Tulsi: Trump: Stop hiding Saudi role in 911 and protecting Al Qaeda

Has Blumenthal been to Syria?


Vanessa and friend.  He wears a suit.  That must make him more decent than those bearded Jihadi guys.


Vanessa Beeley (fourth from right) with President Assad in 2016. She described it as her proudest moment.
Vanessa Beeley (fourth from right) with President Assad in 2016. She described it as her proudest moment.


paulsurovell said:


nohero said:

paulsurovell said:
Perhaps you're suggesting a parallel (hypothetical) dissension within the White Helmets over the organization's cooperation with Al-Qaeda?
 Give it up.  Your continued efforts to tie the White Helmets to AQ ("cooperation", etc.) aren't going anywhere.
Not necessary to "tie" them, it's self-evident. You seem to have an oddly benign view of how Al-Qaeda controls its territories.

 I disagree.  To the contrary, it is you who has an odd need to malign the White Helmets.  I think you've adopted a (literally) "shoot the messenger" attitude towards them, since they testify to Assad's atrocities.  But don't rely on my non-expert view.  I'll outsource the rest of this response to this article from Haaretz about Assad's western apologists and their smearing of the White Helmets [in which I've highlighted some statements] -

The White Helmets are a Syrian volunteer rescue organization part-funded by Western governments to provide civil defense services in opposition-held areas of Syria, from where the Assad regime’s own rescue services have been withdrawn or expelled during the course of the civil war. Without the organization, there would be no ambulances, no firefighters, no paramedics.

White Helmets volunteers, along with their medical colleagues in NGOs like SAMS and MSF have lost more than most in the violence of Syria’s civil war. Their clinics, ambulances and depots are routinely targeted by both the regime and its key supporter, the Russian air force, often using double-tap strikes calculated to murder first responders.

It is no exaggeration to say they are victims of a systematic extermination campaign intended to punish Syria’s civilian population into submission, by taking out those delivering the most critical humanitarian assistance.

These men and women could have chosen another path. Many could have chosen to flee Syria anytime over the last seven years; many could have chosen to try their luck in pro-regime areas; many could have chosen to arm themselves to fight the regime that is trying to exterminate them. 

Much has been written about the sophisticated state-sponsored disinformation campaign targeting the White Helmets. In this twisted world, the very act of repeatedly dismissing fabricated conspiracy theories about the group is exploited by their pro-Assad vendors, to legitimize those conspiracy theories.

The White Helmets only operates in rebel-held areas, some of which are held by or inhabited by extremist organizations such as alQaeda. Some are held by or include moderate anti-regime rebel groups that are actively at war with al-Qaeda. That geographic proximity is a key "gotcha" point for the conspiracists.

But the real reason both the Assad regime and the Russian government want these men and women dead and their good name contaminated is not because they work in areas that are also occupied by al-Qaeda.

It is because White Helmets volunteers have the temerity to film the atrocities to which they respond. By documenting barrel bombs and chemical weapons attacks, they have provided incontrovertible evidence that Russia and the regime are responsible for war crimes.

For that, the price is death. For that, the Russian government has deployed charlatans like alt-left blogger Max Blumenthal to spread Islamophobic smears about the group in order to shift public opinion towards tolerating or accepting military attacks on them.

And if more proof was even needed to dispel the al-Qaeda trope: Just this week, Syria's former al-Qaeda branch kidnapped another White Helmets volunteer. Hayat Tahrir a-Sham (formerly al-Qaeda) arrested Karam Saad al-Haj, a White Helmets photographer in Idlib; Karam is certainly not the first White Helmets volunteer to be kidnapped by the group. Far from being in league with them, Syria's Civil Defense volunteers are also victims of Islamist terrorists.

I think that excerpt dismantles Mr. Surovell's arguments here, and does so in expert fashion.  I recommend the whole article.


Excellent article.  




sbenois said:
Excellent article.

 I was fishing for an "ouch", to be honest.


Yet another person who finds Syria on the ground contradicts the mainstream media, including about the White Helmets.



please no more Jimmy Dore - lol


jamie said:
please no more Jimmy Dore - lol

 This is a great interview and actually, I want to post more because that video (discusses WHs) is Part Two and here is part One (debunks Douma Gas Attacks):



Does Dore work for RT?


nan said:
Yet another person who finds Syria on the ground contradicts the mainstream media, including about the White Helmets.



A decent fact check


 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wikitribune.com/article/69708/%3famp=1


nohero said:


sbenois said:
Excellent article.
 I was fishing for an "ouch", to be honest.

 I was tempted to write KA-BOOM but decided to keep that in my saddle bag.


dave23 said:
One need not demonize Saddam to recognize that he was a demon. That doesn't mean one supported the invasion of Iraq. Those two things can exist simultaneously. The same rule applies to Assad.

 This. If Paul and Nan were to say something along the lines of "The Assad regime is guilty of terrible atrocities, but US involvement will only make things worse," they'd likely get fair number of folks here agreeing with them, and an interesting debate on what the the proper involvement of the US should be from the rest.

Instead, for reasons I don't really understand, they've decided it's necessary to go full-on Assad apologists.


jamie said:


nan said:
Yet another person who finds Syria on the ground contradicts the mainstream media, including about the White Helmets.


A decent fact check


 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wikitribune.com/article/69708/%3famp=1

 This fact check actually makes her case stronger.  They don't rate any of her claims "pants of fire" and the ones they disagree on use questionable sources, such as Newsweek, Snopes, or "anonymous sources."


PVW said:


dave23 said:
One need not demonize Saddam to recognize that he was a demon. That doesn't mean one supported the invasion of Iraq. Those two things can exist simultaneously. The same rule applies to Assad.
 This. If Paul and Nan were to say something along the lines of "The Assad regime is guilty of terrible atrocities, but US involvement will only make things worse," they'd likely get fair number of folks here agreeing with them, and an interesting debate on what the the proper involvement of the US should be from the rest.
Instead, for reasons I don't really understand, they've decided it's necessary to go full-on Assad apologists.

 Please show where we have been "full-on Assad apologists"   If you mean that Syria is a secular state, with women in government, that is a better alternative to ending up like Libya with open slave markets than I guess I am guilty as charged. The people of Syria much prefer Assad to the non-secular dictator that the would surely replace him  I am not a fan of the CIA selling arms to terrorists for the purpose of regime change and then filling the MSM with propaganda to get the American public to support even more money ($200 million is  a LOT of money--we could really use that here, dontcha think?) for the military.  I am not pro-Assad as much as I am anti-war and non-interventionist and sick of financial institutions, oil companies and weapons manufactures looking to profit on the misery of the powerless (including us).    


The previous post has been brought to you from the comfort of a NJ living room, where the author does not worry about being gassed or murdered because of her ethnicity.


 




nan said:

($200 million is  a LOT of money--we could really use that here, dontcha think?)

Only one thing in that Wikitribune fact check was rated “mainly false.” (There was also a “mostly false” and a couple of “likely” falses.)

With uncanny precision, you cited it.


DaveSchmidt said:


nan said:

($200 million is  a LOT of money--we could really use that here, dontcha think?)
Only one thing in that Wikitribune fact check was rated “mainly false.” (There was also a “mostly false” and a couple of “likely” falses.)
With uncanny precision, you cited it.

 It was rated mainly false because of disputes about how the money was allocated, but no one was disputing that the US spent $200 million on whatever it is doing in Syria. 


sbenois said:
The previous post has been brought to you from the comfort of a NJ living room, where the author does not worry about being gassed or murdered because of her ethnicity.


 




That's disputable on the face of it, but also one of those bad arguments that I can never remember the name of.  According to your logic, my surroundings allow me to not believe propaganda.  You live in an even more comfortable living room than I do and you believe the propaganda.  So, how does A cause B when C is just made up crap that one of us believes in and the other knows is crap?


If "Undetermined" is a "win" in your book - then congratulations!


PVW said:


dave23 said:
One need not demonize Saddam to recognize that he was a demon. That doesn't mean one supported the invasion of Iraq. Those two things can exist simultaneously. The same rule applies to Assad.
 This. If Paul and Nan were to say something along the lines of "The Assad regime is guilty of terrible atrocities, but US involvement will only make things worse," they'd likely get fair number of folks here agreeing with them, and an interesting debate on what the the proper involvement of the US should be from the rest.
Instead, for reasons I don't really understand, they've decided it's necessary to go full-on Assad apologists.

Please show me where I've done that.


jamie said:
If "Undetermined" is a "win" in your book - then congratulations!

 Well let's have a look:

Claim: White Helmets repurposed a middle school in Aleppo as a base.
Fact check: Undetermined. Experts who spoke with WikiTribune have no knowledge of such a base. WikiTribune has reached out to the White Helmets organization for comment. Also reached out to director Orlando von Einsiedel. Include your questions for these sources in TALK. 

In the film she shows a school that is filled with terrorist markings and materials.  WikiTribune (owned by Jimmy Wales so that's why they are trying to find fault with her in the first place) calls this  "Undetermined" because unamed "Experts" don't know.  

They also reached out to the White Helmets themselves,  as if the WHs are going to answer the phone and say, "Yup, we are terrorists.  Good guess!," and the director of the propaganda film that won an Oscar, is going to say, "Ooops, hope they don't make me give back my award now that the whole thing is shown to be a fake."  But we don't know what they said because because WikiTriubne does not say.  


nan said:

 It was rated mainly false because of disputes about how the money was allocated, but no one was disputing that the US spent $200 million on whatever it is doing in Syria. 

It was rated mainly false because the $200 million in aid for recovery efforts in Syria was frozen. Whether you believe them is in serious doubt, but reports in March from The Times, The Journal, Reuters, USA Today, PBS, ABC, CBS, et al., all dispute that the U.S. spent that $200 million in Syria.


nohero said:


paulsurovell said:

nohero said:

paulsurovell said:
Perhaps you're suggesting a parallel (hypothetical) dissension within the White Helmets over the organization's cooperation with Al-Qaeda?
 Give it up.  Your continued efforts to tie the White Helmets to AQ ("cooperation", etc.) aren't going anywhere.
Not necessary to "tie" them, it's self-evident. You seem to have an oddly benign view of how Al-Qaeda controls its territories.
 I disagree.  To the contrary, it is you who has an odd need to malign the White Helmets.  I think you've adopted a (literally) "shoot the messenger" attitude towards them, since they testify to Assad's atrocities.  But don't rely on my non-expert view.  I'll outsource the rest of this response to this article from Haaretz about Assad's western apologists and their smearing of the White Helmets [in which I've highlighted some statements] -


The White Helmets are a Syrian volunteer rescue organization part-funded by Western governments to provide civil defense services in opposition-held areas of Syria, from where the Assad regime’s own rescue services have been withdrawn or expelled during the course of the civil war. Without the organization, there would be no ambulances, no firefighters, no paramedics.

White Helmets volunteers, along with their medical colleagues in NGOs like SAMS and MSF have lost more than most in the violence of Syria’s civil war. Their clinics, ambulances and depots are routinely targeted by both the regime and its key supporter, the Russian air force, often using double-tap strikes calculated to murder first responders.

It is no exaggeration to say they are victims of a systematic extermination campaign intended to punish Syria’s civilian population into submission, by taking out those delivering the most critical humanitarian assistance.

These men and women could have chosen another path. Many could have chosen to flee Syria anytime over the last seven years; many could have chosen to try their luck in pro-regime areas; many could have chosen to arm themselves to fight the regime that is trying to exterminate them. 

Much has been written about the sophisticated state-sponsored disinformation campaign targeting the White Helmets. In this twisted world, the very act of repeatedly dismissing fabricated conspiracy theories about the group is exploited by their pro-Assad vendors, to legitimize those conspiracy theories.

The White Helmets only operates in rebel-held areas, some of which are held by or inhabited by extremist organizations such as alQaeda. Some are held by or include moderate anti-regime rebel groups that are actively at war with al-Qaeda. That geographic proximity is a key "gotcha" point for the conspiracists.

But the real reason both the Assad regime and the Russian government want these men and women dead and their good name contaminated is not because they work in areas that are also occupied by al-Qaeda.

It is because White Helmets volunteers have the temerity to film the atrocities to which they respond. By documenting barrel bombs and chemical weapons attacks, they have provided incontrovertible evidence that Russia and the regime are responsible for war crimes.

For that, the price is death. For that, the Russian government has deployed charlatans like alt-left blogger Max Blumenthal to spread Islamophobic smears about the group in order to shift public opinion towards tolerating or accepting military attacks on them.

And if more proof was even needed to dispel the al-Qaeda trope: Just this week, Syria's former al-Qaeda branch kidnapped another White Helmets volunteer. Hayat Tahrir a-Sham (formerly al-Qaeda) arrested Karam Saad al-Haj, a White Helmets photographer in Idlib; Karam is certainly not the first White Helmets volunteer to be kidnapped by the group. Far from being in league with them, Syria's Civil Defense volunteers are also victims of Islamist terrorists.
I think that excerpt dismantles Mr. Surovell's arguments here, and does so in expert fashion.  I recommend the whole article.
 

(1) The good thing about this PR job is that the author concedes that the White Helmets operate in Al-Qaeda-controlled areas. That's something I don't think @nohero/@South_Mountaineer or any of the other we-need-another-regime-change-war enthusiasts have stated.

(2) The article also does a good thing by linking to a critique of Seymour Hersh, inadvertently informing readers that Hersh has debunked allegations that Assad used chemical weapons against his people in several articles, including https://www.welt.de/politik/ausland/article165905578/Trump-s-Red-Line.html in which he describes the White Helmets as:

a first responder group known for its close association with the Syrian opposition.

In an interview about the article, Hersh says the following:

KK (Ken Klippenstein): In your article you state, “The White Helmets are known for its close association with Syrian opposition.” [White Helmets are the rebel-friendly civil defense teams that have been widely celebrated in the West and funded by the U.S. and UK governments, among others.] Could you elaborate on this group and what you know about them?
SH (Seymour Hersh): The only thing I know about the White Helmets is they’re supported by our State Department and the UK. There was a movie last year [about them] that won an Oscar. I’m sure they go places that nobody wants to go and pull people out, but they are in rebel territory and they’re considered to be groups that work against Bashar Assad. That’s one reason we finance them. We’ve very mixed emotions on Assad. He’s the only game in town, but we don’t like that. He’s the only game in town, nobody else is going to win that place, nobody else is going to win that country. If America thinks they can grab a piece of Raqqa and use that as leverage against them, there’s going to be a war, we’re going to be in a war there.
I know by writing this piece I’m going to be called pro-Russia and pro-Syria and all that stuff. So be it. What can you do?
KK: You think the White Helmets serve a sort of propaganda function for the rebels?
SH: I don’t think there’s any question they do. There’s a video about—it’s just comical, it’s out of Monty Python. There’s two guys in hazmat suits, they’re carrying something. They’re asked by somebody speaking Russian, “What do you have there, brother?”
“Oh, we’ve got some samples of sarin we’re taking to the hospital in Turkey for the UN.”
“Show us.”
So he opens it up and there’s a bird wrapped up in cellophane. So he unwraps the cellophane—because that presumably is going to keep the sarin from getting you—and he shows it to the onlooker. They’re putting up skull-and-crossbones placards into the ground, pounding them in to warn people. Meanwhile cars are going driving back and forth. It’s the most funny—as I said it’s beyond belief. If you look at one [of the guys] in slow motion and very closely apparently you see he isn’t even wearing gloves.
This is the bird that’s later used in a UN report to show there were sarin and sarin-like [substances]. We didn’t make a big deal of it in the story I wrote.

(3) The author attempts to distance the White Helmets from Al-Qaeda (known in Syria as Hayat Tahrir a-Sham-HTS) by citing the "kidnapping" of a White Helmet photographer by Al-Qaeda (HTS), reported elsewhere as "an arrest." Not surprising that a fanatical, paranoid organization, engaged in bloody power struggles with other jihadists would arrest someone under its jurisdiction. Certainly not evidence of a rift between Al-Qaeda (HTS) and the White Helmets.

(4) The article promotes the canard that the civil war in Syria is simply "a systematic extermination campaign intended to punish Syria’s civilian population into submission." We've already agreed that most casualties in Syria have been the fighters on both sides, not the civilians. The author doesn't "dismantle" the facts brought out by the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, that the breakdown of fatalities is about 1/3 civilians, 1/3 pro-government forces and 1/3 rebel forces.

(5) One also doesn't "dismantle an argument" with falsehoods, like:

"the Russian government has deployed charlatans like alt-left blogger Max Blumenthal to spread Islamophobic smears about the group in order to shift public opinion towards tolerating or accepting military attacks on them"

Max speaks for himself and there's nothing "Islamophobic" in his reporting.

In short, your "expert" dismantled nothing, except his own credibility.



DaveSchmidt said:


nan said:

 It was rated mainly false because of disputes about how the money was allocated, but no one was disputing that the US spent $200 million on whatever it is doing in Syria. 
It was rated mainly false because the $200 million in aid for recovery efforts in Syria was frozen. Whether you believe them is in serious doubt, but reports in March from The Times, The Journal, Reuters, USA Today, PBS, ABC, CBS, et al., all dispute that the U.S. spent that $200 million in Syria.

 But, she was not talking about that $200 million (which was a good move by Trump and protested by Democrats who called him basically a Russian puppet). She was talking about all the money spent by the US and UK on the White Helmets since Obama and she said, "I think it is up to $200 million by now" so she was not trying to state an exact fact but to just demonstrate that lots of money has been wasted on this.


paulsurovell said:


nohero said:

paulsurovell said:

nohero said:

paulsurovell said:
Perhaps you're suggesting a parallel (hypothetical) dissension within the White Helmets over the organization's cooperation with Al-Qaeda?
 Give it up.  Your continued efforts to tie the White Helmets to AQ ("cooperation", etc.) aren't going anywhere.
Not necessary to "tie" them, it's self-evident. You seem to have an oddly benign view of how Al-Qaeda controls its territories.
 I disagree.  To the contrary, it is you who has an odd need to malign the White Helmets.  I think you've adopted a (literally) "shoot the messenger" attitude towards them, since they testify to Assad's atrocities.  But don't rely on my non-expert view.  I'll outsource the rest of this response to this article from Haaretz about Assad's western apologists and their smearing of the White Helmets [in which I've highlighted some statements] -


(1) The good thing about this PR job is that the author concedes that the White Helmets operate in Al-Qaeda-controlled areas. That's something I don't think @nohero/@South_Mountaineer or any of the other we-need-another-regime-change-war enthusiasts have stated.


 I'm just going to respond to Mr. Surovell's point about me, since the article speaks for itself.  If Mr. Surovell reads it, he can try to explain away another detail - Israel's efforts to extract and protect the White Helmet "terrorists" and their families.

Nobody claimed that the White Helmets weren't in rebel-held territory.  That's the whole point of their existence.  What you're really complaining about is that I and others don't accept (and are offended by your obsessive slandering)  that means they are tied to, colluding with, or even the same as any terrorists among the rebels.  You're not going to listen to facts or reason, I get that.  But when I disagree with you, I point to what you actually wrote.  I don't lie about what you wrote and then use that to criticize.  

And I read your lashing out at @South_Mountaineer in the "Hillary Colluded!" thread, and the long response you got.  Your story is that I posted on MOL with that screen name way before the 2016 election and had an associated account on the Twitter before that - all to annoy you, I suppose.  Not even going to bother. 


nan said:


jamie said:

nan said:
Yet another person who finds Syria on the ground contradicts the mainstream media, including about the White Helmets.


A decent fact check


 https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.wikitribune.com/article/69708/%3famp=1
 This fact check actually makes her case stronger.  They don't rate any of her claims "pants of fire" and the ones they disagree on use questionable sources, such as Newsweek, Snopes, or "anonymous sources."

 Who needs questionable sources like Snopes when a Bolivian actress can tell you all you need to know about Syria.


nohero said:


paulsurovell said:

nohero said:

paulsurovell said:

nohero said:

paulsurovell said:
Perhaps you're suggesting a parallel (hypothetical) dissension within the White Helmets over the organization's cooperation with Al-Qaeda?
 Give it up.  Your continued efforts to tie the White Helmets to AQ ("cooperation", etc.) aren't going anywhere.
Not necessary to "tie" them, it's self-evident. You seem to have an oddly benign view of how Al-Qaeda controls its territories.
 I disagree.  To the contrary, it is you who has an odd need to malign the White Helmets.  I think you've adopted a (literally) "shoot the messenger" attitude towards them, since they testify to Assad's atrocities.  But don't rely on my non-expert view.  I'll outsource the rest of this response to this article from Haaretz about Assad's western apologists and their smearing of the White Helmets [in which I've highlighted some statements] -
(1) The good thing about this PR job is that the author concedes that the White Helmets operate in Al-Qaeda-controlled areas. That's something I don't think @nohero/@South_Mountaineer or any of the other we-need-another-regime-change-war enthusiasts have stated.
 I'm just going to respond to Mr. Surovell's point about me, since the article speaks for itself.  If Mr. Surovell reads it, he can try to explain away another detail - Israel's efforts to extract and protect the White Helmet "terrorists" and their families.
Nobody claimed that the White Helmets weren't in rebel-held territory.  That's the whole point of their existence.  What you're really complaining about is that I and others don't accept (and are offended by your obsessive slandering)  that means they are tied to, colluding with, or even the same as any terrorists among the rebels.  You're not going to listen to facts or reason, I get that.  But when I disagree with you, I point to what you actually wrote.  I don't lie about what you wrote and then use that to criticize.  
And I read your lashing out at @South_Mountaineer in the "Hillary Colluded!" thread, and the long response you got.  Your story is that I posted on MOL with that screen name way before the 2016 election and had an associated account on the Twitter before that - all to annoy you, I suppose.  Not even going to bother. 

 Ka-boom!


nan said:

 But, she was not talking about that $200 million (which was a good move by Trump and protested by Democrats who called him basically a Russian puppet). She was talking about all the money spent by the US and UK on the White Helmets since Obama and she said, "I think it is up to $200 million by now" so she was not trying to state an exact fact but to just demonstrate that lots of money has been wasted on this.

In May, the State Department said $33 million since Obama. From Britain, the White Helmets got about $46 million over the same period. If Ortiz was just trying to demonstrate “lots of money” — facts, I think, are preferable when stating figures — she was off by lots (possibly conflating the actual figure with the “other” $200 million).


nohero said:


paulsurovell said:

nohero said:

paulsurovell said:

nohero said:

paulsurovell said:
Perhaps you're suggesting a parallel (hypothetical) dissension within the White Helmets over the organization's cooperation with Al-Qaeda?
 Give it up.  Your continued efforts to tie the White Helmets to AQ ("cooperation", etc.) aren't going anywhere.
Not necessary to "tie" them, it's self-evident. You seem to have an oddly benign view of how Al-Qaeda controls its territories.
 I disagree.  To the contrary, it is you who has an odd need to malign the White Helmets.  I think you've adopted a (literally) "shoot the messenger" attitude towards them, since they testify to Assad's atrocities.  But don't rely on my non-expert view.  I'll outsource the rest of this response to this article from Haaretz about Assad's western apologists and their smearing of the White Helmets [in which I've highlighted some statements] -
(1) The good thing about this PR job is that the author concedes that the White Helmets operate in Al-Qaeda-controlled areas. That's something I don't think @nohero/@South_Mountaineer or any of the other we-need-another-regime-change-war enthusiasts have stated.
 I'm just going to respond to Mr. Surovell's point about me, since the article speaks for itself.  If Mr. Surovell reads it, he can try to explain away another detail - Israel's efforts to extract and protect the White Helmet "terrorists" and their families.
Nobody claimed that the White Helmets weren't in rebel-held territory.  That's the whole point of their existence.  What you're really complaining about is that I and others don't accept (and are offended by your obsessive slandering)  that means they are tied to, colluding with, or even the same as any terrorists among the rebels.  You're not going to listen to facts or reason, I get that.  But when I disagree with you, I point to what you actually wrote.  I don't lie about what you wrote and then use that to criticize.  
And I read your lashing out at @South_Mountaineer in the "Hillary Colluded!" thread, and the long response you got.  Your story is that I posted on MOL with that screen name way before the 2016 election and had an associated account on the Twitter before that - all to annoy you, I suppose.  Not even going to bother. 

I didn't say you denied that the White Helmets are in rebel-held territory. I said that you have never admitted that the rebels are dominated by Al-Qaeda. And you confirmed my point in this response.

Invoking Israel's evacuation of the White Helmets to make your point that the White Helmets aren't connected to Al Qaeda shows your lack of knowledge. Israel has for years openly provided assistance to Al Nusra (former name for Al Qaeda in Syria). Michael Oren, former Israeli ambassador to the US explains why.

As for the @South_Mountaineer account, I never said (and don't believe) that you created it to annoy me.


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