I have watched Pakistan-Afghanistan relations long enough to distrust easy headlines, and last week’s news produced a few of them. At the Center-2026 (Tsentr-2026) war games in Russia’s Chelyabinsk region, Taliban officers stood among the foreign observers. Reports say it was the first time Moscow had invited a Taliban military delegation since the movement returned […]
The false flag attacks are coming in fast and furious in an attempt to keep both Donald Trump and Bibi Netanyahu in office beyond their normal expiry date. What they really reveal, though, is the extent of how Western media is now a dirty tool of intelligence agencies.
With both leaders of the U.S. and Israel facing an unprecedented challenge to their office, is it not reasonable to assume that both will use their power to indulge in skulduggery and dirty tricks to survive? For Trump, he knows he is facing impeachment if he loses both houses, and I have speculated in earlier articles that he will be looking at unprecedented ways of either calling off the midterm elections or refusing to acknowledge their results – using a pretext of war with Iran. For something, in legal terms, like that to be pulled off, the circumstances would have to be on a scale of Pearl Harbour or 9/11. America would have not only to be at war, but under attack on its own soil for Trump to attempt such a stunt, which many argue isn’t possible in the constitution. But Trump is always breaking rules and pushing the boundaries of what he can do in office, and so it would not be uncharacteristic for him and his legal team to be burning the midnight oil plotting something which is so huge and so significant.
The same story plays out for Benjamin Netanyahu, who is facing seven counts of corruption if his case ever gets heard in Israel. A surefire way of making sure it doesn’t is to keep Israel in a permanent state of war with Iran and to raise the stakes to the point where it appears that this tiny country is under attack.
And so, at the risk of being called a conspiracy theorist, many will assume a false flag attack – or even a series of them – might be coming our way soon, both in Israel and in the West – for the justification of war. Trump’s claims that the U.S. will resume bombing after the midterm elections may well have been a masterly move, when all along he is planning an attack sooner against Iran. To go ahead earlier with a large-scale attack is of course very risky, as, if gas prices go even higher or we see U.S. casualties, this could be a final suicide pill that Trump takes even before Americans go to the polls. But this is a U.S. president who believes he is significantly more intelligent than he really is, and who has fired all the advisers around him who can give him sound advice which would probably not chime with his childish, moronic ideas about what America’s military capability is in the Middle East. Yet it would seem that the plan is to not allow Iran the possibility of a pre-emptive strike.
How else could any cynical analyst interpret two key “attacks” on both Israel and the West recently brought to us dutifully by Western mainstream media? The so-called terror attack on the Dubai flight heading towards Israel is very suspicious, not least of all because Iran issued a warning just a few hours before it happened that a false flag attack was going to take place on a plane, framing Iran. A scuffle in the cockpit which involved a stabbing certainly happened, but the plane spiralling out of control for it to be rescued at the last moment by Israeli pilots who just so happened to be aboard and were able to apprehend the pilot sounds like a really bad Hollywood movie script with B-class actors. The timing is questionable, as is how fast Netanyahu and media were ready to present it to the world as a terror attack.
Just a few days earlier we saw a similar fanciful story in the UK at an RAF airbase where men were arrested under terrorism laws, with Andy Burnham reacting quickly to blame Iran. But where is the evidence? Was Burnham asked to go ahead with a false flag attack by Trump when they met earlier in the month at the UN assembly in New York? The men, although arrested and charged under terrorism laws, were remarkably allowed to walk free on bail. And nothing in their vans, which were parked in woods, has been found which would suggest they were planning any attacks. Were these men set up? Were they paid to do a certain job late at night knowing they were certain to be intercepted? If Iran were behind such fun and games, surely there would not be this level of amateur dramatics.
A more sober take on both the Israeli hostage flight and the UK airbase being a target of terrorism is that they were both staged by the desperate leaders of both the U.S. and Israel in a bid to prepare the Western public for an imminent war which, clearly, the UK will play a considerable role in – despite the window dressing of its foreign minister’s statements about bringing Israel into line on its Gaza genocide (which was also probably a PR ruse).
In many ways this was inevitable, made even more so by the temptation of using Western press as willing partners in crime in a massive, gross misrepresentation of facts to serve a bigger agenda of the elites who own legacy media. A war with Iran is coming on a scale which is certainly going to be greater than the previous “incursions”. The only real question is who blinks first and kicks it off. But the old rules always apply for those who want to seek the truth. In Western media, never believe those who are presented as the culprits, as these usual suspects are nearly always not those who have the finger on the trigger. And in any case, ask yourself: why would Iran need to plan such attacks? What would it gain? The only winners are those who have presented themselves as victims to justify what they are about to do. The lies in the past which we have been presented by both the U.S./UK and of course Israel (which is really the grand master of packing fake news, in particular video) are too great, too exhaustive to ignore. And as long as Western media is happy to play its role, what we are witnessing is what their real role is required to be – given that nearly all of them are loss-making ventures.
Two Iranian nationals have been charged with terrorism offences over an alleged plot targeting the Jewish community in Manchester, with investigators accusing them of researching potential targets and obtaining instructions and materials for an improvised explosive device.
Rahman Salehi, of Salford, and Salam Ahmadyan, 36, of Liverpool, were charged on Friday, 2 October, with engaging in conduct in preparation for terrorist acts, contrary to Section 5 of the Terrorism Act 2006.
They have been remanded in custody and are due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on Saturday, 3 October.
The arrests followed what police described as a long-running counter-terrorism investigation into a suspected plot directed against the Jewish community in the Manchester area.
Police allege that the two men were communicating with a third person overseas who may have been in Iran. No allegation has been made in the charges released so far that the Iranian government directed the suspected plot.
The particulars published by Counter Terrorism Policing allege that Salehi and Ahmadyan used encrypted communications and obtained material containing instructions for manufacturing an explosive device.
Investigators say the men acquired instructions relating to a device using powdered chlorine and vehicle brake fluid, along with video material concerning the manufacture or assembly of an improvised explosive device.
They are further accused of acquiring liquids, components and equipment, researching potential targets, obtaining images, maps and plans, and carrying out reconnaissance at locations considered as possible targets.
Frank Ferguson, Chief Crown Prosecutor for the CPS Special Crime and Counter Terrorism Division, said prosecutors had concluded that there was sufficient evidence for the case to be put before a court.
The CPS stressed that the proceedings are now active and that both men have the right to a fair trial. The charges are allegations and no finding of guilt has been made.
Arrests during Jewish High Holy Days
The arrests took place shortly before Yom Kippur, the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, and came amid heightened security surrounding Jewish institutions in Britain.
Deputy Assistant Commissioner Vicki Evans, Senior National Coordinator for Counter Terrorism Policing, said the investigation had disrupted what police believed to be a plot targeting Manchester’s Jewish community.
The timing is particularly sensitive because it comes one year after the terrorist attack at the Heaton Park Hebrew Congregation synagogue in Manchester on 2 October 2025.
The latest case also comes against the background of a series of alleged Iranian-linked threats and attacks involving Jewish and Israeli targets in Britain.
British security agencies have repeatedly warned about Iranian activity on UK territory. The government said earlier this year that more than 20 potentially lethal Iran-backed plots had been tracked by British security agencies over the preceding year.
The group, the Islamic Movement of Companions of the Right, was subsequently designated under Britain’s new state-threat legislation alongside Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
EU Today has previously examined Iran-linked security threats in Britain following counter-terrorism arrests involving Iranian nationals, as well as alleged Iranian-linked plots targeting Jewish institutions elsewhere in Europe and North America.
Britain expands protection for Jewish communities
The Manchester case comes as the British government increases security around synagogues, Jewish schools and community centres.
The package includes funding for more than 500 additional police officers across England and Wales, including around 80 officers in Greater Manchester, as well as additional resources for Counter Terrorism Policing.
The UK’s national terrorism threat level was raised to severe in April, meaning that an attack is considered highly likely. The government said the decision reflected both an increased threat from Islamist and extreme-right terrorism and a wider background of state-linked physical threats against the Jewish community.
The allegations against Salehi and Ahmadyan will now be considered by the courts. Prosecutors have warned against publishing material that could prejudice the proceedings.
Ann Widdecombe's alleged murderer, Joshua Kerry, has been charged with preparing acts of terrorism against Nigel Farage after "intensive" police investigation.
Yemen’s Houthis have denied targeting a power station in the city of Medina. A Saudi-led coalition earlier accused the militant group of targeting the facility supplying power to the Prophet’s Mosque – one of the holiest sites in the Muslim world.
A senior Houthi official branded the accusation a “lie” aimed at tarnishing the group’s image and reinforcing similar claims made by the coalition in the past.
On Thursday, the Saudi coalition’s spokesman, Major General Turki al-Maliki, accused the Yemeni militants of striking the Taibah electricity distribution station in Medina earlier this week in what he called a “cowardly terrorist act” and a part of an alleged broader campaign by the Houthis to “target the Two Holy Mosques.”
In mid-September, Saudi Arabia accused the Houthis of launching a drone towards the holy city of Mecca. The unmanned aerial vehicle was intercepted and destroyed, it added. The Yemeni movement’s leader, Abdel-Malik al-Houthi, dismissed that claim as a “heinous lie” in a televised address at the time, claiming Riyadh was “weaponizing lies” to advance its own agenda.
The developments have sparked concerns in Türkiye and Pakistan, which signed a joint defense agreement with Saudi Arabia in August. Speaking to the United Nations General Assembly last week, Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif called any “threat to the sanctity” of the Muslim holy cities of Mecca and Medina a “red line that must never be crossed.”
Ankara denounced this week’s alleged Medina attack. “Any attack targeting the sanctity, peace, and security of the Two Holy Mosques is an unacceptable affront directed at the shared sensitivities of the entire Islamic world,” the Turkish government spokesman, Burhanettin Duran, said on X on Friday. He vowed that Türkiye “will continue to stand by Saudi Arabia.”
The developments come amid the continued escalation between the Houthis and the Saudi-led coalition. Riyadh has backed Yemen’s internationally recognized government against the Houthis since intervening in the country’s civil war in 2015.
Large-scale fighting largely subsided after a UN-brokered truce in 2022, but the conflict erupted again this summer after an airport in the Houthi-controlled Yemeni capital of Sanaa was bombed to prevent a returning Houthi delegation that had flown to Iran from landing.
Rather than abandoning the plainly nuts Fairford narrative, Burnham and his government are doubling down on the claim it is an Iranian terror plot.
It remains quite possible the men were indeed fuel thieves, simply stealing fuel from farms. They appear to have been equipped for fuel theft and all they were carrying was petrol. It is worth a footnote that there is a very real history of US military personnel, and indeed British personnel, selling military fuel from bases. Stolen red diesel meant for HMS Bulwark fuelled fairground rides throughout England, which I think is rather lovely. But if the Fairford Five were fuel thieves, farms are more probable as the target.
We should pause here to acknowledge that USAF Fairford is falsely designated RAF Fairford, itself a propaganda lie, just like “RAF Lakenheath” or “RAF Mildenhall”. The UK is full of US military bases, on which US law applies. (My birth certificate gives my father’s occupation as “Clerk USAF”. He was employed at Mildenhall at the time).
It is a classic example of state propaganda that the petrol discovered in the Fairford vans was described by counter terror police as a potential accelerant for a bomb.
Well yes, petrol is that. It has however, rather more obvious uses too. The same technique was used at the height of the War on Terror propaganda in the Great Easter Bomb Plot, that never was. Police rounded up and arrested many young Muslims across the Manchester region, which was front-page news. They were all later released without charge.
But at the time of arrest the police announced they had found a potential bomb-making ingredient in a kitchen.
Well, they had. It was a bag of sugar. Sugar is indeed a potential bomb-making ingredient. Yet most of us have a bag in the kitchen. At least it did not take the police ten days to find the bag of sugar in the kitchen, unlike when they searched Charlie Rowley’s flat for a vial of novichok, and it took them ten days to “find” a bottle of perfume sitting on the kitchen counter.
For Fairford, on balance I think a false flag gone wrong is a little more likely than just fuel thieves. We know the men had no bombs and no guns, which makes the terrorist narrative rather hard for the government to sustain. But if they were patsies set up in a false flag, there would be plenty of things already on the base that go bang which could have been used to create the “terrorist incident” around them.
Two key points make me think this was a false flag. Firstly the lady farmer who called 999 was adamant there were more men that the five arrested and bailed. The others would have been the spycops – agents provocateurs – who would have been quietly spirited away from the scene. That also fits with the released information that it was one of the men who phoned in a warning about the “attack”.
It looks to me like a false flag spectacular had been planned, with US involvement as claimed by Trump and possibly Israeli knowledge as claimed by Netanyahu. This operation by the security services was viewed as over the pay grade of local police (who might be inconveniently honest) who were not in the picture. It all went horribly wrong for the government when an alert local farmer called the local police, and when a participant also called it in. That could have been one of the recruited “terrorists” who got cold feet, or one of the agents panicked they had lost contact with their line of command.
The use of recruited patsies to carry out false flags is now better understood. I have been writing about it since before the Newburgh bomb plot which was a particularly egregious example. In the United States there has been more awareness of and reaction to agent provocateur incited plots than in the UK.
For anyone sceptical, here is a summary of Newburgh:
In May 2009 the FBI arrested four poor men from Newburgh, New York, and announced it had foiled a plot to bomb two synagogues in the Bronx and shoot down military planes at Stewart Air National Guard base. The plot, the targets, the inert bombs and the disabled Stinger missile were all supplied by the Bureau. The recruiter was Shahed Hussain, a Pakistani fraudster who had become an informant to avoid deportation after a driving-licence scam. Paid nearly $100,000, he spent more than a year fishing at a Newburgh mosque, posing as a wealthy Jaish-e-Mohammed agent, before latching onto James Cromitie, a Walmart stocker and petty drug dealer.
Hussain offered heavenly reward and as much as $250,000. Cromitie brought in three others: Onta Williams, David Williams and Laguerre Payen. Hussain drove them across a state line to inspect the fake weapons, which federalised the charges and carried a 25-year minimum. They were convicted in 2010.
The sentencing judge, Colleen McMahon, said she believed beyond a shadow of a doubt that there would have been no crime except that the government instigated it, planned it and brought it to fruition. In 2023 she ordered the release of three of them, calling it an FBI-orchestrated conspiracy and writing that the real lead conspirator was the United States. She freed Cromitie in 2024 on the same basis, describing him as a small-time grifter with no history of violence and Hussain as a villain who had lured him with promises of both heavenly and earthly rewards.
The Golders Green ambulances arson was a classic of this false flag genre. Four young Muslims were recruited, in this case online rather than in person, by someone they never saw who was almost certainly a Mossad agent. They were offered money to attack the ambulances, which they did. The attack is then blamed on Iran through a claim on a Telegram channel on behalf of an “Iranian organisation”, Harakat Ashab al-Yamin al-Islamia, which is a Mossad fabrication.
HAYI first became known to the world through simultaneous press releases on 16 March by five Israeli government outlets in Israel, US and UK (including BICOM) and an article by the Israeli front “Foundation for Defending Democracy”. The FDD’s Nick Stewart travels with Kushner and Witkoff as part of the US negotiating team on the Middle East.
There are numerous reasons for doubting the real existence of HAYI. None of its material is in Farsi. All of its “attacks” have been minor arson attacks on pointless targets that hurt nobody. The grammar, calligraphy and imagery of its materials are all wrong.
The UK state itself has now debunked some of the Mossad HAYI narrative. On 29 April, when Essa Suleiman stabbed three men, the entire media blocked out the first Muslim victim and claimed an antisemitic terrorist attack on the two in Golders Green. The HAYI Mossad run “Iranian” Telegram channel immediately put out a statement claiming responsibility for the attack. But yesterday police and prosecution were forced to drop the claim it was a terrorist attack at all. The stabbing of the Muslim is charged as attempted murder, though still ignored by the media. So “HAYI” claimed responsibility for a non-existent terrorist incident.
A false flag can be, but is not necessarily, the state planting a bomb and then blaming someone else. It can be more complex – the state recruiting people to plant bombs. Those people may believe they are genuinely part of an ideological campaign, or may just be doing it for money.
The opaque Starmer rent-boy arson plot, in which Ukrainian male models burnt property associated with Keir Starmer, remains unclear, largely because any discussion of what lay behind the attacks was banned by the judge in the trial. But the media, with government encouragement, continually relays the story that the arsonists were recruited online by a man known as “El Money”. An interesting twist here is that the media constantly refer to him as Russian-speaking. But the evidence in court is that he spoke both Russian and Ukrainian.
Almost all adult Ukrainians can speak Russian. The number of Russians who speak Ukrainian is very small. Yet El Money is now routinely portrayed as Russian.
Which brings us to the whole question of Russian “hybrid attacks”, where we are asked to believe the narrative of the security services of states whose leaders are openly promoting war with Russia, about desultory and mysterious attacks. The rather sorry Leipzig drone is a good example. We have a more recent claim of Russian arson from Estonia, a state which has instituted massive discrimination against the 29% of its population who speak Russian.
Not only has Estonia closed Russian schools, libraries, theatres, churches, cinemas and university courses, it even refuses passports to people born and bred in Estonia, whose parents were born and bred in Estonia, if they cannot speak Estonian. That is totally contrary to numerous UN, Council of Europe and OSCE instruments on protection of minority linguistic rights.
It is one thing to insist on language qualification for citizenship for new immigrants. Many countries do. It is quite another thing to deny citizenship to a native linguistic minority. Estonia was part of Russia from 1721 to 1919 and of the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1991. It has Russian speakers.
So I decline to believe the Estonian government on Russian “hybrid attacks”.
Which brings us to the amazing “FlyDubai” hijacking and the heroic plumber who knew how to rescue a plane from a death dive because he watched Air Crash Investigation.
There are real problems with this narrative. One is that the plane is said to have dived approximately 15,000 feet in about 30 seconds. This is said to be confirmed by independent flight trackers.
The force was so enormous that the rudder ripped off the plane.
Picture a dive of 500 feet – that is more than a 40 storey building – per second. Picture that. 500 feet in a second. Imagine yourself falling that fast. The forces would be enormous inside the cabin. Anybody not strapped in would be lifted right out of their seats and probably hit the ceiling. Many would be injured. Any unfastened object, including major ones like food trollies, would be hurled about with great force. Baggage lockers would come unlocked as the weight of the bags inside was hurled up. Remember this dive ripped the rudder off. It would be impossible for anyone not strapped into their chair to keep their footing or seat.
Chilling footage of the Flydubai FZ1073 commercial plane making a rapid descent during the on-board struggle between the hijacking pilot and co-pilot/passengers. pic.twitter.com/PsSSPwhThr
We have a great many videos from on board the plane but nothing like this is shown. No video shows this kind of extreme situation, and the cabin at the end of the flight is remarkably undisturbed.
Before #FZ1073 changed its squawk to 7700, we observed extreme fluctuations in the transmitted altitude data, with calculated vertical speeds ranging from approximately -30,000 to +10,000 ft/min.
For context, vertical speeds during normal operations rarely exceed ±4,000 ft/min.… pic.twitter.com/Zgyn0iQ33a
There is also a problem with that flight-tracking data. As pointed out by this commercial pilot on CNN, a plane can’t easily slow down in mid-air. He is disbelieving of how quickly the flight trackers show the plane returning to normal speed. He is also deeply sceptical of the ability to control the plane after the rudder came off due to loss of hydraulic fluid, and of the chances of the airframe staying together. Now compare that to the lack of cabin tumult.
I have seen it argued that if you entered the dive very gently and carefully without sudden change of pitch, and exited it similarly smoothly, then you would avoid extreme G-forces and the cabin might be relatively undisturbed. Even if so, it is hard to imagine the kind of smooth transition into the dive in the circumstances we are told were occurring in the cockpit, with the co-pilot deliberately putting the plane in a death dive while fighting with the pilot.
The smooth transition out of the dive in the official story was achieved by a plumber who knew what to do from watching Air Crash Investigation. I don’t think I need to comment on that.
We will never find out the truth about FlyDubai. The plane diverted to Saudi Arabia. The copilot who is being painted as an Islamic extremist will be isolated there and tortured by the Saudis. Netanyahu has already said Israel will join the interrogation. Do not believe any confession or evidence from the co-pilot.
The plane was a Boeing, so the USA will join the initial investigation alongside UAE, Saudi Arabia and Israel. A more potent coalition of Zionist evil does not exist. We will certainly have faked flight data recorder and cockpit voice recorder evidence coming from that shower.
I do feel something has snapped in people’s willingness to believe official narratives. The Skripal narrative was even more crazy than any of these, but most people still trusted government. Thankfully that faith has been seriously shaken.
It’s easy to forget that the western media – the so-called “free press” – likes to distinguish itself from media in authoritarian regimes on the basis that, unlike them, it asks critical questions of the powerful, reports facts objectively, and formulates its analyses dispassionately.
They do propaganda, we do news – or so the western media argues.
The feverish coverage since five men were arrested in the early hours of Sunday morning close to RAF Fairford in the UK is blowing a very big hole in that claim.
Here are the known facts so far.
Three white vans, bearing the logo of a genuine fuel transit company, were spotted by a local farmer on the road outside her property as she returned from a party. Police arrived promptly and arrested the men, who were all British nationals in their twenties.
On Tuesday, it emerged that one of the arrested men actually called the police earlier – seemingly the reason officers were on the scene so quickly.
Although the men were initially arrested on explosives charges, no “viable” explosives were found. Although they were arrested on terrorism charges, which allow for 14 days of detention, they were released on bail under normal criminal laws in less than two days.
It has also emerged that the men had several empty “barrels” in their vans, plus one that contained what police described disturbingly as an “accelerant”.
Actually, that was simply a reference to petrol. The stuff that goes into vehicles to make them accelerate.
British prime minister Andy Burnham held a rare national emergency Cobra meeting over the incident.
Meanwhile, the Trump administration got involved because RAF Fairford, despite its name, is in reality a US air base from which American planes are waging an illegal war of aggression against Iran, with the UK’s blessing.
US Secretary of state Marco Rubio has said the incident “clearly involves the hands of a foreign actor”. When asked whether Iran was that actor, Trump replied: “It might be.” He added: “I know the answer… I can be very specific, but I’d rather not say.”
According to a report in the New York Times, “American and British intelligence services worked with Israel and Western countries to discover the threats against US bases, including ones in Germany.” [my emphasis]
Despite these sparse facts, the British media have uniformly rushed to a single conclusion: that this was almost certainly part of an Iranian terror plot to target the US airbase and its planes. The only room for debate allowed is whether the five men were witting or unwitting actors in that plot.
As the Guardianreported in its Wednesday edition, referring to this as a “complex investigation”: “An Iranian link to the bizarre events in the Gloucestershire countryside over the weekend is seen as increasingly likely.”
As context, let us note the following: that British and US officials have every interest in trying to hype this incident as an Iranian “terror plot”, whatever the actual evidence suggests.
Why? Because the US is waging an illegal war on Iran, and the UK is allowing it to do so from British soil. Under the rules of war, Iran has every right to attack RAF Fairford.
If the British state and billionaire-owned media were actually serving as a truly “free press”, they would be offering the context that RAF Fairford is a legitimate military target and that any attack on it by Iran would not constitute terrorism.
Of course, none have done so.
Instead, they have loyally regurgitated the British and US security services spin of a “terror plot” – based on no tangible evidence at all – that paints Britain and the US as the victims of a sinister and unwarranted act of Iranian aggression.
But context aside, an objective, sceptical media – a “free press” – would be reserving judgment on what had happened. It would be asking difficult questions. It would be offering plausible counter-narratives.
Again, none of this is happening. In the British media, there has been a lemming-like rush towards accepting uncritically the very conclusions that best serve British and US state interests.
The constant highlighting of a terrorism connection to the arrested men – for which there is no apparent evidence – is precisely the kind of coverage you would expect from state media in an authoritarian regime. This is about whipping up a public mood of fear, not about transparent fact-finding.
Notably, unlike the British media, the New York Times report does allow for another possibility, even if it instantly ignores it and then joins the British media in treating what evidence there is as proof of an Iranian terror plot.
The Timesopens with a question: “The potential ambiguities – were the men Iranian operatives, petty gas thieves, or both? – added to the confusion surrounding the arrests that the authorities have yet to fully explain.”
“Petty gas thieves”! Men in vans with empty barrels close to a farm in the middle of the night. Is it possible they could simply be criminals?!
In fact, this conjecture has been all over social media since the first reports of the men being arrested surfaced. As new details have emerged, those suspicions have only grown.
And yet Britain’s “free press” has uniformly ignored this counter-theory in favour of the US and British security services’ narrative.
Doubtless, British journalists covering this incident would call the idea that this was simply a criminal group caught in the act unhelpful “speculation”.
But how is their no-more-plausible, and possibly less plausible, theory that this was an Iranian terror plot not equally speculation – if in their case, speculation that happens to be extremely helpful to the British and US security establishments?
There are other theories we could posit too, given the known facts. Israel, which originally pushed for the illegal and disastrous war on Iran, has been looking for a way to persuade the Trump administration to return to a full-scale bombing campaign.
An attack on RAF Fairford – or the appearance of one – would be an ideal way to pile on the pressure for renewed strikes on Iran. It’s not, after all, as if there are no examples of Israel carrying out false flags.
If the “foreign actor” of Iran can recruit a gang of petty criminals to unwittingly spark a major security incident outside RAF Fairford, why can the “foreign actor” of Israel not do exactly the same?
I don’t know what happened outside the airbase. I’m not claiming to. I am keeping an open, critical mind while what facts there are emerge. If only our “free press’“ were doing the same.
There may be those reading this who find the claim that the media in our “democratic” societies is not confrontational to, or at least distant from, the state hard to believe. Such an idea may be new to them.
That should not be surprising. After all, how did each of us form our foundational view of the world – of who are the good guys, and who the bad – if not from spending a lifetime reading and watching media owned by billionaire-led corporations and the state?
Since quitting the establishment media myself a quarter of a century ago (I worked for the Guardian), I have dedicated much of my time to identifying some of the most egregious examples of skewed journalism – reporting that consistently presents events in ways that serve not their audiences’ interests but those of the powerful: the corporations themselves; western security establishments; and Israel, the linchpin of the West’s war industries.
In such cases, the establishment media readily abandons even the pretence of neutral, fair or dispassionate reporting. It serves as little more than a propaganda factory. (You can read my detailed explanation of how the Propaganda Model works here.)
This has been all too visible in the coverage of Israel’s mass-slaughter in Gaza, a genocide that could not be named as such.
It was visible in the coverage of Russia’s “unprovoked” invasion of Ukraine that had, in fact, been provoked by Nato for decades, as it expanded across Europe with a clear intention: either to corner Moscow militarily or drive it into a retaliatory attack on Ukraine that would provide an opportunity for the West to bleed Russia on a proxy battlefield.
It was visible in the sustained media campaign of antisemitism smears against Jeremy Corbyn, that rarest, and most dangerous, of things: a leader of a major political party who promoted socialist policies for the benefit of the public, not billionaires, and was a vehement critic of Israel long before it showed its genocidal hand.
It was visible too in the media pile-on against Julian Assange, whose Wikileaks whistleblower platform exposed British and US war crimes while also threatening to destroy the media’s top-down model. Having ridiculed him for claiming asylum in the Ecuadorean embassy for fear Washington would seek to extradite him for exposing its crimes, the media then treated his seizure by British police and incarceration for years in a high-security London prison, while the US sought his extradition for exposing its crimes, as entirely unremarkable, as barely worth reporting.
I could go on and on. There is a consistent pattern when the establishment media deals with the most important issues, the very ones in which our national security states are most invested. Then the media jettisons even the semblance of critical distance from the state.
RAF Fairford is just the latest example of how, in such important moments, the media serves as nothing more than the security state’s loudspeaker.
The Flydubai plane incident appears to have been part of a scenario concocted by Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.
Its aim, observer say, is to divert attention from the growing scandal over Netanyahu’s handling of the October 7 Hamas operation, shore up his position ahead of Israel’s October 27 election and create a pretext for a new confrontation with Iran.
The scenario unfolded days after Netanyahu’s reported secret visit to Abu Dhabi, where he met bin Zayed amid mounting political pressure over allegations that the UAE leader had warned him in advance of an impending Hamas operation.
According to the account, the purpose of the arrangement was to manufacture a dramatic security incident involving an Israeli-heavy Flydubai flight, portray it as a terrorist attack, introduce an Iranian connection into the narrative and use the resulting alarm to reinforce Netanyahu’s security credentials and build support for renewed military action against Tehran.
The Flydubai Boeing 737, carrying 174 passengers, most of them Israeli settlers, made an emergency landing in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday following what was described as a violent confrontation between the pilot and co-pilot in the cockpit.
Netanyahu and his war minister, Israel Katz, immediately characterized the incident as a “terrorist” attack. Netanyahu subsequently compared it to the September 11 attacks, claimed the Omani co-pilot had undergone “radical indoctrination” and suggested that Iran could have been involved.
Yet no public evidence has established an ideologically-motivated attack or an Iranian connection.
Indeed, early Israeli media reports offered entirely different explanations, including a personal dispute or an attempted suicide by the co-pilot. Israel’s Channel 12 reported on Thursday that the Saudi investigation had found no indication of terrorism at that stage.
The timing, however, gave the episode a clear political value for Netanyahu.
Israeli media have reported that Netanyahu is under pressure ahead of the October 27 election, while the controversy surrounding the October 7 Hamas operation continues to raise questions about his regime’s warnings and preparedness.
Haaretz reported on September 9 that bin Zayed had spoken to Netanyahu roughly 10 days before the October 7 operation and warned him of a threat from then-Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was reportedly preparing a “huge surprise.”
Bin Zayed had also previously alerted Israel’s Shin Bet intelligence agency, according to the report.
Netanyahu’s reported secret visit to Abu Dhabi therefore assumed particular significance. Israeli media reports said the purpose of the visit was to ask bin Zayed to deny reports that he had warned Netanyahu about the looming Hamas threat.
Against this backdrop, the alleged Flydubai scenario provided Netanyahu with an opportunity to shift the political narrative from questions over the October 7 failures to a new story about “terrorism”, Iranian threats and the need for renewed confrontation.
Netanyahu repeatedly raised the possibility of an Iranian connection despite acknowledging that Israel had received no specific intelligence warning about the flight and that investigators had found no evidence linking Tehran to the incident.
He told CNN that he had spoken with US President Donald Trump about the incident and its wider implications for global aviation. Trump separately confirmed that the two had discussed the matter at length.
The objective, according to the account, was not simply to generate domestic political headlines. By bringing Iran into the story, Netanyahu could potentially create a new security crisis capable of drawing Washington into another confrontation with Tehran.
Analysts have nevertheless warned against making such a connection.
Dani Citrinowicz, an Iran affairs researcher at Israel’s so-called Institute for Security Studies, warned against linking the incident to Iran.
According to Maariv, he said there was a difference between preparing for possible scenarios and creating the impression that another war was imminent.
He warned that if Tehran concluded Israel was preparing an attack, it could take pre-emptive action, which Israel might then interpret as confirmation of its original assessment, producing a cycle of escalation.
Citrinowicz described the situation as “playing with fire” and warned that statements by Israeli officials could become a “self-fulfilling prophecy.”
Other analysts have reportedly described the attempt to connect the incident to Iran as sounding like “a Hollywood screenplay.”
Flydubai itself has urged against premature speculation until the investigation is completed and suspended flights between Dubai and Tel Aviv while the investigation continued.
The Netanyahu-bin Zayed arrangement therefore presents the incident not as an isolated aviation crisis, but as a politically constructed scenario with three interconnected objectives: diverting attention from the October 7 scandal, strengthening Netanyahu’s position ahead of the election and creating a new pretext for confrontation with Iran.
Netanyahu has said Israel will determine within days whether the co-pilot had links to Iran, adding, “We will get to the bottom of it.”
The central question surrounding the episode, therefore, is not what happened inside the cockpit, but the deliberate construction of a security narrative around the flight designed in advance to transform an unexplained aviation incident into a potential pretext for a new war with Iran.
A side event held during the 63rd session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva has brought together parliamentarians, journalists and civil-society representatives to discuss terrorism, religious freedom and the European Union’s relationship with Pakistan.
The event, “Remembrance and Tribute to the Victims of Terrorism”, took place at the Palais des Nations on 1st October. Speakers included Greek MP Georgios Manous, EU Today Publisher and Editor Gary Cartwright, Stéphane Michot of Ideal International, with a contribution from Prof K. Warikoo.
Two interventions focused particularly on Pakistan and the implications for European policy.
Victims of terrorism at centre of debate
Gary Cartwright began with the victims rather than trade or institutional policy.
“Terrorism is not an abstract concept,” he told the meeting, describing a bomb exploding in a market, a child killed outside a school and families waiting for someone who will never return.
He acknowledged that Pakistan itself has suffered heavily from terrorist violence. The 2026 Global Terrorism Index ranked Pakistan as the country most affected by terrorism in 2025, recording 1,139 deaths and 1,045 incidents.
At the same time, Gary raised the record of militant organisations operating from Pakistani territory. The UN Security Council describes Lashkar-e-Tayyiba as a Pakistan-based organisation involved in terrorist activity and records its involvement in the November 2008 Mumbai attacks, in which approximately 164 people were killed and hundreds injured. The same UN entry also records links to the December 2001 attack on the Indian Parliament.
Questions over EU education funding
Gary also questioned the safeguards surrounding European education funding in Pakistan.
In December 2024, Dutch MEP Bert-Jan Ruissen asked the European Commission whether EU money intended for education could reach Islamic religious seminaries and what controls were in place over the use of those funds.
In its February 2025 response, the Commission said EU assistance in Sindh and Balochistan was primarily directed through provincial education authorities. It also confirmed that, in selected areas of Balochistan, EU support facilitated formal education for pupils enrolled in religious seminaries through a government-recognised certification programme intended to ease their transition into state education. The Commission said projects were subject to field visits, reporting, monitoring and evaluation.
Gary stressed that he was not arguing that religious education itself constituted extremism. His argument was that European taxpayers should be able to establish where money was going, who administered programmes and what safeguards existed against extremist recruitment.
His intervention then turned to Pakistan’s GSP+ trade status.
Pakistan has benefited from GSP+ since 2014 and is currently the scheme’s largest beneficiary. According to the European Commission’s figures on EU-Pakistan trade, more than 85 per cent of Pakistan’s exports enter the EU duty and quota free. Continued participation requires Pakistan to ratify and effectively implement 27 international conventions covering human and labour rights, environmental protection and good governance.
Gary called for Pakistan’s GSP+ preferences to be suspended pending an assessment of the country’s compliance with its international commitments, counter-terrorism obligations and safeguards surrounding EU-funded programmes.
The issue has been examined previously by EU Today. Its 2025 white paper on Pakistan’s GSP+ compliance argued that the evidential threshold for beginning temporary withdrawal proceedings had been reached, while a Geneva side event in March 2026 considered Pakistan’s human-rights record and the conditionality attached to GSP+ preferences.
Pahalgam attack raised by Greek MP
Greek MP Georgios Manous approached the subject through terrorism, religious freedom and European security.
He referred to the terrorist attack at Pahalgam in Indian-administered Kashmir on 22 April 2025, in which 25 tourists and one local civilian were killed. EU Today previously examined the attack and its victims in its coverage of the Pahalgam massacre.
Manous also addressed Pakistan’s blasphemy legislation and the position of Christians, Hindus and Ahmadis, linking those questions to the broader problem of religious extremism. Concerns over minority rights and blasphemy laws have also featured in EU Today’s continuing coverage of the debate over Pakistan’s GSP+ eligibility.
The Greek MP then turned to Europe, arguing that extremist ideologies and networks should not be viewed solely as a South Asian security problem.
Pakistan, meanwhile, continues to present itself as both a major victim of terrorism and an international counter-terrorism partner. At the fourth US-Pakistan Counterterrorism Dialogue in Washington in August, the two governments reaffirmed cooperation against ISIS-K, al-Qaeda, Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and the Balochistan Liberation Army, while discussing border security and the disruption of terrorist facilitation networks.
The Geneva discussion therefore centred on two linked questions for European policymakers: how Pakistan’s counter-terrorism record should be assessed, and how that assessment should interact with the conditions attached to EU trade preferences and European-funded programmes.
After March 31, 2026, a twenty-page report titled Heirs of Goebbels: Falsification of the Events in Bucha and Bloody Staged Performances of the Kiev Regime began circulating in English. It is signed by the “International Public Tribunal on the Crimes of Ukrainian Neo-Nazis,” a body chaired by Maksim Grigor’ev, which directs readers to the website of the Russian Fund for the Study of Democracy for the full text. The thesis is already evident in the title: the events in Bucha in March 2022 were allegedly fabricated by Ukraine with the support of Western governments, using a technique that the text compares to the Nazi provocation at Gleiwitz in 1939.
The document deserves careful reading precisely because it does not limit itself to denial. Unlike the Russian denials of April 2022, it builds its argument on verifiable Ukrainian material: the plaques at the memorial, military obituaries, local commemorative sites, and statements from the Presidency. It is on this ground that the discussion must take place. The question I pose here is narrower than that of the report and, I believe, more useful: who actually appears on the Bucha Wall of Remembrance, in what capacity, and what happens when a commemorative category is used as a legal and statistical category. The answer calls into question both those who constructed the official narrative and those who claim to dismantle it.
The structure is simple. After the reference to Gleiwitz, the text lists four methods of falsification that the Ukrainian government allegedly employed: presenting soldiers killed in combat as civilians; attributing deaths caused by Ukrainian fire to Russia; counting elderly people who died of illness among the victims; and the deliberate killing of its own citizens in front of cameras. The stated target is the official claim that the memorial contains “509 names of identified civilians,” a claim that the report attributes to the website of the Ukrainian Presidency, Mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk, Euronews, and the European ministers present at the March 31, 2026, commemoration.
The core of the document (pp. 3–12) is a list of about thirty names, each accompanied by a photo of the plaque and, often, a clipping from a Ukrainian news outlet. They can be grouped into five categories. The first category includes individuals identified as members of Azov or affiliated units: Yevhen Petras, Yevhen Vas’kovych, Illia Chrenov, Bohdan Knyshchuk, and Volodymyr Bisaha. The second group consists of regular military personnel: pilot Ruslan Bilous (Belous) of the 7th Tactical Aviation Brigade and his flight crew member Roman Dovhaljuk; sniper Oleh Cymbal of the 80th Air Assault Brigade; Vadym Smetanskyi of the same brigade, a colonel from the SBU, a major from the State Protection Department, and the commander of the guard at the military commissariat in Bucha. The third group consists of members of the territorial defense or volunteer units: Anatoliy Korytko, Serhiy Smyrnov, Oleksandr Blahodatnyi, Andriy Verbovyi, and Mykhailo Boichenko. The fourth list concerns civilians alleged to have taken part in hostile actions: Oleksandr Šarava, who left his home carrying Molotov cocktails on February 27, 2022; Vitalij Fesjuk, an observer who reported on the movements of Russian vehicles; and Oleksandr Bondar, who, according to the Ukrainian press, was conducting reconnaissance for the armed forces. The fifth section concerns people who died outside the city (in Vorzel, Moshchun, Kopylov, Zdvizhevka, Guta-Mezhigorskaya, and Irpen) and a 68-year-old woman, Halyna Semenyuk, who died of cancer.
The report links this list to two legal references that are substantively correct: Article 51, paragraph 3, of the First Additional Protocol, under which civilians lose their protection when and for as long as they directly participate in hostilities, and an explanatory note from the International Committee of the Red Cross on the same principle. Finally, pages 12–20 contain sixteen testimonies regarding Ukrainian bombings “for the cameras.” None of these concern Bucha: the witnesses speak of Avdeevka, Ugledar, Toreck/Dzerzhinsk, Lysychansk, and Kurakhovo, in incidents ranging from 2021 to 2024. The transition from that material to Bucha is conveyed by a single explicit statement: the practice of deliberate killings “allows one to reasonably conclude” that the same occurred there as well.
The legal framework
International humanitarian law defines a civilian by exclusion. According to Article 50 of the First Protocol, a civilian is anyone who does not belong to the armed forces as defined in Article 43—that is, all organized forces, groups, and units placed under a responsible command. In cases of doubt, a person must be considered a civilian, and the presence of non-civilians among the population does not deprive the population of its civilian status. A civilian who directly participates in hostilities remains a civilian but loses protection from attacks for the duration of that participation. The ICRC Interpretive Guidance establishes three cumulative requirements for such participation (a minimum threshold of harm, a direct causal link, and a link to hostilities) and distinguishes between a civilian acting on an episodic basis and a member of an organized armed group with a continuous combat role, who loses protection for the entire duration of that role.
Two additional rules apply to the case of Bucha. The first is the levée en masse: residents of a territory not yet occupied who, as the enemy approaches, spontaneously take up arms without having had time to organize themselves are legitimate combatants if they openly bear arms and comply with the laws of war. The second is domestic. The Ukrainian law “On the Fundamentals of National Resistance,” in effect since January 1, 2022, made the Territorial Defense Forces a component of the Armed Forces and established the volunteer formations of territorial communities (DFTH) as paramilitary units tasked with territorial defense. Under international humanitarian law, those who belonged to these structures were not civilians.
There is, however, one point the report never addresses. Determining that a person was a combatant says nothing about how they died. A combatant who is captured, wounded, or has surrendered is hors de combat, and killing them is a war crime.
In the face of information warfare
According to Western commentators, the report lacks credibility because it contains certain legal inaccuracies. Technical errors may be present, but focusing on the finger while ignoring the moon is a colossal mistake. In Bucha, the crime was committed by the Ukrainians, not the Russians. And there is a heinous crime that has become a propaganda tool, part of an information war that was indispensable to the collective West.
Bucha represented one of the decisive moments in the information war that unfolded around the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. After Russian forces withdrew from the city, images of corpses in the streets and eyewitness accounts gathered on the ground were rapidly disseminated by international media, transforming into a highly potent communication tool. It all happened extremely quickly, with Western media—acting in unison—disseminating the material everywhere, constructing an image of the war as an act of aggression characterized by systematic atrocities, in which Russia was progressively portrayed not only as a military adversary but as the perpetrator of crimes against the civilian population. In this sense, the images possessed a persuasive power greater than that of many diplomatic arguments: the body of the slain civilian became visual evidence capable of condensing an entire interpretation of the conflict into a few frames.
Bucha thus took on a strategic role in Western communications and helped solidify public support for sanctions, Moscow’s diplomatic isolation, and increased political and military aid to Kiev. Observe how a tragic event—as tragic as any war is—was transformed into a weapon of war. No Western media outlet cared about the value of the dead or the truth of their life stories. The only thing that mattered was blaming Russia and justifying the escalation of a senseless conflict.
But the truth comes to light sooner or later.
This is how the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs brought the Bucha case back into the international spotlight. Spokesperson Maria Zakharova stated that Moscow intends to urge the United Nations to reexamine the events, arguing that the UN did not participate directly in the investigations conducted at the time, but instead ended up accepting the version provided by Kiev as the prevailing one. A few days later, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov also revisited the incident, denouncing what he considers a typical practice of information warfare: rapidly constructing a narrative, turning it into the dominant truth, and preventing alternative versions from reaching the public.
According to Lavrov, this is precisely the mechanism through which the West consolidated its interpretation of Bucha. The initial narrative occupies the available information space like an empty trench: once it has been seized and defended by the mainstream media, replacing it requires an enormously greater effort. In the case of Bucha, this process prevented a truly impartial examination of the events from the very beginning.
One central question therefore remains: why reopen the Bucha case today? Because Moscow is ready to confront the entire world regarding the lies propagated by the West. And what about the West?
A commercial pilot flying from Dubai to Israel attacked his co-pilot before being overpowered by passengers, potentially averting a major disaster in what is feared to have been an attempted hijacking.
Danny Tommo, the anti-migrant activist, has been denied bail after appearing in court for allegedly slashing a migrant boat in the Channel – despite the five suspects in the RAF Fairford terror plot all being bailed.
The Iranian Embassy in London announced on 28 September its “categorical rejection” and strong condemnation of speculation regarding Tehran’s involvement in an alleged plot to attack a British military air base used by US forces.
In a post on X, the embassy criticized “recent baseless and malicious speculation circulated by certain individuals and British media outlets attempting to link Iran” to the incident, which occurred in the early hours of Sunday.
Gloucestershire Police had announced on Sunday that a “major incident” was taking place in the Welford area of western England, leading to the evacuation of several buildings near the RAF Fairford air base.
Police stated that army explosive ordnance disposal experts were examining several vehicles and that five men had been detained on suspicion of offenses under the Explosives Act.
Residents were evacuated from 85 homes in the area near the base on Sunday as army bomb-disposal experts used a robot to examine three white vans.
The five men detained in connection with the alleged bomb plot, all British citizens, were released on bail on Monday, suggesting the incident is not serious, in contrast to early claims.
The men will remain under investigation, according to the head of counterterrorism policing, Laurence Taylor.
UK authorities continue to “explore multiple lines of inquiry” regarding the incident, Taylor added.
RAF Fairford has been used as a base by the US Air Force to launch bombing operations against Iran during the war that began in February.
The UK authorized the US to use the base for missions involving B-1B and B-52 bombers.
Britain did not join the US-Israeli war on Iran and initially denied President Donald Trump’s request to use bases in the UK.
However, then-prime minister Keir Starmer soon reversed course, announcing days later that he had agreed to let the US use bases in Britain for what he claimed were “defensive” operations against Iran’s missiles and their launch sites following Iranian attacks on UK interests and Britain’s Gulf allies.
Police said Sunday that the men were detained on suspicion of offenses under the Explosives Act, and that army bomb-disposal experts were examining several vehicles.
Police said Sunday that the men were detained on suspicion of offenses under the Explosives Act, and that army bomb-disposal experts were examining several vehicles.
The Bucha Massacre, which occurred in March 2022, remains one of the main tragedies of the Ukrainian conflict. Shortly after the Russian strategic retreat and the entry of Ukrainian troops, the narrative quickly began to spread that Russian soldiers had committed a massacre in the city, murdering hundreds of people.
The news spread around the world and was broadcast by all major media aligned with the Atlantic West. Even in spaces that declare themselves neutral, such as Wikipedia, the entry on the Bucha Massacre narrates it as a slaughter perpetrated by Russian soldiers before they retreated from the city. This is, therefore, the “official version” of the story in the Western world and its satellites.
Ukrainian authorities speak of 509 innocent civilians who were allegedly assassinated by the Russians, and indeed Bucha has been used as one of the main arguments to vilify the behavioral standard of the Russians in the special military operation. It seems peculiar to us, however, from the outset that this event was so singular. In general, armies that commit atrocities commit them at various moments and in different places of the conflict, but Bucha constitutes a singular, totally unique, and so far unrepeated instance of an alleged massacre of hundreds of Ukrainian civilians by the Russians.
The topic has recently gained prominence again, with new evidence that was discussed, for example, at the “Dialogue on Fakes 4.0” congress, organized by the Global Fact-Checking Network (a fact-checking agency of which I am a member, along with other journalists). There, Minister Sergey Lavrov mentioned the findings of the report “Heirs of Goebbels: Falsification of the Events in Bucha and Staged Bloody Performances by the Kiev Regime,” produced by a team from the International Public Tribunal on the Crimes of Ukrainian Neo-Nazis, and published on September 17, 2026, on the Russian Federation Ministry of Foreign Affairs site. (https://mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/reports/2142212/)
According to the report in question, it was possible to gather sufficient material evidence indicating that the Ukrainian regime manipulated the facts about Bucha in various ways, one of them being the inclusion of Ukrainian military and paramilitary personnel killed in combat as victims of an alleged “massacre” committed by the Russians. Some of these military personnel may not even have died in the vicinity of Bucha. Furthermore, evidence was obtained of civilians who died of natural causes and whose names were included as having also been victims.
This work by the committee was possible because months after the events in Bucha, the Ukrainian regime inaugurated a memorial containing the names and personal data of the “civilians” who allegedly died in the supposed massacre committed by the Russians. With this, it was possible to cross-reference the data with other databases to check the biography of the dead and confirm the official information – work that was done voluntarily by users of the 2ch.su forum. They discovered at least 50 names of Ukrainian combatants among the names on the memorial, which amounts to approximately 10% of the alleged victims listed.
Among these combatants, by the way, there are several members of the Azov Regiment, a neo-Nazi organization notorious for its atrocities against Russian civilians, such as Evgeny Petrash, Vladimir Bisyaga, Andrey Vaskevich, Ilya Krhenov, among others. Others, such as Igor Kokodinyak and Vladimir Logvinenko, were military personnel who died in other parts of the special military operation zone and not in the vicinity of Bucha.
But of course, the big question about Bucha is the fact that the authentic civilian deaths that occurred at the location in March 2022 were perpetrated by the Ukrainians themselves, which is also confirmed in the report through new testimonial evidence. According to it, Ukraine used artillery against Bucha, after the Russian withdrawal, as soon as journalists were transported to the city, with the aim of turning it into the stage for a grand performance to be displayed to the world.
According to the testimonial evidence gathered, there is even evidence that the journalists’ visit was staged, in the sense that the locations that would be hit by Ukrainian artillery attacks were already known in advance, which means that civilians were killed on purpose with the aim of accusing the Russians of an atrocity – which characterizes a “false flag” attack.
Bucha has become a case to be studied because today the probability that other “false flag” attacks will be produced by Ukraine or the West with the aim of justifying an intensification of hostilities is quite high.
“I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”
Jesus Christ – Gospel of Saint John the Apostle (14:6)
“Do not fear them, then, for there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed, and nothing secret that will not be made known.What I tell you in the darkness, speak in the light; and what you hear whispered in your ear, proclaim from the housetops.”
Jesus Christ – Gospel of Saint Matthew the Apostle (Mt 10:26-28)
In the cover image the Arcbishop of Saint Pio, father Franco Moscone, and the Zionist rulers Netanyahu and Trump
The Heroic Homily of the Archbishop of San Pio on Genocide, Rampant Zionism, and Banks Profiting from Arms
In an era when Catholic progressivism is obscuring the diamond-bright light of the Word of God with diabolical worldliness, there remain Shepherds who have the courage to challenge wolves in sheep’s clothing to save their flock.
One of them is undoubtedly Monsignor Franco Moscone, Archbishop of Manfredonia, Vieste, and San Giovanni Rotondo—home to the Shrine of Saint Pio of Pietrelcina. Yesterday, during the Solemn Mass marking the liturgical feast of the Franciscan friar, the prelate—originally from the Piedmont region of Saint John Bosco and the Langhe (home of the philanthropist Servant of God Giulia di Barolo)—delivered a homily that was not only moving and courageous but truly heroic.
Gospa News has dedicated three previous articles to the battle waged by this high-ranking prelate of the Archdiocese of Manfredonia, for—just as Gospa News points an accusing finger at the profiteering of… The Weapons Lobby and death.
Indeed, every one of his statements is borne out in detail by the investigations we have linked to them.
Yesterday, he stood in solidarity with the “Priests against the Gaza genocide”—with whom he had demonstrated in Rome the day before, subsequently having to explain to some of the faithful why his seat was empty at the overnight vigil for the Feast of Saint Pio—but above all, he boldly exposed “dominant Zionism”and the “armed banks” that profit from “ethnic cleansing in Palestine.”
In an era when every public authority is terrified of discussing Jewish extremism for fear of being branded antisemitic, Monsignor Franco displayed a fortitude and intelligence truly bestowed by the Holy Spirit; he used unequivocal words to condemn the Tel Aviv regime, while tempering them by citing the book by Israeli historian Omar Bartov:
He did so in a speech challenging—and calling for the “disarming” of—all “theologies of fundamentalism,”such as that of the Boko Haram terrorists: heirs to ISIS and Al-Qaeda, groups created by Anglo-American intelligenceto invade the Balkans, Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria—a connection certainly not made by the priest himself, but one argued in his books by former Interpol official Antonio Evangelista, whom I have interviewed on several occasions.
The prelate cited the theological fundamentalism found among Hindus, as well as among Evangelical Christians and xenophobic Catholics. He concluded with two resounding remarks—delivered before the final blessing of the Mass—regarding the “wars spread by NATO”and the possibility of reviving in Italy the concept of conscientious objection to military spending, as was done during the Cold War.
I have summarized in a few lines a homily lasting about twenty minutes; it must be heard in its entirety to fully grasp the Gospel narrative that began with the blood of Padre Pio’s stigmata and now extends to Gaza—to the 300 children killed during the sham truce—as well as to Lebanon and the 145 others who died during yet another bogus ceasefire.
For this reason, I will limit myself here to transcribing only those sentences containing the aforementioned key points.
The Empty Chair at the Saint Pio Vigil: Standing with “Priests Against Genocide”
«Someone rightly wrote to me this morning saying, ‘Last night there was an empty chair at the vigil for Saint Pio’—and it was mine, the local bishop’s! It was empty here because I sought to embody the spirit of prophecy, solidarity, and peace that Padre Pio always brought through his life and continues to urge upon us: a most urgent cry in this historic moment to which we are all witnesses».
Thus begins Father Franco’s homily, which seems to encapsulate two years of impassioned denunciations against the holocaust of children in Palestine and Lebanon.
«Yesterday, I attended a demonstration called ‘Priests Against Genocide’; it is an international network of priests that emerged just over a year ago in response to a cry for help from an African nun—a plea heard and taken up by a dedicated priest from Sicily. The network currently brings together over 2,600 priests from 57 nations, as well as 27 bishops and three cardinals. Yesterday, we walked a route through Rome, starting at the Jesuit Curia, passing the embassies to the Holy See for Palestine and Lebanon, and arriving at Piazza Mazzini, where Leonardo’s administrative headquarters is located» the priest continued (hereafter, we will not specify that the italicized text comes from his homily).
«We arrived at this point through prayer, by listening to the Gospel, and by reflecting on the words of Pope Leo’s *Magnifica Humanitas* and those of the Israeli historian Omar Bartov, who published a book titled *Into the Abyss: From Zionism to Genocide—Israel’s Moral Defeat*».
The Stigmata of the Holy Land: 445 Children Killed During False Truces, Christians Driven Out
«I look at the wounds of Padre Pio—at the signs of his identification with Christ Crucified and the blood he shed alongside Jesus’s for fifty years—and I ask myself: where is the blood of the Lord’s stigmata and Padre Pio’s stigmata today? Where is it being shed?»
«It is certainly found in the stigmata borne by the population of Gaza, 97% of whom are left without homes or means of subsistence—a place where a truce is said to exist, yet a genocide quietly continues. Yesterday, we recited the names of 300 children killed in Gaza since the truce began.Padre Pio’s wounds are also found in the ethnic cleansing taking place in the West Bank and southern Lebanon; there, too, we counted 145 children killed since a peace plan was supposedly in place».
«In those lands, our Christian brothers—representing the oldest churches in history—are particularly being driven away; only one Christian village remains under the administration of the Palestinian Authority. All the others have been wiped out.»
The Archbishop of San Giovanni Rotondo went on to mention the “stigmata” visible in Africa: the wars in the Sahel and Sudan, the massacres committed by Boko Haram terrorists in Nigeria and the abduction of girls, and the repression in Myanmar and across the Middle East.
He added: «And here in our own Europe, too, Ukraine and Russia continue to send their finest youth to the front lines to be sacrificed. These open, bleeding wounds—akin to the stigmata of Christ—persist in the humiliation of the Venezuelan people and the starving of the Cuban people.»
«I urge everyone to make praying for peace our primary commitment; it was a central focus of Padre Pio’s thoughts and heart throughout his life.»
Monsignor Moscone noted that, in the past, prayer groups did not succeed in halting wars as the “greatest Saint of the last century” had hoped: «It was not effective then, yet we must believe it can be effective today, preventing these scattered conflicts from escalating into a world war.»
Father Franco Moscone: “Disarming Fundamentalist Theologies: From Dominant Zionism to Catholic Xenophobia”
«From Padre Pio, we also learn how to properly interpret Sacred Scripture—the words of the entire Bible, and the Gospel in particular. Let us, therefore, call for the disarming of the theologies that fuel fundamentalism of every kind. Jewish theologies that fuel the dominant Zionism; Islamic theologies that foment terrorism and fundamentalist groups; Hindu theologies—but also Christian theologies, particularly of an evangelical bent as well as within our own Catholic Church—that spread division and violence and stoke xenophobia and racism».
“Arms multinationals and ‘armed banks’ that invest in death.”
«Let us, therefore, pray and read the Word of the Lord and the values of our religion—and all religions—with authenticity and integrity. And let us not be afraid to speak out against what is wrong in this regard. Prayer must translate into action—action that speaks truth and denounces injustice. We cannot settle for a narrative that aims for and leads directly to war—serving solely to boost the interests of major arms multinationals, ‘armed banks,’ and anonymous investment funds that invest only in death—thereby denouncing a form of capitalism and power that makes the rich ever richer and the poor ever poorer, while also—even in our developed West—wiping out the middle class and social mobility, driven by a mindset that leads only to death and injustice».
At the conclusion of Holy Mass—following the reading of the prayer for Civil Protection, of which Saint Pio is the patron—the Archbishop of Manfredonia added a pointed remark that struck like a dart aimed at European armament plans, which he had already severely condemned in previous public statements…
“Wars Spread by NATO and Tax Objection to Arms Spending”
«This is the security we need and desire: the security of Civil Protection, of environmental stewardship… This is true deterrence—not that of armaments and NATO, an alliance that, since its inception, has only brought and spread war across four continents»—a fact confirmed by the recent geopolitical “Mediterranean Sea: Same Blood, Same Mud”) by Interpol official Antonio Evangelista.
«A form of deterrence that is essentially cost-free, requiring no massive financial outlay. It makes me wonder if the time has come to revisit a concept discussed during the Cold War—in the 1970s and 80s—namely, not merely conscientious objection to military service, but objection to military spending itself: a tax objection regarding that 5% of funds they want us to divert to entirely different purposes. I take personal responsibility for what I have said; let us now receive the Lord’s blessing—a blessing that is surely one of Peace, and nothing else».
Invoking Saint John Paul II, a heroic fighter against war
In a gesture reminiscent of the greatest, most heroic crusader against conflict and weaponry—Pope Saint John Paul II—the Mass concluded with the moving hymn “Jesus Christ, You Are My Life,” composed by Monsignor Marco Frisina for the World Youth Day held at Tor Vergata, Rome, during the Jubilee of 2000.
Every Christian must give praise to God, Jesus Christ, and Saint Pio for sending us another courageous prelate—a bishop—like Karol Wojtyła: the Bishop of Kraków during the Soviet communist regime’s political occupation who later became the Bishop of Rome and succeeded in bringing down the USSR dictatorship through the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, in obedience to the secret messages received at Fatima by the visionary Lucia.
Suffice it to recall that it was not the assassination attempt against him on May 13, 1981, nor the military regime imposed by General Wojciech Jaruzelski, but rather the Solidarity trade union—fueled by the Christian spirit instilled by John Paul II himself—that managed to triumph, much like David against Goliath.
Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor find themselves at the center of a political clash involving the Israeli Prime Minister, two government ministers, and top intelligence officials. The catalyst is *Naza*, the documentary they presented at the 83rd Venice International Film Festival—a film that, in just a few days, transformed them from acclaimed filmmakers into targets of accusations of treason.
After declaring he would seek to revoke their Israeli citizenship, Israeli Culture Minister Miki Zohar made a fresh appeal to Shin Bet chief David Zini, urging him to investigate how various materials were obtained. The film features testimony from 24 anonymous Israeli intelligence soldiers denouncing the techniques used by the Israeli military to kill civilians in Gaza.
In a letter to Zini, Zohar asks the agency to investigate whether there was any illegal use of sensitive or classified information.
“When anonymous sources are used to spread serious, false accusations against the State of Israel and the IDF during wartime, it is imperative to establish who is behind these allegations,” Zohar stated. “I have asked the head of the Shin Bet to investigate the source of the material, who provided it, and whether hostile elements were involved,” the minister added.
Reactions from Israeli officials following the Venice screening
Immediately after the documentary film was presented in Venice, Culture Minister Miki Zohar called the film “vile” and announced plans to “act immediately” to revoke the Israeli citizenship of Abraham and Szor.
He accused them of “treason against the State” and of a “self-loathing” that drives them to harm their own homeland in order to garner applause from “antisemites around the world.” Zohar stated that he had contacted senior officials at the Ministry of the Interior and the Population Authority to evaluate revoking their citizenship on the grounds of a breach of loyalty to the country.
Joining the chorus of accusations were Army Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir—who claimed the film relied on “blood libels and deliberate distortions of reality”—and National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who called on the pair to leave the country.
Finally, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu linked the case to broader “antisemitic incitement” and lashed out at opposition political forces.
The Israeli military largely rejected the documentary’s content, maintaining that it could not verify the identities or military roles of the anonymous sources and reiterating that it does everything possible to avoid civilian casualties.
IDF chief floats legal action against ‘NAZA’ film, orders probe of leaked material
IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir on Monday instructed the military’s top legal official to examine legal action against the film “NAZA” and those involved in it, saying it defamed the military, and separately ordered an investigation into the leaking of classified material used in its production.
His comments came shortly after IDF Spokesperson Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin issued a statement inviting the documentary’s filmmakers to allow military officials to view the film in full so that the IDF could respond in a “substantive manner.” So far, the military has only reacted to clips of the movie posted online, and has not yet seen the full documentary.
The 80-minute film by Yuval Abraham and Rachel Szor — whose title is a Hebrew acronym meaning collateral damage — claims to explore AI-powered strikes by Israel in the Gaza Strip it alleges have led to civilian deaths, including testimonies from 24 purported Israeli intelligence soldiers.
The risks of returning to Israel
In the days following the award, Yuval Abraham recounted deleting his social media profiles after being inundated with offensive photomontages targeting both him and his mother; he openly admitted his fear: “Israel is my home… but now, obviously, I am afraid I won’t be able to return.” Abraham had also rejected the idea of positioning himself as a voice of moral superiority, explaining that, as Israelis, they all feel—to some extent—co-responsible for what occurred in Gaza.
The process of stripping Abraham and Szor of their Israeli citizenship—which they hold by birth—is neither swift nor within the sole authority of the Minister of Culture, who lacks the legal power to order it.
Under Israeli law, citizenship can only be revoked in limited cases involving a proven “breach of loyalty” to the State—as established by a 2022 Supreme Court ruling. The procedure requires the Minister of the Interior to submit a request to the Minister of Justice, followed by final approval from a panel of judges. It is, therefore, a lengthy and uncertain process—one that has never before been applied to a case involving journalism or filmmaking.
A more immediate prospect, at least from an investigative standpoint, is Zohar’s request for the Shin Bet to investigate the origins of the material used in the film.
Such an inquiry could lead to investigations into potential offenses related to the disclosure of classified information, carrying criminal consequences not only for the filmmakers but also for the military sources who collaborated anonymously.
Compounding this is the immediate concern for the two creators’ personal safety—a fear fueled by past incidents, such as the assault on Hamdan Ballal following the Oscar win for *No Other Land*.
This story originally appeared in Mondoweiss on Sep. 11, 2026. It is shared here with permission.
This week marks the 25th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.
The United States has experienced much political and social upheaval since then, but the subsequent “War on Terror” paved the way for our current moment, and there are booming echoes of the era all around us.
Once again, the United States is waging a disastrous war in the Middle East with no discernible end in sight. Islamophobic rallies targeting NYC Mayor Zohran Mamdani conjure up memories of the “Ground Zero Mosque” controversy. The government designates activist and advocacy organizations as terrorists. The Guantánamo Bay detention camp remains open. In fact, a legal immigrant was just sent there.
CBS reveals that the Taliban seized roughly $7 billion worth of American-purchased military hardware after the United States officially lost that war 5 years ago.
“Taliban fighters patrol in armored vehicles once supplied to Afghan forces, wearing American tactical gear and carrying American weapons,” reads the report. “CBS News saw one Humvee in the Afghan capital still adorned with a faded Green Bay Packers decal — a remnant from its past operators.”
The small number of Americans who opposed that war were either dismissed or attacked. So too were those who warned that the Bush administration’s overreach would result in disaster.
“The civil libertarians were mostly ignored, and as one new threat followed another — Iraq, ISIS, ‘lone wolves’ — the president’s reach continued to grow. Across the Bush and Obama administrations, the commander in chief was given, or simply took, new powers to prosecute, shut down and seize the assets of alleged terrorist groups and their supporters,” writes Radley Balko in theNew York Times. “With the arrival of armed drones, the president assumed the right to remotely assassinate anyone, anywhere outside U.S. borders, at any time, including American citizens.”
“If the ratcheting diminishment of our liberties came slowly and sometimes without much outcry under Presidents Bush, Obama and Joe Biden, the consequences of all those years of expanded presidential power are plainly visible now,” he continues. “Mr. Trump is using every authority we have given the president since Sept. 11, 2001, and some we haven’t, in ways the civil libertarians had tried to warn us about at the start.”
One of the major differences between the current war on Iran and Bush’s war on Iraq is that a sizable chunk of the population fell for the administration’s lies back then. The polling shows that’s not the case this time around, and, despite information from the region being consistently repressed, there seems to be a growing understanding that the United States military is losing quite badly.
They say Americans don’t vote based on foreign policy, but that isn’t exactly true. Many people voted for Obama over Hillary Clinton in the 2008 primary because he opposed the Iraq War. People voted for Trump because he claimed he wouldn’t launch any new wars. It’s quite obvious that Kamala Harris’s connection to Israel’s genocide hurt her at the polls.
Whether or not this typically translates into policy shifts is a separate debate.
Obama’s election effectively killed the domestic antiwar movement, and he launched the largest assassination campaign in world history. Trump’s rhetoric predictably turned out to be nonsense. The Democratic Party’s establishment certainly didn’t rethink its Israel policy as a result of the Harris loss.
This is all to say that the war in Iran, which the administration now says might last through 2029, could help propel the Democrats back into power during the midterms, but will that actually result in a foreign policy reset?
In recent weeks, Democratic leaders and presidential hopefuls have directed their anger toward Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, hoping to quash the party’s left flank before the 2028 nomination process. For them, it’s an existential battle that transcends the question of which party may or may not control Congress at any given time and there’s no broader discussion about reversing our current course beyond removing Trump from office.
Michigan’s Democratic Senate nominee, Abdul El-Sayed, was recently attacked for an old 9/11 tweet in which he expressed sympathy for those who died on that day and those who were killed in the wars after.
“Today, I mourn the 3K lives, 6K injuries, & infrastructural devastation in NYC, perpetrated ignorantly in the name of my faith,” it read. “Tomorrow, I’ll mourn ~1M lives, millions of injuries, & infrastructural devastation in 3 countries, perpetrated ignorantly in the name of my country.”
According to Brown University’s Costs of War project, an additional 3.6-3.8 million people have died indirectly in post-9/11 war zones, which brings the overall death toll to at least 4.5-4.7 million and counting.
25 years after 9/11, the American Empire is undoubtedly in decline, but its demise seemingly remains far off, and we’ve yet to collectively reckon with its ongoing crimes.
If you make time for one 9/11 anniversary story this year, make it Garrett M. Graff’s piece. This is no mere retrospective. For National Geographic, Graff takes us through that Tuesday morning 25 years ago to explain how America lost its sense of security, minute-by-minute on the morning of September 11, 2001.
It was now 8:53 a.m. There were just 10 minutes left in America as we knew it.
FBI director Robert Mueller was in his first week on the job, sitting in his office suite on the seventh floor of the J. Edgar Hoover Building in Washington. . . .Toward the end of the meeting, someone interrupted to tell Mueller a plane had crashed in New York. Sitting in a briefing on al Qaeda, deep in a conversation about terrorism, Mueller turned and looked out the window at the blue sky beyond and asked, “How could a plane not see the tower? It’s so clear out today.”
Truthfully, terrorism in 2001 just wasn’t something most Americans thought about, outside of the movies or the occasional evening news story or headline. It was a plot device for thrillers, not a perpetual source of anxiety at shopping malls, schools, or public events. And even in the cinema, the “terrorists” were less ideological enemies doing existential battle against the Great Satan and more often the disgruntled genius or vaguely European criminal mastermind. Think Dennis Hopper’s villainous former bomb squad officer in the 1994 blockbuster Speed or Alan Rickman’s turn as the suave, ruthless radical Hans Gruber in Die Hard.
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