Thursday, November 08, 2018

What is Jeremy Hunt doing with the White Helmets?

Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said: "Few people have to make the kind of moral choices that faced White Helmet Raed al-Saleh, who I was privileged to meet today. The White Helmets risked life and limb to save over 115,000 lives during the Syrian conflict, despite attacks at the hands of the Syrian regime and the Russian military. The UK is proud to stand behind them."

http://www.voltairenet.org/article203762.html

The Guardian (allegedly one of the media conduits for Intelligence propaganda - https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/04/where-they-tell-you-not-to-look/ ) has pooh-poohed the idea that the White Helmets are partisan, supporting IS terrorists:

"The Syrian volunteer rescue workers known as the White Helmets have become the target of an extraordinary disinformation campaign that positions them as an al-Qaida-linked terrorist organisation.

"The Guardian has uncovered how this counter-narrative is propagated online by a network of anti-imperialist activists, conspiracy theorists and trolls with the support of the Russian government (which provides military support to the Syrian regime)."

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/18/syria-white-helmets-conspiracy-theories

On the other hand, there is Eva Bartlett, a Canadian journalist who was on the ground in Syria when many Western journalists were filing their reports from well out of area, and according to her there are reasons to be concerned at the decision to take White Helmets into Canada and the UK:

"I have already outlined this chronology of investigations, refuting corporate media claims that voices critical of the White Helmets stem from Russian influence. Yet, slavish supporters of the White Helmets, continue to demonize anyone posing critical and needed questions on this group, generally labelling such people as “Russian bots”, “influenced by Russia”, or some variation of that, in an attempt to insist only people under the influence of Russia have been critical of the White Helmets."

- https://www.rt.com/op-ed/435670-white-helmets-canada-syria/
https://www.globalresearch.ca/how-the-mainstream-media-whitewashed-al-qaeda-and-the-white-helmets-in-syria/5624930

Does Hunt really know what he is doing?

Ever since Boris Johnson looked as though he was preparing to challenge Theresa May for the Premiership, Hunt has seemed to me to be backing onto the limelight. But in this case he could be playing with fire.

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