Badlands News Brief
Hamas Chief Killed & Ukraine Propaganda Drilled
The News Cycle is almost impossible to track these days. At least, to do so fully.
That’s where we come in.
In the Badlands News Brief, the Badlands Media team hand pick news items of interest from the previous days to give you an overview of the biggest goings-on relevant to the Truth Community.
Some items feature original (and subjective) commentary. Feel free to follow the corresponding link to see our writers’ corresponding Substack accounts and check out their other work.
Now, onto the news from Tuesday, January 2 …
Israeli drone kills deputy Hamas chief in Beirut
Deputy Hamas chief Saleh al-Arouri was killed on Tuesday night in an Israeli drone strike on Beirut's southern suburbs of Dahiyeh, a stronghold of the allied Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, signalling the conflict between Hamas and Israel could be expanding to engulf more of the region.
In response to questions from Reuters, the Israeli military said it does not respond to reports in the foreign media.
Lebanon's national news agency said the drone struck a Hamas office. Two security sources said the strike had targeted a meeting between Hamas officials and Lebanon's Sunni Islamist Jama'a Islamiya faction and left a total of four Palestinians and three Lebanese dead.
The strike marks the first targeted assassination of a Hamas official outside Palestinian Territories since the Palestinian group's deadly assault on Israeli territory on Oct. 7.
Mark Regev, an adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told MSNBC that Israel had not taken responsibility for this attack, but "whoever did it, it must be clear: That this was not an attack on the Lebanese state."
"Whoever did this did a surgical strike against the Hamas leadership," Regev said in the interview. — Reuters
Our Take: “It’s probably getting tired for folks to read about ‘Escalation and Acceleration’ theories around these parts … but, I mean … just look at the news cycle.
Therefore, what I like to do sometimes is try to approach a sensational story like this from BOTH an Actual and a Potential/Narrative lens.
On the Actual side, taking the item at face value, this move represents an undeniable mark of escalation on the part of Israel, one that—whether it’s ultimately justified or not—could pull Iran into the kinetic action in the Middle East beyond the various proxies they continue to arm and fund in the chaos.
On the Narrative side, while the Normie Layers of the Collective Mind don’t pay attention to this stuff to nearly the same degree as this audience, war drums tend to grab attention, especially—and regrettably so—if they involve relative newcomers to the War of Stories.
Ukraine-Russia is out of steam, as we’ll discuss next, so the Ghosts in the Media Machine (both good and bad, I suspect,) are transitioning us into a new series of Crisis.
Will they prompt Awakening, Despair … or an odd mix of both?” — Burning Bright
There is 'No Stomach’ in US to Continue Funding Ukraine - Ex-Pentagon Official
Kiev's quest to garner ever more support from its Western donors is facing an increasingly daunting challenge. Ukraine’s failed counteroffensive, political infighting, and corruption have been fueling the waning support for the regime both in the US, where financial aid for it faces political hurdles, and in the EU.
The reality is that there is “no stomach” any longer in the West to fund Ukraine and the ongoing proxy conflict against Russia there, Michael Maloof, a former Pentagon official, told Sputnik.
The Kiev regime is going to have to seriously consider some form of negotiation and look at the realities, he emphasized.
“The United States has their appropriations hung up. The US government could shut down by January 17 if the administration and Congress can't negotiate and work out an arrangement for funding Ukraine and Israel, but at the same time to enforce the border. I think the Republicans to date have held firm, and we'll see if they'll hold on. But there's no stomach right now any longer to fund the Ukrainians. Frankly, the people see that the war is over. Basically, the [Ukrainian] counteroffensive failed, and there's no way that they can pick it back up and turn things around, because they've gone into total defensive mode. The so-called counteroffensive just does not exist,” said Maloof. — Sputnik Globe
Our Take: “I understand why many in the Truth Community are reluctant to give the Sleepers much credit when it comes to sussing out what's really going on in the Info War ... starting with the undeniable fact that an Info War is currently being waged in the first place both for and against said Mind.
That said, I do think they're gaining some level of conscious or subconscious awareness of the coordination of the Deep State's System of Systems, even if they don't have as clear a conception of the mechanisms behind said System as we do.
I often argue that, in order to win a Mind War, you don't necessarily need enemy psychological combatants to adopt your paradigm, only to abandon their own, and I think that pattern is playing out en masse as the Media and Military Industrial Complexes abandon one of the key dramas they fomented and exacerbated for the last two years.
The exposure of the Prussian Proxy is causing both awakening and apathy within the Normie Layers ... and that's a good thing.” — Burning Bright
"Not In The Database... I Don't Know Why" - Tucker Carlson Exposes Epstein Brother's Battle For 'Basic' Records
With the imminent release of roughly 10,000 pages of documents (originally scheduled for Jan. 1, 2024) - expected to be a list of 156 John Does who were sex offender Jeffrey Epstein's friends, recruiters, and victims - former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has raised questions about the official account of the 2019 death of Epstein in federal custody.
Jeffrey Epstein died in federal prison while awaiting trial on sex trafficking charges, with the official cause of death determined as suicide by a New York City medical examiner.
In an apparent preview of a forthcoming interview with Jeffrey Epstein's brother Mark, Carlson shared a video on social media revealing the struggles to obtain basic documents related to the incident.
Mr. Carlson expressed skepticism about the official cause of death being ruled suicide, writing:
The U.S. government claims Jeffrey Epstein killed himself in a federal detention facility in Manhattan four and a half years ago, just before his trial.
If that’s true, why are there so few records available from that night?
Here’s Mark Epstein trying to get a copy of one of the most basic documents of all, the pre-hospital care report, written by the EMS team that moved his brother’s body out of the cell.
Caden Pearson reports that in the video, Mark Epstein is heard asking the employee, “But as of right now, you’re telling me you can’t find the PCR report?”
The employee responds, “Not for the 10th of August 2019... It’s not in the fire department database,” the employee continues. “I don’t know why." — ZeroHedge
Our Take: “Don't lose sight of the final of the three segments of names set to be released as part of the Epstein docs this month:
‘The imminent release of roughly 10,000 pages of documents (originally scheduled for Jan. 1, 2024) is expected to be a list of 156 John Does who were sex offender Jeffrey Epstein's friends, recruiters, and victims.’
As I said over the weekend, the fact that the MSM is hyping the Epstein drop has my bullshit radar on high alert, and as many Anons have pointed out in recent days, the not-so-subtle attempt by some of the Usual Suspects to tie names like Trump and Kennedy to Epstein via flight logs that have nothing to do with Epstein Island gives the game away.
(Please note: I do NOT consider Tucker Carlson to be a bad actor in this group, but he’s not the only one signal boosting the release.)
While it's going to be annoying to see the MSM conflating those exposing Epstein's operations with those actively participating in them, it's all just another sign of Overton's Goalpost in action.
Remember, the powers that would be never wanted to talk about this stuff existing in the first place.
Too late.” — Burning Bright
Comedy specials by Ricky Gervais and Dave Chapelle causing ‘furious backlash’
Our Take: “The top two comedy specials in the world right now are 'Armageddon' by Anon favorite Ricky Gervais (he of the epic Epstein Golden Globes extravaganza,) and 'Dreamer' by Dave Chappelle.
While that seems unspectacular at a glance, both specials are going viral across the Normie and Anon Layers of the Collective Mind due to their harsh criticisms of everything from Establishment Politics to Transgender Ideology and Cultural Marxism.
What's more, both specials are distributed by Netflix, certainly a platform that's no friend to the Truth Movement.
It's possible to consider these sorts of deployments as distraction events, mollification spells or even Limited Hangouts, but I think they're more indicative of either Patriot Ghosts in the Machine, or corporate acknowledgement of just how far the Overton Window has been pushed BACK in the direction of objective reality.
As Just Human says, sometimes the audience needs ‘social permission’ to speak the truth.
In 2024, they're getting it.” — Burning Bright
Harvard University president Claudine Gay resigns
Claudine Gay’s tenure as the first Black president of the nation’s oldest and most prestigious university came to a bitter end Tuesday after her brief term was derailed by controversies stemming from the Israel-Hamas war, campus antisemitism, and allegations of plagiarism in her scholarly works.
A daughter of Haitian immigrants who rose through the sharp-elbowed politics of higher education to reach the pinnacle of academia, Gay described her decision to resign as “difficult beyond words” in a message sent to the Harvard University community.
But she said that “after consultation with members” of Harvard’s top governing board, it became clear to her that “it is in the best interests of Harvard for me to resign so that our community can navigate this moment of extraordinary challenge with a focus on the institution rather than any individual.” She will return to teaching and scholarship as a tenured faculty member. — The Boston Globe
Our Take: “For years, if not decades, the Party of False Decorum (h/t Chris Paul) have closed ranks against the unwashed masses (that’s us, by the way,) whenever it came time for one of their own to face the consequences for ascending to the top of an institutional position of power projection using falsity incarnate, knowing that, if too many of their own ilk were pulled down off their faux thrones and exposed in front of the waking populace, they would soon follow.
Lately, however, the Marxist Death Spiral that continues to afflict the communist contingent in American society accelerates its self-immolating spin, as POC Claudine Gay has officially been ‘cancelled’ due to her past as a serial plagiarizer, and her present as an ideologue who unsuccessfully attempted to walk a tightrope between angry Israel-supporters and angry Hamas-supporters by coming a BIT to close for her own party’s liking to dismissing the Holocaust.
Even for the side of culture rooted almost entirely in falsity, there are certain standards to maintain … it just turns out, almost none of them are capable of living up to the ones they themselves set.” — Burning Bright
BONUS ITEMS
Saudi Arabia and UAE officially join Brics: What will it mean for the bloc?
The expansion of the Brics bloc to include Saudi Arabia and the UAE is expected to offer new investment opportunities for the Arab world’s two largest economies while boosting the group's influence globally, analysts said.
Saudi Arabia along with the UAE, Egypt, Iran and Ethiopia joined Brics on January 1, doubling its membership to 10, with Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa the original members.
“Expansion of the Brics multilateral bloc to include Saudi Arabia and UAE augurs extremely well amid ongoing geopolitical and economic challenges confronting the world economy,” Ullas Rao, assistant professor of finance at Edinburgh Business School of Heriot-Watt University in Dubai, said.
“Both Saudi and the UAE as [among] the richest countries on per capita and home to the biggest sovereign wealth funds, create enormous growth opportunities through investments, trade and commerce.” — The National News
Turkey Arrests 34 Suspected Mossad Spies Over Abduction Plot Aimed At Hamas Leaders
Turkey has busted up what it says is a major Israeli spy plot on its soil, having arrested 34 suspects on Wednesday, alleged to have been plotting attacks on foreigners in Turkey, namely Hamas operatives.
In total 46 arrest warrants were issued, with the Chief Prosecutor's Office in Istanbul says ongoing efforts are underway to capture the remain suspects at large. The are all suspected of conducing espionage activities specifically on behalf of the Mossad intelligence agency.
According to statements in Turkish media, "The investigation found that Israeli intelligence was behind activities targeting foreigners residing in Türkiye, from reconnaissance to assaults and abduction attempts."
However, "No other details are available regarding the investigation, but Mossad was implicated in the past in investigations about attempts to kidnap Palestinians living in Türkiye."
Indeed Hamas operatives and some of the group's leadership have long been known to hide out and conduct business in Turkey. Israel has recently vowed to pursued the group's leadership abroad, possibly in a Munich-style assassination campaign. — ZeroHedge
Over 200 Service Members, Veterans Pledge To Hold Military Leaders Accountable For Vaccine Mandate
More than 200 active service members and veterans have signed an open letter seeking accountability over the alleged harm caused by the Department of Defense’s (DOD) implementation of the now-rescinded COVID-19 vaccine mandate.
The open letter, published on Jan. 1, is directed to the American people, but names specific senior military leaders who the signers claim enabled lawlessness and betrayed the Constitution.
Some of the leaders specifically named in the letter include former and current joint chiefs of staff, service academy commandants, service inspectors general, and service surgeon generals.
The signatories state, “In the coming years, thousands within our network will run for Congress and seek appointments to executive branch offices, while those of us still serving on active duty will continue to put fulfilling our oaths ahead of striving for rank or position.
“For those who achieve the lawful authority to do so, we pledge to recall from retirement the military leaders who broke the law and will convene courts-martial for the crimes they committed.”
A number of the signatories are veterans who are now running for Congress and state-level political offices. These veterans also pledged to introduce legislation to seek accountability by reducing the alleged perpetrators’ retirement income to zero.
Many of the 231 signers of the letter are still on active duty. Several said they are taking on significant personal risk to stand up for what they believe in and to defend their unalienable rights that they feel have been trampled. — The Epoch Times
We hope you enjoyed this brief look back at the major news items you might have missed in this ever-escalating and ever-accelerating news cycle as the Information War continues to rage on around us.
As always, if you have any thoughts on these news items or the MANY others swirling in the digital ether, drop into the comments below to share them with your fellow Badlanders.
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Wow...the Epstein death is not going quietly into the night. And Gervais at the Golden Globes was phenomenal and I happened to be at my in laws and saw it live...the audience of entertainers was extremely uncomfortable, so I'd be interested in what he might say. The veterans going after the military for the vaccine- DAM RIGHT! The younger generation NEEDS to realize everything about Covid was illegal and unconstitutional and those who participated need to be held accountable, so it NEVER happens again! Like I keep saying...God Loves Justice ⚖️
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t recall Claudine taking responsibility for her actions and admitting what she did was wrong. Seems to me she just blames the establishment, cries racism, and decides to resign as a matter of, well, I don’t know what.