Bulletin N° 1172
“The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe”
by Walden Media
(2:22:51)
Siblings Lucy, Edmund, Susan and Peter step through a magical wardrobe and find the land of Narnia. There, the they discover a charming, once peaceful kingdom that has been plunged into eternal winter by the evil White Witch, Jadis. Aided by the wise and magnificent lion, Aslan, the children lead Narnia into a spectacular, climactic battle to be free of the Witch's glacial powers forever.
Subject : An Interpretation of the Judeo-Christian-Islamic Tradition – ‘Cogito Ergo Sum!’ - interpreted as ‘I control, therefore I exist!’(The Costa Nostra School of Diplomacy welcomes the Snopes Family.)
Grenoble, France
June 21, 2025
Dear Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA,
The history of the European Middle Ages continues to attract our interest, not as an escapist device in the attempt to ignore the grim, biblical cataclysms which are threatening our very existence today; but rather to examine past political economies, since the fall of the Roman Empire, which might shed light on the construction of social configurations that arose to redistribute wealth, and institute new forms of economic inequality, and stabilize political injustice.
We begin with Marc Bloch’s 1940 manuscript of Feudal Society, volume 1, entitled “The Growth of Ties of Dependence”.
The Two Ages OF Feudalism.
The framework of institutions which governs a society can in the last resort be understood only through a knowledge of the whole human environment. For though the artificial conception of man’s activities which prompts us to carve up the creature of flesh and blood into the phantoms homo oeconomicus, philosophicus, juridicus is doubtless necessary, it is tolerable only if we refuse to be deceived by it. That is why, despite the existence of other works on the various aspects of medieval civilization, the description thus attempted from points of view different from ours did not seem to us to obviate the necessity of recalling at this stage the fundamental characteristics of the historical climate in which European feudalism flourished. Need I add that in placing this account near the beginning of the book there was no thought of claiming any sort of illusory primacy for facts of this kind? When it is a question of comparing two particular phenomena belonging to separate series –a certain distribution of population, for example, with certain forms of legal groups—the delicate problem of cause and effect undoubtedly arises. On the other hand, to contrast two sets of dissimilar phenomena over a period of several countries, and then say: ‘Here on this side are all the causes; there on the that are all the effects’, would be to construct the most pointless of dichotomies. A society, like a mind, is woven of perpetual interaction. For other researches, differently oriented, the analysis of the economy or the mental climate are a starting-point.
In this preliminary picture designedly limited in scope, it will be necessary to retain only what is essential and least open to doubt. One deliberate omission, in particular, deserves a word of explanation. The wonderful flowering of art in the feudal era, at least from the eleventh century on, is not merely the most lasting glory of that epoch in the eyes of posterity. It served in those times as a vehicle for the most exalted forms of religious sensibility as well as for that interpenetration of the sacred and profane so characteristic of the age, which has left no more spontaneous witness that the friezes and capitals of certain churches. It was also very often the refuge, as it were, of certain values which could not find expression elsewhere. The restraint of which the medieval epic was incapable must be sought in Romanesque architecture. The precision of mind which the notaries were unable to attain in their charters presided over the works of the builders of vaults. But the links that unite plastic expression to the other features of a civilization are still insufficiently understood; from the little that we know of them they appear so complex, so subject to delays and divergences that it has been necessary in this work to leave aside the problems posed by connections that to us seem so astonishing.
It would, moreover, be a grave mistake to treat ‘feudal civilization’ as being all of one piece chronologically. Engendered no doubt or made possible by the cessation of the last invasions, but first manifesting themselves some generations later, a series of very profound and very widespread changes occurred towards the middle of the eleventh century. No definite break with the past occurred, but the change of direction which, despite inevitable variations in the time according to the countries or the phenomena considered, affected in turn all the graphs of social activity. There were, in a word, two successive ‘feudal’ ages, very different from one another in their essential character. We shall endeavor in the following pages to do justice as much to the contrasts between these two phases as to the characteristics they shared.(pp.59-60)
The Economic Revolution of The Second Feudal Age.
We shall endeavor, in another work, to describe the intensive movement of repopulation which, from approximately 1050 to 1250, transformed the face of Europe: on the confines of the Western world, the colonization of the Iberian plateau and of the great plain beyond the Elbe; in the heart of the old territories, the incessant gnawing of the plough at forest and wasteland; in the glades opened amidst the trees or the brushwood, completely new villages clutching at the virgin soil; elsewhere, round sites inhabited for centuries, the extension of the agricultural lands through the exertions of the assarters. It will be advisable then to distinguish between the stages of the process and to describe the regional variations . For the moment, we are concerned only with the phenomenon itself and its principal effects.
The most immediately apparent of these was undoubtedly the closer association of the human groups. Between the different settlements, except in some particularly neglected regions, the vast empty spaces thenceforth disappeared. Such distances as still separated the settlements became, I any case, easier to traverse. For powers now arose or were consolidated --their rise being favored by current demographic trends—whose enlarged horizons brought them new responsibilities. Such also were the kings and princes; they too were interested in the prosperity because they derived large sums of money from it in the form of duties and tolls; moreover they were aware --much more so than in the past—of the vital importance to them of the free transmission of orders and the free movement of armies. The activity of the Capetians towards that decisive turning-point marked the reign of Louis VI, their aggressions, their domanial policy, their part in the organization of the movement of repopulation, were in large measure the reflection of considerations of this kind –the need to retain control of communications between the two capitals, Paris and Orleans, and beyond the Loire or the Seine to maintain contact with Berry or with the valleys of the Oise and the Aisne. It would seem that while the security of the roads had increased, there was no very notable improvement in their condition; but as least the provision of bridges had been carried much farther. In the course of the twelfth century, how many were thrown over all the rivers of Europe! Finally, a fortunate advance in harnessing methods had the effect, about the same time, of increasing very substantially the efficiency of horse-transport.
The links with neighboring civilizations underwent a similar transformation. Ships in ever greater numbers ploughed the Tyrrhenian Sea, and its ports, from the rock of Amalfi to Catalonia, rose to the rank of great commercial centers; the sphere of Venetian trade continually expanded, the heavy wagons of the merchant caravans now followed the route of the Danubian plains. These advances were important enough. But relations with the East had not only become easier and more intimate. The most important fact is that they had changed their character. Formerly almost exclusively an importer, the West had become a great supplier of manufactured goods. The merchandise which it thus shipped in quantity to the Byzantine world, to the Latin or Islamic Levant and even –though in smaller amounts—to the Maghreb, belonged to very diverse categories. One commodity, however, easily dominated all the rest. In the expansion of the European economy in the Middle Ages, cloth played the same vital rôle as did metal a
nd cotton goods in that of nineteenth-century England.(pp.69-71)
The second volume of Feudal Society, entitled “Social Classes and Political Organization” offers many insights into the evolution of institutions and customs that defined this era of European history and has left a permanent mark of our present era.
In his “Introductory Note,” at the beginning of volume 2, he prepares us for a trip into a past where the landscape was significantly different, though not altogether foreign.
The most characteristic feature of the civilization of feudal Europe was the network of ties of dependence extending from top to bottom of the social scale. (How such a distinctive structure arose and developed, what were the events and the mental climate that influenced its growth, what it owed to borrowings from a remoter past, we have endeavored to show in Book I.) In the societies to which the epithet ‘feudal’ is traditionally applied, however, the lives of individuals were never regulated exclusively by these relationships of strict subjection or direct authority. Men were also divided into groups, ranged one above the other, according to occupation, degree of power or prestige. Moreover, above the confused mass of petty chiefdoms of every kind, there always existed authorities of more far-reaching influence and of a different character. From the second feudal age onwards, not only were the orders of society more and more strictly differentiated; there was also an increasing concentration of forces round a few great authorities and a few great causes. We must now direct our attention to the study of this second aspect of social organization; then we shall at last be in a position to attempt to answer the question which it has been the main purpose of our inquiry to elucidate, namely: by what fundamental characteristics, whether or not peculiar to one phase of Western evolution , have these few centuries deserved the name which thus sets them apart from the rest of European history? What portion of their heritage has been transmitted to later times?(p.282)
In the final chapter of his second volume, Bloch analyses “the persistence of European feudalism,” beginning with a look at the “survivals and revivals” of feudalism, and continuing with a discussion of ‘the warrior idea and the idea or contract.”
Survivals and Revivals.
From the middle of the thirteenth century onwards European societies diverged decisively from the feudal pattern. But a social system, which is simply a phase of a continuous evolution within human groups possessed of memory, cannot perish outright or at a single stroke. Feudalism had it s continuations.
The manorial system, on which feudalism had left its mark, long survived it, undergoing many changes, which do not concern us here. It is plain, however, that when manorialism had ceased to form part of a closely related system of political institution, it was bound to appear more and more pointless in the eyes of the subject populations, and consequently more odious. Of all forms of dependence within the manor, the most genuinely feudal was serfdom, and although it had undergone profound changes and become territorial rather than personal, it nevertheless survived in France till the eve of the Revolution. Who at that time remembered that among those subject to mainmorte there were undoubtedly some whose ancestors had voluntarily ‘commended’ themselves to a protector? And even supposing this remote circumstance had been known, would that knowledge have made an anachronistic state of affairs any easier to bear?
With the exception of England, where the first of the seventeenth-century Revolutions abolished all distinctions between tenure by knight-service and other forms of tenure, the obligations arising from vassalage and the fief were rooted in the soil, and they lasted, as in France, as long as the manorial system or, as in Prussia (which in the eighteenth century proceeded to a general ‘allodification’ of fiefs), very nearly as long. The State, which alone was capable henceforth of utilizing the hierarchy of dependence, only very slowly abandoned recourse to it for the supply of military forces. Louis XIV summoned the whole body of vassals on more than one occasion. But this was now only an exceptional measure on the part of governments in need of troops; or it might even be a mere fiscal expedient to raise funds though the medium of fines and exemptions. After the end of the Middle Ages the only characteristics of the fief which really retained practical importance were the pecuniary burdens to which it was subject and the special rules which regulated its inheritance. Since there were no more household warriors, homage was henceforth invariably attached to the possession of an estate. Its ceremonial aspect, ‘empty’ though it might seem in the eyes of jurists nurtured in the rationalism of the new age, was not a matter of indifference to a noble class with the natural concern of etiquette. But the ceremony itself, formerly charged with such profound human significance, not only served –apart from the monetary levies of which it was sometimes the occasion—to establish the ownership of the properly, a source of rights which were more or less lucrative, according to the ‘custom’. ‘Feudal matters’ were essentially contentious and a preoccupation of jurisprudence. They supplied a prolific literature of the legal theorists and practitioners with splendid themes for dissertations. But that in France the edifice was very decayed, and the profits which its beneficiaries expected from it mostly rather poor, is clearly demonstrated by the ease with which it was overthrown. The disappearance of the manorial system was effected only at the cost of much resistance and not without seriously upsetting the distribution of wealth; that of the fief and of the vassalage seemed the inevitable and almost insignificant termination of a long death-agony.
Nevertheless, in a society which continued to be beset with many disorders, the needs which had given rise to the ancient practice of companionage, and then to vassalage, had not cease to be felt. Among the various reasons which led to the creation of the orders of chivalry which were founded in such great number in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, one of the most decisive was undoubtedly the desire of the princes to attach to themselves a group of highly-placed retainers by an especially compelling bond. The knights of Saint-Michel, according to the statues drawn up by Louis XIV, promised the king bonne et vraye amour and pledged themselves to serve him loyally in his just wars. The attempt was to prove as vain as that of the Carolingians in an earlier day: in the oldest list of persons honored by the famous collar, the third place was occupied by the Constable of St. Pol, who was so basely to betray his master.
More effective –and more dangerous—was the reconstitution, during the disorders of the closing years of the Middle Ages, of bands of private warriors, very much akin to the ‘satellite” vassals whose brigandage had been denounced by writer of the Merovingian age. Frequently their dependence as expressed by the wearing of a costume displaying the colors of their chieftain or emblazoned with his arms. This practice was condemned in Flanders by Philip the Bold, but it seems to have been especially widespread in the England of the last Plantagenets, of the Lancastrians and the Yorkists –so much so that the groups thus formed round the great barons received the name of ‘liveries’. Like the household vassals of former days they did not consist exclusively of low-born adventurers, and in fact, the majority were probably recruited from the ‘gentry’. When one of these men was involved in a law-suit, the lord extended his protection to him in court. Although illegal, this practice of ‘maintenance’ was extraordinarily tenacious, as is attested by repeated Parliamentary prohibitions; it reproduced practically feature of for feature the ancient mithium which the powerful man in Frankish Gaul had extended over his retainer. And since it was also to the advantage of the sovereigns to make use of the personal bond in its new form, we find Richard II seeking to spread through the kingdom -- like so many vassi dominici—his personal followers, distinguished by the ‘white hart’ with which their uniform was emblazoned.
Even in the France of early Bourbons the nobleman who in order to make his way in the world became the servant of a great man assumed a status remarkably akin to primitive vassalage. In a phrase that recalled the vigor of the old feudal language, one said of so-and-so that he ‘belonged’ to Monsieur le Prince or to the Cardinal. True, the ceremony of homage was no longer performed, though it was often replaced by a written agreement. For, from the end of the Middle Ages, the ‘promise of friendship’ was substituted for the dying practice of homage. See, for example, this ‘letter’ addressed to Fouquet on the 2nd June 1658, by a certain Captain Deslandes. ‘I promise to give my fealty to My Lord the Procurator-General . . . never to belong to any but him, to whom I give myself and attach myself with the greatest attachment of which I am capable; and I promise to serve him generally against all persons without exceptions and to obey none but him, nor even to have any dealings with those whom he forbids me to deal with . . . I promise him to sacrifice my life against all whom he pleases . .. . without any exception whatsoever.’ It is as though we were hearing across the ages, the echoes of the most absolute of the formulas of commendation: ‘thy friends shall be my friends, thy enemies shall be my enemies’ –without even a reservation in favor of the king!
The Warrior Idea and the Idea of Contract.
To the societies which succeeded it the feudal era had bequeathed knighthood, which had become crystallized as nobility. From this origin the dominant class retained pride in its military calling, symbolized by the right to wear the sword, and clung to it with particular tenacity where, as in France it derived from this calling the justification for valuable fiscal privileges. Nobles need not pay taille, explain two squires of Varennes-en-Argonne about 1380; for ‘by their noble status, nobles are obliged to expose their bodies and belongings in wars’. Under the Ancien Régime, the nobility of ancient lineage, in contrast with the aristocracy of office, continued to call itself the nobility ‘of the sword’. Even today, when to die for one’s country has altogether ceased to be the monopoly of one class or one profession, the persistence of the feeling that a sort of moral supremacy attaches to the function of professional warrior –an attitude quite foreign to other societies, such as the Chinese—is a continual remainder of the separation which took place, towards the beginning of feudal times, between the peasant and the knight.
Vassal homage was a genuine contact and a bilateral one. If the lord failed to fulfill his engagements he lost his rights. Transferred, as was inevitable, to the political sphere –since the principal subjects of the king were at the same time his vassals—this idea was to have a far-reaching influence, all the more so because on this ground it was reinforced by the very ancient notions which held the king responsible in a mystical way for the welfare of his subjects and deserving of punishment in the event of public calamity. These old currents happened to unite on this point with another stream of thought which arose in the Church out of the Gregorian protest against the myth of sacred and supernatural kingship. It was the writers of his clerical group who first expressed, with a force long unequalled, the notion of a contract binding the sovereign to his people –‘like the swineherd to the master who employs him’, wrote an Alsatian monk about 1080. The remark seems even more full of meaning when taken in the context of the indignant protest of a (moderate) partisan of monarchy: ‘the Lord’s anointed cannot be dismissed like a village reeve!’ But these clerical theorists themselves did not fail to invoke, among the justifications for the deposition to which they condemned the bad prince, the universally recognized right of the vassal to abandon the bad lord.
It was above all the circles of the vassals which translated these ideas into practice, under the influence of the institutions which had formed their mentality. In this sense, there was a fruitful principle underlying many revolts which on a superficial view might appear as more random uprisings: ‘A man may resist his king and judge when he acts contrary to law and may even help to make war’ on him…. Thereby, he does not violate the duty of fealty’. These are the words of the Sachsenspiegel. This famous ‘right of resistance’, the germ of which was already present in the Oaths of Strasbourg (843) and in the pact between Charles the Bald and his vassals (856), resounded in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries from one end of the Western world to the other, in a multitude of texts. Though most of these documents were inspired by reactionary tendencies among the nobility, or by the egoism of the bourgeoisie, they were of great significance for the future. They included the English Great Charter of 1215; the Hungarian ‘Golden Bull’ of 1222; the Assizes of the kingdom of Jerusalem; the privilege of the Brandenburg nobles: the Aragonese Act of Union of 1287; the Brabantine charter of Cortenberg; the statute of Dauphiné of 1341; the declaration of the communes of Languedoc (1356). It as assuredly no accident that the representative system, in the very aristocratic form of the English Parliament, the French ‘Estates’, the Stände of Germany, and the Spanish Cortés, originated in states which were only just emerging from the feudal state and still bore its imprint. Nor was it an accident that in Japan, where the vassal’s submission was much more unilateral and where, moreover, the divine power of the Emperor remained outside the structure of vassal engagements, nothing of the kind emerged from a regime which was nevertheless in many respects closely akin to the feudalism of the West. The originality of the latter system consisted in the emphasis it placed on the idea of an agreement capable of binding the rulers; and in this way, oppressive as it may have been to the poor, it has in truth bequeathed to our Western civilization something with which we still desire to live.(pp.448-452)
Marc Bloch’s classic study of the Middle Ages sets a framework for specific investigations into the social history of this period. The 12th century autobiography of Guilbert of Nogent, Self and Society in Medieval France: The Memoirs of Abbot Guibert of Nogent, 1064? – c.1125, edited by John F. Benton (1970), offers insights into the ideological influence of the medieval Church on the mentality of monastic life in this period. In addition, the anthology, Women in Medieval Society, edited by Susan Mosher Stuard (1976) provides research findings on the social conditions of women, offering comparisons of their public roles, their acknowledged rights and responsibilities, and their economic contributions in the two periods under discussion: The Early Middle Ages and the Later Middle Ages, which began at the end of 11th and early 12th centuries.
In his introduction to Guibert’s three-volume memoires, John Benton described the architecture of this unusual medieval document.
The progression of his book led Guibert to describe an ever-widening scene. In the first book, he wrote of himself and his family and of the abbey of Saint-Germer; in the second, he related the history of Nogent; in the third, he told the story of what he called ‘the tragedy of Laon,’ ending with an account of events in neighboring dioceses. This third book, with its vivid and detailed history of the revolt of the commune of Laon, its discussion of heretical practices, and its record of conflicts involving great lords, bishops, and the king himself, is one of our most important medieval sources. Dramatic and well-informed, Guibert’s narrative has provided primary documentation of fundamental importance for the history of northern France in the early twelfth century. Historians looking for vivid illustrations of conflict between classes in the establishment of medieval communes, or for descriptions of depraved behavior by heretics and brutal feudal lords, have only to turn to Guibert for their material ready-made.
But is that material a trustworthy representation of reality? Since Guibert makes his allegiance obvious, saying that the word ‘commune’ is an evil name and heresy a cancer, many historians have written as if they could discount Guibert’s opinions and yet accept his ‘factual’ statements. A distinguished historian of heresy and inquisition states, for instance, that ‘it would be an injustice to suspect his honesty.’ But our problems with Guibert lie at a deeper level than his integrity or sincerity; they spring from his own conception of what he was writing and from his capacity to perceive and understand the world about him.
Let us hope that the sensitive article published in 1965 by Jacques Chaurand has now laid to rest any lingering remnants of the idea that Guibert was a ‘scientific’ historian. Chaurand shows convincingly that Guibert’s conceptions were not those of the nineteenth or twentieth centuries –how could they be?—but were those of a moral commentator. The same author who composed tropological Biblical commentaries called his Memoirs ‘homilies’ and said at one point that he was ‘picking out examples useful for sermons’. . . . His narrative was meant to edify, and to do so it had to be effectively written. Close reading of his work suggests that time after time Guibert sacrificed literal truth in order to point a moral or adorn his tale. What did it matter that at one point the vidame Adon is struck down from behind while on his way to battle, while elsewhere Guibert tells of his death in the thick of the fight…? Was the actual nature of payments made by the king when he visited Laon important, so long as any payment at all could illustrate Guibert’s point…? Should Guibert have been concerned to find that his explanation of a war which he blames on uxoriousness conflicts with that of a historian closer to the situation…? Questions such as these should make us wonder how many other explanations or vivid details are literary and moral embellishments. The tendency to stretch the evidence to fit the framework of one’s preconceptions is common to all historians. Rather than trying to guard against them, however, Guibert was like his contemporaries in thinking that such adjustments were part of his job.
In some instances discrepancies with reality may have been introduced when Guibertt consciously reshaped his evidence, but in other cases the set of his mind probably led Guibert to gross distortions in perception or understanding. For instance, misunderstanding the remark of a countryman may have led him to the ‘honest’ belief that Thomas of Marle pierced the windbags of his prisoners …. The belief could be held in good faith, but it should be added that he wanted to believe the worst of Thomas. Guibert may also have sincerely believed that the heretics whom he detested condemned propagation by intercourse and yet routinely engaged in fornication in their secret meetings…. Without impugning Guibert’s good faith, the reader may still conclude that he was all too ready to accept abusive reports uncritically. As a theologian, Guibert saw the structure of the world as a conflict between flesh and spirit, devils and saints. As a moralist, he found it easy to think that people he did not like personally had been caught up by the forces of evil. As a tormented and introverted man, he did not have the charity, generosity, and sympathy that are necessary for understanding the motivations and behavior of others. The accuracy of Guibert’s representations of medieval life is continually flawed by his limitations.
Many medieval historians surpass Guibert of Nogent in accuracy, but few can match his vigor and detail, his passionate prejudices, the personal imprint he put on his work. Guibert brought more to his Memoirs than his skills as a seasoned author. His book is marked by his own view of himself and reality and by his compulsion to write. Like the later work of Vincent van Gogh, his shapes are distorted, his colors are ‘unreal,’ and he exhibits some for the tortures of the a distressed mind. Other authors give us more realistic representations of the world without. Guibert show us how the world affected the man within.(pp.31-33)
At the beginning of his memoirs, Guibert recounts the routine abuse he suffered at the hands of his religious teacher. His mother and he nearly died at his birth, and his father promised that his son would devote his life to the church. Shortly after he died, and his mother proceeded to fulfill his father’s commitment to God. Here, Guibert recounts this early period of his life without a father:
Now, my teacher had a harsh love for me, for he showed excessive severity in his unjust floggings, and yet the great care with which he guarded me was evident in his acts. Clearly I did not deserve to be beaten, for if he had had the skill in teaching which he professed, it is certain that I, though a boy, would have been well able to grasp anything that he taught. But because he stated his thoughts poorly and what he strove to express was not at all clear to him, his talk rolled ineffectively on and on in a banal but by no means obvious circle, which could not be brought to any conclusion, much less understood. He was so uninstructed that he retained incorrectly, as I have said before, what he had once learned badly late in life, and if he let anything slip out (incautiously, as it were), he maintained and defended it with blows, regarding all his own opinions as firmly established. I think he certainly should have avoided such folly, for indeed, a learned man says, ‘before one’s nature has absorbed knowledge, it is less praiseworthy to say what you know then to keep silent about what you do not know.’
While he took cruel vengeance on me for not knowing what he did not know himself, he ought certainly to have considered that it was very wrong to demand from a weak little mind what he had not put into it. For as the words of madmen can be understood by the sane with difficulty or not at all, so the talk of those who are ignorant but say that they know something and pass it on to others will be more darkened by their own explanations. You will find nothing more difficult that trying to discourse on what you do not understand, so that your subject is obscure to the speaker and even more to the listener, making both look like blockheads. I say this, O my God, not to put a stigma on such a friend, but for every reader to understand that we should not attempt to teach as a certainty every assertion we make, and that we should not involve others in the mists of our own conjectures.
It has been my purpose here, in consideration of the poorness of my subject, to give it some flavor by reasoning about things, so that if the one deserves to be reckoned of little value, the other may sometimes be regarded as worthwhile.
Although he crushed me by such severity yet in other ways he made it quite plain that he loved me as well a he did himself. With such watchful care did he devote himself to me, with such foresight did he secure my welfare against the spite of others and teach me on what authority I should beware of the dissolute manners of some who paid court to me, and so long did he argue with my mother about the elaborate richness of my dress, that he was thought to guard me as a parent, not as master, and not my body alone but my soul as well. As for me, considering the dull sensibility of my age and my littleness, I conceived much love for him in response, in spite of the many weals with which he furrowed my tender skin, so that not through fear, as is common in those of my age, but through a sort of love deeply implanted in my heart, I obeyed him in utter forgetfulness of his severity. Indeed, when my master and my mother saw me paying due respect to both alike, they tried by frequent tests to see whether I would dare to prefer one or the other.
At last, without any intention on the part of either, an opportunity occurred for a test which left no room for doubt. Once I had been beaten in school –the school being no other than the dining hall of our house, for he had given up the charge of others to take me alone, my mother having wisely required him to do this for a higher wage and a better position. When my studies, such as they were, had come to an end about the time of vespers, I went to my mother’s knee after a more severe beating than I had deserved. And when, as often happened, she began to ask me repeatedly whether I had been whipped that day, I, not to appear a telltale, entirely denied it. Then against my will she threw off my inner garment (which is called a shirt or chemise) and saw my little arms blackened and the skin of my back everywhere puffed up with cuts from the twigs. Grieved to the very savage punishment inflicted on my tender body, troubled, agitated and weeping with sorrow, she said: ‘You shall never become a clerk, not any more suffer so much to get an education.’ At that, looking at her with what reproach I could, I replied; ‘If I had to die on the spot, I would not give up studying my lessons and becoming a clerk.’ I should add that she had promised that if I wished to become a knight, when I reached the age for it she would give me the arms and equipment of knighthood.
When I declined all these offers with a good deal of scorn, she, Thy servant, O Lord, accepted this rebuff so gladly, and was made so cheerful by my disdain of her proposal, that she repeated to my master the reply with which I had opposed her. They both rejoiced that I had such an eager longing to fulfill my father’s vow. I was eager to pursue my lessons more quickly, although I was poorly taught. Moreover, I did not shirk the church offices; indeed, when the hour sounded or there was occasion, I did not prefer even my meals to that place and time. That is how it was then: but Thou, O God, knowest how much I afterward fell away from that zeal, how reluctantly I went to divine services, hardly consenting even when driven to them with blows. Clearly, O lord, the impulses that animated me then were not religious feelings begotten by thoughtfulness, but only a child’s eagerness. But after adolescence had exhausted itself in bringing forth wickedness within me, I hastened toward the loss of all shame and that former zeal entirely faded away. Although for a brief space, my God, good resolve, or rather the semblance of good resolve, seemed to shine forth, it came to pass that it soon vanished, overshadowed by the storm clouds of my evil imagination.(pp.48-50)
In the introduction to her anthology on women in medieval soceity, Professor Stuard writes,
The late eleventh and twelfth centuries stand in many ways as a watershed between the greater opportunity for women in early medieval times and the more confining circumstances of life in the later Middle Ages. But before we identify civil law codes or ecclesiastical opinions as the arch-villains in this change, some effort could be made to count the cost of relative freedom for women in the early Middle Ages. When inventories and similar sources yield comparative statistical data, we learn that early medieval women had notably higher (that is, earlier) mortality rates than men. Women in the early Middle Ages paid the price of early death for the valuable contributions of maintaining population growth and contributing to society in the public sphere. Historians must therefore take into account an individual’s reasonable desire for a longer and less demanding existence. A privatized life might mean some reduction in the harsh demands of life, even if purchased at the price of lower social status. Here lies a difficult issue involving, possibly, changing mentalities. Does a peasant women or a town-bred spinster feel better resentment if relieved of field work or excluded from a guild by an adequate supply of male labor? Does the Florentine bourgeois wife find ample satisfaction in her high-ceilinged palace and lovingly executed portrait to compensate for loss of participation in the family’s civic and business concerns? Does a Provencal duchess shut out from the administration of her own lands by her husband’s growing corps of bureaucrats enjoy the courtly songs and poems composed in her honor by lesser noblemen who have been as effectively dislodged from their bases of power as she has been from hers? These are the issues of changing mentalities and only in the latter instances, the courtly romance, are there adequate resources to begin the investigation of new and changing sensibilities.
By the later Middle Ages, in the most favorable (that is, urban) settings, women had increased their life spans, sometimes even outdoing the male segment of the population in longevity. Less difficult work seems to have exerted an influence here, but another factor is involved: certain women did not marry in the cities of the later Middle Ages, their comparatively long lives adding up to a statistical increase for all womankind. After centuries of population growth in which all but those few women who chose the monastic life marries and propagated, single women began to appear in considerable numbers. Lack of dowries was trumpeted as the cause of this worrisome social situation, but it is also a symptom that population level increases were no longer particularly desirable. This complicated the celebrated Frauenfrage. Women who did not marry were considered appropriately situated only when they were cloistered, an enormous burden upon the spiritual nature of the conventual orders and houses which existed.
Although this volume does not purport to examine women’s condition throughout all of medieval Europe, there is ample variety in the essays included to make useful comparisons by time and place. The medieval period will always attract notice because of curiosity about the origins of ideas and social traditions. But there are many more significant reasons to investigate women’s position in the early centuries of the West. Possibly the greatest claim for early-European women’s significance was put forward by David Herlihy. He states that women were sufficiently capable to undertake the administration of the economy so that they might free men to undertake the geographical expansion of European society. No age is sufficiently understood until the contributions of women are made evident, that is particularly true of the Middle Ages.(pp.10-11)
The 22+ items below reflect the chaos caused by a class dominated society in crisis. The ruling class leaders are simply not prepared to lead the population into prosperity and security. Their claims are false, and they are motivated by ill-will, as we shall see.
Sincerely,
Francis McCollum Feeley
______
Professeur honoraire de
l'Université Grenoble-Alpes
Ancien Directeur de Researches
Université de Paris-Nanterre
Director of The Center for the Advanced Study
of American Institutions and Social Movements
(CEIMSA-in-Exile)
The University of California-San Diego
http://www.ceimsa.org
___________
a.
“Top U.S. & World Headlines — June 20, 2025”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMGoPYDZ0Rs&si=0WYkH3Lw59jTk1e4
with Amy Goodman
(12:02)
+
MOATS: “Iran–Israel STRIKES – Who’s Winning?”
https://www.youtube.com/live/WNDd71utBUA?si=m6CeA1LbYahJ77I8
with George Galloway
(2:15:03)
As the world reels from the latest Iran–Israel missile exchange, George Galloway is joined live by two heavyweight voices:
Glenn Greenwald — Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, host of System Update, founder of The Intercept and
Lowkey — Renowned hip-hop artist, host of The Watchdog podcast, and veteran political campaigner
Together, we break down: – Who’s really winning in the Middle East standoff? – What does this mean for nuclear risk, US foreign policy, and global escalation? – Why the media is failing to tell the full story 📊 Tonight's Poll: Who's winning – Israel or Iran? 🕗 Live from 8pm UK / 3pm ET 💬 Join the conversation in the live chat & vote now!
EPISODE 457:
· 04:55 Menu #iran #trump #israel #middleeast #gaza #piersmorgan #putin
· 07:05 Monologue #iran #trump #israel #starmer #northkorea #jordan #kinghussein
· 28:30 Glenn Greenwald #iran #gaza #netanyahu #trump #biden #tuckercarlson #tulsigabbard #huckabee #churchill #maga
· 1:11:05 Lowkey #trump #netanyahu #iran #gaza #turkey #arabstates #kushner #uae #erdogan #uani
· 2:02:00 Gayatri with social media #trump #tuckercarlson #tedcruz
=======
b.
“A Brief History of Israel and Iran”
with Greg Reese
(4:59)
From it’s inception, Israel began the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians living on the land given to them by the British Crown. The new Israelis used biological warfare by poisoning village wells, which was considered a war crime, but ignored.
In the early 1970s, Israel supplied weapons and intelligence to aid South Africa’s apartheid movement, in return for weapons grade uranium.
In 1982, thousands of Palestinians were executed in Israeli run refugee camps, and the UN General Assembly labeled it an act of genocide.
In 1994, Israel supplied weapons to support the Rawanda genocide, which murdered about eight-hundred-thousand people.
In 2006, Israel was accused of war crimes after deploying cluster bombs in civilian areas.
Israel supplied weapons and training to South Sudanese forces during their civil war, where war crimes were rampant.
Israel sold weapons to Myanmar’s military during its 2017 Rohingya genocide.
Meanwhile, British imperialism has been infiltrating Persia for over a century. In 1891, the Qajar dynasty sold Persia's entire tobacco industry to Britain for fifteen-thousand pounds. In 1902, they sold exclusive oil rights to Britain, who then formed the Anglo-Persian Oil Company. In 1935, when Persia was renamed Iran, the name was changed to the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company.
Iranian leadership had all the appearances of being vassals to the British Crown, until 1951, when Iran elected Mohammad Mossadegh as prime minister and voted to nationalize their oil.
+
“Israel Iran War Explained, Will US Join War? Why Trump Met Asim Munir, G7 Summit Highlights”
https://www.youtube.com/live/jp6fYT-_x_I
by ET Now
(38:55)
=======
c.
“Israel Has Walked Off a Cliff”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dalbnR8vNvs&si=2B_NibdiincnO6DP
with Glenn Diesen, John Mearsheimer, and Alexander Mercouris
(1:14:49)
0:00 - Introduction to the discussion on Iran
0:13 - Overview of the surprise attack and its impact on Iranian military leadership
1:08 - Discussion of Israeli goals regarding Iran
2:45 - Analysis of the feasibility of achieving Israeli goals
5:01 - Examination of the Israeli overestimation of their military capabilities
10:09 - Assessment of Israel's economic consequences from the ongoing conflict
12:51 - Discussion on the effectiveness of Israeli air defenses
16:10 - Exploration of the possibility of U.S. involvement in the conflict
19:29 - Consideration of Iran's potential responses and strategies
24:41 - Discussion on the implications of U.S. involvement for Russia and China
30:02 - Analysis of domestic American opposition to entering the war
35:00 - Speculation on potential outcomes of the conflict
39:07 - Final thoughts on the need for a ceasefire and negotiations
+
“‘Real Nightmare Yet To Come’: Iran Reveals Big Missile Secret: IRGC's Stunning Israel Declaration”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nVt8p7DAcBQ&si=llEexf7lvTvNJbgP
by Times Of India
(5:50)
A top Iranian general has warned the Israel of "catastrophe" and "suffering" amid the conflict between the two countries. Mohsen Rezaee, Member of Iran's Expediency Council, has claimed that Tehran has used less than 30 per cent of its operational capacity in the conflict. He has also demanded the expulsion of Israel and its ally United States from the Middle East region.
=======
d.
“Iran as the Graveyard of the American Empire”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASUeEhYLscg
with Glenn Diesen and Alex Krainer
(1:05:58)
+
“Developing A Nuclear Weapon Will Be THE END Of Iran!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbLrAp0z0mY
by The Jimmy Dore Show, with Arron Maté and Scott Ritter
(15:44)
=======
e.
“Iran’s Hypersonic Missiles POUND Israel as Tel Aviv Burns, Netanyahu Beg…”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LRi1QtUKso
with Danny Haiphong
(22:07)
Israel came under heavy fire overnight as Iranian ballistic missiles rained over Tel Aviv and key Israeli cities. Danny Haiphong explains the immense historic significance of these strikes as Israel moves toward full desperation mode, begging the US to enter the war in full.
+
“Iran SMASHES Tel Aviv, Israel & Trump's War BACKFIRES”
https://www.youtube.com/live/VGBgbmXDs9Y?si=ljvIGNVF9L24X2Tm
with Larry Johnson & Col. Lawrence Wilkerson
(1:27:22)
Wave 17 of Iran's Operation True Promise 3 just hit as Trump issues a two-week deadline for the US fully entering Israel's war amid Netanyahu begging the US to save him from his failed regime change operation. But the truth is far worse. Trump appears ready to pull the trigger on war, revealing the true aims of Washington toward Iran that span several generations. Former CIA analyst Larry Johnson and Chief of Staff Col. Lawrence Wilkerson join Danny Haiphong live for a full update on one of the most consequential wars in modern history.
+
“War Against Iran Escalates Unchecked”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SM8JcMwYeEA&si=veMT30kmTf9xvU2-
with Glenn Diesen and Lt. Col. Daniel Davis
(43:18)
=======
f.
“Russia & Algeria Warns U.S & Israel LIVE at UN | Leave Iran Now or Else...!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GveH99abaXo&si=dmv2NJf75p_xR2WE
by We Love Africa
(18:51)
+
“Russia's Lavrov Warns Israel While Meeting Muslim Nation's Minister| Iran| Trump| US| Putin| Ukraine”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=miAGvpHFSMU
by Hindustan Times
(19:47)
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov held a meeting in Moscow with his Indonesian counterpart Sugiono. After the meeting, Lavrov issued a warning to Israel amid heightened tensions in the Middle East. Watch here. INTERNATIONAL NEWS #iran #israel #iranisraelwar #russia #lavrov #hindustantimes #lavrov #russia #russiawarnsisrael #moscowmeeting #middleeastwar #putin #trump #iran #ukraine #worldwar #worldnews #warupdates #breakingnews #geopolitics
+
« De la Tunisie à Gaza, un convoi pour briser le blocus israélien »
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uuAGCRl-11E
par le Journal l'Humanité
6 000 activistes arrivent ce jeudi 12 juin au Caire pour lancer la « Marche vers Gaza ». L’objectif de cette action qui réunit 52 délégations est de rallier El-Ariche et de rejoindre à pied le poste-frontière de Rafah, le 15 juin, pour alerter sur la situation humanitaire. Mais les autorités égyptiennes pourraient les bloquer. Le point sur la situation avec Rosa Moussaoui, rédactrice en chef et Elizabeth Fleury, journaliste d'investigation au micro de Théo Bourrieau.
+
“Algiers-Tunis-Gaza: A caravan breaks the world's silence”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XPqpXzx0kjc
by Algérie Nouvelles
(3:54)
On June 9, 2025, an exceptional caravan named "Al Soumoud" set off from Tunis toward Gaza. Comprised of hundreds of vehicles and thousands of activists from Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya, its goal was to break the Israeli blockade and make the voices of the Maghreb peoples heard. This unprecedented movement is not only humanitarian: it is highly symbolic and political, marking a citizen mobilization on an international scale. At the same time, the Israeli navy intercepted activist Greta Thunberg and MEP Rima Hassan at sea. Discover in this video the details of this historic mobilization, the activists' testimonies, the international reactions, and the diplomatic challenges of this resistance caravan.
Stay informed about Maghreb and international news!
00:00: The Resistance Caravan to Gaza: When the Maghreb Mobilizes
3:46: outro
+
« Il videoracconto della piazza per Gaza: ‘Siamo oltre 300mila. Israele si fermi, Meloni è complice’ »
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCIsFNUafzU&si=exwo25gG3krTG8iP
by Fanpage.it
(5:34)
Decine di migliaia di persone sono scese in piazza a Roma per la manifestazione organizzata dai partiti del centrosinistra per chiedere la fine delle operazioni militari nella Striscia di Gaza da parte di Israele. I partecipanti hanno sicuramente superato le 100mila unità, secondo gli organizzatori sono stati oltre 300mila. Tra i tanti cori e cartelli, in molti hanno definito quello del governo Netanhyau a Gaza un genocidio e hanno accusato l'esecutivo Meloni di troppa accondiscendenza, se non di complicità, verso le azioni israeliane. Dal palco hanno chiuso l'evento i leader di Avs Bonelli e Fratoianni, il presidente M5S Giuseppe Conte e la segretaria del Pd Elly Schlein. Ecco il videoracconto della manifestazione
+
« À Paris, la police expulse un campement solidaire de Gaza et de l'équipage de la Freedom Flotilla »
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b_ZPpD4JdMI
by le Journal Humanité
Sur
la place de la République à Paris, des campeurs s'étaient installés depuis
lundi 9 juin pour occuper la place en solidarité avec la population gazaouie et
l'équipage de la Freedom Flotilla. Ils demandent notamment la libération des
Français qui ont pris part à la flottille de la liberté, dont Rima Hassan et
notre confrère Yanis Mhamdi. Ce mercredi 11 juin, ils ont été expulsés par la
police aux alentours de la mi-journée. ABONNEZ-VOUS à la chaîne de l'Humanité 
/ @humanitefr
Vous avez aimé cette vidéo ? Pour une info 100 % libre et engagée, ABONNEZ-VOUS : https://abonnement.humanite.fr ✊ Nous ne sommes financés par AUCUN MILLIARDAIRE. Et nous en sommes fiers ! Pour nous accompagner face à des défis financiers constants, SOUTENEZ-NOUS : https://www.humanite.fr/donner-a-lhum...
=======
g.
“The Israeli Strike on Iran, the JFK Assassination, and the 9/11 Attacks”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/israeli-strike-iran-jfk-assassination-911-attacks/5891229
by Ron Unz and Prof Michel Chossudovsky
Introductory Note: What Is Washington’s Unspoken Intent?
Let Your Allies Do the Dirty Work for You?
Israel’s Attack directed against Iran was undertaken in close liason with the Pentagon.
It required careful planning as well as the participation of US-Israel intelligence as outlined in Ron Unz carefully documented article
This was NOT an Israeli project with the IDF calling the shots. It was a joint US-Israel operation.
A military operation directed against Iran has been on the drawing board of US Central Command since the mid-1990s.
Israel was entrusted to Doing the Dirty Work for Us, as outlined in 2005 by Dick Cheney.
At the outset of Bush’s Second Term, Vice President Dick Cheney dropped a bombshell, hinting, that Israel would, so to speak: be doing the dirty work for us (paraphrase) without US military involvement and without us putting pressure on them “to do it”.
According to Cheney: (2005)
“The Israelis might well decide to act first, and let the rest of the world worry about cleaning up the diplomatic mess afterwards,”
+
“Fact-Checking 9/11, the JFK Assassination, the COVID Outbreak, the Holocaust, and Other Controversial Topics”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/fact-checking-911-jfk-assassination-covid-outbreak-holocaust/5890237
by Ron Unz
About a year ago, I first began exploring the powerful new AI systems that had been receiving so much public attention, and incorporated some of their features into our website.
For myself and many of our other writers, I added focused chatbots that used the corpus of the written works hosted on our website to simulate the responses of the authors to new questions. This was particularly effective in the case of the Ron Unz Chatbot given that it was trained on the substantial 1.5 million words of my own articles.
Then a few months ago I added another AI feature, having the ChatGPT system automatically produce short summaries and outlines for every article we publish that was longer than 1,000 words, thereby allowing readers to easily get a rough sense of pieces that they lacked the time or interest to actually read.
However, over the last few weeks I’ve begun using a new AI system for an even more important purpose, one much closer to the core mission of this website and my own large body of work.
OpenAI recently released an especially powerful new version of the ChatGPT AI called Deep Research. Whereas the ordinary ChatGPT and most other chatbots are designed to respond to prompts within seconds, the Deep Research AI may spend up to 30 minutes working on a given assignment, but it uses that time to produce remarkably detailed and advanced results. For example, according to Wikipedia a standard benchmark test scored the GPT-4o system at only 3.3% and DeepSeek’s R1 model did much better at 9.4%, but Deep Research rated a vastly superior 26.6%.
I discovered that the Deep Research AI could very effectively be used to fact-check exactly the sort of long, complex articles that I often write, and the results it produced were extremely impressive, fully confirming the sort of performance quality suggested by that standard benchmark. This led me to begin producing such fact-checking runs for the pieces in my lengthy American Pravda series and some other ones.
A couple of weeks ago I published an article discussing this process and the dozens of very impressive fact-checking results that I had already obtained.
Unsurprisingly these Deep Research runs are enormously resource-intensive, so that a standard OpenAI account limits them to 25 per month, with the first 10 being full-power and the remaining 15 low-power. We soon switched over to a Premium account that raised the allotment to 250 monthly runs, evenly divided between full-power and low-power. The full-power runs usually seemed as if they had been written by an exceptionally intelligent individual who had read nearly everything available on the Internet and also possessed almost total recall.
This new AI system seemed to have great potential value for my own writing and for other controversial content.
Over the last few years I have produced a huge body of work analyzing many of the most important world events of the last century or more, and often coming to extremely controversial conclusions, conclusions that would have enormous impact upon our entire society if they were judged correct and widely accepted. I have always done my best to adhere to the strictest standards of accuracy and care in writing these sometimes inflammatory articles, and as a result I have regularly declared that I would still stand by at least 99% of everything I have written in this huge body of extremely controversial material.
Many of the topics that I have decided to cover in this series are explosive ones and my conclusions are often even more so. This necessarily places my work very far beyond the pale of our mainstream academic and journalistic communities, quite often even far outside the acceptable boundaries of nearly all other alternative writers as well.
For these reasons, I would imagine that the overwhelming majority of those who initially encounter my material might often react with visceral disbelief, perhaps automatically dismissing my analyses out of hand. This has obviously made it quite difficult for my writing to gain any widespread traction.
I have always made every effort to take great care in producing my content and when I reread my past articles I find them quite compelling. But I recognize that this subjective impression might easily be an illusory result, while an objective, third-party analyst would have come to very different conclusions.
For both of these reasons those recent fact-checking runs applying the powerful Deep Research AI to roughly 120 of my articles have been extremely helpful. These reports often validated my own opinion while also providing powerful corroborative evidence of the accuracy of my findings to any interested outside readers.
Click here to read the full article on The Unz Review.
=======
h.
“Tensions Explode: Violent Protests Sweep the Nation After ICE Raids”
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/xwg4agejPE8
by Tsyonzt
Raids #shorts
+
“ICE Raid Protests LIVE | Second Night Of LA Curfew, Anger Spreads Across US | Trump | National Guard”
https://www.youtube.com/live/-yfdxmNXEDI
by CRUX
(4:03:23)
Downtown Los Angeles is now under curfew for a second night as protests against ICE raids and troop deployments in the city continue for a sixth day. Similar protests have popped up across the US, including in New York, Chicago, Austin and Washington, DC. More demonstrations are planned this week. The Trump administration has urged a judge to reject California’s bid for a court order that would limit how officials can use the Marines and the National Guard. The 700 Marines mobilized to the LA area are still undergoing training, and it is not yet clear when they will be deployed to help with protests. #laprotests #losangeles #iceraids #donaldtrump #nationalguard
+
“Chaos & Cruelty: Trump Deploys Thousands of Soldiers to Put Down Anti-ICE Protestors in L.A.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l_o66Ji-330
by Democracy Now!
(17:59)
President Trump has inflamed tensions over immigration raids in Los Angeles, which his top adviser Stephen Miller described as an insurrection. "They want protesters to react violently to distract from what is really happening, which is that families are being separated, our communities are being devastated, and the people of Los Angeles are standing up to say, 'We will not stand for this,'" says Jean Guerrero, "New York Times" contributing opinion writer and author of "Hatemonger: Stephen Miller, Donald Trump, and the White Nationalist Agenda."
+
“Los Angeles riots, Trump-Musk spat... Will crisis in America escalate?”
https://infobrics.org/en/post/47817
by Drago Bosnic
At the moment, it's too early to say that the situation would escalate into a full-blown civil war, but it goes to show that the Deep State will stop at nothing to regain full power.
The Deep State invested enormous resources and effort to ensure Donald Trump doesn't get elected, including several assassination attempts. Some of these even involved the Neo-Nazi junta, the Deep State's favorite "beacon of freedom and democracy" (they also tried assassinating President Vladimir Putin, meaning that these lunatics are after the two most powerful men on the planet). This is not to say that Trump is without fault. In fact, he bears at least some responsibility for failing to prevent the ongoing escalation of the NATO-orchestrated Ukrainian conflict (despite numerous promises he'd do so). However, the warmongers in Washington DC don't want anything but to ensure continued escalation with Russia (and the multipolar world as a whole). In order to achieve that, they need full control over the United States, as only the financial power of America can ensure they can fully go forward with the implementation of this plan.
+
“BRAVE Protesters STOP ICE ARRESTS in SHOCKING SHOWDOWN”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwrWrOWfaXw
by Keith Edwards
Keith Edwards discusses a tense standoff in Minneapolis where protesters confronted federal agents during a raid on a local taqueria.
========
i.
“MAGA Means War Against Iran!”
https://corbettreport.com/nwnw594/?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
with James Corbett and James Pilato
(26:41)
This week on New World Next Week: US Congress critters try to stop Trump from taking MAGA to war with Iran; the globalist elitists prepare for their annual summer vacation at Bohemian Grove; and WATCH OUT!!! the Russkies are trying to dim the sun!!!
+
“Iran-Israel; Missile stockpiles and air superiority”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6l4qHKfsdno
by The Duran
(11:38)
=======
j.
“Lindsey Graham Asks Top Army Officials Point Blank If US Would Beat Iran In 'An All-Out War'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHPQeB_cjuo
by Forbes Breaking News
(6:56)
During a Senate Appropriations Committee hearing on Wednesday, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) asked Army officials about the United States' capacity to beat Iran in a war. Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more: https://account.forbes.com/membership...
|
+ “IRAN UNLEASHES HELL on Tel Aviv - U.S. War Countdown” https://www.youtube.com/live/SKLfsf2w9LQ?si=gVfjkT7VlNOW91Hl by Dialogue Works, with Alex Krainer (1:15:48) |
=======
k.
“Monitor Breakfast with Steve Bannon”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXJTCMVOiEI
by The Christian Science Monitor
(1:01:03)
At a Monitor Breakfast with reporters, political strategist Steve Bannon warned against U.S. involvement in a lengthy conflict in Iran.
Over the Christian Science Monitor’s 117-year history, we’ve built a legacy of high-quality, distinctive journalism because we recognize that news is more than facts. It’s the story of how we are each trying to make our homes, communities, and nations better. What matters are the values and ideals that drive us, not just the who, what, when, and where of the news. Visit us online at: http://www.csmonitor.com/daily
+
“WHAT I HAVE BEEN TOLD IS COMING IN IRAN”
by Seymour Hersh
The initial battle plan for a new war.
This is a report on what is most likely to happen in Iran, as early as this weekend, according to Israeli insiders and American officials I’ve relied upon for decades. It will entail heavy American bombing. I have vetted this report with a longtime US official in Washington, who told me that all will be “under control” if Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei “departs.” Just how that might happen, short of his assassination, is not known. There has been a great deal of talk about American firepower and targets inside Iran, but little practical thinking, as far I can tell, about how to remove a revered religious leader with an enormous following.
I have reported from afar on the nuclear and foreign policy of Israel for decades. My 1991 book The Samson Option told the story of the making of the Israeli nuclear bomb and America’s willingness to keep the project secret. The most important unanswered question about the current situation will be the response of the world, including that of Vladimir Putin, the Russian president who has been an ally of Iran’s leaders.
The United States remains Israel’s most important ally, although many here and around the world abhor Israel’s continuing murderous war in Gaza. The Trump administration is in full support of Israel’s current plan to rid Iran of any trace of a nuclear weapons program while hoping the ayatollah-led government in Tehran will be overthrown.
=======
l.
“Israel-Iran, FOG of war and misdirection”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tc_JUVGostA&si=Zt3l85wOX7Q789bx
by The Duran
(31:58)
The Duran: Episode 2255
- 0:00 - Discussion on tensions between Iran and Israel
- 0:34 - Trump administration's potential military action against Iran
- 1:12 - Analysis of the attack on Fordo nuclear facility
- 2:02 - Public speculation about military strategies
- 4:14 - The real objective of potential strikes on Iran
- 6:10 - Misinterpretation of Iran's political structure
- 8:21 - Historical context of Iran's nuclear program
- 9:59 - Effectiveness of a strike on Fordo and its implications
- 12:01 - Discussion on regime change versus nuclear concerns
- 13:40 - The neocon agenda and fragmentation of nations
- 19:10 - Comparison of Iran's political system to Iraq and Syria
- 27:00 - Potential consequences of regime change in Iran
- 31:24 - Conclusion on the unpredictability of Iranian stability after chaos
=======
m.
“UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER: How ‘peacemaker’ Trump capitulated to the warm
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=74vxPu8ls-s
with George Galloway
(19:06)
He's 'executed' his three best supporters. His only knowledge of Middle East is collecting gold and diamonds there. Trump is just a low-rent, casino-owning mobster.
========
n.
“HowAmeica Goes To War: Iraq, Ukraine and Now Iran”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/america-war-iraq-ukraine-iran/5891660
by Dr. Jack Rasmus
After promising during the 2024 election to stop the USA’s ‘forever wars’ in the 21st century, in less than six months in office Donald Trump is about to start another ‘forever’ war with Iran.
There’ll be no prior vote in Congress, as required by the US Constitution. No seeking support of the United Nations or forming a coalition with allies. Nor even a preparation of public opinion, apart from the Fox News network that appears completely on board. There won’t even be a suspension of the War Powers Act, as occurred in previous ‘forever wars’.
Trump plans to simply order US aircraft to bomb Iran, within days or perhaps even hours. Certainly as soon as the three additional US aircraft carrier task forces he’s ordered arrive on station in the Arabian sea off Iran’s southern coast.
The carriers and planes are there to neutralize Iranian coastal and inland anti-aircraft missile forces to create a corridor for US B-2 strategic bombers flying from USA’s Diego Garcia island airbase in the Indian Ocean. The B-2s will drop US made GBU 43 bunker busting bombs on the three or more Iranian sites that Israel, and now USA, allege are producing nuclear material for use in an Iranian bomb.
The US bombing will occur on the flimsiest evidence supporting the claim Iran is just weeks away from having a nuclear weapon, as the US and Israel leadership and both countries’ media are saying. To the contrary, however, UN IAEA inspectors this past March 2025 publicly said there was no evidence Iran was near having such a weapon. Tulsi Gabbard, the Director of the US Director of National Intelligence, which coordinates all 17 US intelligence services, also told Congress that same month there was no evidence.
Two days ago as Trump was leaving a G7 meeting in Canada he was asked by the media what he thought of Gabbard’s view and statement. Trump replied:
“I don’t care what she said. I say they’re working on a weapon…I don’t listen to her”.
So who does Trump listen to? Netanyahu? Israel’s CIA-like counterpart, Mossad, instead of US intelligence services?
Trump will send US planes and bombers into Iran— not to prevent an attack on the USA by that country; not in response to an actual or imminent attack by Iran on US bases or its 40,000 troops now in west Asia; nor in response to an attack by Iran on US warships or any international shipping. Iran is not at war with the USA nor plans to; nevertheless, the USA will soon be at war with Iran.
Iran publicly offered this past week to sign a treaty saying it has no nuclear weapon and agrees not to develop one—a move strongly suggesting it is not concerned US inspectors would find anything indicating it has.
Trump is thus preparing to take the USA into another ‘forever’ war, this time with Iran on behalf of a foreign nation—Israel—simply because its leader, Netanyahu, has asked him to do so. The Israeli leader has been asking the USA to attack Iran since 2002 when he addressed the US Congress on the eve of the USA’s imminent Iraq invasion in 2003. Now he’ll likely get what he’s been asking for: the USA to attack Iran on behalf of Israel.
Since 2002 Netanyahu has cleverly deepened Israel’s influence—and indeed control—of the US government through its lobbying group, AIPAC, and other personal connections within the US bureaucracy, aka its Deep State.
A majority in Congress has already been writing a blank check to Israel to cover the costs of its current wars in GAZA, Lebanon and Syria. Congress will no doubt rubber stamp quickly any US air attack on Iran, in order to legitimize US bombing Iran—an act of war and aggression by America by any definition of international law. Like Congress, the US government bureaucracy and Deep State is also deeply aligned with Israeli interests, as is the Trump administration and the president himself.
The two political systems—USA and Israel—are fused at the political hip and have been for some time. There has never been anything quite like the political integration of the two systems, America and Israel, in the entire 250 year history of the USA.
Israel is the American Empire’s landlocked aircraft carrier looking out over the entire middle east, enforcing US imperial interests; America is Israel’s military weapons industry and blank check writer. It is estimated more than $340 billion in aid has been given to Israel by the US government since the 1970s. Most of which gets recycled back to the US companies providing Israel US advanced weaponry.
The USA ‘How to Go to War’ Playbook . . . .
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o.
“Iran: The Road to Armageddon?”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/iran-the-road-to-armageddon/7193
by Felicity Arbuthnot
This incisive article by Felicity Arbuthnot was written on October 27, 2007.
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p.
News from Underground by Mark Crispin Miller
“Top Neurosurgeon Sounds Alarm: COVID ‘Vaccines’ Are ‘Bioweapons’ Designed to ‘Kill People’”
https://www.globalresearch.ca/covid-vaccines-bioweapons-kill-people/5891768 https://www.globalresearch.ca/covid-vaccines-bioweapons-kill-people/5891768
by Frank Bergman
A world-renowned neurosurgeon is raising the alarm after discovering that Covid mRNA “vaccines” are laced with secret cancer-causing ingredients to act as a “bioweapon” and “kill people.”
The warning was issued by Dr. Jack Kruse, one of America’s most highly respected medical experts.
Dr. Kruse is a renowned neurosurgeon and CEO of Optimized Life, a health and wellness company dedicated to helping patients avoid healthcare burdens.
He is a member of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, the Congress of Neurological Surgeons, and the Age Management Medicine Group.
As a neurosurgeon, Dr. Kruse’s research has been published in respected dental and medical journals.
In a new interview, Kruse exposes a decades-long globalist plot to poison entire populations with the SV40 cancer virus.
Speaking with Robert Breedlove on the “What Is Money?” podcast, Kruse explains how Covid mRNA “vaccines” were developed as bioweapons.
Kruse warns that the “vaccines” were designed to “kill people.”
He clarifies how SV40 is responsible for the escalating “turbo cancer” crisis that is being reported by oncologists around the world.
According to Kruse, the plan to spread the cancer virus has been in the works since SV40 contaminated polio vaccines.
“This is a bioweapons program that spans 75 years,” Kruse asserts.
“We have killed more people in the last 4 years than we did in any world war we’ve been involved with.”
“That alone should end everything that’s going on with Covid,” he adds.
“60 billion copies of DNA plasmids and SV40 promoter in it.”
According to Kruse, Pfizer intentionally spiked its Covid mRNA “vaccine” with SV40 to trigger a “turbo cancer” epidemic.
However, he warns that Pfizer has been battling to keep the use of SV40 hidden from the public.
Kruse goes on to note that the depopulation effort backfired when young, healthy “vaccinated” people started dying from cancers typically associated with older people.
“The official story is: They wanted to kill people,” Kruse adds. [See Video]
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“In memory of those who “died suddenly” in the United States and worldwide, June 9-16, 2025”
by Mark Crispin Miller
Brian Wilson; actor David Hekili Kenui Bell (Lilo & Stich, 46); Real Housewives exec Lauren Miller; HGTV exec Loren Ruch; producer Terry Louise Fisher (L.A. Law); VJ Juliette Powell (54); & more
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“Rod Stewart cancels more shows, ESPN's Jay Harris takes "time off" for prostate cancer; UK: Kylie Minogue postpones 4 shows, Peter Murphy cancels summer shows; NO: rocker Morton Harket has Parkinson's”
by Mark Crispin Miller
Further indications of the global toll of COVID “vaccination,” based on the reports collected by our worldwide team of researchers.
To help support our work, consider subscribing or making a donation.
UNITED STATES:
‘Devastated’ music legend cancels more shows due to health issues
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“Shari Redstone has thyroid cancer; actor Andrei Ivchenko has rare bone cancer; Fox anchor Rick Jerrick diagnosed with skin cancer live on air; WWE's Ric Flair has 2nd skin cancer diagnosis in 3 years”
by Mark Crispin Miller
Sportswriter Bill Plaschke has Parkinson's; CA: soccer GM Ted Goveia has esophageal cancer; UK: King Charles' cancer "incurable," singer Natasha Hamilton (Atomic Kitten) has skin cancer; & more
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