The empire’s war on activism and journalism continues to escalate as the Trump administration targets left-wing streamer Hasan Piker and antiwar activist Medea Benjamin for the crime of bringing humanitarian aid to Cuba.
This is yet another act of aggression in the same onslaught that has seen inconvenient truth-telling and expressions of moral clarity attacked and undermined throughout the western world at every juncture in recent years.
It is not separate from the persecution of Julian Assange for exposing US war crimes.
It is not separate from the steadily increasing escalations of internet censorship we’ve seen in the wake of Gaza, Ukraine, Covid, January 6, the 2016 US presidential election, and any other excuse the imperial narrative managers could find.
It is not separate from the Trump administration’s efforts to deport non-citizens for criticizing the state of Israel.
It is not separate from the efforts to stomp out pro-Palestine protests and university campus demonstrations.
It is not separate from the arrests of activists in the UK on terrorism charges for saying the words “I support Palestine Action”.
It is not separate from activists facing criminal charges for saying “From the river to the sea” in parts of Australia and Germany.
It is not separate from imperial efforts to crack down on BDS activism and outlaw boycotts of Israeli products.
It is not separate from Israel’s ban on foreign press from entering Gaza, nor is it separate from Israel’s systematic extermination of Palestinian journalists within Gaza.
It is not separate from the artificially manufactured hysteria about “antisemitism” in western society and the efforts of western governments to silence criticism of Israel in the name of protecting Jews.
It is not separate from Israel’s massive increase in its hasbara budget this year and the armies of paid trolls we’ve seen swarming online discourse.
It is not separate from the nonstop barrage of imperial propaganda we see every day from the plutocratic press justifying every war and slandering every dissident.
It is not separate from the way imperial oligarchs like Jeff Bezos, Elon Musk and Larry Ellison buy up news outlets like The Washington Post and CBS and social media platforms like TikTok and Twitter in order to manipulate the way the public thinks, acts, and votes.
It is not separate from the way tech platforms have been manipulating algorithms to hide dissident sources of information from the public and using bogus “fact checking” firms to suppress unauthorized facts.
It is not separate from government secrecy measures which forbid the public from knowing what their rulers are doing, and which aggressively punish anyone who tries to reveal inconvenient facts.
The empire is waging a relentless war on intellectual clarity and on moral clarity, because truth and morality are its enemies.
They do not want us to have unobstructed vision, lucid minds, functioning empathy centers and well-formed consciences, because if we did, we would instantly dismantle the empire brick by brick.
This is why they go after anyone who tries to expand the consciousness of western society using activism and journalism. In an empire built on lies and fueled by human blood, telling the truth is seen as treason and doing the right thing is seen as insurrection.
The only sane response to such a dystopian situation is to join in the revolution. Help spread unauthorized ideas and information. Take action to spread awareness of the abusive nature of the empire. They’re trying to keep it all in the dark, so we need to bring it all into the light.
They wouldn’t be fighting so hard to suppress truth and compassion if it didn’t present an immediate existential threat to their power structure.
The Complicit Lens: How Media Helped Normalize the Destruction of Gaza
On the latest episode of Scheer Intelligence, host Robert Scheer sat down with media scholar Robin Andersen for a blistering examination of how major American media institutions covered — and often concealed — the realities unfolding in Gaza.
At the center of the discussion is Andersen’s new book, The Complicit Lens: U.S. Media Coverage of Israel’s Genocide in Gaza, which argues that corporate media did far more than simply fail the public. According to Andersen, institutions like The New York Times and CNN helped manufacture a sanitized narrative that erased the historical roots of Palestinian suffering while shielding Israeli state violence from meaningful scrutiny.
Throughout the conversation, Scheer and Andersen return to a central question: What happens when the institutions tasked with informing the public become instruments of political messaging?
Andersen points to leaked newsroom directives reportedly instructing journalists to avoid words such as “occupation,” “ethnic cleansing,” and even “refugee camp.” The effect, she argues, was not merely semantic. It fundamentally stripped audiences of the historical and legal context necessary to understand Gaza itself. If Palestinians are never described as occupied people, then their resistance appears irrational rather than rooted in decades of dispossession and military control.
Scheer repeatedly stresses that this is not simply a failure of journalism, but a crisis of democracy and intellectual freedom. The conversation expands beyond Gaza into the repression seen across American universities, where students and professors protesting the war increasingly found themselves surveilled, punished, or accused of antisemitism. Andersen describes how campus protests were portrayed not as organic moral outrage, but as dangerous extremism requiring police intervention and political suppression.The interview also confronts the growing contradiction at the heart of American political discourse: criticism of the Israeli government is increasingly treated as hostility toward Jewish identity itself. Scheer, drawing from his own Jewish background, calls this “a blasphemy against the Jewish people,” arguing that the history of Jewish struggle has long been rooted in universal human rights and dissent against oppression — not unconditional allegiance to state power.
One of the most striking parts of the discussion centers on how Palestinian voices — especially journalists documenting the destruction on the ground — were marginalized by establishment media even as they risked and lost their lives reporting from Gaza. Andersen argues that social media and independent outlets became essential because they bypassed traditional gatekeepers that often repeated official Israeli talking points without verification.Scheer ultimately frames the crisis as one extending far beyond a single conflict. If governments, media institutions, and universities can collectively narrow the boundaries of acceptable speech around Gaza, then the implications for democratic society are profound. The issue is no longer only about what is happening overseas, but whether Americans themselves retain the ability to openly question power without fear of censorship, retaliation, or ideological policing.
By the end of the interview, Andersen delivers a stark warning: journalism that abandons accuracy, historical context, and moral clarity ceases to function as journalism at all. It becomes public relations for power.
And in moments of mass suffering, silence and distortion become forms of complicity.
Amid escalating U.S. aggression towards the Cuban island through a maximum pressure campaign and the threat of military intervention, the United States government has been covertly funding a huge network of Cuban media outlets that claim to be independent in a push for regime change against the independent socialist government.
These outlets present themselves as unbiased investigative journalism, but are quietly being financed by Washington through USAID, the National Endowment for Democracy and the Open Society Foundation in order to sow discontent across the Caribbean nation, softening it up for a potentially “imminent” invasion by the Trump administration.
Cuba faces some of its worst energy blackouts in its history, thanks to the U.S. blockade, which is attempting to strangle the island into submission. As a Communist state defying U.S. orders, Cuba has, since 1959, been in the crosshairs of Washington, which is attempting to overthrow the government. MintPress sheds light on this shady regime change nexus.
Independent Journalism, Funded by the State Department
CubaNet is one of the most influential and well-established news outlets covering affairs on the Caribbean island. Founded by anti-government activists in 1994, the site has become the go-to source of information for corporate media, which regularly cite it, and present it as an objective and unbiased independent media (e.g., The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, Fox News, and The Los Angeles Times). CubaNet reporters have written op-eds in major U.S. newspapers such as USA Today, calling for an immediate change in government on the island.
But CubaNet is not as independent as it seems. The outlet is bankrolled by the U.S. national security state. CubaNet has received millions of dollars in funding from USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy, as well as the Open Society Foundation.
One currently active $500,000 USAID grant, for instance, was awarded to CubaNet to “engage on-island young Cubans through objective and uncensored multimedia journalism.” While ostensibly a laudable goal, even the grant’s own one-sentence description hints that its purpose is to undermine and attack the Cuban government. It states that it will (emphasis added) “increase the free flow of information to and from Cuba in order to offset the regime’s disinformation campaigns.”
Another news organization receiving huge sums of money from Washington is ADN Cuba. Literally meaning “Cuba’s DNA,” the outlet has amassed a significant following online, boasting over 100,000 subscribers on YouTube, over 200,000 on Instagram and over 1.3 million on Facebook. It describes itself as “an independent media outlet committed to freedom and democracy in Cuba.” Yet it is actually based in Spain. And it does not seem particularly committed to transparency about its funding.
What is clear, however, is that ADN Cuba has received millions of dollars from the U.S. national security state. In September 2024, USAID approved a $1.1 million grant to ADN Cuba — a gigantic amount of money for an organization that publishes barely one story per day on its website. This was on top of a $1.5 million allocation for the 2022-2024 period.
Indeed, since 2020, ADN Cuba has received in excess of $3 million from USAID alone. This relationship is not disclosed to readers — even in stories directly covering USAID funding Cuban media — and is relegated to the footnotes of obscure U.S. government funding databases.
Diario de Cuba is another Spanish-based news outlet that publishes a wide variety of stories, all with one thing in common: a deep aversion to the Cuban government. The BBC describes it and CubaNet as key sources for impartial news, run by journalists who “report without censorship and to paint a broader picture on the country’s reality.”
And just like CubaNet, Diario de Cuba has received seven-figure funding from Washington. Between 2016 and 2020, Diario de Cuba received $1.3 million in USAID cash — almost as much as CubaNet over the same period. This generous funding has allowed it to reach a global audience, with over 600,000 followers on Facebook alone.
The Central Intelligence Agency used to directly (and secretly) sponsor hundreds of media outlets across the world. However, after a series of scandals and more information about its nefarious activities came to public attention, Washington decided to outsource many of its most controversial foreign operations to organizations such as the National Endowment for Democracy and the U.S. Agency for International Development.
“It would be terrible for democratic groups around the world to be seen as subsidized by the C.I.A.,” Carl Gershman, the NED’s longtime president [until 2021], said, explaining the 1983 decision to create his organization. NED co-founder Allen Weinstein agreed: “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the C.I.A.,” he told The Washington Post.
Under the guise of democracy promotion and human rights, the U.S. government channels money to political and social groups across the world in order to maximize its strategic goals, including regime change.
In recent years, the U.S. has used the twin organizations of the NED and USAID to bankroll anti-government protests in Hong Kong, to attempt a color revolution in Belarus, to overthrow the government of Ukraine in 2014 and to organize riots across Iran earlier this year.
In Cuba, the NED and USAID played a critical role in organizing a (failed) uprising against the government in 2021. USAID in particular spent millions of dollars funding, organizing and promoting the San Isidro Movement — a collective of musicians, artists, and journalists– to lead a counter-revolution on the island.
San Isidro members were at the forefront of a wave of nationwide protests that July. The demonstrations were immediately signal boosted by Western corporate media, top celebrities and U.S. politicians, including President Joe Biden. Neitzens were flooded with the astroturfed “SOS Cuba” campaign, that trended across the Internet for days.
In the end, however, the coordinated efforts of the U.S. failed to convince ordinary Cubans to take to the streets, and the movement quickly petered out.
Esteban Rodríguez, a key member of the San Isidro movement, is a producer at ADN Cuba.
Pause US Money, and see ‘Independent’ Media Immediately Collapse
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. Jobs for the Boys
All this, however, pales in comparison to the resources the U.S. has dedicated to Radio and TV Martí. Founded in 1985 by the Reagan administration, the Miami-based network boasts dozens of full-time employees and receives tens of millions of dollars from Washington annually.
Unlike the rest of the journalism industry, workers at Radio and TV Martí enjoy strong job security and six-figure wages, despite the fact that the Cuban government is able to jam and block many of their broadcasts from reaching Cuba, meaning precious few people consume its content.
Since its creation, Washington has spent at least $800 million on Radio and TV Martí.
The outlets profiled make up only a small portion of the network of anti-government media being funded by the United States. Most of the recipients of American money remain anonymous — a decision taken in part to hide their identities and preserve their credibility inside Cuba.
The National Endowment for Democracy considers Cuba a “long-standing priority,” and is currently officially funding 32 separate projects on the island.
Media related grants include one $80,000 project titled “Strengthening Access to Information,”…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Anti-government media are only a small portion of the huge array of groups Washington secretly funds and supports. From musicians and academics, to civil society, educational and religious groups, to think tanks, charities and NGOs, there exists a vast nexus of organizations receiving vast sums of money from the U.S. government.
Two of these bodies include The Observatorio Cubano de Derechos Humanos (Cuban Observatory of Human Rights, or OCDH) and lawyers’ group, Cubalex.
Both groups produce reports denouncing the Cuban government and are regularly cited as impartial authorities on human rights on the island in Western outlets, such as The New York Times, CNN and The Washington Post. But what readers are not told is that both organizations are bankrolled by the U.S. national security state. ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..
Digital Bombardment
In 2010, a new social media and messaging app, Zunzuneo, took Cuba by storm. From nowhere, it went viral, picking up tens of thousands of users — a very large number for the time on such an internet-sparse island.
None of its users, however, were aware that the platform had been secretly created by USAID in order to promote regime change. Their plan was to first provide an excellent service that would capture the market, then to slowly drip feed Cubans anti-government messaging, and finally to direct them to join “smart mobs” aimed at triggering a color revolution……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
Unending War on Cuba
In October, for the 33rd consecutive year, the United Nations voted overwhelmingly (165-7) to call for an end to the American blockade against Cuba. This economic war was established by the Eisenhower administration in response to the Cuban Revolution of 1959, which overthrew the U.S.-backed dictator, Fulgencio Batista.
These illegal unilateral coercive measures, which an internal U.S. government memo states are designed to “decrease monetary and real wages, to bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government,” cost Cuba billions every year, and severely impede its development.
The U.S. attempted to invade Cuba in 1961, and brought the world to the brink of annihilation during the subsequent Cuban missile crisis. It reportedly attempted to kill its leader Fidel Castro hundreds of times and carried out waves of terror attacks against the country, including using biological weapons on the island.
Successive administrations continued the economic war against Cuba, which was ramped up after the fall of the Soviet Union. But the Trump State Department, run by Cuban-American Marco Rubio, has taken it to a new level, declaring the island to be one of its top priorities.
Trump himself has declared that Cuba is “next” on the list of countries being targeted for regime change. “We may stop by Cuba after we’re finished” with Iran he said last month.
It is in this context that the U.S. government’s funding of a vast array of media outlets targeting Cuba should be seen; the media attack is just one facet of Washington’s multipronged approach to regime change.
Many of the organizations profiled here publish in English, and nearly all are used as supposedly credible sources of information on Cuba for Western corporate media, meaning that U.S. State Department narratives are laundered into the American public consciousness through this network.
Any aliens who have been monitoring radio and television transmissions streaming outwards into space from Planet Earth over the past few decades will likely be intrigued, bemused or simply horrified at humanity’s headlong drive towards climate catastrophe. No matter the urgent warnings from climate scientists, the power of billionaires, financial speculators and corporations maintains a death-like grip on governments around the world. Amid the occasional flurry of big business greenwashing and government rhetoric about ‘climate protection’ and ‘eco-friendly’ initiatives, billions of people are being held hostage by the forces that are dragging everyone to the edge of the climate abyss.
New warnings about climate change do, of course, occasionally appear in the press. But rarely, if ever, are there prominent and sustained front-page headlines and news-leading television coverage. Rarer still are impassioned editorials, high-profile presenters and commentators demanding the substantive, radical changes that are needed to avoid the most damaging predicted impacts of business as usual.
Earlier this month, the Royal Albert Hall hosted a 100th birthday party for naturalist David Attenborough, Britain’s most beloved broadcaster. Celebrities showered him with love and praise: Leonardo DiCaprio, Judi Dench, Olivia Colman, Emily Eavis, Chris Martin, Ben Fogle, Raye, Kate Winslet. And Paddington Bear. Attenborough sat in the royal box, alongside Prince William. King Charles delivered a handwritten message from Balmoral Castle via a ‘cavalcade of creature couriers’, including eagles, a red squirrel, a hedgehog, otters, ducks, a fox and deer, thanks to the wonders of CGI. All very nice; all very Disneyfied.
For many years now, Attenborough has been warning about the dangers of mass consumption, pollution, worldwide species loss and global warming. These subjects are clearly of great concern to him, although he started ringing the alarm bell very late.
But the evening gave a wide berth to such uncomfortable topics. ‘Life on Earth’? The climate crisis must be happening on a different planet entirely.
As Jonathan Liew, a Guardian sports journalist and columnist, pointed out:
‘This is, of course, the Attenborough with which our public discourse is most comfortable: depoliticised, universally adored, a man-sized Paddington Bear fit only for our veneration. Who teaches us about tree frogs and seal cubs and stick insects and asks for nothing in return.’
Of course, what Liew called ‘public discourse’ is the tightly constrained media space permitted by state and corporate power.
Liew continued:
‘And perhaps there are more difficult questions to negotiate here: the extent to which he has been a force for the meaningful and revolutionary change he seeks, and the extent to which his broad, inoffensive appeal has been more hindrance than help, allowing the powerful to feign concern for the planet while shirking the tough and bloody compromises required to secure it.’
To his credit, Attenborough has been eloquent and impassioned in recent years about the climate crisis. He addressed the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow in 2021, saying that:
‘We are already in trouble. The stability we all depend on is breaking. This story is one of inequality, as well as instability. Today, those who’ve done the least to cause this problem, are being the hardest hit. Ultimately, all of us will feel the impact, some of which are now unavoidable.’
But, even five years on, as the climate crisis worsens, the topic was deemed unmentionable by the organisers of Attenborough’s 100th birthday party.
‘Hothouse Earth’ And Collapsing Currents
In February, a new scientific report warned that runaway global warming is closer than had previously been thought. We are heading for the ‘point of no return’ after which we would be locked into a hellish ‘hothouse Earth’. Climate ‘tipping points’ would be triggered, producing rapid heating, which would lead to a domino effect of yet more tipping points and feedback loops. These include the melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, drastic dieback of the Amazon rainforest and the weakening, and possible shutdown, of the Atlantic ocean conveyor belt known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC).The scientists stated that:
‘Earth’s climate is now departing from the stable conditions that supported human civilization for millennia.’
The world has already experienced a global average temperature rise of over 1.3C since pre-industrial times and is likely to surpass the Paris Agreement ‘limit’ of long-term average heating of 1.5C in the next few years. Current government and business policies are pushing us towards 2-3C of global warming, if not more, by 2100.
But, if trigger points are breached and runaway global warming occurs, we are talking about much higher temperature rises, perhaps 10C or more. This would mean almost unimaginable catastrophic effects on the climate system, global agriculture and societal infrastructure; not to mention the extinction of humans. Scientists have warned that even a rise of 3-4C means that ‘the economy and society will cease to function as we know it’.
Bill McGuire, Professor Emeritus of Geophysical and Climate Hazards at University College London, put things in grim perspective via X:
‘We are already locked-in to a return to Pliocene [around 2.6 to 5.3 million years ago] conditions (3C hotter and (eventually) ~ 20m sea-level rise)
‘Keep going as we are, and hotter Miocene [5.3 to 23 million years ago] conditions will result
‘Beyond this a return to early Eocene [around 48 to 56 million years ago] hothouse beckons – and potential oblivion’
During the Eocene, the global average temperature was well over 10C higher than present. Oblivion would hit humanity long before such a temperature rise occurred.
Earlier this month, yet another deeply disturbing scientific studyrevealed that the risk of AMOC reaching a tipping point by 2100, after which its shutdown would be inevitable, is as high as 50 per cent. Previously, this was considered ‘a low likelihood event’ of around five per cent. But even this should be held in perspective. How many of us would board a plane knowing that there was a five per cent chance that it would crash?
AMOC, of which the Gulf Stream is the best-known component, is a vital carrier of warm water from the tropics to high latitudes in the North Atlantic, returning cold water southwards. It is a primary source of heat for western and northern Europe, leading to the temperate climate here. AMOC connects with other ocean current systems in a global network that transports heat, water, nutrients and carbon around the planet. Any disturbance to AMOC, far less its collapse, would have devastating global consequences for climate, agriculture, infrastructure and even for the habitability of Earth.
Professor Stefan Rahmstorf of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in Germany, who has studied AMOC for 35 years, said:
‘This is an important and very concerning result. It shows that the “pessimistic” models, which show a strong weakening of the AMOC by 2100, are, unfortunately, the realistic ones, in that they agree better with observational data.’
He added:
‘I now am increasingly worried that we may well pass that AMOC shutdown tipping point, where it becomes inevitable, in the middle of this century, which is quite close.’
To emphasise: the tipping point may be much earlier than 2100; it could happen by 2050, or even sooner. The vital point here is that scientists increasingly agree that the ‘safe window’ to stabilise the current by halting emissions is closing far faster than previously thought. And the public likely does not even realise it.
Rahmstorf had previously said that a collapse must be avoided ‘at all costs’. Now he added:
‘I argued this when we thought the chance of an AMOC shutdown was maybe 5%, and even then we were saying that risk is too high, given the massive impacts. Now it looks like it’s more than 50%. The most dramatic and drastic climate changes we see in the last 100,000 years of Earth history have been when the AMOC switched to a different state.’
In an English-language video for the German DW news channel, Rahmstorf explained the importance of AMOC for European and global climate, and the significance of the latest alarming results. He warned that we should expect more climate extremes in heat, cold, drought, floods and storms.
If and when the AMOC collapses, the impact on agriculture in the northern hemisphere will be devastating. The drop in harvest yields for key crops could be as high as 50 per cent. Mass starvation is a very real possibility.
Climate Shocks
……………………………………………………………………………………………………. The fact that deeply disturbing findings about a likely collapse of a vital component of the climate system were not given wider, extensive and sustained coverage is a devastating indictment of ‘mainstream’ journalism.
……………………….Scientists are warning, as loudly as they possibly can, that the present economic system of rampant capitalism is destroying the very life-support systems that made Planet Earth a habitable environment for humans to evolve and flourish.
……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. Look at the daily, hour-by-hour obsessing over the endless maneuvering within the Labour government; every single statement from ministers and their allies scrutinised by the Westminster bubble of political correspondents.
Imagine that, instead of focusing on short-term melodramas, leading news organisations rigorously probed politicians, day in and day out, about the climate crisis.
Imagine that news editors and journalists relentlessly challenged the government about current policies that are bringing us closer to the brink of climate chaos.
Imagine that reporters investigated and exposed the deep reluctance and state-corporate obstacles, including the establishment media, that are blocking alternatives to climate Armageddon.
Since October 2023, Israel has occupied vast stretches of territory in Gaza, Syria and, most recently, Lebanon. Corporate media have been reluctant to use clear, direct language to characterize US-backed Israeli land grabs in each of these places, preferring to describe Israel’s policies with euphemistic terminology.
“Buffer” is chief among these. For instance, a Wall Street Journal article (4/9/26) told readers that “Israeli forces now hold buffer zones inside Gaza, Lebanon and Syria.”
Merriam-Webster defines a “buffer zone” as “a neutral area separating conflicting forces.” The UN defines it as “neutral space created by the withdrawal of hostile parties or a demilitarized zone.”
The Journal‘s uncritical use of the term makes it sound as if these Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian lands are demilitarized zones, when in reality they have been taken over by a belligerent foreign army that intends to remain for the long term.
Israel has said even after the war with Hezbollah, it plans to occupy part of southern Lebanon, setting up a buffer zone inside the area and keeping security control over the territory. Some analysts say that the move could lead to the permanent displacement of communities from the region.
“Setting up” is part of the same obfuscatory process as “buffer zone.” Amnesty International’s Kristine Beckerle (3/6/26) offered this account of the evacuation orders Israel issued to over 100 villages and towns in Lebanon’s south and east, and the entirety of Beirut’s southern suburbs, key components of how Israel has gone about “setting up a buffer zone”:
The sweeping evacuation orders have sown panic and terror, displaced hundreds of thousands of people and fueled yet another humanitarian catastrophe for a population already exhausted and reeling from multiple crises.
And it’s not just “some analysts” who say that creating this “buffer” could lead to “permanent displacement.” Israeli Defense minister Israel Katz (BBC, 3/31/26) said that the state plans to maintain control over Lebanon south of the Litani River, a 19-mile stretch of territory, even after Israel’s current war on the country ends. Katz added that Israel will demolish “all houses” in Lebanese villages near the Lebanon/Israel armistice line, a move that would make the displacement of the residents of those houses seem awfully permanent. That’s not a “buffer zone”—that’s occupation.
A Washington Post report (4/12/26) noted that Israel was “continuing military operations in south Lebanon, where it says a bigger buffer zone is needed to prevent strikes by Hezbollah on northern Israel.” The article amplified Israel’s benign description of its policies in Lebanon without offering anything to contradict this description.
Another Post report (4/20/26) said “the Israeli military published a map Sunday delineating a buffer zone in southern Lebanon that it called a ‘forward defense line.’” By the time this article was published, it was clear that Katz’s threats had been actualized. A team of UN experts described Israeli actions in Lebanon thusly:
The issuance of blanket evacuation orders, combined with the destruction of urban and village housing that displaced persons would have returned to, is consistent with the pattern of domicide that was initiated during the genocide in Gaza.
“Delineating a buffer zone” sounds like part of a peace-making process, but what the UN described were acts of war.
‘Security zone’
“Security zone” is another euphemism. Who, after all, wouldn’t want to live somewhere secure? The trouble is that the “security” being created isn’t for the zone’s inhabitants. CNN anchor Lynda Kinkade (4/2/26) told viewers:
The United Nations says more than a million people, that’s about 20% of Lebanon’s population, have now been displaced. Many of them won’t be able to return home right away, even after the war, because Israel plans to set up a security zone in much of the south of Lebanon.
As Human Rights Watch (3/23/26) noted, those displaced people “have sought refuge with friends and relatives or in government-run shelters, or have simply set up camp along the coastline of Beirut, itself the site of a recent Israeli strike.”
In sum, Israeli aggression drove Lebanese people from the south of the country, causing some to camp on a beach that Israel then bombed, and CNN blithely adopted Israel’s language to sanitize it as “set[ting] up a security zone.”
A front-page Chicago Tribune piece (4/17/26) read:
Netanyahu said Israeli troops will stay in an expanded security zone in southern Lebanon “much stronger, more extensive and more continuous than before.”
“That is where we are, and we are not leaving,” he said.
The article offered no counter to Netanyahu’s characterization, nor did it put the term “security zone” in quotation marks. After a two-paragraph interval, the authors wrote, “It’s unclear when the 1 million people displaced by the war will be able to safely return.”
Netanyahu said Israeli troops will stay in an expanded security zone in southern Lebanon “much stronger, more extensive and more continuous than before.”
“That is where we are, and we are not leaving,” he said.
The article offered no counter to Netanyahu’s characterization, nor did it put the term “security zone” in quotation marks. After a two-paragraph interval, the authors wrote, “It’s unclear when the 1 million people displaced by the war will be able to safely return.”
But the million people weren’t simply “displaced by the war.” Nor were they displaced, as in CNN‘s formulation, by some unidentified force. They were displaced by Israel’s US-backed military. Without such obscurantism, the fiction that Israel is simply “setting up a security zone” would fall apart.
Ethnic cleansing erased
Such accounts also omit a rather important facet of what Israel has done in its war on Lebanon, which is to target Lebanon’s Shia Muslims. As Human Rights Watch (3/23/26) pointed out:
On March 16, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said, “Shiite residents of southern Lebanon who have evacuated…will not return to their homes south of the Litani area until the safety of Israel’s northern residents is guaranteed.” Through this lens, the displacement of the Shia population looks less like a temporary military necessity and more like a move to permanently displace the civilian population based on their religion.
“Permanently displac[ing] the civilian population based on their religion” is another way of saying “ethnic cleansing,” a point raised by the UN experts (4/15/26) who condemned Israel’s forced displacements as war crimes and crimes against humanity .
BBC Verify (4/16/26) said that satellite and video images they obtained showed that “towns and villages in southern Lebanon are being leveled by Israeli demolitions.” The outlet quoted professor Ben Saul, UN Special Rapporteur on counter-terrorism and human rights:
IIn places the pattern of attacks appears aimed to “cleanse” predominantly [Shia] villages and populations from the south, collectively punishing civilian populations within which Hezbollah fighters may be mingled…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………. https://fair.org/home/buffer-zone-is-medias-euphemism-for-israeli-occupation/
Walt Zlotow West Suburban Peace Coalition Glen Ellyn IL, 18 May 26
It’s understandable the Chicago Tribune is concerned about the future of the Republican Party (Editorial: Republicans are preparing for the midterms. They should be worrying about the party’s future). Soon after its founding in 1847, the Trib championed creation of an anti-slavery party and its most eloquent spokesman, native son Abe Lincoln. Seven years later that led to founding of the Republican Party and eventual election of Trib favorite Lincoln in 1860.
One hundred seventy-two years on the Trib’s still favorite party is fundamentally opposed to every vestige of its historical legacy. The Trib urges Republicans to reflect on their party “whose historical brand is inextricably linked with patriotism” How did the Trib miss the Republican Party, under Donald Trump, destroyed every vestige of patriotism when it inspired an insurrection at the Capitol in 2021 to overturn the election. The tiny handful of Republican patriots like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger who dared call out Trump’s treason were systematically purged from Republican Party. Trump, cheered on by nearly every Republican congressperson, then pardoned his 1,500 coup brigade who injured over 150 patriotic cops, five of whom died shortly afterwards from injury or suicide, trying to save American democracy from Trump’s treason.
Besides now being the party of treason, Trump’s Republican Party is now the party of senseless criminal war in Iran that, besides being lost with no exit strategy, is systematically degrading the world economy including America’s.
The Trib is anxious to find something of value in the Republican wrecking ball controlling the entire government with no check whatsoever. Alas, it’s not in the claim “There are plenty of rational folks who voted for Trump; 44% of Illinoisans are not fools. “Plenty of rational folks” are not words that befit the 56% to 44 % Illinois blowout against Trump. Every one of Trump’s 2,449,079 Illinois voters in 2024 were fools to vote for the only presidential candidate in US history who sought to destroy American democracy. And when each now forks over an extra 20 or 30 bucks to fill their gas guzzler due to Trump’s criminal war on Iran with no end in sight, they’ll likely ponder the wise words of a 1958 Elvis hit…”Now and then there’s a fool such as I.”
The Chicago Tribune, by spending 1,500 words seeking to salvage the Republican Party without mentioning the Trump GOP treason and criminal war on Iran , may be the biggest fool of all.
COMMENT. This is an excellent article, but does have some bias. (E.g it doubts the murder of Litvinenko, though the evidence for this murder is convincing)
I accept the total message of this article, warning of NATO’s war-mongering influence on the entertainment media. I also think that the Russian government does exactly the same sort of thing to demonise the WEst
Many members of the Writer’s Guild of Great Britain invited to the upcoming London summit with NATO operatives expressed anxiety about the military alliance’s brazen interference in popular culture. One Irish scriptwriter told The Guardian the “outrageous” meeting amounted to the arts being used to promote war, while presenting NATO “in a positive light” in countries that are not alliance members, including those that “have suffered under wars that NATO has joined and propagated.” Elsewhere, a veteran screenwriter fretted that film and TV industry attendees would be “seduced into thinking they now have some secret knowledge.”
A scandal has erupted over covert NATO conferences with the Western entertainment industry. Leaked documents reviewed by The Grayzone show how NATO has sought to infiltrate film and TV for decades, with UK intel operatives taking the lead.
On May 3, The Guardian revealed that NATO has held a series of secret meetings with film directors, screenwriters and TV producers in cities from Paris to Los Angeles. The disclosure suggests NATO is seeking to employ the entertainment industry in its propaganda operations as a European war looms.
To date, NATO’s “conversations” with scriptwriters have reportedly “inspired, at least in part” three separate unstated projects, which are already in development. At a forthcoming London summit, NATO operatives are set to meet with screenwriters tied to the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain (WGGB). In email correspondence, the union told its members the event will focus on the “evolving security situation in Europe and beyond.”
Organizers claim NATO was “built on the belief that cooperation and compromise, the nurturing of friendships and alliances, is the way forward.” The alliance is actively seeking to influence film and TV projects extolling this mantra, stating, “even if something so simple as that message finds its way into a future story,” as a result of the meeting, “that will be enough.”
But collusion between NATO and the entertainment industry has a well-established history. Over recent decades, NATO has covertly sought to employ film and television creatives as psychological operations specialists, while influencing popular culture. A core driver of this push has been Chris Donnelly, a veteran British Ministry of Defence and military intelligence operative, who led alliance expansion into Central and Eastern Europe during the 1990s.
Donnelly later developed the Integrity Initiative to cultivate support for conflict with Russia through covert networks of influential pro-war pundits and operatives. Hidden behind a seemingly legitimate think tank called the Institute for Statecraft, the Integrity Initiative only became known to the public after independent outlets like The Grayzone reported on leaked emails from Donnelly revealing its existence.
In leaked documents discussing NATO expansion, Donnelly stated, “What I needed in the 1990s and did not have” was a major international public relations firm to “scale up successful activities to have real impact,” and achieve “essential behavioural change” in audiences. To address the problem, he proposed “advertising campaigns on TV promoting change, a TV soap opera looking at the problem of corruption” and other innocent-seeming cultural products aimed at enhancing NATO control.
Donnelly expanded NATO – often against significant public opposition – in the former Soviet Union, Warsaw Pact and Yugoslavia by penetrating target countries’ governments, militaries and even religious institutions. This ensured a NATO-friendly lobby on the streets, and throughout corridors of power, across the region. This experience was fundamental to Donnelly’s founding of now-defunct ‘charity’ the Institute for Statecraft. Through its subsidiary Integrity Initiative, the Institute constructed clandestine nexuses of journalists, academics, and military and intelligence operatives throughout the Western world, known as “clusters”.
These networks could be mobilized to spread pro-NATO propaganda, and encourage public and state-level antagonism towards Russia. Integrity Initiative played a not insubstantial role in laying the Ukraine proxy war’s foundations. An essay published on the Institute’s website in July 2014 by MI6-connected academic Victor Madeira openly laid out this objective, declaring “economic boycott, breach of diplomatic relations” and “propaganda and counter-propaganda” could produce “armed conflict of the old-fashioned sort” with Moscow, “that Great Britain and the West could win.”
In a leaked Institute file, Madeira discusses precisely the kind of “propaganda and counter-propaganda” he meant. “We’ll need to go beyond old-style military ‘romps’ and get entertainment ‘outputs’ that draw out the nature of 21st-century conflict: diffuse, across society, without clear boundaries at times,” he wrote. “That’s the real fight we’re fighting; we can more than hold our own on the military side of things.”
Popular TV show ‘McMafia’ influenced by British intelligence
In February 2018, a veteran writer on US state cultural policy and public diplomacy named Martha Bayles emailed Donnelly to pitch a “multi-episode, multi-season dramatic television series” about Russia in the 1990s. Bayles pointed to a US-UK co-production called McMafia as an example of the “commercial and cultural dominance” of long-form TV with “an avid following among young and old alike.” The widely-watched program drew on former BBC World Service reporter Misha Glenny’s 2008 non-fiction book of the same name.
Bayles believed the “hefty appetite out there for ‘period pieces’ about the recent past” was a “compelling” reason to create a similar series about Russia in the 1990s, when the country descended into neoliberal chaos and oligarchs took control following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
The screenwriter was convinced that Russia’s traumatic time then “in many crucial ways set the stage for the world we now inhabit.” She added that a serial about the traumatic period could be supported by “scholarly and journalistic accounts by both Russian and Western participants and observers.” She suggested Donnelly’s “own experience and knowledge of those years would also be invaluable.”
The program needed to “avoid all taint of propaganda,” Bayles insisted, eschewing “black-hatted villains and white-hatted heroes.” Otherwise, audiences might suspect the show had been developed by some powerful outside force with an ulterior information warfare agenda. Bayles was certain there were “a lot of talented people out there” who could produce such a program. And she was clear about the ultimate objective: “an entertainment-based response to Russian propaganda and disinformation.”
By this point, Donnelly and the British military-intelligence veterans who staffed his now-defunct Institute for Statecraft were hard at work weaponizing popular culture to drive public hostility to Russia. In January 2018, the British state broadcaster interviewed a staffer at Donnelly’s Institute, Euan Grant, about “the impact of suspect Russian money” on London, as part of BBC wider series enquiring “How Real is McMafia?”
Grant styles himself as an expert on “geopolitical transnational organised crime.” According to a self-authored leaked CV, he worked closely with senior MI5 and MI6 operatives on the issue. Come 2018, he remained in close quarters with former MI5 chief Jonathan Evans, the agency’s then-chief Andrew Parker, and numerous veteran MI6 officials. They were among an extensive array of contacts that, Granted bragged, could be leveraged to underhandedly flood the airwaves with anti-Russian propaganda.
This included an array of think tankers, intelligence veterans, and mainstream journalists covering Russian organized crime. Grant boasted of “providing source material” to these individuals on “Russian speaking criminal groups.” Recipients included creatives including fiction authors, and award-winning reporters with the BBC, Financial Times, Guardian, and other major outlets. “Material” supplied by Grant informed “radio, TV and print and online media” output, on the purported “impact of Russian influence” overseas.
Popular culture was a key component of the Institute’s information war. Martha Bayles was listed as a contact, “for making use of fictional work for reinforcing messages” about Russia in the mainstream consciousness. A “memorandum of cooperation” had been sent to her by Grant, “about opportunities jointly and separately in North America, UK and elsewhere in Europe for input into media documentaries and fictional entertainment.”
Another listed contact was McMafia creator Misha Glenny. Grant said he had “recently met” Glenny, who requested a further discussion on “‘ideas’ for his next project,” providing the Institute with “possible input” into McMafia’s then-recently commissioned second series.
As part of the proposed collaboration, NATO would be granted “input” into the show’s script. At the time, the Institute for Statecraft was the British representative of NATO’s Atlantic Treaty Association, a “community of policy-makers, think tankers, diplomats, academics and representatives from industry.” The organization described its mission as “inform[ing] the public of NATO’s role in international peace and security and promote democracy, individual liberty and the rule of law through debate and dialogue.”
Western popular culture infiltrated by NATO for years
Leaked files show Grant masterminded a dedicated Institute project countering supposed “Russian destabilisation” of “international financial sectors.” Contacts in journalism and the arts provided an ideal delivery mechanism. He argued the broadcast of popular TV shows and films referencing Russian organized crime provided an extraordinary propaganda bonanza for the British military-intelligence apparatus, potentially exposing millions of Westerners to anti-Russian programming.
Grant proposed alerting “press, radio, TV” contacts to the “relevance and authenticity” of the fictional serials “to contribute to publicity and discussion ahead of, and during, broadcasting.” Integrity Initiative “cluster” operatives in NATO member states could secretly “arrange similar domestic articles” about the shows, to maximize international impact. Canadian and US media contacts would provide NATO access to “powerful and influential North American” TV and film networks.
In other leaked documents, Grant strategized a covert propaganda blitz to expose how the NATO protectorate of Moldova was supposedly “exploited” by Moscow, for “building Russian and Russian speaking influence in EU, EU applicant and Eastern Partnership countries.” He noted how recent Hollywood films and the smash French drama series Spiral had featured “Moldovan linked” plotlines, providing “opportunities” to Institute for Statecraft propagandists. He suggested the BBC “might also be interested” in covering recent books about Russian organized crime, “set in Moldova.”
Unfortunately for Grant and his boss, Donnelly, the second season of McMafia failed to materialize. However, other leaked files indicate British intelligence has been disseminating pro-NATO propaganda in Central and Eastern Europe through TV shows and films for some time.
London’s psy-war demonizes Russian speakers in former Soviet states
From 2016 onwards, according to the leaked documents, London exploited the megaphone of popular culture to “make a positive impact on how target individuals perceive the UK/EU/Euro-Atlantic values.”
British intelligence defined “Euro-Atlantic values” according to the NATO Stratcom Centre of Excellence’s own conception: “democracy, human rights, freedom of media, trust to international organisations and freedom of speech.” In practice, this took the form of waging psychological warfare operations to demonize and discredit Russia across the realm of the former Soviet Union. In Baltic states, for example, London’s covert propaganda denigrated Russian speakers, who since ‘independence’ in 1991 have been systematically marginalized and discriminated against, portraying them as “individuals who are susceptible to negative Kremlin-aligned messaging.”
British intelligence simultaneously recruited Russophone influencers as pro-NATO assets, working with programming commissioners at state broadcasters to identify “young Russian speaking talent in the online influencer, stand-up comedy and social commentary spaces.”
The British assisted their hand-picked assets in developing three “content ideas” and TV pilots each, then disseminated the products through state broadcasters’ social media channels and on-demand services in order “to test audience responses and viability.”
In one leaked file, a British intelligence contractor known as Zinc Network boasted that its propaganda operations had demonstrated a clear behavioral change in its target audience.
“Our strategic approach moves beyond ‘messaging’ by influencing not only the attitudes and behaviours of our audiences but also the social networks which they are embedded in and the norms and institutions which shape them,” Zinc Network boasted.
NATO works to “seed online conversations”
NATO supplemented its covert culture war in the Baltics with an online army of bots and trolls. It employed M&C Saatchi, a British public relations agency which claims to be “the world’s largest independent creative network,” to recruit a local “network of online influencers and advocates” to stealthily “seed online conversations” with “Euro-Atlantic” themes. Under this “tailored” strategy, British intelligence inserted messaging into “pre-existing conversations,” conducted by real people on social media. Therefore, “young Russian speakers” could unwittingly become British “agents of change.
This included infiltrating online discussions occurring around “key dates and events of significance” to Russian-speakers, such as Victory Day on May 6th, which commemorates the Soviet Union’s defeat of Nazi Germany’s genocidal invasion. M&C Saatchi claimed its techniques had “already been employed successfully and sustainably” for major clients, including Britain’s Home Office and Ministry of Defence, the Pentagon, USAID, Facebook, Google, and NATO.
Were these top serials demonizing Russia organic products?
It is uncertain which recent Western cultural productions have resulted from NATO’s covert meddling. However, inexplicably timed historical dramas in recent years, featuring highly negative portrayals of Russia and Russians, raise serious questions.
Chief among them is Chernobyl, the HBO series which broke viewing records after it first appeared, on May 6 2019. Authored by an anti-Russian ideologue, the show’s script contained countless egregious, politicized falsehoods and grotesque mischaracterizations. The many distortions and outright fabrications were deployed to portray the 1986 nuclear accident as the result of the brutality and incompetence of Moscow, while exaggerating the effects of radiation. “Chernobyl” took so many dramatic liberties, even the New York Times accused its creators of “the imposition of a simple narrative on history” and “the twisting of events.”
Chernobyl was followed three years later by a less elegant production, taking aim at Russian President Vladimir Putin. Aired on British streaming service ITVX, a TV drama called “Litvinenko” dramatized the bizarre supposed 2006 assassination of FSB defector of the same name. Though The Guardian panned the show as “unwatchable,” its broadcast led to renewed interest in the incident thanks to coverage from celebrity gossip magazines, not typically read by individuals with an interest in intelligence intrigues.
British writers fret about NATO interference
This March, an influential pro-NATO, London-based think tank called the Centre for European Reform published a report urging member state governments to “engage with cultural institutions and leaders like theatre directors, screenwriters, film producers and museums to better tell the story” of why increased European defense spending was “needed.” It stressed the importance of targeting militaristic messaging at “audiences who may otherwise not engage with international affairs,” with “specific funding for the arts to contribute to the public conversation on defence and security.”
The Centre further recommended European governments consider “unconventional approaches, designed to reach audiences beyond the defence and national security establishment,” in order to trigger “a national conversation on defence” across member states. NATO’s recent series of meetings with film and TV scriptwriters is clearly consistent with this strategy.
Many members of the Writer’s Guild of Great Britain invited to the upcoming London summit with NATO operatives expressed anxiety about the military alliance’s brazen interference in popular culture. One Irish scriptwriter told The Guardian the “outrageous” meeting amounted to the arts being used to promote war, while presenting NATO “in a positive light” in countries that are not alliance members, including those that “have suffered under wars that NATO has joined and propagated.” Elsewhere, a veteran screenwriter fretted that film and TV industry attendees would be “seduced into thinking they now have some secret knowledge.”
As the leaked documents[on original] presented here demonstrate, NATO’s attempts to infiltrate the film and entertainment industry are nothing new. Films and TV serials have been an alliance-dominated battlefield for decades. The Ukraine proxy war was a direct outcome of NATO’s full-spectrum bombardment on the perceptions of Western populations, with film and TV providing an ideal megaphone for anti-Russian resentment.
Now, as Europe formally prepares its citizens for a wider war, NATO is openly enlisting the arts to bring its longstanding script to an apocalyptic conclusion.
Kit Klarenberg is an investigative journalist exploring the role of intelligence services in shaping politics and perceptions.
The Israeli government is currently accusing The New York Times of antisemitic blood libel for publishing a report on Israel’s already well-documented systemic rape of Palestinian prisoners.
Contrary to popular belief, the highest award in journalism is not the Pulitzer. The highest award in all of journalism is being accused of antisemitism by the Israeli government for factual reporting.
But the New York Times is unworthy of this award. The Times has been running cover for the Gaza holocaust from the very beginning with extensively documented biases in its reporting, and played a leading role in promoting the atrocity propaganda about mass rapes on October 7. Israel’s abuses were actively facilitated by the New York Times, including its systemic sexual abuse of Palestinian prisoners.
Non-western and non-mainstream media sources have been covering the facts about Israeli sexual abuse for years. Human rights groups have been warning about the systemic rape of Palestinian prisoners since long before the onslaught in Gaza began. The only reason we’re hearing about it from the mainstream press now is because they got the destruction of Gaza they were seeking, and now the crosshairs of the war machine have moved on to places like Lebanon and Iran.
The New York Times does not deserve credit for its too-little, too-late, ass-covering reporting, and it does not deserve the honor of being accused of blood libel by the Israeli government. It deserves nothing but scorn and derision for failing to cover this completely unhidden story until May 2026.
There’s orders of magnitude more evidence for the systemic rape of Palestinian prisoners than there ever was for mass rapes on October 7, and there always has been. Anyone who claims otherwise is a hasbarist.
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It’s downright poetic all the different words that Reuters editors can find to avoid saying Israel violated a ceasefire.
It’s such a trip how all these dusty old newsroom liches who’ve never created an ounce of art in their lives can spontaneously transform into wildly creative wordsmiths when they need to run cover for Israeli abuses.
Speaking of headlines, The New York Times recently altered the title of an article by House Democrats Pramila Jayapal and Jonathan L. Jackson about their visit to Cuba, wording it to remove blame from the United States for the suffering created by the US blockade on the island. The original headline read “What We’re Doing to Cuba Isn’t Just Unlawful. It’s Cruel.” New York Times editors changed it to “What We Saw in Cuba Shocked Us”. They deliberately shifted it to a passive-voice observation without a named perpetrator.
Speaking of headlines, The New York Times recently altered the title of an article by House Democrats Pramila Jayapal and Jonathan L. Jackson about their visit to Cuba, wording it to remove blame from the United States for the suffering created by the US blockade on the island. The original headline read “What We’re Doing to Cuba Isn’t Just Unlawful. It’s Cruel.” New York Times editors changed it to “What We Saw in Cuba Shocked Us”. They deliberately shifted it to a passive-voice observation without a named perpetrator.
One of the silliest contradictions in the Zionist narrative is that it is simultaneously (A) antisemitic to criticize Israel and (B) antisemitic to conflate Israel with all Jews.
Zionists will officially claim that it is possible to criticize Israel without being antisemitic, but that’s not actually their position in practice. We know this because there is not a single vocal and forceful critic of Israel who isn’t regularly accused of antisemitism by Zionists. Not one. They might let you get away with a rare timid critique of individual Israeli officials, but consistently and vocally criticizing the apartheid state of Israel itself (and your own government’s alliances with it) is strictly forbidden.
When you consistently slam literally all of Israel’s critics as antisemites, you are communicating that all criticism of Israel is antisemitic, and that Israel therefore represents all Jews. You are therefore necessarily doing the very thing you decry as antisemitic.
Veteran CNN journalist Christiane Amanpour pointed to the “ideological realignment” at CBS News on Wednesday as she expressed her “concern” at what her own network might look like under the oversight of incoming owner David Ellison.
Speaking in London at the Truth Tellers Sir Harry Evans Investigative Journalism Summit on Wednesday, Amanpour voiced “concern” over Ellison’s influence on CBS News and what it potentially meant for CNN as his Paramount Skydance acquisition of the network’s parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery, moves forward.
The deal would place Ellison, the son of Oracle co-founder and Trump donor Larry Ellison, in control of the network where Amanpour has worked since 1983, alongside CBS News, which has already undergone sweeping changes under Paramount and Skydance leadership.
“[Defense Secretary] Pete Hegseth, the world’s favorite frat boy supremo, has said that the sooner David Ellison owns CNN, the better. And CNN has become this sort of lightning rod, hasn’t it, for this administration?” asked moderator Emily Maitlis, as the topic of corporate ownership takeover came up. “Does it change what you do? Do you fear what is coming at you now in terms of a change?”
“Clearly I’m concerned, and I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to say about a corporate thing that’s underway, but I am, obviously, as a person, as a journalist with a record, concerned,” Amanpour said. “And I’m concerned based on what’s happened to the other things that he’s taken over already like CBS News right? I mean, do I have to list what’s happening there?”
Amanpour then delivered a blistering takedown of the CBS News under Ellison’s leadership.
“I mean hemorrhaging viewers, probably hemorrhaging money, this ideological realignment of CBS and the destruction potentially of 60 Minutes,” she said.
In a passionate case for 60 Minutes, she praised the show as “one of literally the legacy” programs in American television journalism, adding: “Nobody can match 60 Minutes for a brilliant television magazine show that’s been doing hard news and cultural news, and for decades and decades.”
The comments come amid mounting scrutiny over the future editorial direction of major news outlets as billionaire-backed consolidation reshapes the media landscape.
Amanpour suggested staff at CNN were anxious about preserving newsroom autonomy under new ownership.
“I would like to think that we would have the very basic, which is editorial independence, I’m hoping for that,” she said. “I know many of us at CNN are incredibly – including leadership – are very, very committed to that clearly.”
New York, May 7, 2026 — Today, Freedom of the Press Foundation (FPF) and Reporters Without Borders, Inc. demanded records from Paramount Skydance Corp. regarding potentially corrupt acquisitions and deals that could result in relinquishing editorial control of major news outlets to the Trump administration. Public reports suggest that David Ellison and his father Larry may have tried to secure regulatory approval to acquire Paramount and now Warner Bros. Discovery by, among other things:
Making a “side deal” to settle President Trump’s spurious lawsuit against “60 Minutes” by providing $15 million to $20 million worth of free advertising.
Installing a pro-Trump GOP donor without journalism experience as “ombudsman” at CBS News to evaluate complaints of “bias” and to eliminate all diversity, equity, and inclusion practices.
Promising to make “sweeping” changes to CNN, and to potentially fire anchors and commentators whom Trump dislikes.
Since Paramount Skydance announced its most consequential Trump-friendly changes at CBS News in October — acquiring The Free Press and appointing Bari Weiss as editor-in-chief — the company’s market capitalization has decreased by 40%, wiping out more than $8 billion in shareholder value. Ratings for key programs, like “CBS Evening News with Tony Dokoupil,” have also dropped precipitously. Freedom of the Press Foundation and Reporters Without Borders, which are both shareholders in Paramount Skydance Corp., are entitled to inspect the company’s books and records related to these developments under Section 220 of the Delaware General Corporation Law.
“Shareholders are entitled to know when the government uses its leverage over corporate transactions as a backdoor to meddle in editorial decisions that the First Amendment leaves to the press,” said Seth Stern, chief of advocacy at Freedom of the Press Foundation. “Larry and David Ellison’s capitulation not only harms the public and our democracy, it hurts Paramount by producing news shows people don’t want to watch and tanking the reputations of news outlets in order to appease Trump. If the Ellisons can’t stand up to their friends in the administration and defend the First Amendment, they should stay away from the news business.”
“We need to know what the Ellisons may have promised the president to secure these deals,” said Clayton Weimers, executive director of Reporters Without Borders, Inc. “This acquisition has all the warning signs of a political capture. The American public deserves to know whether the Ellisons are sacrificing editorial independence to appease Donald Trump and secure regulatory approval from an administration that is openly hostile to press freedom.”
“Our clients are entitled to the same records as any other shareholder in Paramount, and legally, the company must comply,” said Brendan Ballou, CEO of the Public Integrity Project. “If Paramount fails to do so, we are prepared to vindicate our clients’ rights in court.”
Under Delaware law, Paramount has five business days to respond to the shareholders’ request. Freedom of the Press Foundation and Reporters Without Borders are being represented by the Public Integrity Project and Ron Poliquin of The Poliquin Firm.
Please email Seth Stern (seth@freedom.press) for any follow-up questions or inquiries.
CNN journalist Christiane Amanpour voiced discomfort with the possibility of Paramount Skydance taking over her outlet if the cable channel’s parent company is allowed to merge with the David Ellison-led media conglomerate.
“Clearly I’m concerned, and I’m not sure how much I’m allowed to say about a corporate thing that’s underway, but I am obviously as a person as a journalist with a record, concerned,” Amanpour said during a journalism summit this week. “And I’m concerned based on what’s happened to the other things that he’s taken over already, like CBS News, right? I mean do I have to list what’s happening there?”
Amanpour also bemoaned what she called the “ideological realignment of CBS and the destruction potentially of ’60 Minutes.’”
Paramount Skydance is seeking to purchase Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns CNN, a network President Trump has sparred with for years. He said in recent months that he wishes to see the network operate under new ownership.
The president on Wednesday marked the death of CNN founder Ted Turner by saying the news outlet he founded has been “destroyed” by what Trump called the channel’s “woke” coverage.
The president on Wednesday marked the death of CNN founder Ted Turner by saying the news outlet he founded has been “destroyed” by what Trump called the channel’s “woke” coverage.
David Ellison, a media mogul that is seen as an ally of the president, has retooled CBS News in recent months to cater to what he has called a more “diverse” audience, a move seen by many as a rightward shift at the network.
“I would to think we would have the very basic which is editorial independence,” Amanpour said. “And I don’t think I need to say more about that.”
Over the past two years, Israel has lost the support of the American public and is now losing one of its last bulwarks in the political arena — prominent voices in the mainstream media.
The ‘Cronkite moment’ during the Vietnam War was the night in 1968 when CBS anchor Walter Cronkite said the U.S. was stuck in a “stalemate” and that the only honorable path was to negotiate a withdrawal. President Johnson concluded that he’d lost Middle America and soon decided not to run for reelection.
Israel lost Middle America at least a year ago, according to opinion polls, and it is at last losing what is more important to its support, prominent mainstream voices, the Cronkites of our era.
“How many civilian deaths per Hezbollah target is acceptable? Is it five? Is it 10? Is it 300? Or is there no ceiling at all?” Bennet said.
And this, too: “What military objective is served by killing reporters?”
Ambassador Danny Danon did what any self-respecting spokesperson for Israel does in such a spot . . . he accused Geoff Bennett of antisemitism. He said the charges were a lie and a “blood libel.” But Bennett did what no broadcaster does, and fought back.
“I take issue with that, sir,” he said and cited Committee to Protect Journalists figures on 15 reporters and media workers killed in Lebanon.
The NewsHour surely anticipates criticism of Bennett’s refusal to accept Israeli propaganda (a sharp departure from the Dana Bashes and Jake Tappers of the world). So it has headlined the story, “Israel’s U.N. ambassador says IDF is the ‘most moral military in the world.’” Giving Danon a victory, though Danon is peeved.
Scribblers, scribes, authors and publishers – all of these are facing ever worsening conditions in pursuing their work in battling the goons of secrecy and impunity. The Reporters Without Borders (RSF) World Press Freedom Index has rotten news on that score. For the first time since the index came into being, RSF states that “over half of the world’s countries now fall into the ‘difficult’ or ‘very serious’ categories for press freedom. In 25 years, the average score of all 180 countries and territories surveyed in the Index has never been so low.”
In reaching its scores on press freedom, RSF uses five contextual indicators: political context, legal framework, economic context, sociocultural context and safety. The political context evaluates, among other things, the extent of support and respect for media autonomy regarding political pressure from the state or various political actors. Factors important to legal matters include the extent of censorship, judicial sanctions and restrictions on freedom of expression. The economic dimension takes account of such factors as the difficulties of establishing news media outlets, blighting corruption, the allocation of state subsidies, and the interest of media owners. The sociocultural context covers such issues as “denigration and attacks on the press based on such issues as gender, class, ethnicity and religion” and cultural restraints against reporting. Safety focuses on the ability of journalists to identify, gather and disseminate news without facing bodily harm, psychological or emotional distress, and professional harm
There are various reasons postulated by the group for the precipitous decline in press freedoms. Armed conflict plays its inevitable, corrosive role. Iraq (placed at 162), Sudan at one spot above, and Yemen at 164, are cases in point. The ongoing battle between Israel and the Palestinians has been disastrous for press freedom, not least because of the killing, since October 2023, of over 220 journalists in Gaza by the Israeli Defense Forces. 70 of the slain were killed while carrying out their work.
The authoritarian regimes have done little to move up the index. China remains confidently oppressive of reporters at 178, with North Korea stoutly taking the spot below. Eritrea completes the bottom at 180. Russia, at 172, continues to blot its copybook in targeting journalists (as of April 2026, 48 remain in prison), a situation not helped by its ongoing war in Ukraine. The Iranian regime (177) maintains its studied viciousness against journalists. Saudi Arabia, despite its gaudy, kitschy efforts at modernisation headed by the petulant princeling Mohammed bin Salman, has not softened on the issue of press freedom. On June 14 last year, the Saudi journalist Turki al-Jasser was executed after a seven-year spell of arbitrary imprisonment. Al-Jasser had been accused by the Saudi authorities of operating the X account named Kashkool, one inclined to post material linking the House of Saud with human right abuses and corruption.
Of all the states recorded, Niger, at 120, registered the most dramatic fall (down 37 spots). This, according to RSF, underscored “the wider decline in press freedom in the Sahel region seen in recent years as attacks by armed groups and ruling juntas have suppressed the right to balanced information from diverse sources.”
The organisation despairingly notes that the Index’s legal indicator has registered a sharp fall in 2026. “This score deteriorated in more than 60% of states – 110 out of 180 – between 2025 and 2026.” Journalism has been systematically criminalised, a practice “rooted in circumventing press law and misusing emergency legislation and common law.”
Resorting to national security laws and regulations is a favourite. Mention terrorism as a charge, as happened to the journalist Frenchie Mae Cumpio, and a prosecution, however baseless, becomes elementary and successful. (In Cumpio’s case, the shoddy charge was that of financing terrorism.) In Türkiye, the net on national security is drawn widely to include charges of “disinformation”, Article 299 of the country’s Penal Code covering insults of the President, and the charge of “denigrating state institutions.” States, in claiming to use the law appropriately, resort to strategic lawsuits against public participation (SLAPPs). RSF underlines Bulgaria (71) and Guatemala (128) as practitioners of the art. Not to be left out, political and business plutocrats make use of laws to curb exposure of their antics in the press. Indonesia (129), Singapore (123), and Thailand (92) are seen as experts in this regard.
Protections for journalists from legal or physical threats was also found to be woeful, with more than 80% of countries having “non-existent or ineffective” measures. Even the European Media Freedom Act (EMFA), seen as sound armour for the independence and sustainability of media outlets, has been weakened by domestic legislatures. Hungary (ranked 74), only recently rid of its long serving Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, excelled in this regard, though RSF also notes the programs of such countries as Slovakia (37) and Lithuania (15).
To round up the inglorious list are the United States (64), Argentina (98) and El Salvador (143). US President Donald Trump continues to hound and harry the Fourth Estate, with RSF taking particular issue with cuts to the US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) responsible for the drastic slimming of personnel at the Voice of America (VOA), Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL), and Radio Free Asia (RFA).
Rankings, in themselves, are cold measures. They can also prove vague. But there is nothing vague about the insatiable appetite towards persecution shown by states of all political persuasions when attacking reporters and publishers. The dictates of the national security state and its desperation in controlling narratives and holding the line on mendacity and the exposure of bad behaviour, remains that most threatening of diseases to the Fourth Estate.
As World Press Freedom Day (May 3) nears, it’s a good time to step back and assess how journalists and news outlets are faring in our current media climate.
President Donald Trump came back to the White House and picked up right where he left off, insulting and attacking the press on an almost daily basis, suing media outlets, and taking a number of concrete actions to restrict press freedom. Against this backdrop, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) will release its 2026 World Press Freedom Index on April 30.
Every year, RSF scores and ranks 180 countries and territories based on their level of press freedom. The Index evaluates five indicators: political context, legal framework, economic context, sociocultural context, and safety. The United States has declined in each of these indicators and steadily fallen on the Index over the past decade, dropping in rank from 49th in 2015 to 57th in 2025.
It may be tempting to blame Trump entirely for the perilous state of journalism in the country, but that steady decline in press freedom over the past decade spans multiple administrations, with both parties holding power in Washington. Such a prolonged decline points to structural deficiencies that cannot be attributed to a single issue, person, or administration.
Media ownership has become increasingly consolidated among a few media moguls, as outlets have also faced major revenue losses.
Local news is also vanishing, and millions of Americans, especially in rural and low-income areas, now live in “news deserts.”
Time and again, Congress has missed opportunities to enact meaningful press freedom protections, such as the PRESS Act, while local and state governments have chipped away at press freedom.
Violence against journalists has risen to stubbornly high levels, according to the US Press Freedom Tracker. And in the last decade, eight journalists in the US were killed for their journalism or while working.
And through this tumultuous period, public trust in news has plummeted.
Now, on top of that overall troubling context, a White House openly hostile to journalism is exacerbating an already fraught situation. Since returning to power, Trump, along with his advisors and allies, has dealt devastating blows to journalism, setting dangerous precedents and inflicting enduring harm.
From limiting journalists’ access to government buildings to cutting public media funding to targeting and threatening disfavored media outlets, the administration has regularly violated press freedom.
While these individual incidents are scandalous, and often unconstitutional, it’s easy for them to be washed away into the constant churn of the news cycle. Put them all together, though, and one conclusion is unavoidable: Trump is waging an all-out war on press freedom and journalism.
Trump promised to be a dictator on just “day one” of his term, but the totality of his anti-press campaign signals that the self-proclaimed “Peace President” is sinking to the depths of authoritarian regimes. His war on press freedom affects all five indicators RSF measures to compile the Index: political, legal, economic, sociocultural, and safety.
Political context
On his first day in office, Trump issued an executive order “ending federal censorship,” effectively eliminating government monitoring of misinformation and disinformation.
Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr has also weaponized the independent agency to investigate news outlets with coverage that the presidential administration disagrees with.
The administration removed thousands of US government pages that hosted information ranging from vaccines to climate change, vital resources for journalists and the general public alike.
Reporters have been barred from, or had their access severely restricted at the State Department, Air Force One, the Pentagon, and even a section of the White House previously known as “Upper Press.”
Legal framework
In addition to the president’s numerous lawsuits against media outlets, his administration earlier this year raided the home of Washington Post journalist Hannah Natanson and confiscated her personal and professional devices, a truly dangerous and unprecedented assault that puts thousands of Natanson’s sources at risk and is likely to scare off future sources from speaking with journalists. Journalists like Don Lemon and Georgia Fort have been arrested and threatened with criminal charges while doing their work.
Economic context
Trump led the charge to eliminate federal funding for public media. He’s also inserted himself into media company mergers and acquisitions, putting his thumb on the scale to ensure his political allies take control of American media outlets—a move eerily reminiscent of Viktor Orbán in Hungary and even Vladimir Putin in Russia.
Sociocultural context
Trump’s near-daily attacks and insults against journalists have set an example for others, with journalists now facing online and public harassment while doing their job. The bar for attacks against journalists is undeniably lower today thanks to Trump. RSF’s 2024 investigation into the state of press freedom in swing states found journalists reporting alarming instances of direct threats to their safety by local politicians. Threats against journalists by elected officials that once seemed inconceivable have become de rigueur.
Safety
Journalists faced a spike in physical violence by law enforcement and federal agents while doing their work. This was most evident as journalists covered widespread protests against the administration’s sweeping crackdown on immigration in Minnesota’s Twin Cities, Los Angeles, and Chicago.
Press freedom around the world is in trouble, as RSF’s Index has shown in recent years. Notably, the Trump effect extends beyond US borders. The American retreat from foreign aid led to the withdrawal of millions of dollars that supported independent media in developing economies around the world. In one striking example, a safety training session for journalists in the Amazon was abruptly canceled because of the USAID shutdown.
Authoritarian leaders are further emboldened to attack the press with the knowledge that the United States is no longer championing press freedom. When Serbian authorities raided the offices of the country’s largest fact-checker, they cited X posts by Elon Musk in his capacity as the leader of DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency) as evidence of the media organization’s crimes. That evidence? Accepting a USAID grant.
This is a moment of crisis for American media. During the twentieth century, press freedom—and free expression more broadly—saw a gradual, if uneven, expansion. Now we’re heading in the other direction for the first time in generations, and RSF isn’t the only organization that’s noticed. The Varieties of Democracy Institute’s 2026 Democracy Report found that US freedom of expression had declined to World War II levels. Freedom House also docked the United States in its latest global report, with freedom of expression cited as a leading factor in democratic backsliding.
We can’t lay all the blame for the state of American press freedom at the president’s feet, but Trump has taken a troubling situation and turned it into a full-blown crisis that we must urgently solve. Our very democracy is at stake.
Clayton Weimers is a recognized leader in press freedom who serves as North America Director for Reporters Without Borders (RSF). He and his team defend press freedom across the English-speaking Americas and advance RSF’s global priorities to advocate for journalists and everyone’s right to information. His writing on press freedom has appeared in publications such as the Guardian, Newsweek, The Hill, and TheIndependent. He originally joined RSF’s DC team as Deputy Director for Advocacy after a career in political campaigns. He has degrees from the University of Chicago and Pitzer College and a borderline unhealthy relationship with the Chicago Cubs and Everton Football Club.
Wallis also bats away the patently absurd notion, nevertheless advanced by those same politicians, that somehow having nuclear weapons keeps us safe, something he declares as “nonsense” while reminding us that “Nuclear weapons are the biggest racket of all time — billions of dollars going from taxpayers to giant corporations to produce things everyone hopes will never be used!”
Tim Wallis’s book provides an optimistic view, but it’s also a methodical journey toward the nuclear-free world we all want, writes Linda Pentz Gunter
The Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) is about to begin in New York City. There is no reason to be particularly optimistic about any positive outcome. Meanwhile, signatories to the treaty itself continue to defy it, most specifically the United States.
The US is a signatory to the NPT, which in its Article VI states: “Each of the Parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control.”
It is the second shortest clause in the entire treaty. And yet, what we are seeing instead is a clear intent by the major nuclear powers, especially the US, Russia and China, to arm up rather than down.
Meanwhile, two nuclear armed states — the US and the undeclared nuclear weapon nation Israel — are busy attacking a non-nuclear armed state, Iran, that is also a signatory to the NPT. (Israel cannot join because it officially neither confirms nor denies whether it has the upwards of 200 nuclear weapons that everyone knows it does have.)
Iran has long declared that it is abiding by the terms of the NPT and enriching uranium for a civil nuclear power program, not to build nuclear weapons. This “inalienable” right is granted to any NPT signatory that forswears nuclear weapons in Article IV that says: “Nothing in this Treaty shall be interpreted as affecting the inalienable right of all the Parties to the Treaty to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes without discrimination and in conformity with Articles I and II of this Treaty.”
Article IV is arguably the fatal flaw of the NPT — and, regrettably, of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) which repeats the clause verbatim — since it effectively leaves the back door open to transition to nuclear weapons via access to materials, technology and know-how. This is precisely the suspicion harbored by the US, Israel and Iran’s other enemies about Iran’s nuclear program. It was also used as the pretext for the current attack, almost certainly a cover story given both US intelligence and the International Atomic Energy Agency have consistently insisted that Iran is not moving toward nuclear weapons production.
The ramping up of nuclear weapons arsenals by the existing nuclear weapon nations, and the aspirations by other countries to acquire them — now potentially made more keen by the attack on Iran — moves us ever closer to the nuclear abyss.
It is a frightening scenario, and one brought vividly alive by Annie Jacobsen’s chilling book, Nuclear War. A Scenario.
But, says Timmon Wallis, founder of NuclearBan.US, let’s not abandon our optimism too quickly. Surely there is a different way to think about this, and even a possibility that we can, after all, achieve our global nuclear disarmament goals?
Wallis’s book, Nuclear Abolition. A Scenario, takes a very different tack, and approaches the process through a form of mathematical calculation by subtraction, by moving the arms of the Doomsday Clock — currently at 85 seconds to midnight — gradually further away from that grim moment of Armageddon. (Wallis’s book was published when the clock sat at 89 seconds to midnight, still dire enough.)
Wallis begins by asking the question aspired to by his book — “What if there were no nuclear weapons in the world?” —then asks us to savor the joy of that feeling for a while. It’s what most of us want, after all, but somehow we have elected a rash of megalomaniacs who don’t seem to share that worldview.
Wallis also bats away the patently absurd notion, nevertheless advanced by those same politicians, that somehow having nuclear weapons keeps us safe, something he declares as “nonsense” while reminding us that “Nuclear weapons are the biggest racket of all time — billions of dollars going from taxpayers to giant corporations to produce things everyone hopes will never be used!”
To ensure they are never used, Wallis argues, we must do away with them altogether. But can we really arrive at that moment, when we can turn the Doomsday Clock off altogether? Unlike many of us, Wallis has not lost that hope. His book provides the pathway to get there. The central obstacle, however, is the world’s arms manufacturers, who profit from the existence of nuclear weapons — and of course from the manufacture and unending use of conventional weapons.
Wallis’s central thesis, therefore, is that pressure must be exerted on the nuclear weapons companies to turn them into advocates for nuclear abolition. And that pressure, Wallis asserts, can come first and foremost from the now 99 countries that have signed the TPNW, 74 of which have also ratified it.
And so, Wallis takes us on a trip around the world, showing how countries both large and small can exert that pressure and move us out of the nuclear age. Wallis provides a check box of tactics per chapter, ending with “US bombs out of Europe,” an imperative that has become even more urgent now it is clear that US bombs have likely returned to British soil — at RAF Lakenheath, in reality a US Air Force base — for the first time since 2008. Ironically, this also comes at a time when US President Trump’s rhetoric has threatened a lifting or even folding up of the so-called “nuclear umbrella” with which the US, still a member of NATO, suggests it is protecting its European allies.
Pressure needs to come from within the US, too, Wallis writes. Wallis was an essential ally as we fought here in Takoma Park, Maryland, to maintain our nuclear-free status (we have, but the city has largely abandoned any efforts to promote perhaps its most famous achievement, having been one of the first US cities to become a Nuclear-Free Zone back in 1983.) What if every US city and town declared itself a nuclear-free zone, we had asked our city council? Wallis does not expect every city and state to do so, but he makes a strong case in his book for the power of local activism, especially in boycott and divestment, a proven tactic.
Finally, Wallis expresses the hope that Trump himself could denuclearize. This notion emanated from early, less irrational declarations from the White House at the beginning of Trump’s second term. Trump has indeed said one or two slightly sensible things here and there, denuclearizing being an example. But the ride has become considerably wilder since then.
I wonder if Wallis would feel as optimistic today? We are undoubtedly in an “alternate universe” as he states late in the book. Is it one in which Trump leads the world to nuclear weapons abolition? That’s an optimistic leap that most of us probably aren’t willing to take. But Wallis takes it, because optimism is what drives his writing and his activism, and because it’s an essential fuel if we are to persist in our mission to achieve global nuclear abolition. That work may seem hard to impossible. But what’s the alternative?
The hands of the Doomsday Clock cannot and must not inch any closer to midnight. Wallis’s book gives us a detailed guide to moving the clock — and the world that is watching its inexorable and ominous progress toward zero hour — slowly back to a time when no one had to worry about nuclear weapons. After all, as Wallis points out, that wasn’t really so long ago. Everyone alive before 1945 slept much better at night than we do.
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