Protests in Lebanon and Iraq were caused by internal problems but are manipulated by external forces. Today an Iraqi leader exposed those forces which might well bring that problem to an end. Lebanon will still have to suffer through more strife.

AFP reports of more bloody protests in Iraq:

Anti-government protests in Iraq entered their third week with fresh bloodshed on Friday, as leaders appeared to have closed rank around the country's embattled premier.

More than a dozen demonstrators died in Baghdad and the southern port city of Basra within 24 hours, medical sources told AFP.

The reporter listened to some protesters and it is interesting what voices s/he chose to repeated:

"Even if it comes down to the last man, we have to enter the Green Zone and bring it down," another protester shouted.

"We'll announce our people's revolution from there against everyone who stole from us — Prime Minister Adel Abdel Mahdi, Qais al-Khazaali, Hadi al-Ameri!" he said.

Khazaali and Ameri are leading commanders in the Hashed al-Shaabi paramilitary network, which has publicly backed the government after protests erupted.

It was founded in 2014 to fight the Islamic State group, drawing from a host of Shiite armed factions, many of which have close ties to Iran.

A month ago we wrote that the legitimate protests in Iraq and Lebanon are used by the U.S. for coup attempts financed by Saudi money. The actual target of the coup attempts are those groups who have the support of Iran – Hizbullah in Lebanon and the Hashd al Shaabi in Iraq. That is why the AFP piece quotes those who attack the leaders of the Hashed which was founded, trained and equipped by Iran. It is now standard in 'western' reporting to falsely depict the protests as being against those entities.

We also warned that these protest might escalate:

Cont. reading: Grand Ayatollah Sistani Warns Against U.S. Coup Plot In Iraq

News & views …

What's up with Jared Kushner's great Middle East peace plan? It seems to be as much alive as that famous parrot.

The other big Middle East project the Trump administration launched intended to achieve a new nuclear deal with Iran. That project isn't doing well either.

Secretary Pompeo @SecPompeo – 20:29 UTC · May 8, 2019
Today marks one year since President @realDonaldTrump made the historic decision to leave the Iran nuclear deal and embark on a bold new strategy to counter #Iran. Our maximum pressure campaign has already achieved historic success.

Secretary Pompeo @SecPompeo – 19:48 UTC · Jun 19, 2019
We’ve imposed the toughest sanctions ever on the Iranian regime. Our pressure is working. We'll continue this line of effort to convince Iran not to move forward with their nuclear program, development of missiles, & the other malign activities they've been engaged in globally.

The proof of the 'historic success' of the ever working 'maximum pressure' is this:

Cont. reading: As ‘Maximum Pressure’ Fails To Move Iran Dirty Tricks Become More Likely

Eight and a half years ago when the war on Syria began, Turkey played the most important role. Weapons were smuggled from Libya through Turkey to be delivered to 'Syrian rebels'. Over the years tens of thousands of foreign Jihadis traveled through Turkey to join the various groups fighting against the Syrian government. After the Islamic State came into existence even more followed.

When the U.S. changed course and started to fight ISIS it urged Turkey to clamp down on the stream of fresh fighters. Turkey did so to some extent after several ISIS bombings killed dozens within Turkey. But recent events show that Turkey still does not see ISIS as an adversary. Nor do ISIS leaders fear Turkish authorities.

On October 26 2019 President Donald Trump announced that U.S. special forces had killed ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Baghdadi and two of his wives were found in a house in Barisha village in Idleb governorate in Syria. Barisha is just 5 kilometer (3 miles) from the Turkish border and the Turkish city Reyhanli. The Idleb region (darker green) is under Jihadi control but Turkey has several outposts within the area.

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The Guardian reported that Baghdadi's entourage had reached Idleb from east Syria by traveling through Turkey:

Iraqi officials say that in mid-September they identified a Syrian man who had been used to smuggle the wives of two of Baghdadi’s brothers, Ahmad and Jumah, to Idlib province via Turkey. The same smuggler had earlier helped move Baghdadi’s children from Iraq. Iraqi intelligence officers say they were able to co-opt the man and a woman believed to be his wife, as well as one of Baghdadi’s nephews, into providing information about the route he used and the destination of the people travelling with him. It was a break like no other, and was soon passed to the CIA.

A day after Baghdadi's death U.S. forces killed ISIS spokesperson Abu al-Hassan al-Muhajir in the village of Ayn al-Bayda, near Jarabulus. The Jarabulus area of Syria is under Turkish control (light green).

On October 28 2019 U.S. helicopters again landed in Jarablus and either captured someone or ex-filtrated an asset:

Cont. reading: Turkey’s Continued Care For ISIS Will End Badly

This is a working thread intended to be updated when new details come to light.

The Washington Post provided a timeline of the 2015/206 intervention by then-Vice President Joe Biden against the then-General Prosecutor of Ukraine, Viktor Shokin. Shokin was investigating Mykola Zlochevsky, the owner of the gas company Burisma Holdings which paid Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden at least $50,000 per month for being on its board.

We used that timeline to show that Biden’s intervention reached its height shortly after the prosecutor confiscated Zlochevsky houses.

A new report by John Solomon, based on released State Department emails, supports the suspicion that Joe Biden and others intervened against Shokin on behalf of Burisma and on request of his son:

Hunter Biden and his Ukrainian gas firm colleagues had multiple contacts with the Obama State Department during the 2016 election cycle, including one just a month before Vice President Joe Biden forced Ukraine to fire the prosecutor investigating his son’s company for corruption, newly released memos show.

During that February 2016 contact, a U.S. representative for Burisma Holdings sought a meeting with Undersecretary of State Catherine A. Novelli to discuss ending the corruption allegations against the Ukrainian firm where Hunter Biden worked as a board member, according to memos obtained under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

Just three weeks before Burisma’s overture to State, Ukrainian authorities raided the home of the oligarch who owned the gas firm and employed Hunter Biden, a signal the long-running corruption probe was escalating in the middle of the U.S. presidential election.

Solomon points to the same Interfax-Ukraine report about the prosecutor’s action against Burisma owner Zlochevsky that we have used to make our case against Biden. Other media have so far ignored that report and several have falsely claimed that the case against Burisma was “dormant” when Biden intervened to get the Prosecutor General fired.

Below is an integrated timeline which combines the one WaPo provided with the new dates from Solomon’s reporting and from additional sources. It is intended as a working reference that can be updated when new details come to light. 

Cont. reading: A Timeline Of Joe Biden’s Intervention Against The Prosecutor General Of Ukraine

At the end of last year some enterprising 'anonymous' person released papers of the British Integrity Initiative. As we reported at that time:

The British government financed Integrity Initiative is tasked with spreading anti-Russian propaganda and thereby with influencing the public, military and governments of a number of countries. What follows is an contextual analysis of the third batch of the Initiative's internal papers which were dumped by an anonymous yesterday.

Christopher Nigel Donnelly (CND) is the co-director of The Institute for Statecraft and founder of its offshoot Integrity Initiative. The Initiative claims to "Defend Democracy Against Disinformation".

The Integrity Initiative does this by planting disinformation about alleged Russian influence through journalists 'clusters' throughout Europe and the United States.

Both, the Institute as well as the Initiative, claim to be independent Non-Government Organizations. Both are financed by the British government, NATO and other state donors.

There have been seven releases of Institute of Statecraft documents. They included proposals for large anti-Russian disinformation campaigns. The Institute of Statecraft suggested imposing anti-Russian sanctions as early as January 2015. Its head, the former NATO advisor and military spy Chris Donnelly, also proposed a simultaneous expulsion of a large number of Russian diplomats from western countries.

That plans seems to have been the blueprint for the March 2018 mass expulsion of Russian diplomats during the Skripal affair. Several of the other measures Donnelly and his ilk planned have since been implemented.

The Institute of Statecraft was registered as a charity under Scottish law. After the release of its papers the Scottish charity regulator OSCR investigated the status of the Institute. Unsurprisingly the OSCR found (pdf) that its shady behavior and its running of anti-Russian disinformation campaigns did not justify its status:

Cont. reading: British Government Disinformation Shop Lost Charity Status – Continues In New Format

Last week's posts at Moon of Alabama were fewer than usual as your host was a bit under the weather.

• October 28 – Endorsing The Deep State Endangers Democracy
• October 30 – Who Is Supposed To Define U.S. Foreign Policy – Hint: It Is Not The Borg
• November 1 – Impeachment Theater

This from WaPo is ridiculous:

> [Lt.Col. Vindman] told lawmakers that he was deeply troubled by what he interpreted as an attempt by the president to subvert U.S. foreign policy and an improper attempt to coerce a foreign government into investigating a U.S. citizen. <

That the WaPo scribe lets it stand without pointing out that, constitutionally, the president sets foreign policies is even worse. An earlier NYT piece about an NSC staffer who Trump likes and had asked about the Ukraine had a similar bad formulation:

> Any involvement by Mr. Patel in Ukraine issues would signal another attempt by Mr. Trump’s political loyalists to go around American policymakers to shape policy toward Kiev. <

• October 29 – Why Lebanon And Iraq Are At The Brink Of Further Strife

Other issues:

A good overview of how the conflict in Syria developed:
Russia Isn't Getting the Recognition It Deserves on Syria – Scott Ritter, Truthdig
US Needs To Occupy Syria Because Of Kurds Or Iran Or Chemical Weapons Or Oil Or Whatever – Caitlin Johnstone

Former U.S. supplied proxy forces kill other former U.S. supplied proxy forces with U.S. supplied weapons (video):

Cᴀʟɪʙʀᴇ Oʙsᴄᴜʀᴀ @CalibreObscura – 8:24 PM · Nov 2, 2019
TFSA hitting a YPG/SDF vehicle (Humvee?) with a likely originally US-supplied BGM-71 TOW ATGM.
video

Russiagate: Growing Indicators of Brennan's CIA Trump Task Force – Larry Johnson, SST
Ukrainegate: Some interesting backstories on John Brennan in this Kiriakou and Matt Taibbi talk. Kiriakou thinks that the 'whistleblower complaint' is a part of the CIA plot against Trump:
CIA Whistleblower John Kiriakou on Impeachment, "Assets," and the Espionage Act | Useful Idiots (vid)

Last week Germany won an important battle against the U.S.:
Denmark grants permit for construction of Nord Stream 2 pipeline in its waters – Tass
Europe’s gas alliance with Russia is a match made in heaven – M. K. BHADRAKUMAR, Indian Punchline

Use as open thread …

Ukrainegate is the new Russiagate. The 'whistleblower complaint' is the new 'dirty dossier'. The 'former' MI6 spy Christopher Steele wrote the dossier. The current CIA spy Eric Ciaramella wrote the 'complaint':

Federal documents reveal that the 33-year-old Ciaramella, a registered Democrat held over from the Obama White House, previously worked with former Vice President Joe Biden and former CIA Director John Brennan, a vocal critic of Trump who helped initiate the Russia “collusion” investigation of the Trump campaign during the 2016 election.

Further, Ciaramella (pronounced char-a-MEL-ah) left his National Security Council posting in the White House’s West Wing in mid-2017 amid concerns about negative leaks to the media. He has since returned to CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.

“He was accused of working against Trump and leaking against Trump,” said a former NSC official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.

Also, Ciaramella huddled for “guidance” with the staff of House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, including former colleagues also held over from the Obama era whom Schiff’s office had recently recruited from the NSC. Schiff is the lead prosecutor in the impeachment inquiry.

And Ciaramella worked with a Democratic National Committee operative who dug up dirt on the Trump campaign during the 2016 election, inviting her into the White House for meetings, former White House colleagues said. The operative, Alexandra Chalupa, a Ukrainian-American who supported Hillary Clinton, led an effort to link the Republican campaign to the Russian government. “He knows her. He had her in the White House,” said one former co-worker, who requested anonymity to discuss the sensitive matter.

The whole impeachment show the Democrats launched is a major political mistake.

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The Democrats have chosen the wrong issue, Ukraine, where they themselves have a lot of ballast. The choice of a Trump phonecall with the Ukrainian president as the item to hang the impeachment on is especially dumb. Trump's call was less incriminating than Biden's pressure on the Ukrainian president to help his son's paymaster. It is also a mistake to let the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee Adam Schiff run the impeachment process. Schiff already flip-flopped over requesting the 'whistleblower' to testify after it was reported that two members of his staff, who knew Ciaramella from working with him at the Obama National Security Council, had advised him.

The process will create a lot of collateral damage. It will hurt a number people involved in it, but it will not hurt Trump with his electorate. It will not end with impeachment. I believe, like Noam Chomsky, that it will, in the end, even help Trump:

"Is it politically wise? I frankly doubt it. I think it’ll turn out pretty much like the Mueller report, which, that I thought was also a political mistake. What’ll happen is probably the House will impeach, goes to the Senate. The Republican senators are utterly craven. They’re terrified of Trump’s voting base. So they’ll vote to turn down the impeachment request. Trump will come along, say I’m vindicated. Say it was the Deep State and the treacherous Dems trying to overturn the election. Oh, vote for me."

Trump can be beaten by good policies. Instead of offering any the Democrats try to defeat him with theater. But Trump is a much better showman than Schiff or any other Democrat. It almost looks as if they want Trump to win.