Morocco and Israel Start Process of Normalizing Relations

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addresses his supporters at party headquarters after elections in Tel Aviv, Israel, Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2019.

This is just hitting Twitter right now. Israeli media are reporting that Israel and Morocco have reached an agreement on allowing direct flights between those two countries.

Coming on the heels of the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain normalizing relations with Israel, this signals that a tectonic shift in Middle East politics is underway…if President Trump is reelected. If not, this will just be another entry in the catalog of what might have been. There is zero doubt that a Biden Administration will go back to the Obama policy of ferociously fellating the mullahs…all of them…because that is what China will require him to do. Likewise, there is no doubt that we will see a return of the Obama policy of punishing and blaming Israel for just about everything. Plus, there is no way that Biden will push this because even the foreign policy establishment will give Trump credit for the breakthrough, not Biden, and he could not handle that. 

https://www.redstate.com/streiff/2020/09/12/morocco-and-israel-start-process-of-normalizing-relations/

Pelosi: Trump Negotiating Peace Between Israel and Arab Countries Is a 'Distraction'

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi really fumbled a question about the latest Trump-negotiated Middle East peace deal on CNN Friday night.

Wolf! Blitzer asked the speaker a simple question: “How much credit do you give the President of the United States for these peace agreements?”

Pelosi should have anticipated the question. In fact, the leftwing TV network probably gave her all the questions ahead of time as a precondition of her appearing there. Pols often have their handlers do this. One as powerful as Pelosi, coming off claiming to be bamboozled by her hairdresser, is even more likely to have been handed the question ahead of time.

Yet it still flummoxed her.

“Well, hopefully they won’t—hopefully they will beneficial [sic] to the region,” Pelosi said. “We’ve been waiting for a very long time for the president’s proposal for an Israeli-Palestinian peace agreement that honored the two state solution. It was coming in two weeks, it was coming in two months, it was coming in six months—it still hasn’t come in any way that has brought peace.”

“So, good for him for having a distraction on a day when the numbers of people who are affected and the numbers of people who are dying from this virus only increases,” Pelosi stated.

Emphasis added. Because it’s amazing.

Democrats claim the whole world hates and disrespects Trump as much as they do. Yet here he is racking up foreign policy wins — Israel and UAE, Kosovo and Serbia, then Israel and Bahrain. He has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for the first two. Will he get a hat trick?

Foreign policy is a major component of a president’s portfolio.

Peace in the Middle East is only a “distraction” if you don’t like peace. Or you’ve become so political that your feelings are more important than finding ways to reduce hostility and keep people from killing each other.

This is where the Democrats are right now.

Maybe the hairdresser really did set up the woman who is third in line to control the nuclear codes…?

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/bryan-preston/2020/09/12/pelosi-trump-negotiating-peace-between-israel-and-arab-countries-is-a-distraction-n923890

U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Had Embassy Staff Monitor Social Media Of Pro-Trump Americans

• 
  

Story after story about actual government corruption and abuses of power, including spying on Americans, leads right back to the BFFs of Obama and Biden. Remember that whole question of impeachment? Do we remember WHY it came up? pr

During the Ukraine hoax, when people outside the government exposing the truth about the Democratic-party created scandal, the U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch and her embassy staff were monitoring the social media of prominent pro-Trump Americans. The list included Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, Rudy Guiliani, Dan Bongino, Sebastian Gorka, John Solomon, Jack Posobiec, Ryan Saavedra, Sara A. Carter, Donald Trump Jr., Michael McFaul, Lou Dobbs, and Pamela Geller.

It was a Democrat CYA that sprang up when people started sniffing around too close to where the bodies were buried. Remember the phone call? Trump dared to ask whether there was any truth to Biden’s boasting about getting a Ukrainian official fired and whether there was anything about it that smacked of corruption.

For one thing, certain corrupt characters in Ukraine figured prominently in the Spygate scandal, even providing another bogus accusatory document — informally known as the ‘black ledger’ — that prompted the investigation forcing Trump’s campaign manager to step down in the middle of his campaign.

There were rumored to be some other sketchy operations hostile to Trump originating there. Add to that, Biden’s boasting about holding Ukraine’s billion-dollar financial aid hostage unless they fire the prosecutor looking into the company Joe’s son just ‘happened’ to be working for, and that could present a significant scandal.

Trump’s hands were tied from looking into this case until the conclusion of the Mueller report — otherwise, Democrats would cry ‘obstruction’ and pounce on Trump to impeach him.

But that didn’t stop citizens from doing democrats from doing some digging of their own.

Officials at the U.S. embassy in Kiev ordered the monitoring of 13 prominent Americans’ social media accounts during the early days of the Ukraine scandal in spring 2019 and later were informed their activities potentially violated the Privacy Act, according to State Department memos made public on Tuesday.

The memos, released under a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by the conservative watchdog Judicial Watch, show those targeted for monitoring included President Trump’s eldest son, Don Jr., the president’s personal lawyer and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, and Fox News personalities Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham and Lou Dobbs. This reporter [John Solomon] was one of the 13 individuals on the list targeted.

The U.S. ambassador at the time, Marie Yovanovitch, and one of her top deputies, former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent, were apprised of the social media monitoring, emails show.

Embassy officials used search terms indicating they were interested in social media posts involving the ambassador, liberal megadonor George Soros, and the controversy around Joe Biden and Burisma Holdings, the Ukrainian gas company engulfed in a corruption controversy that hired the vice president’s son Hunter in 2014. State officials testified during last year’s impeachment proceedings that the Bidens’ role in Ukraine created an uncomfortable appearance of a conflict of interest that undercut U.S. efforts to fight corruption inside Ukraine.

Regular readers of this site may be familiar with Marie Yovanovitch, who’s been accused of blocking Ukraine from providing evidence to A.G. Barr and lying to the Schiff committee. But it didn’t lead to any charges because she testified against President Trump.

The timing of the latest account of the Obama administration spying on American Citizens ‘just happened’ to correspond with the time at which Americans were taking an interest in the Embassy’s activities with Ukrainian prosecutors and the Bidens.

The same day, Yovanovitch received an email updating her on the social media monitoring.

“Thanks Ambassador — I just wanted you to be aware as we are really trying to help them and recognize how hard everyone is working in this especially trying time,” an official whose name was redacted wrote Yovanovitch. “The good news is our social media team back here is now helping to provide them with the reports they want when Kyiv is asleep/offline — through existing PD tools — so this should greatly help.”

…Amanda Milius, a former senior adviser and deputy assistant secretary in the early Trump State Department, told Just the News she was alerted by State Department leadership about the embassy’s social media monitoring early on and was assured the embassy was instructed to stop the activity targeting Americans because it violated federal law.

“Personally I find it hard to believe that senior communication officials at post were not aware of the limitations of the Privacy Act because all communications employees and contractors are very well versed on what they are allowed and not allowed to do in regards to the Privacy Act and the Smith-Mundt law,” Milius said in an interview Tuesday.

The memos show the embassy sought to use a Facebook-related product called CrowdTangle to handle automated social media monitoring. A deck about the product’s capabilities was included in the FOIA release.

…”These new documents confirm Deep State officials at the Ukraine Embassy seemed to set up an enemies list to help illicitly monitor and report on the social media postings of President Trump’s family and lawyer, as well as journalists,” he said. “The State Department hid these smoking gun documents for months.”

Remember folks…

Democrats picked Biden to be their guy AFTER we already knew that accusations of nepotism and corruption surrounding Burisma was an albatross around his neck — and they STILL picked him.

Bringing this story into the harsh light of day is entirely fair game.

Especially if there are already accusations of Biden dancing like a marionette because of foreign favors lining the pockets of his family members during the LAST time occupied the White House.

Solomon’s piece is a good one, and well worth reading in its entirety.

https://lidblog.com/pro-trump-americans/

Media Blackout: Massive Gathering In Germany As RFK Jr. Exposes Bill Gates & Big Pharma

 Children’s Health Defense Director and renowned lawyer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recently spoke to a very large crowd in Berlin, Germany in what was a gathering of of tens of thousands of people who came together to create awareness and protest against what Kennedy referred to as Bill Gates’ “bio-security agenda, the rise of the authoritarian surveillance state and the Big Pharma sponsored coup d’etat against liberal democracy.”

According to Kennedy, and many others around the globe, “the pandemic is a crisis of convenience for the elite who are dictating these policies… Fifty years ago, my uncle John F. Kennedy came to this city.

“He came to this land, because Berlin was the frontline against global totalitarianism. And today again, Berlin is the frontline against global totalitarianism.”

We also published an article written by Kennedy a couple of years ago that also provides more about Gates’ relationship with big pharma.

It’s hard to really know how many people showed up, but judging by the pictures it seems like a lot were in attendance. Mainstream media completely ignored the gathering.

According to Kennedy,

“This was one of 40 sites scattered around Berlin where where some 1.5 million people gathered around separate stages to evade police harassment and peacefully protest the alarming global rise of Medical & Digital Totalitarianism.”

If mainstream media covered a gathering of one thousand, they could make it a big spectacle and make it seem as the “majority” feel a certain way.

When they don’t cover something that threatens their and their partners interests, which in this case is big pharma, they can make it seem like it never happened, no matter how big the gathering is.

Mainstream media can make it seem as if the majority is the minority, and the minority is the majority.

Bill Gates has also recently been dubbed the ‘journalism gatekeeper.’ Not only does he practically own the WHO and Big Pharma, the same goes for mainstream media.

A recent Instagram post made by Kennedy expresses his feelings about the event, and the resistance the gatherings faced:

“Beneath the Siegesäule Monument where I spoke. This was one of 40 sites scattered around Berlin where where some 1.5 million people gathered around separate stages to evade police harassment and peacefully protest the alarming global rise of Medical & Digital Totalitarianism.

“As I said in my speech, the government strategy is to portray the protestors as right wing extremists or “Covid Deniers”(a euphemism, in the official narrative for Holocaust deniers) none of which is true.

“The government issued three proclamations declaring the protest illegal. Our Rapid Response team of lawyers successfully appealed each of these declarations in court.

“The Pharma-controlled main stream media blacked out all coverage the main event altogether-ignoring what were perhaps the largest crowds in German history. No main stream media covered this momentous gathering.

“The only media reports claimed only 38,000 people & showed clips of a staged incident where 100 riot police colluded in a false flag show with some 50 agents provocateurs in Nazi regalia near the Reichtag miles from our protest.

“The obsequious Pharmedia dutifully conflated that phony fascist Kabuki play with our peaceful democratic event to claim we were allied with violent far right extremists 6)World Futbol champion (1990)Thomas Bartholdi and his wife Britta Protest 7)German National Team Basketball Star Joshiko Saibou and Olympic long jump champion Alexandra Westore. 8)Organizer Attorney Marcus Haintz and program moderator Nana from Ghana. KP

Below is a brief clip of him speaking I found on YouTube:

Why This Is Important

The number of activists from all walks of life, from all professions, including thousands of doctors and scientists who have been questioning actions that have been and are being taken by governments around the world for a long time is quite large and continues to grow.

Speaking of Germany, for example, More than 500 German doctors & scientists have signed on as representatives of an organization called the “Corona Extra-Parliamentary Inquiry Committee” to investigate what’s happening on our planet with regards to COVID-19.

They also believe that the measures and actions being taken by governments worldwide represent a draconian totalitarian agenda that’s continuing to play out under the guise of goodwill. These are actions that are completely unnecessary, unscientific and even harmful according to them and many others.

“The medical profession is being bought by the pharmaceutical industry, not only in terms of the practice of medicine, but also in terms of teaching and research. The academic institutions of this country are allowing themselves to be the paid agents of the pharmaceutical industry. I think it’s disgraceful.” – Arnold Seymour Relman (1923-2014), Harvard professor of medicine and former Editor-in-Chief of The New England Medical Journal (source)

A couple of years ago, Kennedy explained the power big pharma has in the United States, let alone the world:

Those of you who have been involved in the past in the battle to protect our children from poorly made vaccines or toxic chemicals in our food or in our water know the power of these industries and how they’ve undermined every institution in our democracy that is supposed to protect little children from powerful, greedy corporations.

Even the pharmaceutical companies have been able to purchase congress. They’re the largest lobbying entity in Washington D.C.. They have more lobbyists in Washington D.C. than there are congressman and senators combined.

They give twice to congress what the next largest lobbying entity is, which is oil and gas… Imagine the power they exercise over both republicans and democrats. They’ve captured them (our regulatory agencies) and turned them into sock puppets. They’ve compromised the press… and they destroy the publications that publish real science. (source)

The question is, why are so many people who share these opinions completely censored? Even when there are thousands of them, when it comes to covid the list of renowned doctors and scientists is quite long.

As authoritarianism spreads, as emergency laws proliferate, as we sacrifice our rights, we also sacrifice our capability to arrest the slide into a less liberal and less free world. Do you truly believe that when the first wave, this second wave, the 16th wave of the coronavirus is a long forgotten memory, that these capabilities will not be kept? – Edward Snowden (source)

I’ve written numerous articles expressing the feelings, opinions, research and data of many explaining why lockdown measures and more for covid seem quite ridiculous.

Here’s one of many that goes into the infection fatality rate, for example, the article linked above with regards to the more than 500 German doctors and scientist is another example. To read more of our coverage throughout this pandemic, you can click here.

The Takeaway

Why is there a digital authoritarian Orwellian “fact-checker” going around the internet that is censoring information that’s clearly not false?

Why are they censoring information that doesn’t fit the narrative of the World Health Organization (WHO)?

Why are the leaked documents from Wikileaks showing the influence that Big Pharma has within the WHO completely ignored?

Why does mainstream media constantly use ridicule, character assassination and words like “conspiracy theory” instead of actually addressing and countering the points being made by so many doctors, scientists and activists? Why can’t we have these discussions openly and transparently?

What is going on here?

Our world is going through a massive shift in consciousness, and the COVID-19 pandemic has and is serving as a catalyst for more and more people to start questioning exactly what is going on here instead of simply believing what they are hearing and seeing on their television screens.

This questioning and critical inquiry results in a perception shift, and the world people once thought was becomes something completely different. Not everything is as we’ve been told and taught, and in order to change things for the better we have to be able to identify and see the problem.

This is exactly the process we are going through, and the more we ‘wake up’ the more effort there is from those who are threatened by our ‘awakening’ to silence and control us.

We are living in exciting times! It’s great to see an event like covid spark such a massive gathering of people who desire a better and more transparent world for all. We saw similar things after 9/11.

https://humansarefree.com/2020/09/media-blackout-massive-gathering-in-germany-as-rfk-jr-exposes-bill-gates-big-pharma.html

Navy Makes Unusual Public Display Of Its Secretive Seawolf Submarine's Presence Off Norway

 

The visible deployment of the advanced submarine is a pointed signal to Russia, which has stepped up its own sub operations in the region.

he U.S. Navy has released a number of pictures of the first-in-class USS Seawolf surfaced in a fjord near Tromsø, Norway last week. The service is typically very tight-lipped about submarine operations, in general, and even more so about its three highly advanced and secretive Seawolf class boats, which are known to be heavily involved in specialized intelligence activities, among other missions. This very rare public appearance in Scandinavia would seem to be intended, at least in part, to send a message to the Russian government about American underwater capabilities in the region.

The Navy first announced that Seawolf had visited Norway and was otherwise operating in that region on Aug. 21, 2020, which was itself an unusual public disclosure. The pictures of the submarine making what was described only as "a brief stop for personnel" appeared online on Aug. 25. It is very uncommon to see official photographs of this submarine, or the others in its class, outside of exercises or its homeport at Naval Base Kitsap in Washington State. Defense journalist Chris Cavas, who follows naval issues closely, noted on Twitter that this also appears to be the first time the Navy has released photos of Seawolf anywhere, in any context in five years.

“USS Seawolf’s deployment from Bangor, Washington, to the U.S. 6th Fleet demonstrates the Submarine Force’s global reach and commitment to provide persistent and clandestine undersea forces worldwide to execute our unique missions with unrivaled readiness," Navy Vice Admiral Daryl Caudle, the service's top submarine officer, said in a statement. “Our undersea warriors are the best in the world in submarine warfare and are equipped with unmatched capabilities designed to enhance our Navy and multiply the Joint Force’s effectiveness in competition and conflict.”

“USS Seawolf’s deployment from Bangor, Washington, to the U.S. 6th Fleet demonstrates the Submarine Force’s global reach and commitment to provide persistent and clandestine undersea forces worldwide to execute our unique missions with unrivaled readiness," Navy Vice Admiral Daryl Caudle, the service's top submarine officer, said in a statement. “Our undersea warriors are the best in the world in submarine warfare and are equipped with unmatched capabilities designed to enhance our Navy and multiply the Joint Force’s effectiveness in competition and conflict.”

“The arrival of Seawolf compliments our already robust undersea warfare capabilities and demonstrates our continued commitment to providing maritime security and deterrence throughout the region,” Navy Rear Admiral Anthony Carullo, head of Submarine Group Eight, added. Carullo is also the commander of Task Force 69, U.S. 6th Fleet's standing undersea warfare task force, to which Seawolf is presently assigned. U.S. 6th Fleet is responsible for overseeing all Navy activities in and around Europe and Africa.

https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/35997/navy-makes-unusual-public-display-of-its-secretive-seawolf-submarines-presence-off-norway

Cheeky! Over 100 Nudists Test Positive For Chinese Coronavirus at ‘Naturist’ Resort in France

Over 100 nudists have tested positive for the Chinese coronavirus after brazenly flouting social distancing and mask requirements at a famous ‘naturist’ resort on the French Mediterranean.

According to the regional health authority, the Cap d’Agde resort in the Hérault department near Montpellier recorded 38 positive tests on Monday of last week and another 57 on Wednesday. 

A further 50 holidaymakers tested positive for the Wuhan virus after returning home from their nudist holiday, according to France 24.

The tests reportedly showed that infection rates among those who attended the nudist resort were around 30 per cent, compared to just 7 per cent of those tested in the surrounding areas.

Pierre Ricordeau, the director-general of the local health authority blamed the inability of the nudists to properly social distance for the “very worrying” outbreak.

“There are infections everywhere, including among people who are not libertines. The message is the same for everyone: wear a mask, wash your hands and practise social distancing, whether you are a libertine or not”, Ricordeau said.

The Cap d’Agde is one of Frances oldest and largest ‘naturist’ resorts, with an estimated 35,000 visitors every summer.

Following the outbreak, the government banned the gathering of more than ten people in the region and called on nudists who were planning to revel by the French sea to postpone their vacation plans.

“We are in an alarming situation, therefore we ask that all the people of the village be tested before leaving the place and going elsewhere,” a spokesman for the Hérault Prefecture said per The Sun.

“And we also ask all the people who wish to come to this naturist village to postpone their arrival,” the spokesperson added.

The local outbreak in Hérault comes as France reported nearly 5,000 coronavirus cases in one day, the largest spike since lockdown measures were introduced by President Macron in May.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/08/24/france-over-100-nudists-test-positive-for-chinese-coronavirus-at-naturist-resort/

Major Exchange Of Fire Between US & Syrian Armies Results In Casualties

Trump's "secure the oil" policy in Syria is set to get increasingly costly as tensions rise and more such confrontations inevitably occur: on Monday US occupying forces and the Syrian Army exchanged fire in a rare direct clash, reportedly ending in casualties on the Syrian government side.

It happened in northeast Hasakah province just southeast of Qamishili, in an area where for the past couple years American special forces have bolstered Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). The Associated Press writes of the rare but not without precedent deadly encounter:

U.S. forces clashed with Syrian troops in the northeast on Monday, killing at least one soldier and wounding two others, state media said, while the U.S. military said it responded to small arms fire near a Syrian checkpoint.

American patrol in Syria

It appears to have all started when a US military convoy approached a Syrian national checkpoint manned by soldiers. 

Like with some prior confrontations, the Syrian soldiers refused to let the Americans through, given Damascus sees them as illegal occupiers of their sovereign soil. This was similar to incident last month where bloodshed was barely avoided, and US armored vehicles were forced to turn around.

In that prior instance pro-government forces threatened to fire on the Americans.

RT Arabic was the first to publish video from the confrontation on Monday. Gunfire can be heard erupting, with spoke billowing from the government checkpoint:

But in this instance, it appears firepower was unleashed. A US helicopter was also reportedly part of the response, according to state-run SANA. AP continues:

State news agency SANA quoted an unnamed Syrian military official as saying a U.S. helicopter gunship attacked an army checkpoint in the village of Tal Dahab, near the town of Qamishli, at around 9:45 a.m. (0645 GMT). The official said a Syrian soldier was killed and two others were wounded.

The US ground convoy had been ordered by Syrian Army forces to turn around at "Rasho Checkpoint," regional reports say.

There were initial reports that a major airstrike may have been conducted, but official Pentagon statements have denied this.

While some pro-Syrian government sources say the Americans took on casualties during the clash, no official casualties have been reported by the US military.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/rare-exchange-fire-between-us-syrian-armies-results-casualties

Steele Source Had Meeting In Russia At Crucial Point In Dossier Saga

 

• Igor Danchenko, the primary source for Christopher Steele’s dossier, met in June 2016 with an official in the Russian ministry of energy and a journalist who is speculated to be a sub-source for the dossier. 
• Danchenko’s activities in 2016 have come under intense scrutiny since he was identified as Steele’s source last month. His meetings and travels could shed light on how he obtained information that he later passed to Steele. 
• Sergey Abyshev, who served as a deputy director in the Russian ministry of energy, confirmed meeting with Danchenko in Russia days before the first memo of the dossier was written. 

In June 2016, a month that is key to the origin story of the Steele dossier, the primary source for that salacious document met with an official in the Russian ministry of energy and a journalist friend in Russia, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.

Igor Danchenko, a Russia analyst who worked for Christopher Steele, met with Sergey Abyshev, who was then a deputy director in the energy ministry, and Ivan Vorontsov, the editor-in-chief of a Russian finance website, according to a Facebook post by Vorontsov and confirmation from Abyshev.

It is not entirely clear what relevance the rendezvous might have to the dossier, but it helps fill in the timeline of Danchenko’s interactions and movements at a critical stage in the development of the provocative report.

At the time of the meeting, Danchenko was well at work for Steele collecting information about Donald Trump’s possible ties to Russia.

Danchenko, a Russian national who lives in Washington, D.C., told the FBI in January 2017 that Steele, a former MI6 officer, tasked him in June 2016 to dig up dirt on Trump. Steele was hired in May 2016 by Fusion GPS, an opposition research firm working for the Clinton campaign and DNC.

Vorontsov posted a photo on June 16, 2016 from the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), an annual business conclave, saying he had met the prior evening with Danchenko and Abyshev.

“The night before was so nice with Sergey Abyshev and Igor Danchenko,” Vorontsov wrote.Four days later, on June 20, 2016, Steele penned the first of 17 memos that make up what is colloquially known as the dossier. Steele has said that most of the information was collected by a single source who worked as an independent contractor for his firm, Orbis Business Intelligence. (RELATED: FBI Memo Raises Red Flags About Sources Behind The Steele Dossier)

Danchenko was identified as the contractor last month by an anonymous Twitter user after the Senate Judiciary Committee released a memo of his interviews with the FBI from Jan. 24-26, 2017.

The first Steele memo contains the dossier’s most eye-catching allegation: that the Kremlin was blackmailing Donald Trump with video of him watching prostitutes urinate on each other in a room at the Moscow Ritz Carlton in 2013.

Danchenko told the FBI that the information came from two sources who are referred to as Source 1 and Source 2 in the FBI memo of the interviews.

It is unclear if Danchenko passed any information from either Vorontsov or Abyshev to Steele, though a group of Twitter sleuths who helped identify Danchenko as Steele’s source have pointed to clues about Vorontsov that match up with descriptions about Source 2.

The DCNF reached both Vorontsov and Abyshev for comment about their interactions with Danchenko and about the dossier.

Abyshev confirmed meeting with Danchenko and Vorontsov after being shown the photo Vorontsov posted on Facebook, though he said that the encounter occurred in Moscow rather than St. Petersburg.

He described the encounter as “an almost accidental meeting in the center of Moscow with three ‘cheerful’ guys.”

“As a result, I had to listen to a lecture on investment opportunities for about 20 minutes,” he said in a message translated from Russian.

The FBI memo describes many of Danchenko’s meetings, but locations and participants are all redacted.

Vorontsov told the DCNF when asked about Danchenko, Abyshev, and the dossier that he was “ready to talk.”

He called Danchenko a “good man” with whom he has a long relationship. Vorontsov later decided against discussing Danchenko, saying that he did not feel comfortable talking about his friend without his consent.

Vorontsov and Danchenko appear to have a close friendship stretching back several years. Vorontsov has posted photos of Danchenko dating as far back as 2014 and as recently as November 2019.

Vorontsov, the editor-in-chief of BANKIFIN, also referred to Danchenko in a post on Nov. 26, 2018 as a “special correspondent” for his media outlet at the 4th annual Russian-British Business Forum, which was held in London.

Danchenko displayed a badge that said he was with Sidar Global Ventures, a Washington, D.C. firm where he worked as a Eurasia analyst.

Cenk Sidar, the president of Sidar Global, said he knows nothing about the dossier, and has never met Danchenko.

“Igor worked for Sidar Global as a political risk and commercial due diligence analyst. He did periodic Russia political reports for my Wall Street and corporate clients, and did a good job,” Sidar told the DCNF.

“I don’t know him personally or don’t have anything to say about his work quality as there were other people who managed him but in general, he is a smart guy and knows well about Russia.”

But Sidar said that Danchenko did not attend the forum in London on behalf of Sidar Global.

“I have no idea about that conference and we did not send him to this event,” he said when shown a photo of Danchenko’s badge.

Carter Page, former foreign policy adviser for the Trump campaign, speaks to the media after testifying before the House Intelligence Committee on November 2, 2017 in Washington, DC.

Danchneko told the FBI about his work for Steele and his sub-sources for the dossier during his interviews. He undercut several aspects of the dossier, telling investigators that he provided Steele with unverified rumors he picked up from friends.

There is no indication of wrongdoing on Danchenko’s part. He agreed to meet with the FBI in exchange for immunity, according to the FBI memo of his interviews. A Justice Department inspector general report released on Dec. 9 said that the FBI described Danchenko as “truthful and cooperative” in applications for surveillance warrants against Carter Page, a former Trump campaign aide.

The IG report did raise the prospect that Danchenko was not entirely forthcoming with investigators. According to the report, the FBI intelligence analyst who took part in the Danchenko interview believed Danchenko might have been “minimizing” his contacts with some of his sub-sources.

A source close to Danchenko told the DCNF that he stands by the information he presented to Steele, but has no comment on how Steele wrote it in the dossier. Steele provided the dossier to the FBI and briefed numerous reporters about it in 2016.

The FBI relied heavily on Steele’s information to obtain warrants to surveil Carter Page.

The revelation last month that Danchenko was Steele’s source has drawn even more scrutiny to the dossier.

That’s because the narrative initially spun by Democrats and Steele-friendly journalists was that the retired spy used a deep network of Russian sources with insight into the Kremlin’s links to Trumpworld and its interference in the U.S. election. Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, cited Steele’s use of Russian sources during a March 20, 2017 hearing in which he touted the allegations in the dossier.

But according to what Danchenko told the FBI, he appears to be far removed from Kremlin power centers. He told investigators that he derived most of his information from friends he had in Russia who he believed had some loose affiliations with Russian government officials.

Danchenko, who worked for the Brookings Institution years before partnering with Steele, told the FBI of six people he said were sources for the information he gave Steele, according to the FBI memo.

One of the purported sources has been identified as Sergei Millian, a Belarusian-American businessman long reported to be a major but unwitting source for the dossier. ABC News and The Wall Street Journal reported on Jan. 24, 2017, the same day that Danchenko met with the FBI, that Millian was a key source for the dossier.

Danchenko undercut the claim that Millian played a prominent role in the dossier in the FBI interview, according to the memo. He told the FBI that he believes he may have talked to Millian by phone once in late July 2016, but that the person on the other end of the line did not identify himself.

His statements conflict with reports that popped up after the dossier was published in January 2017 that said that Millian was the source for the story about Trump with prostitutes in Moscow. (RELATED: A Dossier Source Of Mystery)

Millian, who is referred to as Source 6 in the FBI’s Danchenko interview memo, attended the SPIEF event that Danchenko may also have attended. He posted photos on his Facebook account speaking with Oleg Deripaska, a Russian oligarch who once hired Steele, and Alexander Novak, Russia’s minister of energy.

Danchenko told the FBI that Source 2, who he said was a friend, provided the information to him about the alleged Trump sex tape.

According to Danchenko, the source told him in June 2016 that there was a “well known story” about Trump’s activities at the Ritz Carlton in Moscow. The source said that people knew about the allegation but that “it only becomes fact if people come forward.”

Danchenko told the FBI he investigated the allegation himself, but was unable to verify it after speaking with staff at the Ritz Carlton.

Trump has vehemently denied the so-called “pee tape” allegation. People with him on his trip to Moscow have said Trump spent only a few hours in his hotel room, making it unlikely he would have had the time to take part in a sex romp.

Danchenko also said he met with another source, Source 1, in June 2016 at a cafe in an unidentified location and discussed the purported Trump blackmail.

According to the FBI memo, the source passed along information from a conversation he had with a former Russian intelligence official. Danchenko said that the former spy said the Kremlin had “embarrassing stuff — sexual/pornographic material” on many people, including Trump.

The former Russian spy is not identified in the FBI memo, but Steele indicated in a meeting with State Department officials in October 2016 that Vyacheslav Trubnikov, the former chief of Russia’s FSB, was somehow a source for the dossier.

The Justice Department’s inspector general, which released a scathing report of the FBI’s handling of the dossier, raised the prospect that the Trump sex tape story could have been the product of Russian disinformation.

According to the report, a U.S. intelligence community report dated Feb. 27, 2017 said that a person with possible ties to Trump and Russia claimed that the sex tape allegation was planted by Russian intelligence operatives. The IG report said that allegations in the dossier regarding former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen — which Danchenko said came from a source called Source 3 — may have been Russian disinformation.

Adding more potential significance to Danchenko’s relationship with Vorontsov is speculation that he is Source 2 described in the FBI memo.

Danchenko told the FBI that Source 2 was a collector of some sort, and that he gave the source Scottish currency that he took out of an ATM. Vorontsov’s Facebook account shows that he is an avid collector of foreign currency. In several posts he thanked Danchenko for gifting him paper money and coins.

“I thought Danchenko brought me my salary!” Vorontsov wrote in a March 13, 2015 post. He thanked Danchenko in a post on June 21, 2017 for a bill issued by the United Cigar Stores of America. He referred to Danchenko as Santa Claus in a post on Nov. 9, 2014 thanking him for a coin set from the U.K. Vorontsov thanked Danchenko “for remembering and caring for us” in another post with a five-pound bank note.

Danchenko has not responded to repeated phone calls and messages seeking comment. The DCNF reached his attorney, Mark E. Schamel, with questions about Vorontsov, Abyshev and the dossier, but he was unable to provide comment on the record.

Abyshev, who left the Russian ministry of energy in August 2016, is the highest ranking Russian official identified to date who Danchenko is known to have met.

Abyshev has served in various local and federal government positions, according to his LinkedIn profile. Before joining the ministry of energy in 2011, Abyshev worked for Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service. He served as vice mayor and head of the city duma for Nizhny Novgorod in the early 2000s.

Radio Free Europe, the news outlet, reported in October 2002 that Abyshev was impeached as speaker of the Duma on allegations of embezzlement and improper actions related to budget issues.

Abyshev confirmed to The Daily Caller News Foundation through Facebook chat that he met with Danchenko and Voronovich, though he suggested that they met in Moscow a day before SPIEF.

Whether Danchenko used any information from Abyshev in the dossier is unclear. Danchenko indicated that some of his sources were unaware that he was working for Steele on an investigation of Trump’s possible contacts with Russia. He also said that his sources provided rumor and speculation over drinks about Trump and Kremlin activities, and that it was unverified information.

Abyshev did not answer a follow-up question about whether he might have been a dossier source, either witting or unwitting. But he did volunteer some information that matches up with details about Danchenko in the FBI memo.

Abyshev told the DCNF that he recalls that Danchenko worked as a translator for a Russian delegation who visited the Library of Congress in 2002.

“Igor was a translator for the Open World program at the Library of Congress in 2002 for the organizers,” Abyshev said.

According to the FBI memo, Danchenko said that he was a “facilitator” for an event held at the Library of Congress. Details of the event are heavily redacted, as are many other pieces of information in the FBI document.

“I don’t remember the details, a lot of time has passed, I don’t even remember the place, but I remember about the congress, because it is not easy for the citizens of the country to get to it,” Abyshev said.

Abyshev said he has not seen Voronovich since their 2016 rendezvous. He did not say whether he has met with Danchenko, saying that “Igor also never came to Moscow, in any case, I don’t know about it.”

Voronovich did not address questions about whether he provided Danchenko with information found in the dossier. He shut down access to his Facebook account during the reporting for this story.

https://dailycaller.com/2020/08/07/igor-danchenko-steele-dossier-russia/