Tag: cnn

Proof that Syrian ‘prisoner’ discovered and freed by CNN crew was one of Assad’s ruthless henchmen as ex-intelligence officer is now missing

A shocking image of the Syrian ‘prisoner’ who was discovered locked up Damascus prison by journalists proves that he was actually one of former dictator Bashar al-Assad’s henchmen who ruthlessly killed and tortured inmates. 

The feigned inmate was found by CNN‘s chief international correspondent Clarrisa Ward and her team while they toured an abandoned detention site last Wednesday.

He was found under a blanket trembling and exclaiming ‘Oh God! There is light!’, in a video that went viral. 

But earlier this week Syrian fact-checking organization Verify-Sy reported that the man in the clip was in fact a first first lieutenant in the Syrian Air Force Intelligence, which served former President Assad.

CNN launched an investigation into the man’s identity and confirmed that he was not a ‘civilian father’ named Adel Gharba, but rather Salama Mohammad Salama. 

Citing local sources, CNN said in a statement Monday that Salama ‘was known for running the Air Force Intelligence Directorate’s checkpoints in the city’ and was accused of ‘having a reputation for extortion and harassment’.

Now, an image, that was shared with CNN by locals and Verify-Sy, shows Salama wearing a sly smirk behind a desk that appears to be inside a government office. 

He is dressed in military uniform, further proving his links to the Assad regime. 

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CNN Admits Reporter Duped: Assad ‘Victim’ Found In Syria Prison Was Regime Intel Officer

The long and colorful history of major media promotion of false, government-serving narratives has a new chapter. 

Last week, CNN aired a melodramatic report from reporter Clarissa Ward that was supposed to show a CNN crew amazingly rescuing a victim of the Assad regime from the bowels of a Damascus dungeon. After days of mounting skepticism and pointed questions ricocheting across social media, alternative new sites and here at ZeroHedge, CNN now says the “rescued” man was actually a regime intelligence officer, and there are reports that he himself perpetrated crimes against civilians

The man identified himself as Adel Ghurbai, and said he lived in the central Syrian city of Homs. However, over the weekend, the self-described Syrian fact-checking site Verify-Sy said he was actually Salama Mohammad Salama, aka “Abu Hamza”, an infamous and cruel first lieutenant in Syrian Air Force Intelligence: 

Abu Hamza reportedly managed several security checkpoints in Homs and was involved in theft, extortion, and coercing residents into becoming informants. According to locals, his recent incarceration—lasting less than a month—was due to a dispute over profit-sharing from extorted funds with a higher-ranking officer. This led to his detention in one of Damascus’s cells, as per neighborhood sources. 

…

Despite his seemingly innocent and composed demeanor in the CNN report, Salama has a grim history. He participated in military operations on several fronts in Homs in 2014, killed civilians, and was responsible for detaining and torturing numerous young men in the city without cause or on fabricated charges. Many were targeted simply for refusing to pay bribes, rejecting cooperation, or even for arbitrary reasons like their appearance. These details were corroborated by families of victims and former detainees who spoke with Verify-Sy.

On Monday, CNN posted a report — written by Tim Lister and Eyad Kourdi but not Ward — revealing the network had been duped. Unsurprisingly, the rolling ratings disaster that is CNN stopped short of taking responsibility for its failure. CNN did credit Verify-Sy for first reporting the man’s apparent real identity, which CNN corroborated with its own canvassing of residents in the Bayada neighborhood of Homs. Considering the crimes Salama is accused of, the CNN follow-up article ends on a darkly amusing note: “Salama’s current whereabouts are unknown.” Yes, Ward yearned to bask in the glory of saving a regime victim, only to be exposed as aiding and abetting the escape of an apparent regime criminal.  

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Prisoner CNN helped free from Syrian prison was actually notorious Assad regime torturer: report

The prisoner CNN helped free from a secret facility in Syria was actually a notorious member of Bashar al-Assad’s forces known to torture those who refused to pay him off, according to a shocking local fact check.

The network went viral last week with footage of the startled prisoner being led from the prison by journalist Clarissa Ward, who called it “one of the most extraordinary moments I have witnessed” in her 20 years of reporting.

But “independent and unbiased” fact-checkers Verify-Sy published a detailed report Sunday saying that the seemingly innocent prisoner was actually Salama Mohammad Salama — a first lieutenant in Syrian air force intelligence with a long history of alleged war crimes.

“We have subsequently been investigating his background and are aware that he may have given a false identity,” CNN acknowledged to The Post. “We are continuing our reporting into this and the wider story.”

The CNN story last week showed Ward and a camera crew, escorted by a rebel fighter, visiting a former Syrian air force intelligence headquarters in Damascus and freeing the man who was found under a blanket locked in a windowless cell. 

He gave his name as Adel Ghurbal and claimed to have been arrested by government authorities three months earlier — and said he had no idea the Assad regime had collapsed.

Verify-Sy noted, however, that he appeared “well-groomed, and physically healthy, with no visible injuries or signs of torture — an incongruous portrayal of someone allegedly held in solitary confinement in the dark for 90 days.”

He also “did not flinch or blink even when gazing up at the sky” despite having said he had not seen sunlight for three months.

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CNN Correspondent Says the Quiet Part Out Loud – Admits Hunter Was Pardoned Out of Fear His Family Would Be Investigated by Trump

Jeff Zeleny, Chief National Affairs Correspondent from CNN, said the quiet part out loud on Sunday night after news broke that Joe Biden had granted Hunter Biden a blanket pardon for any criminal acts he partook in from 2014 to present including, trading influence for cash, trafficking prostitutes, and taking on the role of the Biden Family bagman.

Jeff Zeleny: We were told that this came to a head this weekend, and this is why President Biden decided now to do this. But as Isaac was just saying, that really is a sense of the conversation that has been going on really inside the family.

I’m told this has been very much a family discussion and something that has been not widely shared or discussed as a policy matter inside the West Wing.

But there was a worry of future prosecutions or future the potential of what the incoming Trump Justice Department could do.

So that, of course, is fretted in all of this as well.

But for now, this moment, this certainly is a decision that President Biden, I’m guessing, did not come too easily. But as you played that statement before, so much has changed since June when he told David Muir of ABC News that he would not do that.

Of course, his station in life has changed. Did not complete his campaign. So that is why, leading up to this, that’s why I’m told a decision was reached finally this weekend after spending time together in Nantucket.

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Scott Jennings Pulls Hilarious Reversal During Argument About X With Fellow CNN Panelists

If you’re not an X user, I can safely say you’re missing out on a great free speech platform that gives you the news faster than any corporate organization can, and what’s more, it is ideologically balanced, as all good platforms should be. 

Elon Musk’s platform isn’t just a breath of fresh air, it easily changed the conversational landscape and, as a result, affected the political one. As free speech spread, the Democrat Party and the left lost its narrative edge, collapsing multiple attempts to push lies that may very well have shaped public opinion for the worse. 

If you want proof that X is effective enough to shape the people’s opinion, look no further than the fact that CNN talking heads are mad about it. They don’t even want to discuss any positive reporting about it… even if it comes from CNN. 

Scott Jennings was, once again, on a panel taking on his colleagues when the subject of X came up. 

“I saw a survey this week,” Jennings began. “It’s now the most ideologically balanced user platform of any platform.” 

Before he could even finish that sentence, fellow CNN Cari Champion was already trying to shut him down. She attempted to tell him “you cannot say that,” which is actually a phrase you’ll find repeated at Jennings quite often during these back and forths.

Host Audie Cornish asked for a source, causing Champion to ask for one as well, but Jennings, a man who clearly plays 4D chess, was ready with the answer. 

“We’ve reported it on this network,” said Jennings. 

Champion’s only recourse was to say that CNN’s reporting on X was “not accurate.” 

Cornish didn’t let Jennings speak again, though he was clearly ready to, but you can see just how radical the leftists on the panel were when the question was posed if they would worry if Bill Gates bought MSNBC, to which Champion responded “no, because he’s sane.” 

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O’Keefe Scores Victory in 11th Circuit of Appeals Against CNN in Defamation Case

James O’Keefe has scored a significant victory in his ongoing legal battle against CNN, with a ruling in his favor from the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals. This victory comes after three years, thousands of miles traveled, and nearly a million dollars in legal fees in his defamation case against the network.

In 2021 when CNN’s Ana Cabrera falsely accused Project Veritas (PV) of promoting misinformation on Twitter, leading to a suspension of the organization’s account. This defamatory claim was based on a misrepresentation of the facts—PV’s Twitter suspension was not for spreading misinformation, but for publishing truthful, yet supposedly private, information. Cabrera’s statement contradicted a prior CNN report which acknowledged the true reason for the suspension.

The defamation suit aimed to hold CNN accountable for these false claims that directly impacted PV’s reputation. Despite an initial unfavorable ruling from a federal judge in Georgia, who dismissed the lawsuit, O’Keefe and his legal team refused to back down.

The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals sided with O’Keefe, acknowledging that Cabrera’s statement was not only false, but materially false. The court also found that the statement had the potential to harm the reputation of Project Veritas. This ruling was a crucial step forward in the battle for truth in media, and it sent a strong message that news organizations cannot simply disregard the truth and misrepresent the facts without facing legal consequences.

Judge Ed Carnes, concurring in the decision, highlighted the absurdity of CNN’s defense, pointing out that a major news organization was essentially downplaying the importance of truth in its broadcasts. “If you stay on the bench long enough, you see a lot of things. Still, I never thought I’d see a major news organization downplaying the importance of telling the truth in its broadcasts,” said Carnes.

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CNN Freaks Out Over Trump Making RFK Jr. HHS Chief

CNN freaked out over President-elect Donald Trump making RFK Jr. Secretary of Health and Human Services, with Jake Tapper accusing Kennedy of engaging in “quackery”.

Announcing Kennedy would head up the post on Truth Social, Trump asserted that it was a victory for Americans who have been “crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies.”

Trump added that Kennedy “will restore these Agencies to the traditions of Gold Standard Scientific Research, and beacons of Transparency, to end the Chronic Disease epidemic, and to Make America Great and Healthy Again!”

This caused heads to explode at CNN, with Tapper raging that RFK was “somebody who has been pushing quackery, who has been pushing lies, who has been pushing conspiracy theories.”

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CNN Analyst: Trump’s Victory Was So Massive He “Broke History”

CNN’s data analyst Harry Enten did a deep dive into the gains president Trump made with specific demographics in the election, highlighting how crushing they were for Democrats.

The numbers are truly astounding, and incredibly bad for the party of ‘joy.’

Enter pointed out that Trump made the greatest improvements over a previous presidential election performance from the same party since 1992.

“When was the last time a party gained in so many different places?” Enten asked, explaining that “You have to go all the way to back to 1992 when Bill Clinton improved on Michael Dukakis’ performance in 49 states, plus the District of Columbia.”

“Donald Trump’s performance on Tuesday was the best for a Republican presidential candidate in exit poll history,” Enten further urged, adding “He literally goes all the way back through history and breaks history.” 

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BRUTAL: CNN Hosts Absolutely Silent as Democrat Strategist Delivers Some ‘Hard Truths’ to Her Party 

Democrat strategist Julie Roginsky appeared on CNN this morning and delivered some tough but fair comments to members of her party.

According to her, the problem was not Joe Biden or even Kamala Harris, but the party itself which has gone so far left that average Americans don’t even understand their language anymore.

If you watch the video below, you may agree with some of the things that Roginsky says about the Democrats.

The New York Post has details:

Dem strategist delivers scorching reality check to her own side after Harris’ loss: ‘Not party of common sense’

Democratic strategist Julie Roginsky issued “some hard truths” about Donald Trump’s historic election win during a CNN segment Thursday, claiming her own side is “not the party of common sense” and can’t talk to normal people.

“I’m going to speak some hard truths to my friends in the Democratic Party. This is not Joe Biden’s fault. It’s not Kamala Harris’ fault. It’s not Barack Obama’s fault — it is the fault of the Democratic Party in not knowing how to communicate effectively to voters,” she said.

“We are not the party of common sense, which is the message that voters sent to us.”

She argued against addressing Latinos as the Latinx because “it makes them think that we don’t even live in the same planet as they do.”

“When we are too afraid to say, ‘Hey college kids, if you’re trashing a campus at Columbia University because you’re unhappy about some sort of policy and you’re taking over a university and you’re trashing it, preventing other students from learning, that that is unacceptable,’”…

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CNN’s Acosta On Nevada Mail-In Ballot Issues: ‘Young People Don’t Know How To Sign Their Name’

CNN anchor Jim Acosta discussed an election issue in Las Vegas, Nevada, where over 13,000 people across the state who voted by mail will have to verify their identities in order for their votes to count.

According to the news anchor, “a lot of young voters don’t know how to sign their names,” saying state officials are texting the individuals for verification or else their votes won’t be counted.

The issue is strange, as even young people surely know how to sign their own names, but it’s also suspicious that AP News says “younger voters” have slightly shifted towards Trump in the 2024 election.

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