NBC News cited two unnamed sources familiar with US intelligence to exclusively report that Russia is allegedly taking advantage of the campus protests for Palestine “with the aim of aggravating political tensions in the US and tarnishing Washington’s global image”. Only the second part is half-true, and that’s just because publicly financed Russian international media platforms are raising awareness across the world of America’s double standards towards international law, hate speech, and riots.
Before proceeding, it’s important that the reader is informed of Russian policy towards these three interconnected subjects: the latest Israeli-Hamas war, hate speech, and riots. In the order that they were mentioned, Russia is balancing between the warring parties with a view towards eventually mediating a resolution, strictly prohibits any incitement of ethno-national or religious hatred, and has zero tolerance for unauthorized protests, especially large-scale and violent ones. Here are some background briefings:
* “President Putin On Israel: Quotes From The Kremlin Website (2000-2018)”
* “Rioting In Purported Support Of Palestine Discredits Its People’s Independence Cause”
* “Clarifying Lavrov’s Comparison Of The Latest Israeli-Hamas War To Russia’s Special Operation”
* “Putin & The Patriarch Reminded Russians That Ethno-Religious Hate Speech Is Unacceptable”
* “Russia’s Request For UNSC Sanctions Against Israel Is A Principled Soft Power Move”
In short, President Putin is a proud lifelong philo-Semite who zealously supports Israel, but he understands that his country’s objective national interests rest in balancing between it and Palestine. To that end, the Kremlin has condemned both Hamas’ infamous terrorist attack on 7 October and Israel’s collective punishment of the Palestinians afterwards. It’s also officially suggested exploring sanctions against Israel for violating UNSC Resolution 2728 by refusing to implement a ceasefire.
The piece clarifying Lavrov’s comparison lists almost two dozen pieces from October-December elaborating more on Russian policy in this respect. As for the home front, the security services dispersed a pro-Palestinian mob that rioted at a Dagestani airport in late October upon being duped by fake news into thinking that Israeli Jews were about to arrive there. After the Crocus attack, President Putin and the Patriarch also tacitly reminded everyone about Article 282’s strict prohibition on hate speech.
Whatever readers might think about the merits of Russia’s foreign and domestic policies, they’re its sovereign right to promulgate in accordance with how policymakers believe that their country’s objective national interests can best be advanced. American perception managers have consistently exploited them though to discredit Russia’s sincere interest in brokering peace and to tar it as a dictatorship. The international legal basis of the former policy and national security one of the latter are always ignored.
At the same time, however, the US blatantly violates international law by giving Israel a blank check to collectively punish the Palestinians and ignore the earlier mentioned UNSC Resolution demanding that it implement a ceasefire with Hamas. It’s also dispersed some campus protests for Palestine on the pretext, whether accurate or not, that they’re spewing hate speech against Jews and turning into riots. Russia naturally has an interest in drawing maximum attention to these double standards.
As for the allegation that it has “the aim of aggravating political tensions in the US”, NBC News claimed that “The sources declined to share examples of Russian-generated bots on social media to avoid revealing U.S. intelligence-gathering methods”, which is suspicious and can’t be taken seriously. It thus appears as though no evidence exists and this is just a way to kill two birds with one stone: fearmonger about Russian meddling and create the pretext for a larger crackdown if the decision is made.
About that, “The Democrats Are Destroying Themselves By Supporting The Campus Protests For Palestine” for the reasons explained in the preceding hyperlinked analysis, which boil down to factional disputes within the ruling liberal-globalist coalition and counterproductive electoral considerations. The schizophrenic policy of dispersing some protests, not dispersing others, and declining to prosecute those who occupy public property with the same charges as the J6 protesters are proof of double standards.
A survey from earlier this week showed that a whopping 80% of Americans support Israel over Hamas, however, so the Democrats might calculate that it’s time to put an end to the protests. Former Speaker Pelosi already seeded the narrative for doing so late last month just in case the decision was made by claiming that the protests have “a Russian tinge” to them, which prompted Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Zakharova to describe this as “an affront to Americans and an attack on democracy.”
NBC News’ latest report builds upon Pelosi’s allegation by lending it the credence of the US Intelligence Community, albeit without a shred of evidence being shared with the public, which could move the needle in the direction of getting the Democrats as a whole to turn on these protests. Some already have done so out of fear that wealthy Jewish donors to their party and its ideological indoctrination centers (“universities”) will pull their funding if they don’t, but no large-scale crackdown has yet to happen.
Even so, the latest signal being sent is that the Democrats might possibly turn on the pro-Palestinian members of their base – who are numerically small but wield outsized influence due to their activism and could be the key for winning Midwestern swing states – by claiming that they were duped by Russia. In connection with this, they could also add an anti-Chinese dimension to it too by accusing Chinese-owned TikTok of colluding with the Kremlin “with the aim of aggravating political tensions in the US”.
That could kill a third bird with the same stone after the latest Ukraine aid package contained a measure calling for the US to ban TikTok unless ByteDance sells its stake in the next 12 months. This law sparked immense controversy due to concerns about free speech and the impact on the many American entrepreneurs who rely on that platform to make a living. By cooking up a Sino-Russo conspiracy over the campus protests for Palestine and TikTok, however, this impending ban might seem more palatable.
Regardless of whatever happens, it’s important for folks to remember that Russia’s only interest is in exposing US hypocrisy, not in manipulating campus protesters into functioning as regime change proxies. Russia has already suffered from the effects of misguided pro-Palestinian activism orchestrated from abroad in late October and foreign-encouraged hate speech within its society after the Crocus attack so it’s not going to wield them against others lest the Kremlin risks discrediting itself on the home front.
