{"id":132528,"date":"2014-07-22T18:56:26","date_gmt":"2014-07-22T18:56:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?p=132528"},"modified":"2014-07-22T18:56:26","modified_gmt":"2014-07-22T18:56:26","slug":"u-s-admits-mh17-evidence-based-youtube-clips-social-media-posts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/breaking-news\/u-s-admits-mh17-evidence-based-youtube-clips-social-media-posts\/","title":{"rendered":"U.S. Admits Its MH17 \u2018Evidence\u2019 is Based on YouTube Clips &#038; Social Media Posts"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"entry-subtitle\" style=\"font-weight: 500;\"><strong>AP journalist challenges State Department spokesperson on official narrative<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In a testy exchange between AP reporter Matt Lee and U.S. State Department Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf, Lee virtually corners Harf into admitting that the \u201cevidence\u201d presented by the U.S. to blame Russian-backed rebels for the shoot down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 amounts to nothing more than YouTube videos and social media posts.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/oQRvINebeok?rel=0\" width=\"620\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Lee begins by asking Harf how the U.S. plans to produce \u201cforensic evidence\u201d proving Russian-backed rebels were behind the attack, to which Hard responds by reeling off talking points before stating, \u201cwe know, we saw in social media afterwards\u2026.of the pro-Russian separatists bragging about shooting down an aircraft.\u201d<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">\u201cHow is it exactly that you know it was fired from separatist held territory?\u201d asks Lee, to which Harf responds that the evidence is based on \u201ccommunications posted on YouTube by the Ukrainian government.\u201d<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">\u201cIs there anything other\u2026.than social media?\u201d asks Lee. Harf alludes to an \u201cassessment,\u201d before again reeling off talking points (based on social media and YouTube videos) that blame separatist rebels.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">\u201cAll you\u2019re willing to present publicly that backs up your version of the story, which may well be the correct version of the story,\u201d states Lee before being interrupted by Harf who sardonically retorts, \u201cmay well be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">\u201cI haven\u2019t seen your evidence that shows that the missile was launched from rebel held territory,\u201d continues Lee. \u201cThe only thing you\u2019re willing to put out publicly is the social media accounts,\u201d he adds, before citing other social media accounts that dispute the State Department\u2019s version of events.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Harf asserts that any version of events that challenges the State Department\u2019s version (based again on social media posts) is \u201cillogical.\u201d Lee states that the State Department\u2019s evidence would not stand up to an international investigation.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">\u201cThe Russians have said we\u2019ve put out our radar images which show this Ukrainian plane near at least\u2026.why don\u2019t you put out your\u2026,\u201d states Lee before again being interrupted by Harf.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Credit must be given to Matt Lee for doing his job and challenging Harf given that any questioning of the official narrative behind the MH17 shoot down, backed up as it is by the flimsiest of \u201cevidence,\u201d has been demonized as \u201cRussian propaganda,\u201d just as skepticism towards last year\u2019s chemical weapons attack in Syria, which an\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/rt.com\/news\/study-challenges-syria-chemical-attack-681\/\">MIT study later concluded<\/a>\u00a0was likely not launched by government forces, was derided as \u201cAssad propaganda.\u201d<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Despite the State Department\u2019s insistence that YouTube clips and social media posts can be considered as hard evidence, even the veracity of that material has attracted intense skepticism.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Harf\u2019s mention of social media posts which show rebels \u201cbragging\u201d about bringing down the airliner is likely a reference to a post on the Russian version of Facebook shortly after MH17 was shot down by Ukrainian rebel commander Igor Strelkov. However, as\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.vox.com\/2014\/7\/17\/5913089\/did-this-ukrainian-rebel-commander-take-credit-for-shooting-down-the\/in\/5677250\">Max Fisher documents<\/a>, \u201cThere are real reasons to doubt that the message was genuine.\u201d<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">First of all Strelkov\u2019s page \u201cis a fake made by fans,\u201d according to rebels who spoke to\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/maxseddon\/status\/489819271632281600\">Buzzfeed\u2019s Max Seddon<\/a>, so the words cannot even be attributed to the commander. In addition, the post makes reference to the shoot down not of a civilian airliner but to an Antonov AN-26 military transport plane.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">\u201cThis casts a bit further doubt on the idea that people fired on the airplane and then posted on VK about it; if someone fired on the plane they likely would have noticed it was a large jet and not a small-ish prop plane,\u201d writes Fisher.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Video of a Buk missile launcher apparently crossing the border back to Russia after the plane was shot down which was cited by Kiev and Washington\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonsblog.com\/2014\/07\/2nd-key-piece-video-evidence-russian-responsibility-plane-shootdown-debunked.html\">has also since been debunked<\/a>. The clip is actually shot in the Ukrainian of town of Krasnoarmeisk, which has been controlled by Kiev since May.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\"><a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/en.itar-tass.com\/russia\/741521\">According to audio experts<\/a>\u00a0who conducted a forensic analysis,\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/news\/2014-07-17\/ukraine-releases-youtube-clip-proving-rebels-shot-down-malaysian-flight-mh-17\">a YouTube video<\/a>\u00a0of a conversation between a separatist leader and a Russian military commander which purported to show rebels accepting responsibility for shooting down the airliner is in fact a fabrication.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">While Russia has\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/landdestroyer.blogspot.co.uk\/2014\/07\/mh17-show-tell-its-wests-turn.html\">presented actual radar and satellite evidence<\/a>\u00a0to back up its contention that Ukrainian fighter jets were following the doomed airliner shortly before the incident, the sum of Kiev and Washington\u2019s proof that separatists were to blame for the shoot down amounts to little more than highly questionable YouTube videos and social media posts.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">Kiev has also\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.infowars.com\/kiev-censors-mh17-air-traffic-control-recordings\/\">failed to release air traffic control recordings<\/a>, which were seized immediately by Ukrainian security forces, which could offer a crucial insight into what was happening in the skies immediately prior to the aircraft being shot down.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\">While any questioning of the narrative behind the incident has been dismissed by the establishment media as \u201cRussian propaganda,\u201d Russia is the only party to have actually presented anything which could be considered real evidence, whereas Washington and Kiev are still reliant on the sort of proof that would only satisfy the sloppiest of Internet conspiracy theorists.<\/p>\n<p align=\"left\"><em>Paul Joseph Watson is the editor at large of\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/infowars.com\/\">Infowars.com<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0<a style=\"color: #025ab4;\" href=\"http:\/\/prisonplanet.com\/\">Prison Planet.com<\/a>.\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.infowars.com\/u-s-admits-its-mh17-evidence-is-based-on-youtube-clips-social-media-posts\/\" target=\"_blank\">This piece<\/a> was reprinted by <a href=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\" target=\"_blank\">RINF Alternative News<\/a> with permission or license.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>AP journalist challenges State Department spokesperson on official narrative In a testy exchange between AP reporter Matt Lee and U.S. State Department Deputy Spokesperson Marie Harf, Lee virtually corners Harf into admitting that the \u201cevidence\u201d presented by the U.S. to blame Russian-backed rebels for the shoot down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 amounts to nothing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":132529,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[487,1616],"tags":[665,526],"class_list":{"0":"post-132528","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"category-usa-news","9":"tag-flight-mh17","10":"tag-propaganda"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132528","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=132528"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/132528\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/132529"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=132528"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=132528"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=132528"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}