Robert Fisk is one of the very few excellent investigative journalists still employed in the UK. He is twice winner of the British Press Awards‘ Journalist of the Year prize, and seven time winner of the British Press Awards’ Foreign Correspondent of the Year. He is extremely smart and knows the Middle East very well. He has just made his way – not accompanied by Russian or Syrian government officials – to Douma and this is what he reports.
If you care to search for Robert Fisk on twitter, the attacks on his reputation and integrity at this very moment from achieve nothing neo-con trolls and media lackeys are astonishing. He is in Douma – they are at their desks.
It also says a great deal about our media that one of the greatest living British journalists is employed only by The Independent, a newspaper which has become extremely marginal, while other genuine greats like Jon Pilger, with a fantastic pedigree, do not have access to UK mainstream media at all. 60,000 people on average are reading my journalism here every day, but no mainstream outlet will carry it.
UPDATE you can now read Fisk’s brilliant report from Douma here. Excellent journalism with appropriate scepticism of all sides, and vital information of the nature of the jihadists the UK/US/Saudi Arabia and Israel so desperately support.
The MSM is leading on Windrush and McPartlin in tomorrow’s papers. How quickly they move on.
http://suttonnick.tumblr.com/
Oh. And Russia will carry out a cyber attack on us. What rot.
In a way that’s a good thing, the skripals and syria and russia, all of us being hoodwinked by our corrupt government, it’s all to depressing…
The testimony of the doctor corroborates both reports filed by the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights on April 7:
1. The first report: http://www.syriahr.com/en/?p=88799
“reliable sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory that some of the casualties and injured people had been subjected to suffocation due to the demolition of basements of houses as a result of the heavy and intense shelling of Douma city, and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights published hours ago that 11 people at least including 5 children had suffocated, after bombardment by a warplane on an area near the old cemetery at the northern outskirts of Douma city in the Eastern Ghouta.”
2.The second report http://www.syriahr.com/en/?p=88805
“The trusted sources confirmed to the Syrian Observatory of Rights that the number of injuries today has exceeds 500, including tens of children and tens of women, where more than 70 of them have suffered suffocation as a result of the demolition of home basements over them due to the heavy and intense shelling on the last area beyond the regime forces’ control in the Eastern Ghouta, which is the stronghold of Jaysh al-Islam, and the Syrian Observatory published hours ago that 11 people at least including 5 children had suffocated, after bombardment by a warplane on an area near the old cemetery at the northern outskirts of Douma city in the Eastern Ghouta.
You do know that the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights is one bloke in Coventry, UK who hasn’t been to Syria for about 15 years or so, don’t you? — https://www.rt.com/news/317813-sohr-visit-syria-long/
I know that SOHR is a pro-opposition site and cannot be unquestioningly trusted. My point is that in this case, the contacts that SOHR had on the ground in Douma independently confirm the testimony of the doctor interviewed by Fisk. The fact that SOHR is pro-opposition makes the confirmation even stronger, in my view.
I think the point being made – or, at least, the point that should be take away – is that, if there really had been a gas attack, the SOHR would be sure to have mentioned it, and they didn’t.
It’s also confirmation, albeit from an unlikely source, of what the two medics told RT, namely that the people in the video (the one where children are seen being hosed down and given asthma inhalers) were not being treated for exposure to chemical weapons, but someone came in claiming there had been a gas attack and the adults panicked, resulting in the scenes shown in the video.
@WJ, @Gideon
That’s fair enough, but if I recall correctly there have been times that he occasionally contradict jihadis and sided with the Syrian State. To my mind that is so as to appear more credible, so I just discard what comes out of SOHR on the basis that SOHR doesn’t add anything of value and it’s too hard to infer the motives of statements made. 🙂
This is Russia Insider with an article showing a whole host of western-funded false-flags courtesy of the White Helmets.
https://russia-insider.com/en/take-red-pill-history-syrian-false-flags-exposed/ri23162
“One American” onsite reporter at Douma- better story than Frisk’s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSXwG-901yU
I’m in Damascus right now and know Pearson Sharp who was also allowed into Douma today. Sharp said the doctors told him there was no chemical weapons attack that day, no one died and the white helmets suddenly burst into his hospital room, shouted there’d been a chemical weapons attack, hosed down the alleged victims all the while filming the entire event. They then left, WH operatives and alleged victims. This is more evidence this was a staged hoax perpetrated by British and French intelligence services. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSXwG-901yU
This corroborates the Fisk story 100%.
There’s a chicken in the oven.
But where, I can’t see it?
That doesn’t prove it isn’t there…
Oh ffs. Keep the chicken, I’ll phone a pizza.
After Iraq Blair got re-elected in 2005
After Libya Cameron got re-elected in 2015
The general public gets what it deserves.
It’s a small consolation however that May will not be re-elected after a war with Russia.
The general public gets its bread, and in a far foreign land other people suffer the games.
Fisk’s is a powerful story of human suffering and human resilience.
Apart from Plato’s parable of the cave which pushes itself to mind here, there’s a remarkable parallel.
There’s the literal tunnel vision of the people of Douma, all living separate from one another, and separate from the small and large events that go on (or do they?) around them, that even seem to shape the world, but that don’t seem to concern them.
Their tunnel was their reality.
And there’s modern Western ‘(wo)man’ with his/her own tunnel vision. Who is shaped by Politics 2.0 (the objective of which it is no longer to shape a common reality, but to shape a common truth), and whose reality, the walls of his singular tunnel, is continuously and constantly fabricated by what the dutiful MSM and artificial ‘Social Media’ choose to present to her/him.
This tunnel is his reality.
Small wonder that wars are now based on Social Media reports, and declared on Social Media.
If only we could make it so, that they waged and waned, just there, on Social Media.
“..and whose reality, the walls of his singular tunnel, is continuously and constantly fabricated by what the dutiful MSM and artificial ‘Social Media’ choose to present to her/him.”
And he doesn’t even notice the change. So good! Thanks
Like
On RT right now, Syrian air bases currently under missile attack – Damascus & Homs.
Seems to be the “most moral military in the whole world”. Also the ‘world’s bravest’, apparently.
Quite funny how quickly the Pentagon denied its own involvement 😀
Dear Craig Murray,
That mainstream news refuses to deal with people like Pilger and Fisk, while even a relative newcomer like yourself can achieve 60,000 readers a day, comes as no surprise.
It seems to be synchronized with my accompanying desire not to waste time or money reading them. I tried to watch Channel 4’s Cathy Newman interview a Russian yesterday and simply switched off at the end of her first question, for the sake of my blood pressure.
I realized I like reacting emotionally to what’s going on in the world, but watching maniacs try to provoke this in me through lies and misrepresentation just makes me sick.
You are not alone.
“people like Pilger”…for sure he has done great work…however he is also part of the deception…Pilgar supports the 19 Arab hijackers flying planes into buildings theory…he is a proponent of the ‘blowback’ deception which the progressives use in order to support the 9/11 conspiracy perpetrated by the Administration of President Bush…view my site:
https://vigilantcanadian.ca
which gives evidence of the conspiracy based on ‘live’ stream network feeds on 9/11…I’m not Pilger yet i was able to uncover the conspiracy simply through the ‘live’ network feeds…so what is Pilger’s real mission?
This is the kind of information I would trust. I am extremely interested to find out what the OPCW conclude from their most recent visit.
Any group in the region (not necessarily Arab) who have a grievance with Assad can now deploy a chemical attack against Syria and Assad will get the blame.
The US have changed the rules and a large part of the international are quite happy to go along with the news rules. No Evidence Required.
And its not just Syria that could make an easy target for an attack that is easy to get away with.
The US, UK and France are now sitting ducks for terrorist and criminal gangs or geeks sat in their underpants in their bedrooms. Attacking their cyber infrastructure (health education transport emergency services, councils / cities or banking / commerce or defence / national security and they will not be investigated because it is already known that if that happens Russia did it. The evidence required for that already exists.
That’s not particularly a smart move of Trump May and Macron if their desire was to weaken Putin. They have massively strengthened Putin’s ability to strike back at them and NO One will know for sure who did it.
Trump did say his intelligence was not in doubt, who now can disagree with him?
Yep, next “chemical attack” will be the Yarmouk palestinian refugee camp, next to Old Damascus, run by ISIS…
This is a photo of Ghouta, it isn’t fabricated.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Da06Sn-X0AEdYCy.jpg:large
The RAF have not been near, Syrian and Russia managed that all by themselves.
Nice photo Fred. Can we expect a follow up from Mosul or Raqqa? Unfortunately this seems to be the only way to remove Western backed Jihadis
You really do like Jaysh al-Islam, Faylaq al-Rahman, Ahrar al-Sham, and Tahrir al-Sham, don’t you?
Only in your warped imagination.
It’s the logical conclusion from you posting a picture of a war zone and then blaming Russia and Syria for the mess. Rather than their western-backed jihadist enemies.
Fred
I dont understand what the photo is about to show? Syria, Russia been fighting terrorism for years, of course thats how it will look like.
Any photo of Italian cities at the end of WWII does not look that different. In Milan 2/3 of the buildings were hit, and when they removed the rubble they amassed stuff enough to create a little hill (186 metres) on the outskirt of the city, which is still existing and is a nice spot next to the San Siro Stadium, romantically named “Monte Stella”.
That photo is “from Ghouta” according to whom, the White Helmets?!
I did a reverse image search on google and checked with multiple sources.
You could do the same if you like.
Multiple sources peddling the same identical image with no attribution and no similar photos but from different angles/perspectives- just that one! It’s the lack of corroborative evidence that’s suspicious!
Funny how so many people care about the plight of innocents in war torn Syria all of a sudden. The same people supported attacks on Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan and say nothing of Yemen.
Yet here they are talking of poor suffering children in the context of an argument for dropping more bombs.
Shameful, glib, see-through, bastards basically.
Who would that be?
If you are suggesting I have supported those wars I hope you have some evidence or are prepared to retract.
You didn’t show a picture of any of those places, just Syria.
I didn’t post a picture of what Hitler did to Coventry either it doesn’t mean I supported him.
fred, keep on digging a hole deeper for yourself…
RAF was not bombing Douma but UK money was poured there, at least, through the White Helmets, to prop up extremists. What would you do if your country is invaded by a group of head choppers? Ask them, in a very delicate manner, to leave? Would you let them stay forever just to not hurt anybody?
I would think it should be very painful to destroy your country to save it. But that was precisely the plan of those who promoted this war from afar.
Jolly glad Fisk got through, when those OPCW wallahs found themselves “blocked” outside of town on some fake excuse about their “security”.
The only security OPCW needs is security against a bullet from Washington.
Listen everybody, you won’t believe what’s happened. The ghost of Harold Shipman has turned up and he is threatening to call in an air strike on Westminster if they don’t stop picking on pensioners. The good news is he wants a political solution, even if he is prepared to start World War III over the issue.
@ Hatuey April 17, 2018 at 00:56
Hang on a sec, as a pensioner I have just benefited from a reasonably substantial increase in my pension.
Just before local elections? Pure coincidence, surely you wouldn’t expect a British Govt. to bribe pensioners, would you?
Oddly enough, I’ll accept the bribe, but won’t vote Tory.
Stick that in yer pipe and smoke it, Mrs. May, cronies, and Bliarites.
Pretty good, the old Fisk, telling it as it is. The BBC will obviously (not) invite his comments – ?Como no?
because they are now totally subservient to the PTB, just like the (what used to be) a bloody good newspaper, the Guardian.
!A Luta Continua!
Israel apparently not keen on international law:
https://www.rt.com/news/424333-syria-missiles-defense-homs/
@ J April 17, 2018 at 01:01
Come on, play the game. They are ‘Exceptional’, with God-given rights to kill every man, woman, child and animal, in the land ‘HE’ has ‘given’ to them. What is International Law against ‘God’s Law’?
Hmmmmm, what sort of ‘God’ is that? You got it in one.,
“(W)hat sort of ‘God’ is that?” A tribal one.
Youtube – Breaking:Syriangirl explains who is behind the latest ‘chemical attack’…saddest film I have seen of army of islam parading cages of hostages through the streets of Douma.
@ Beth April 17, 2018 at 01:02
You forgot the link.
Craig says 60,000 of you read this blog. There were barely 2000 of us in Parliament Square today. The Harry S. Truman Carrier Strike Group (HSTCSG – one nuclear powered aircraft carrier, six destroyers, one cruiser and one German frigate) continues to approach Syrian waters, and will arrive Wednesday. All the US has to do is destroy Syria’s airfields and the jihadists will be enabled to overrun Syria, just like in Libya.
Stop gassing and do something!!!
If there was no #Douma chemical attack, then who the hell was @BBCMatthewPrice’s ‘medical student’ — all ‘yellow gas’ and ‘atropine’ and ‘almost everyone died’ — as b’cast by @bbcr4today on 12/4? See the BBC LiePlayer @ 2h57m30s… http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09y6zfp
M.
To be honest Mark that looks to have been cut and pasted from Twatter or Fraudbook but in answer to your question the BBC have *no* contacts on the ground so my guess the “medical student” was a White Helmets operative conning the utterly gullible twats who call themselves “editors” at the Beeb. IMV anyway
This really represents a new low in disinformation and blatant – ‘I am running through the streets naked but nobody notices’ propaganda by the BBC. I am no ‘Journalist’ – I can barely write – yet sitting in bed last night with my mobile phone It took me 20 minutes to read Fisk’s report, cross referencing a few Youtube channels and find and watch Pearson Sharp’s report. This morning I then come across the SOHR report. All confirming NO CHEMICAL ATTTACK – from sources on the ground. Did they slip something into the water supply – am I one of the 60,000 who just happen to be immune. Madness is just around the corner.
F-UK-US aren’t the only powers that have been bombing Syria. A few hours ago the Iｓ?aelis (“unidentified”) launched missiles at a base near Homs. I am not sure whether any successfully struck their targets. It is possible they were all shot down.
The list of aggression over the past eight days reads like this:
Mon 9 Apr: Iｓ?aelis (“unidentified”) bomb T-4 base near Homs
Early on Sat 14 Apr: F-UK-US bomb Damascus and sites near Homs
Late on Sat 14 Apr (the same day!): Iｓ?aelis (“unidentified”) bomb Aleppo
Late on Mon 16 Apr: Iｓ?aelis (“unidentified”) launch missiles at Shayrat base near Homs
And no MP thought to ask about “collusion” today. Has any British government admitted that collusion took place during the Suez war in 1956 yet?
Iｓ?aeli attacks on Syria are highly relevant to the thesis that the Iｓ?aelis – a known chemical power and non-ratifier of the CWC – may have had a hand in Salisbury. Why? Because there may be an Iｓ?aeli policy to provoke Russia. Eventually Russian air defences are going to shoot down Iｓ?aeli missiles launched at Syria, if that hasn’t already happened.
The likelihood of me reading the Talmud is as remote as me reading any other godbothering tract. I think Tim Osman played for Everton once upon a time bit as I’m not an Evertonian I may be makingthat up. Which is of course a veritable boon for a godbotherer. Maybe i missed my vocation.
You are clearly taking the piss and I enjoyed our banter. Good night!
Robert Fisk is a brilliant journo. I especially like his jab to the white Helmets.
Hehe, the only civil defense in the world, that has its own camera crew, and who only rescues children, but never people blown to bits or riddled with scrapnel, no it is always TV-savy HD pictures of crying children.
Both Beeley and Bartlett have done a good job too.
Much praise on this blog for Robert Fisk’s latest article in the Independent, and rightly so. But spare a thought for Vanessa Beeley who has been reporting from Syria and who long ago exposed the White Helmets. She has been vilified in the MSM (as recently as a few days ago in the Times), and last year even Reporters Without Borders tried to silence her.
Point made, Robyn. Beeley and Bartlett have been slimed for years over having the temerity to report what they witnessed, among the few Western journalists who actually enter Syria. .
Anybody else confirm that moonofalabama and sicsempertyrannis websites are both down?
Yes, MOA down.
Some corroboration of Fisk’s report: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wnkhQu-e0n0&feature=youtu.be
had the misfortune to hear a brief segment of an interview with Lavrov by the bbc (hardtalk) – where it is now being claimed by the american representative of OPCW that the Russians have interfered with the site of the undoubted chemical weapons attack in Douma last week – evidence from social media etc – OPCW is ‘neutral’ hey?? – really sick of this.
jazza, on Russians interfering with the site, Caitlin Johnstone expressed it thus:
‘I guess the idea is that this international top-level investigative team on which tremendous credibility has been placed by the western world can be thwarted by Russians showing up with a Hoover and spraying some Febreze in the air like a teenage stoner when mom comes home?’
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2018/04/17/us-russia-hacked-the-evidence-of-chemical-attack-in-syria/
thanks – it’s difficult keeping up with the nonsense – distraction is on the increase in the propaganda poisoning of our planet
Well Done Robert exposing these lies .The Uk has just followed the Usa like a puppy dog into costly expensive military illegal action ! Our proportion of the Cost could have repaired our NHS problems for years !
Seems a bit weird to me, demonstrating outside a parliament, which funds terrorists, and operates a fake rescue service the white powder helmets, which can concoct whatever narrative USUKIS want to act on. That lot have all been bummed, especially my MP, Liam Byrne, who made a few million by being an MP in the right places at the right time and now sports a gingery brown little beard to attract his personality to the local Birmingham Muslims.
Nor do I have any reason to believe the narrative of US journalists who find Damascus cheerfully supporting Assad. This is just to reassure the Western publics that Damascus is not in danger of being bombed from Wednesday. Mrs May has built her own bonfire. Are we all going to sit up late tonight and watch the firework display? Real journalists do not taunt others for staying away from a war-zone. everything pre-recorded and shown to the public at the right time.
If the Western powers destroy Damascus the people will tear their politicians limb from limb. MPs will be murdered in their surgeries which will then be operated under heavy policing and vetting. Politicians will retreat to their villas abroad. We will literally bulldoze parliament and political buildings to the ground. There will be no call to rebuild it, or re-assemble the Versailles it has become.
If Trump, May and Macron bomb Damascus, that is the end of Zionist fake democracy. It will be 1789.
Love all that.
Syria will probably be the last Middle East war the west will fight – not because its own people will retaliate – but because Russia will nuke western capitals (and similarly the West will nuke Russia), leading to a near-total annihilation of the entire world, but primarily the Northern countries – the so called developed world. It’s interesting that Syria in Arabic is also know as “Bilad-as-Sham” meaning the “Northern Land” – if that is not enough of a symbolic reminder that for NATO (the primary villain) and Russia to destroy Syria is for themselves to call for self-destruction. That a total world war is looming has been indicated in all Jewish, Christian and Islamic Scriptures. A deep study of Ezekiel 38, 39, the Book of Revelation, and Surah-al-Kahf of the Quran, all testify to this.That a Muslim reformer of the late 19th century stated that the centre of the third world war (after having correctly predicted the fall of the Czar, the first and second world war) will be Syria (from which the war would escalate) should be enough to seriously worry us. You’re probably thinking it’s mumble jumble – but a warning is a warning – whether you like it or not. There you have it.
On the news today in Australia: Russian Cyber Attacks. Woolworth’s and assorted Oz businesses had network problems, and it’s being blamed on the Russians.
Pu-lease. It no wonder I no longer watch the news, or read the newspapers. My brain literally disengages, turns away from the MSM like it would an especially painful memory. It’s not my imagination, they have gotten much much worse in the last few years (and were never that great anyway). Clearly The Plan – whatever that is – is being accelerated, and all sorts of laughable lies are put out 24/7 in the name of the Hegemon, whoever that is.
Basically, crazy people are running the show. It’s like The Joker has taken over Gotham City, and the Mayor is being blackmailed. Not good.
Desperation and incompetence.
May and Macron will have a simple answer to this. To classify building rubble and sand as CW agents of a type developed in Douma.