Oh look, the fearless White Helmets are in the news once again. Ironically, this time the internationally-acclaimed rescuers were the ones who needed rescuing ~ Israel evacuates 400-plus White Helmets to Jordan for resettlement in UK, Canada and Germany.
 
Although it doesn’t receive much reportage these days, Syria’s civil war still goes on – with the Assad regime clearly having the upper hand in the conflict. According to this account at The Stream, nearly 300,000 civilians have been displaced in the government’s most recent offensive which began in June. Opposition forces (primarily the Al-Qaeda terrorist network) have been steadily losing ground in southwest Syria, and apparently were pushed up against the border near the Golan Heights. The White Helmets, typically embedded with these groups, were trapped along with the rebels.
 
 

As the UK Telegraph reported ~

The group of more than 400 (White Helmets), including women and children, was evacuated from Syria into Israel late Saturday night under cover of darkness, in an unprecedented operation few knew about until after its successful completion […]
 
The last-minute rescue of the famed first responders, officially known as the Syrian Civil Defence, came as a result of discreet high-level negotiations between the US, UK, and allies, spurred by fear for their immediate safety working in opposition areas under heavy regime bombardment […]
 
With opposition-held territory dwindling by the day, the group had gathered in the shadow of Israel’s border fence, where hundreds of thousands of displaced Syrians have sought safety from airstrikes.
 
 
The Israeli military, which facilitated the group’s passage from the border area outside the Golan Heights into Israel, called the transfer of the group “an exceptional humanitarian effort.”

The evacuees are being assisted by the UN and Jordan has agreed to hold them for several weeks until they’re relocated in — (of course western countries! Why is that??) Britain, Germany and Canada.
 
Discussing the proposed rescue plan last week, The Times of Israel was curious about the unusual request for extraction in this particular case ~

In other parts of Syria, where government control has been restored, civil defense volunteers have almost always evacuated to other opposition-controlled areas. It is not clear why this time they will be evacuated out of the country.

Hmmm… But it is awfully suspicious. If this group was truly as non-partisan as they want us to believe – say the Syrian version of the International Red Cross – would they be in such desperate need of rescuing?
 
Although the Syrian Civil Defense has managed to convince many in the west that they’re some wonderful humanitarian organization, that benevolent image is seriously tarnished by the fact that they operate exclusively in terrorist-held areas of Syria. And suddenly, now that those areas are shrinking, they’re running for cover in the the infidel countries. Curious, no?
 
The fact is, as I’ve pointed out before, HERE, HERE and HERE, rescue is just a sideline for the White Helmets. They no doubt have saved lives, but their primary function has been agit-prop; stirring up sentiments against the evil Assad.
 
To get anywhere near the truth about these dudes – or at least beyond the established narrative – you have to drill down 20 pages or so in any search engine, but the facts are out there. There are more than enough conflicting stories available on the group to raise numerous red flags.
 
The White Helmets, a 3,000 member NGO, was established in “late 2012 – early 2013” after a group of 20 Syrians were trained and organized by former British army officer James Le Mesurier. The problem is, these humanitarians seem to have divided loyalties. I don’t know how credible Clarity of Signal may be on other issues, but they have tons of photos/links adding credence to the theory that Syrian Civil Defense are really just terrorists in disguise. Many have been exposed by their own facebook posts ~ Massive White Helmets Photo Cache Proves Hollywood Gave Oscar to Terrorist Group.
 
 
Vanessa Beeley, an independent researcher, writer and photographer, has been reporting on these fraudsters for years. She seems to blame the west for the Islamic chaos in the Middle East (religion-of-peace and all that), so I find many of her opinions controversial, but this rings true, and is quite troubling ~

In fact, the White Helmets are a fiercely partisan organization of relatively well-paid employees, set up by British and US intelligence services inside of Turkey (a belligerent in the war against Syria) in 2013. A Madison Avenue public relations firm was contracted to develop the concept of the White Helmets as a humanitarian agency for public consumption in the West – to provide a ‘suger-coating’ to an ugly and illegal imperial war. John Lemesurier, a former British military intelligence officer and later “military contractor”, was hired to front the organization, which has been funded to the tune of about 150 million dollars by the governments of the USA, UK, France, Holland, Denmark, Japan, New Zealand, and Canada, among others […]
 
(T)he White Helmets’ true role as an auxiliary to terrorism was captured on film on several occasions when they participated in Al-Qaeda summary executions and by Facebook postings by numerous White Helmets on their personal accounts showing themselves moonlighting as armed Al-Qaeda fighters and heaping praise on Al-Qaeda leaders. Contrarily, civilians inside the enclaves in Syrian cities liberated from Al-Qaeda and ISIS told many western reporters that the White Helmets provided no medical help or assistance to them, but rather only to the armed terrorists. Moreover, real Syrian Civil Defence workers testified that many of their comrades were killed by Al-Qaeda fighters and their equipment and vehicles given to the White Helmets.

It appears that the Trump Administration may actually be on to these guys. Back in May, the president cut off funding for Syria’s “White Helmets” ~

The Trump State Department has frozen funding to the controversial Syrian aid group known as the White Hemlets, a non-governmental organization (NGO) which provided the sole evidence that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad reportedly used chemical weapons on his own people in an April 7 attack on the city of Douma, according to CBS News […]
 
The US has provided at least $32 million to the group – around 1/3 of their total funding – through a USAID scheme orchestrated by the Obama State Department and funneled to the White Helmets using a Washington D.C. contractor participating in USAID’s Syria regional program, Chemonics […]
 
Perhaps fueled by troubling reports that the White Helmets have been accused of staging incidents, the Trump administration has now frozen funding to the group, and has placed support under “active review.”

 
On the other hand, weeks after the freeze, it seems that the release of several million in aid was authorized (What’s up Donald? Conflicting advice?) ~

President Donald Trump has authorized the release of approximately $6.6 million for the White Helmets, a Syrian civil defense organization, and the International, Impartial and Independent Mechanism, a U.N. agency that is investigating war crimes committed during the Syrian conflict, according to a statement. That accounts for a fraction of some $200 million in frozen funds for Syria stabilization programs — a move that leaves nearly $195 million in limbo.

 
I guess at least we can be grateful that the U.S. hasn’t agreed to accept any of these terrorist sympathizers…
The sooner we get completely out of the Syrian mess the better.

 
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Related:
Damascus condemns White Helmet evacuation as ‘criminal operation’ ~ A bit of hyperbole from the Assad regime
 
The Fraud of The White Helmets ~

(T)he White Helmets only operate in rebel held territory, which enables them to shape the narrative both regarding who they are and what is occurring on the ground. Because of increasing awareness of the back story, there is now a growing movement to petition the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to revoke the Oscar based on the complete and deliberate misrepresentation of what the White Helmets are all about.
 
Exploiting their access to the western media, the White Helmets have de facto become a major source of “eyewitness” news regarding what has been going on in those many parts of Syria where European and American journalists are quite rightly afraid to go. It is all part of a broader largely successful “rebel” effort to manufacture fake news that depicts the Damascus government as engaging in war crimes directed against civilians.

 
Clooney and the “White Helmets,” Dupe or Dope? ~ A typical well-intentioned but clueless Hollywood celebrity, George Clooney was involved on some level with the phony docudrama ~

Always in areas controlled by “moderate opposition” or, quite frankly outright terrorists like ISIS and the group formerly named Jabat al Nusra, this organization has been lauded as the savior of the Syrian people from the beastly depredations of the “regime” and its “brutal dictator,” Assad.
 
The truth is something a bit different, a truth it would have taken Clooney only a few moments on the internet to discover, that or the most minimal research, which he either did or didn’t do. If he didn’t do the research, he is a dupe, meaning he has been fooled into supporting a terrorist group against a legitimate democratically elected government for purposes of protecting and supporting paid mercenary murders.