“The US is the number 1 warmonger in the world.
US has attempted to overthrow more than 50 foreign governments, blatantly interfered in elections in at least 30 countries, and attempted to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders.”
— The Chinese Foreign Minister
BREAKING: HAMAS TO ACCEPT CEASEFIRE DEAL WITHIN HOURS
The Saudi news channel reports that Hamas will accept the Egypt’s proposal for a cease-fire and the release of hostages within hours.
Hamas said it has received a promise from the U.S. for a cease-fire and full Israeli… pic.twitter.com/x3QLQzuwlI
— Sulaiman Ahmed (@ShaykhSulaiman) May 4, 2024
Former Israeli soldiers explain the circumstances of the founding of Israel.
China essentially says that October 7th Was An Exercise of International Law
China’s representative points out at the ICJ that armed resistance against occupation is enshrined in international law and is not terrorism.
Sectors across the Israeli economy are warning of wide-reaching impacts of Turkey’s decision to halt all trade with Israel, and are scrambling to find alternative sources for lost imports.
The Turkish trade ministry announced earlier this week that Ankara is halting all import and export transactions related to Israel until it “allows an uninterrupted and sufficient flow of humanitarian aid to Gaza.” The ban on imports includes iron and steel products, construction materials, minerals, machinery, cars, energy products, rubber, plastics, health and agricultural products.
The construction industry is bracing for the loss of Turkish iron and steel products and building materials, as Turkey supplied 29 percent of Israel’s total cement imports last year.
Construction work on the settlement of Tzofim, east of the Palestinian West Bank village of Qalqilya, on 2 January 2024 (AFP)
Last month, Israeli businessmen warned that the restrictions could drive an increase in property and rent prices. Meanwhile, Israel’s largest oil refinery, Bezan, said the ban could impact crude oil imports.
Forty percent of Israel’s annual oil consumption is piped to the Turkish oil hub port of Ceyhan and then shipped to Israel.
Moreover, representatives of the electrical products industry are warning that the ban could lead to a 35 percent hike in prices, as the majority of domestic electrical goods in Israel are manufactured in Turkey.
The new restrictions could force importers to import across the Red Sea, where attacks by Yemen’s Houthi group have driven a spike in shipping costs.
‘Dire straits’
In April, the contractors’ association wrote a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, accusing them of driving the sector to the brink of collapse.
Amit Gottlieb, chairman of the Urban Renewal Committee in the Israel Builders’ Association (ACB), said the Israeli construction industry was already in “dire straits” since Israel’s war on Gaza began, due to labor shortages resulting from Israel’s ban on Palestinian workers.
He added that alternative imports of construction materials from Germany, Great Britain, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Greece needed to be arranged “as soon as possible”.
Turkey’s exports to Israel were worth $5.4bn in 2023, or 2.1 percent of its total exports, according to official data. From 2009 to 2023, trade between the two countries nearly tripled. By the end of that period, Turkey had become the fifth-largest supplier of goods imported by Israel, while Israel ranked as Turkey’s 10th-largest export market, based on data from the Central Bureau of Statistics.
On Thursday, Israel’s foreign minister, Israel Katz, accused Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of ignoring international trade agreements and acting like a “dictator”. He added that Israel would seek to replace the lost Turkish imports with locally produced goods or imports from other countries.
IMPORTANT QUESTION: “Why does the government borrow the money that it prints?”
Jared Bernstein, Chair of Council of Economic Advisers to Joe Biden: “I don’t get it”
➡️ Thought so, they don’t get it … LMAO
Fact. By law, the US Treasury cannot issue dollars, it can only mint coins. When the Federal Reserve (which is a consortium of private banks) wants to create money and put it into the system, it does so through banks lending money to the government. Treasury bonds are IOUs that the government issues in exchange for a loan. You, or the bank, buy a bond with cash today and the government promises to pay you back with interest in the future.
Banks like to hold treasury bonds because they’re viewed as low risk—it’s unlikely the US government will default on debt (any time soon at least). Treasury bonds also have the advantage that they’re relatively easy to sell to someone else to get cash. Economists call this ease of converting an asset into money liquidity.
When the Federal Reserve buys bonds, they have an advantage you and I don’t. They are allowed to print new money (in fact only FED is allowed to print dollars) to buy the bonds. It’s more likely that the money will be digitally created than literally printed, but the form of the money doesn’t make a difference.
Now, it is common to hear people say the Fed prints money.
That’s not technically correct. The Bureau of Engraving and Printing, an agency of the U.S. Treasury, does the printing. The Fed, for its part, purchases cash (dollars) from the bureau at cost (which is pennies to the dollar) and then puts it in circulation.
A debt based monetary system is when money creation is issued as debt from commercial banks (primarily). The more money is created the more debt for the government.
BlackRock CEO: Depopulation is good because robots will replace humans
“I can argue that in developed countries, countries with declining populations will benefit,” BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said during a recent World Economic Forum panel discussion.
BlackRock CEO: Depopulation is good because robots will replace humans
“I can argue that in developed countries, countries with declining populations will benefit,” BlackRock CEO Larry Fink said during a recent World Economic Forum panel discussion.
“These countries will rapidly develop robotics and AI and technology. And if the promise of all of that transforms productivity, which most of us think it will, we’ll be able to elevate the standard of living of those countries and individuals, even with shrinking populations. And so the paradigm of negative population growth is going to be changing, and the social problems that one will have in substituting humans for machines is going to be far easier in those countries that have declining populations.”
via SputnikInt
via RT
Former US President Donald Trump has refused to rule out withholding military aid to Israel to force an end to the war in Gaza if he is reelected. Once a stalwart defender of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump has argued that the Israeli leader and his military have bungled the war with Hamas.
In an interview with Time magazine published on Tuesday, Trump stood by his insistence last month that Israel should “finish up [its] war” before it loses any more international support.
“I think that Israel has done one thing very badly: public relations,” Trump told the outlet, adding that he thinks the Israeli military shouldn’t “be sending out pictures every night of buildings falling down and being bombed.”
Asked whether he would rule out withholding or applying conditions to US military aid to Israel in order to bring the war to a conclusion, Trump replied “no,”before launching into a scathing critique of Netanyahu.
“I had a bad experience with Bibi,” he said, referring to Netanyahu by his nickname. Trump recalled how Netanyahu allegedly promised to take part in the US airstrike that killed Iranian military commander Qassem Soleimani in January 2020, before pulling out at the last minute.
“That was something I never forgot,” Trump told Time, adding that the incident “showed me something.”
Netanayhu, he said, “rightfully has been criticized for what took place on October 7,” referring to Hamas’ attack on Israel. “And I think it’s had a profound impact on him, despite everything. Because people said that shouldn’t have happened.
Israel has “the most sophisticated equipment,” he continued. “Everything was there to stop that. And a lot of people knew about it, you know, thousands and thousands of people knew about it, but Israel didn’t know about it, and I think he’s being blamed for that very strongly.”
Trump is not the first person to allege that the Israeli military and government failed to respond to warnings of an impending attack by Hamas. According to Israeli media reports, multiple military and intelligence personnel tried to warn their superiors that an attack was in the works, while Egyptian officials told the Associated Press that they passed on warnings to their Israeli counterparts in the weeks leading up to October 7.
Trump was a close ally of Netanyahu during his term in the White House, and described himself as “history’s most pro-Israel US president.” He imposed sanctions on Iran at Netanyahu’s request, moved the US embassy in Israel to West Jerusalem, and brokered the Abraham Accords, which saw Israel normalize relations with Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Morocco, and Sudan.
Asked whether he could work better with Netanyahu’s main political rival, Benny Gantz, if he were to return to the White House after the November presidential election, Trump did not give a straight answer. However, he remarked that “Gantz is good,” and that there are “some very good people I’ve gotten to know in Israel that could do a good job.”
Trump vs Biden?! Is that Sovereigntists vs Globalists?!
How about Pro-Zionists vs Pro-Palestinians?!
Is there such a thing as the Axis of Trump-Netanyahu-Orban-Putin vs. Pro-Globalists?!
Then where does China fit into this? Maybe somewhere in-between. Where’s Ukraine? It is supported by Israel, but it is against Russia. Where is the EU? A mixed bag pro-Israel, pro-Palestinians, anti-Russia, pro-Russia…
Trump’s first appointed National Security Advisor is Gen. Michael Flynn, pictured at the same dinner table with Putin in Moscow. Collusion? No collusion? High level appointees in his administration, all staunchly pro-Israel: Nikki Haley, Bolton, Cohen, etc. Netanyahu, while visiting the US, sleeps in Trump’s son in law Kushner’s bedroom, that’s his “senior adviser’s” bedroom. Collusion? No collusion?
So we had four years of Trump and four years of anti-Trump’s denunciation of his collusion with Putin (Russia). Will we have another four years of Trump and four years of anti-Trump’s denunciation of his collusion with Netanyahu (Israel)?
The way things are going right now that’s quite possible.