tell her story.

Titled ‘I’m Not a Monster’, the podcast which heavily features Begum is hosted by journalist Josh Baker, who claims he wants to know “the truth about what really happened”.

However, with the British media seemingly being obsessed with giving the defector prominent and sympathetic if not positive coverage over the last few years — despite there being plenty of other ISIS defectors stripped of citizenship they could choose to highlight — some have accused the publicly owned broadcaster of “wasting” taxpayer money with the series.

According to a report by The Sun on the response to the podcast, many critics have expressed concern over the BBC’s decision to dedicate such an extensive podcast to Begum, who is currently battling to regain her British citizenship.

The publication lists one commentator as questioning why the former ISIS supporter was being given a platform “while the victims of grooming gangs are still trying to be heard and get justice,” for example.

However, the BBC has defended the podcast as reportedly being aimed at separating “fact from fiction”.

“This is not a platform for Shamima Begum to give her unchallenged story,” a spokesman for the broadcaster claimed.

“This is a robust, public interest investigation in which Josh Baker has forensically examined who she really is and what she really did.”

“We’d also encourage people to listen to the podcast and make up their own mind,” they added — although why Begum should be deserving of such disproportionate coverage either way was, as ever, not explained.

Even if the podcast intends to do more than just take Begum’s telling of the story at face value, with its first episode posted on Wednesday investigating the information surrounding her trip to Syria, the series’ release still comes at a time when the Brtish media seems strangely keen to give the jihadi bride sympatheti coverage.

For instance, back in 2021, one of Britain’s more supposedly “conservative” newspapers, The Telegraph, gave the woman a very positive write-up, even going into bizarre detail as to the Western clothes she was wearing.

Gushing that “Today Shamima Begum looks more suited to a shopping trip on Oxford Street than life in a camp for hardened jihadists”, the article took great efforts to humanise the former ISIS affiliate who currently remains stuck in a refugee camp in Syria.

However, despite the positive media cover of Begum, as well as her claims that she is “not the person” many fear she is, questions remain as to the extent of her involvement with Islamic State.

For instance, some reports have described the woman as being a strict “enforcer” of Islamic State laws during her time in the caliphate, with some saying she helped “stitching the vests” onto suicide bombers.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2023/01/12/bbc-hands-islamic-state-terror-bride-a-10-episode-podcast/

Sweden Convicts Islamic State Jihadi Bride over Child Rapes, Human Trafficking

In what is being touted as a historic case, a Swedish court has convicted a female Islamic State member for human trafficking and facilitating the rape of children in Iraq and Syria.

The woman, who is said to be in her sixties and was previously married to a high-ranking Islamic State leader, was convicted and sentenced by the Solna district Court — but only to a sentence of six years and ten months.

The woman took her two young daughters to Syria in 2014 and 2015 in order to live in the “caliphate” then controlled by the Islamic State terrorist organisation, broadcaster SVT reports.

“The woman’s purpose in doing so had been to help establish and live in an Islamic state ordered under a strict Salafist interpretation of Islam, governed by the Islamic State,” the Solna District Court stated.

It emerged during the trial that the woman had taken her underage daughters to the Islamic State territory in order to marry them off, and she was accused by the court of sexually exploiting them.

A man originally from the no-go Stockholm suburb of Jarva was convicted alongside the woman. He is said to have married one of her daughters when she was under 15 years old.

The man had previously been convicted of raping children between 2013 and 2015 but was only given a short eight years and ten months sentence.

Prosecutor Karolina Wieslander commented on the verdict in the woman’s case, saying: “It’s a very important judgment. In Sweden, this is the first conviction of its kind.”

While some Islamic State women have been charged for crimes committed overseas in Iraq and Syria in Sweden, including one charged with forcing her own son into becoming a child soldier, very few convictions have been reported relative to the numbers who travelled to the erstwhile caliphate.

Many have claimed the reason for the lack of convictions is the level of difficulty in pursuing such cases, with Swedish terror expert Magnus Ranstorp urging the government not to repatriate Islamic State women due to the lack of sufficient laws to prosecute their activities.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2023/01/12/sweden-convicts-islamic-state-jihadi-bride-over-child-rapes-human-trafficking/

Millions of heads of American cattle could soon “starve to death” due to rail, feed crisis

California-based poultry producer Foster Farms is petitioning the Service Transportation Board (STB) for emergency assistance, warning that its dairy cattle and chickens are running out of food, and fast.

Blaming extreme weather conditions, Union Pacific (UP) rail delivery failures, and other factors, Foster Farms says the “point has again been reached where hundreds of thousands of dairy cattle are not being fed, and … millions of chickens will starve to death because of UP’s service failures.”

A day after the petition was submitted, a U.S. freight rail regulator ordered UP to deliver five trains of feed to Foster Farms. However, only one of those trains arrived as scheduled, according to the company.

Because chickens are smaller than cattle, they risk dying more quickly without food than their larger counterparts. To prevent this, Foster Farms says it is diverting cattle feed to its chickens for the time being.

Responding to the complaint, UP blamed its delivery delays on bad weather, which now includes washouts in California due to numerous “atmospheric river” events, as well as rockslides in Nevada. (Related: We warned you about all this and more last year.)

“Union Pacific continues to work closely with Foster Farms, providing daily updates and delivering the trains addressed in the order,” a spokeswoman from the company said.

“Systemic problems,” not just weather, to blame for UP train failures

Four of the five UP feed trains have since arrived, after which Foster Farms wrote in an STB filing that it believes there is more to the story than just bad weather.

“While Foster Farms concedes that weather played a part, it also believes this failure is indicative of systemic problems within UP that will persist,” the company said.

As you may recall, UP and other major rail lines have been on the verge of a nationwide strike for many months now. Failed negotiations with unions and the Biden regime have left a precarious situation that seems to get worse by the day.

Since October, three Foster Farms facilities are undersupplied due to UP delays. In the past six months, Foster Farms has twice attempted to get emergency assistance with very little success.

“In June, Foster Farms said it was on the verge of euthanizing millions of birds because of delays in feed shipments, and it received a rare emergency service order from the STB to alleviate the crisis,” reported The Wall Street Journal. “This type of order was the first in more than a decade.”

That same month, the Foster family sold off the company to Atlas Holdings, prompting Donnie Smith, a former CEO of competitor Tyson, to come out of retirement to take over the company.

“There were very few opportunities that would cause me to, frankly, get out of what was a deliriously happy retirement,” Smith said. “I had a very fulfilling retirement, but for me, this was such an intriguing and such a phenomenal opportunity for me … I just couldn’t say no.”

All of this is a crying shame, considering California used to be the “breadbasket” of the nation. Without working rail lines and stable feed supplies, poultry and cattle are at risk of dying, which means mass starvation could be looming for the millions of Americans who rely on these animals for food.

“This is being orchestrated,” wrote a commenter about the situation. “The first complaints about the railroad, just last year, were when they limited amounts of fertilizer being delivered for agricultural use, limiting crop yields. Now they’re going after the meat industry.”

https://www.newstarget.com/2023-01-11-millions-american-cattle-starve-death-rail-feed.html

New study reveals rampant conflicts of interest at think tanks

The report focuses heavily on how the nuclear industry influences institutional output in its favor and works to censor its critics.

“Scholars, media organizations, and members of the public should be sensitized to the conflicts of interest shaping foreign policy analysis generally and nuclear policy analysis specifically,” is the conclusion of new academic research that documents how think tank funders are shaping the foreign policy debate.

The study, “No such thing as a free donation: research funding and conflicts of interest in nuclear weapons policy analysis,” authored by Kjølv Egeland and Benoît Pelopidas of the Center for International Studies in Paris, was released in late December by Sage. After an exhaustive review of the world’s top foreign policy think tanks — including the Brookings Institution, the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Atlantic Council, and many more — the authors found that they all receive “donations from actors with interests in the perpetuation of the extant nuclear order.” The study then answers the question posed in its title — “No such thing as a free donation?” — by showing exactly how these donations provide funders with considerable influence over these institutions’ work and the marketplace of ideas.

Through interviews with grant managers and former and current employees at these think tanks, the authors identified numerous instances where funding biased these organizations’ work through outright censorship, self-censorship, and perspective filtering.

The authors found that outright censorship was rare, but could have dramatic effects on these organizations’ products. One former think tank employee explained that a research project had been canceled at the request of a major funder. Another recounted how an entire think tank they were working at had been bankrupted when a nuclear umbrella state abruptly canceled its funding. By his account, this was “unquestionably done for political reasons,” as the institution “had been doing a lot of critical work on nuclear deterrence and security, questioning orthodox thinking.”

An analyst at yet another think tank recounted how funder pressure led to direct censoring of its report “away from controversial or critical analysis,” with analysts there being told, “Don’t talk about government militarism…talk about what the terrorists are doing instead.”

Self-censorship, on the other hand, is much more commonplace, according to the study. In fact, nearly all of the analysts interviewed said they engaged in it, as did their colleagues.

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2023/01/11/new-study-reveals-rampant-conflicts-of-interest-at-think-tanks/

Lawsuit accuses former Barclays, JPMorgan exec of being a part of Jefferey Epstein's sex ring - who they said he had a 'profound friendship' with and exchanged 1,200 emails from his work account

Jes Staley, 66, accused of having 'profound friendship' with billionaire pedophile

US Virgin Islands claims JPMorgan had a relationship with Epstein through 2012

'Staley exchanged approximately 1,200 emails with Epstein' from work account

During that time, the bank 'serviced approximately 55 Epstein-related accounts'

Former Barclays and JP Morgan exec Jes Staley is accused of being an operative in late billionaire pedophile Jeffrey Epstein's sex ring, after thousands of emails between the two reveal a 'profound friendship,' a lawsuit claims.

The filing was made in an an amended complaint Tuesday by the US Virgin Islands, which had previously sued JPMorgan over the bank's ties to Epstein. Staley worked at JPMorgan until 2013.

'Between 2008 and 2012, Staley exchanged approximately 1,200 emails with Epstein from his JP Morgan email account,' the amendment alleges. During that time, the bank 'serviced approximately 55 Epstein-related accounts collectively worth hundreds of millions of dollars.'

Staley, 66, had quit Barclays in November 2021 after the bank's board said it was 'disappointed' with the outcome of a report into his links to convicted sex offender Epstein.

he US Virgin Islands' suit also claims that Staley was allowed 'to remain a decision-maker on Epstein's accounts' and even asked to discuss the historical, sordid sex trafficking and human trafficking allegations against him.

In addition, JPMorgan allegedly would make payments to 'numerous women with Eastern European surnames who were publicly and internally identified as Epstein recruiters,' including a $600,000 payment to one Jane Doe who the pedophile purchased when she was just 14 years old.

The complaint goes on to say that Hyperion Air, who owned Epstein's infamous 'Lolita Express' private jet, also issued hundreds of thousands of dollars in checks payable to cash for fuel expenses.

'Many of these cash withdrawals either exceeded the $10,000 reporting threshold or were seemingly structured to avoid triggering the reporting requirement,' the lawsuit claims. 'This is particularly significant since it is well known that Epstein paid his victims in cash.'

Epstein is accused of misusing JPMorgan accounts for nonprofit organizations and used it to pay associates like Les Wexner, as well as ex-girlfriends.

Many thought the lawsuit against JPMorgan might go dead after former Attorney General Denise George was fired shortly after the initial suit was filed.

When Staley quit Barclays in 2021, the American banker intends to contest the findings. He is reportedly 'shell-shocked, angry and upset' at the preliminary conclusion of the report.

Barclays meanwhile pointed out that the probe makes no findings that he saw, or was aware of, any of Epstein's alleged crimes.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11625647/Lawsuit-accuses-former-Barclays-JPMorgan-exec-involved-Jeffrey-Epstein-sex-ring.html

Ukraine Is Shedding Blood for ‘NATO Mission’: Ukrainian Defense Minister

Zelensky says Ukraine wants more than NATO's 'open door'

Ukrainian Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov said last week that Ukraine is “shedding blood” for a “NATO mission” in candid remarks about the relationship between Kyiv and the Western military alliance.

“At the NATO Summit in Madrid (in June 2022), it was clearly delineated that over the coming decade, the main threat to the alliance would be the Russian Federation. Today, Ukraine is eliminating this threat,” Reznikov said in an interview on Ukrainian TV last week.

“We are carrying out NATO’s mission today. They aren’t shedding their blood. We’re shedding ours. That’s why they’re required to supply us with weapons,” he added.

Reznikov’s comments reflect Russia’s view that they are not just fighting against Ukrainian forces in the war but also against the US and NATO. Reznikov insisted that Ukraine would eventually become a NATO member and said it was already a “de facto” part of the alliance since Kyiv is already armed with so much advanced NATO military equipment.

While Ukraine was promised eventual NATO membership in 2008, it has been repeatedly denied official NATO membership in recent years. But Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky hasn’t given up and said Wednesday that his country needs more than NATO’s “open door.”

“For today, just support for Ukraine from colleagues in NATO and support in the form of rhetoric about open doors is not enough for Ukraine. Namely, not enough to motivate our state … our soldiers,” Zelensky said.

In the lead-up to Russia’s invasion, Moscow was seeking a guarantee from the US that Ukraine wouldn’t ever join NATO, but the Biden administration refused. Shortly after the invasion, Zelensky said he was told privately that Ukraine won’t be joining NATO.

“I requested them personally to say directly that we are going to accept you into NATO in a year or two or five, just say it directly and clearly, or just say no,” Zelensky said in March. “And the response was very clear, you’re not going to be a NATO member, but publicly, the doors will remain open.”

https://news.antiwar.com/2023/01/11/ukraine-is-shedding-blood-for-nato-mission-ukrainian-defense-minister/

Doug Emhoff to visit Poland and Germany to combat rise in global antisemitism

Jewish husband of US Vice President Harris will mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, visit Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp, meet European special envoys in Berlin

Doug Emhoff, the husband of US Vice President Kamala Harris, is set to visit Poland and Germany later this month to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day and to hold meetings aimed at combating rising antisemitism in the US and around the world.

Emhoff, the first Jewish person to be married to one of the top two nationally elected US officials, will visit Krakow, Poland, including a stop at the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp. He will then travel to Berlin join a meeting of European special envoys and coordinators working to combat antisemitism.

The January 26-31 trip comes as Emhoff takes on an increasingly vocal role in working to address anti-Jewish rhetoric and violence globally. It will serve as one of his most high-profile solo engagements since Harris and US President Joe Biden were elected.

At Auschwitz-Birkenau, Emhoff will participate in a wreath-laying ceremony during the International Holocaust Remembrance Day commemoration. He will be joined on parts of the trip by Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt, the US special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism. He is also expected to meet with local Jewish communities and civil society leaders and tour local historic and cultural sites.

Ahead of the trip, Emhoff on Thursday will meet with the Democratic and Republican co-chairs of the House bipartisan task force for combating antisemitism.

Emhoff’s focus on global antisemitism comes a month after he addressed rising domestic extremism during a roundtable with Jewish leaders at the White House.

“I understand the weight of this responsibility — I do,” he said. “And as second gentleman, let me reiterate, I will not remain silent. I’m proud to be Jewish, and I’m proud to live openly as a Jew. I am not afraid. We cannot live in fear. We refuse to be afraid.”

In recent months, former US president Donald Trump hosted Nick Fuentes, a Holocaust-denying white supremacist, at his Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach, Florida. The rapper Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, expressed love for Adolf Hitler in an interview. Basketball star Kyrie Irving appeared to promote an antisemitic film on social media. Neo-Nazi trolls are clamoring to return to Twitter as new CEO Elon Musk grants “amnesty” to suspended accounts.

Emhoff, a successful entertainment lawyer in California when his wife was elected vice president, has also spoken publicly about his great-grandparents fleeing persecution in what is now Poland for the US.

“As long as I have this microphone, I am going to speak out against hate, bigotry and lies,” he said. “I am going to speak out against those who praise fascist murderers and idealize extremists. I am going to speak out against Holocaust deniers. I’m going to call those out who won’t do it.”

https://www.timesofisrael.com/doug-emhoff-to-visit-poland-and-germany-to-combat-rise-in-global-antisemitism/

Cover up mechanism put in place

https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1613602655590547456

WHO secretly discusses changes to existing international law

Appointed health experts and bureaucrats discuss amendments to international health regulations this week during secret, backdoor discussions.

The United Nation's World Health Organization (WHO) is attempting a global coup by amending existing international law, as per the alarm bells of researcher James Roguski.

Roguski has been closely following the actions of the WHO as it moves to strengthen its mandate in a ‘post COVID’ world.

He is sounding the alarm on the secret, back-door meetings underway this week (January 9 – 13) in Geneva, that will focus on proposed amendments to existing international law through a Working Group on the Amendments to the International Health Regulations (IHR).

The amendments are being overseen by a special IHR expert Review Committee (RC), comprised of appointed, unelected ‘health experts’ and bureaucrats who operate primarily in secret.

“They are sworn to confidentiality. The IHR RC answers only to the Director General [of the WHO, Tedros],” Roguski states, hinting further at the clandestine way these committees operate.

The WHO can already impose a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC) whenever they deem there to be a health threat.

Roguski cynically renamed the acronym to be the ‘Pharmaceutical Hospital Emergency Industrial Complex,’ which he suspects will essentially usher in a surveillance state in the future.

It’s all under the guise of "maintaining preparedness.” For instance, Article 1 amendments include one that would enforce member states to share resources readily at the directive of the WHO to ensure ‘equitable access.’

“These are more international surveillance recommendations,” says Roguski. Budi Gunadi Sadikin, Indonesia’s Health Minister, submitted a proposal to impose a global health certificate:

https://www.rebelnews.com/who_secretly_discusses_changes_to_existing_international_law

The Dutch farmers have created their own political party, and it's doing well in the polls

The Dutch farm intensively, being the second largest exporter of food worldwide (after the USA). Yet their agribusiness is not owned solely by big business. In the USA, four companies dominate the meat industry. In 2022, by contrast, most Dutch meat companies had one employee, 60 had two, and only 35 have more than 100. Dutch farming is not in the hands of massive corporations but still owned and operated by small scale local farmers who rely on each other.

https://www.lifesitenews.com/opinion/the-dutch-farmers-have-created-their-own-political-party-and-its-doing-well-in-the-polls/

Minnesota Poised To Ban Christians, Muslims, And Jews From Teaching In Public Schools

Minnesota will soon ban faithful Christians, Muslims, and Jews from teaching in public schools by requiring that every state-certified teacher “fosters an environment that ensures student identities such as … gender identity … are … affirmed.” Once the new requirements clear a final procedural hurdle, they will be immediately challenged in state and possibly federal court, a civil liberties lawyer told The Federalist on Tuesday.

“We have lots of parents who are upset by this sort of thing in schools already,” said Doug Seaton, president of Minnesota’s Upper Midwest Law Center, in an interview. “They’re going to be even more upset with how their teachers are going to be licensed. Their teachers are going to have to be faced with hiding their beliefs or getting denied [for a state teaching license].”

Seaton said it was accurate to describe the nearly finalized regulations as communicating: “Christians, Muslims, and Jews need not apply for Minnesota teaching jobs.” That is unconstitutional, he said, so UMLC plans to sue once the changes go into effect.

The state agency that composed the changes disputed they would effectively ban religious Americans from teaching in Minnesota schools through a spokeswoman on Wednesday. The spokeswoman did not respond to a follow-up asking how Christians, Jews, and Muslims could adhere to their faith while complying with the licensing requirements that all new teachers publicly reject their faiths’ declaration that God has created only two sexes, male and female.

Minnesota’s Professional Educator Licensing and Standards Board (PELSB), a division of the state Department of Education, has been working to change teacher certification requirements since 2019. Its latest public draft, which is finalized save for a few tweaks that don’t affect the content, includes multiple requirements that licensure candidates publicly support critical race theory and transgender ideology and include both in their teaching. Teachers must receive state licensure to be employed in Minnesota public and many private schools.

PELSB justified its changes by claiming “the predominantly white teacher workforce must be equipped to understand their own implicit bias and the unique lived experiences of all their students as a core requirement of teaching. For this reason, PELSB has worked closely with a wide range of stakeholders, including researchers and experts in the field of pedagogy, to ensure that anti-racism, cultural competency, and implicit bias were effectively embedded and identified throughout the scope of the proposed Standards of Effective Practice” (page 62).

“Standards for effective teaching” 1A in the nearly finalized regulations requires a teacher candidate to “affirm[] the validity of students’ backgrounds and identities.”

https://thefederalist.com/2023/01/12/minnesota-poised-to-ban-christians-muslims-and-jews-from-teaching-in-public-schools/

Funny af

Twitter put a sensitive warning on this video because it exposes the Hypocrisy of the war in the Ukraine

https://twitter.com/alexstein99/status/1613242297252204544

Journalist Reveals Senate Passed Secret Measure In December That Further Confirms Pelosi Was “Queen of the Mob” On January 6th

The Gateway Pundit has reported consistently on Pelosi’s culpability for the events on January 6th and how she escaped legal and moral accountability. PJ Media on Sunday released an article further confirming that Pelosi was the main person responsible for the riot.

Victoria Taft, the author of the piece, revealed senators passed a measure on December 12 removing Pelosi’s authority to call out the National Guard. The responsibility was instead handed over to the Capitol Police.

We all know how badly the Capitol Police botched the handling of the riot, ignoring several warnings and refusing to call in backup. Imagine if Pelosi could have summoned the National Guard with a simple phone call.

But the Senate removed her power altogether. They almost certainly knew Pelosi had no intention of calling in the Guard and may have even wanted the January 6th riot to happen altogether so she could impeach Donald Trump and try to bar him from ever holding office again.

Here are the key parts from Taft’s enlightening article:

A little-noticed bill passed before Christmas shows that the U.S. Senate knows Nancy Pelosi had more to do with the U.S. Capitol breach on January 6, 2021, than anything President Trump did that day. Indeed, Nancy Pelosi could be crowned Queen of the Mob, since her actions led to the crashing of the perimeter fences, general dysfunction, and deaths of Trump supporters that day.

Pelosi was more responsible for the marauding mob at the Capitol that day than anything President Trump did to “incite” his huge crowd of supporters — which he probably did not.

And here’s how we know this.

On Monday night, December 12, senators unanimously passed a measure to remove authority for calling out the National Guard from politicians like Nancy Pelosi and gave it over to the Capitol Police.

Pelosi’s office “was heavily involved in planning and decision-making before and during the events of Jan. 6, 2021, and micromanaged the Sergeant at Arms,” according to texts and other communications that came to light after January 6.

From early December 2020, Pelosi aides attended regular meetings with Irving and Sund to discuss the security plan. So hands-on was Pelosi’s chief of staff Terri McCullough that, at one point, she was editing details of parking, event timing and “language regarding official business visitors” for the Joint Session.

The Pelosi team’s messages and posts were exposed in an investigative report by the same House Republicans Pelosi removed from the J6 Committee. The messages show how Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund begged Pelosi and the Sergeant at Arms to plus-up security. His request for help was only satisfied after the riot fizzled out.

The New York Post reported that the GOP investigation showed that “House Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving, who answered to Pelosi as one of three voting members of the Capitol Police Board, ‘succumbed to political pressures from the Office of Speaker Pelosi and House Democrat leadership,’ was compromised by politics and did not adequately prepare for violence at the Capitol.”

The House and Senate sergeant at arms and Capitol Police Chief Sund resigned their jobs after the disaster, which could have been prevented.

But in a move the same week, the Democrat-run Senate tacitly affirmed that Nancy Pelosi royally screwed up by failing to take Trump up on his offer of using the Guard and preventing what the J6 Cassandras said was worse than the Civil War or the 9/11 attacks.

If anyone deserves prison for what happened on January 6, it is Nancy Pelosi. What a corrupt and cynical woman.

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/victoria-taft/2023/01/08/more-proof-that-nancy-pelosi-was-more-responsible-for-j6-riot-than-trump-n1659840

WHO Encourages Mask Wearing On Long-Haul Flights

Countries should consider recommending travelers to wear masks in high-risk settings such as long-haul flights, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Tuesday, citing the rapid spread of the latest COVID-19 Omicron subvariant XBB.1.5 in the United States—even though nothing currently suggests that it brings more severe disease than previous strains.

Mask wearing on long-haul flights “should be a recommendation issued to passengers arriving from anywhere where there is widespread COVID-19 transmission,” Catherine Smallwood, the WHO’s senior emergency officer for Europe, told reporters at a press briefing on Jan. 10.

In Europe, the XBB1.5 subvariant is being detected in small but growing numbers, WHO and Europe officials said.

“Countries need to look at the evidence base for pre-departure testing,” and if action is considered, “travel measures should be implemented in a non-discriminatory manner,” Smallwood said.

That did not mean the WHO recommended testing for passengers from the United States at this stage, she added.

Measures that could be taken include genomic surveillance and targeting passengers from other countries as long as it does not divert resources from domestic surveillance systems. Others include monitoring wastewater around points of entry such as airports.

Her remarks come just weeks after Ashish Jha, the White House’s COVID-19 coordinator, said during a recent discussion with the Philadelphia Inquirer that “no study in the world that shows that masks work that well.”

Nothing currently suggests that XBB.1.5 brings more severe disease compared to previous strains of Omicron, an official from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recently told CBS News. The WHO itself noted in November 2022 that the Omicron COVID-19 variant, although more transmissible, has, in general, caused less severe disease compared to previous COVID-19 variants of concern, such as Delta.

Most Transmissible Subvariant of Omicron

XBB.1.5 is considered to be the most transmissible Omicron subvariant detected so far in the United States, accounting for an estimated 27.6 percent of COVID-19 cases in the United States for the week ending Jan. 7, per CDC data.

XBB.1.5 is another descendant of Omicron, the most contagious and now globally dominant variant of the virus that causes COVID-19. XBB.1.5 is an offshoot of XBB, which was first identified in India in August and quickly became dominant in the country. XBB has also been responsible for the increase in COVID-19 cases in parts of Asia, including Singapore.

XBB is a recombinant of two subvariants that descended from the Omicron BA.2 subvariant. This means that genetic data from two versions of the virus that descended from BA.2 that had infected a person at the same time combined during the viral replication process to form the new XBB subvariant.

https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/who-encourages-mask-wearing-long-haul-flights

Who Is Merrick Garland’s Special Counsel Robert Hur? …He Partnered with Chris Wray at DC Law Firm and Later Was Rod Rosenstein’s Top Lieutenant

Biden Attorney General Merrick Garland announced on Thursday the DOJ was launching a Special Counsel to investigate Joe Biden’s mishandling of top secret classified documents as Vice President of the United States.

This comes after a second batch of classified documents was found in his Delaware garage next to his Corvette.

Garland nominated Robert Hur to investigate Joe Biden’s criminal activity. Unlike the US president, the vice president does not have the right to take and store classified government documents.

Robert Hur was a US Attorney for the District of Maryland from April 2018 to February 2021. Hur was a Trump nominee.

Robert Hur was a partner with Chris Wray at the powerhouse law firm King & Spalding in 2015.

Hur later became a top lieutenant to Rod Rosenstein, a serial liar who pushed the Trump-Russia lie for several years, the U.S. deputy attorney general.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/01/merrick-garlands-special-counsel-robert-hur-partnered-chris-wray-dc-law-firm-later-rod-rosensteins-top-lieutenant/

MCCARTHY: "You watched them leak photos of sitting out files of President Trump. Where's the photos of President Biden's documents? […] This is what makes America not trust their government."

https://twitter.com/Breaking911/status/1613611104868892695

>>18131262

THIS