After almost 10 years online, over 250 videos, almost 13,000 subscribers, and about 8 million total video views, YouTube has terminated the Middle East Observer (MEO) channel on its platform.
Although perhaps MEO became best known for its video translations of regional political actors such as Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah, its work was certainly not limited to that. Middle East Observer sought to provide its viewers with reliable English translations on politics, religion, and culture from the Middle East more broadly, with a particular focus on media from key states such as Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Iran.
The termination of MEO’s channel came after several months of seemingly routine ‘violation’ emails sent to us by YouTube, the taking down of various videos of ours (most of which were uploaded several years ago) and the imposition of ‘channel strikes’ accompanied by emails about how we could better uphold its rather vague and in many ways hegemonic ‘Community Guidelines’. We gradually realised that no matter what measures we took, it would not satisfy YouTube’s ‘Guidelines’, as the platform’s architecture and policies increasingly moved towards the censorship of alternative news and views.
This censorship process against MEO began several years earlier, when YouTube deactivated our ability to monetise the absolute majority of our videos, classifying them as “Non-advertiser friendly”. Needless to say, this demonetisation regime has increasingly been criticised by many observers and major ‘YouTubers’ in recent years. They argued that the “Non-advertiser friendly” label was deeply ideological, as it worked to effectively censor (no funds = less ability to produce content) alternative and non-mainstream narratives while continuing to portray YouTube as a democratic and transparent media platform.
To bypass reliance on YouTube advertising revenue, we tried various options over the years, the last of which being an up-until-now successful experience on Patreon (here’s our page), where after only a few months 17 of our global viewers/readers joined the highly flexible crowd sourcing platform to fund our work and keep it going. Truly without their support we would not have been able to continue producing translations consistently (by all means support us to help us expand our work too).
Nevertheless, we believe that the termination of our channel today is a great blow to the coverage on YouTube of voices, news, and perspectives found on Arab and Islamic media that are rarely covered – or even purposefully silenced – by Western mainstream media.
YouTube’s message today is clear: the production, uploading, and viewing of genuinely critical and alternative ideas and viewpoints is not welcome.
Thankfully we at MiddleEastObserver.net have been anticipating this scenario for many years, and especially in the last 6 months. For now, these are the best ways to continue to follow and support our work:
– Support us financially (even with $1/month) on Patreon
– You won’t miss out on any content if you subscribe to our Website Mailing List
– We will now be uploading our video content on our Daily Motion channel
– Like our Facebook page
– Follow us on Twitter
Best wishes,
Middle East Observer
Middle East Observer: right now, feeling a mix of sadness for you guys that the psychopathic loons running the World have targeted MEO to silence your voice, and also bloody pissed off that you join an ever lengthening number of people and blogs and anti war – anti imperialist sites of independent voices: people who speak the truth on how the World is, those who speak truth to power, and you are squashed like a bug. The ruling elites, the Anglo Zionist Empire fear losing control of the narrative, hence its increasingly brazen attempts to censor opposition voices.
Uh, they still have a website. They aren’t dead yet.
https://www.middleeastobserver.org/
YouTube is the gatekeeper to the audience. Suggesting that all is OK because of the existence of a single website without much traffic is rather akin to saying that free speech is alive and well because we are able to say what we want in the isolation of our living room. Without access, the concept of freedom of speech becomes more hypothetical than real.
In Soviet times people who wanted to spread ideas were forced to use hand typed and hand duplicated documents called samizdat. Some might see that current actions against those with a message counter to the approved truths place people in a rather similar position.
Moving forward, all the tech giant corporations are going to have to be abandoned. They are now pursuing a policy of total censorship & deplatforming, especially against prominent anti-war voices that promote the truth. This is already beginning to happen. Check out gab.com, minds.com, and steemit.com… it’s going to take a lot more time, but eventually we will get there.
Be careful guys, that web link points to another separate entity with a similar name.
The correct web link of the Middle East Observer in question is this one: http://middleeastobserver.net
A fascist tyranny, run by a latter-day Mussolini like Satan-yahoo and his coterie of stand-over billionaire thugs, where merely expressing support for the eternally brutalised Palestinians can bring the threat, or even, who knows, the reality of twenty years in gaol, hardly equates to ‘The Free World’, does it, Gezzah? It does, however, ironically, equate exactly to the really existing truth of ‘Western Moral Values’.
Mulga Mumblebrain: made a reply to you hours ago but think it was binned coz I used a couple ‘impolite’ words, so I’ll try again in a more polite manner: screw Western moral values and put them where they belong – at the bottom of a sewerage pond. My god, the searing hypocrisy…. The self righteousness …. The utterly deluded belief that the West is civilised. Someone once said you can judge a society by how it treats its most vulnerable members. Everything is like smoke and mirrors, a giant blinkin charade.
I am not an expert in telecommunications and coputerology to it squarely but the question that keeps popping up in my mind is that if there is so much technology available why is the net that seems totally controlled by Jews..is the only net and means to communicate with millions available?
I mean how hard is it to build another net, set up another youtube,, facebook, twitter etc?
all I hear is noise about eh Khazar/Jewish control. why in the goddam hell are people not developing alternatives?
I am fed up to my ear with all the complaints about Jews and their censorship. it seems to me that we build what we control or lie down and die for christ sakes
just stop using the Khazar/Jewish thing and see what happens. they cannot exist without our participation and acceptance of their censorship. if we all boycotted Facebook, Youtube, Twitter etc they would collapse by tomorrow morning and disappear. so why dont we?
I have had enough of this nonsense. I dont use twitter and facebook at all. years ago I could see where this was going. and I did not want the net to monitor all I said, follow me everywhere, know all my information. so I got out of facebook and twitter.
I still use Youtube because there is a lot there I need. but I can see the censorship there as well. as soon as what I go there for begins to be censored then I am done with Youtube.
but I cant stand all this crying about the goddam Khazars and their global control..a few million people..when all that is required is a sustained boycott and the building up of alternate services… and all they have over us is done and gone.
What do you expect from US corporations ?
It was only a matter of time.
The empire is showing its true face.
Next they will target money transactions and put anyone they want on terrorist or undesirable lists.
People need to start working towards alternatives. Alternatives to social media like youtube, google and alternatives to financial transactions that are physically based outside the West. Some of these alternatives already exist.
These alternatives need to be agressively promoted and need to have incentive mechanisms to attract people away from these Western services and products.
Also, don’t throw all your eggs in one basket. Diversify your revenue stream. Even the French Dailymotion/Vivendi could be next.
To be honest, I am surprised why the Empire isn’t sanctioning, banning and confiscating at an even quicker rate. They seem to be testing the waters if you will.
They are just waiting for the next orders from the West’s de facto Master, Satan-yahoo, either directly expressed in an address to the US Congress degenerates, yelling and gesticulating their total adoration for their paymaster, or communicated through hissing and spitting diktat from the Zionazi billionaires who own US politics. There can be no end to Zionazi ambition and demands-it is not in their group DNA.
It’s not a good idea to trust Patreon either. Dmitry Orlov now recommends his readers to use SubscribeStar instead, as Patreon too has now begun to inflict political censorship on its creators’ outputs. (They’re also hopelessly unhelpful, behind the standard PR-babble, when you try to contact them about unresolved issues.)
It gets clearer that all US-based, or US-leaning, internet services are moving more and more towards censorship favouring the Anglozionist empire’s deceitful propaganda narratives, and they are suppressing any conflicting views and information. The best thing to do with YouTube, Wikipedia, FaecesBrook, Twitter, etc., is to boycott them completely and permanently. Use the alternatives that exist, unless they too show signs of going the same way.
I take this and other takedowns by Youtube to be an indication of something big being planned for which the propaganda system needs to be streamlined and brought under stricter control.
2019 will be an interesting year.
For the life of me I don’t understand why Russia and China do not pool their resources together and create alternatives to Youtube, Google, Facebook etc. I know they have their own platforms presently but to be honest they just dont look good at all. All that brainpower, talent and creativity Russia and China possess could surely create alternatives that would not only look better but work better too without threats from western interference. Russia and China have millions of young peopke that could reach the stars if their governments took them seriously and give them the encouragement and incentive to create. And while you’re at it Russia and China, work together and find cures to all disease.
Remember your people are your greatest resource and the world’s hope against the evil that is presntly engulfing it.
Russia seems far more open to free speech than China which is still quite repressive. Sadly just because opposed to the Empire, doesn’t make nations paragons of virtue. Think Saddam.
Peter, you’ve swallowed the Sinophobic Western agit-prop Kool-Aid. In China public comment is freer than in the West, with the one caveat that you cannot peddle the aggressive Western hate propaganda that is designed to ‘bring China down’ and break it into fragments. No sane Government allows internal subversion by agents of an aggressive hyaena enemy like the West. And Chinese popular opinion is ceaselessly polled and examined by organs of the Government, and popular opinion is reflected in Government policy, whereas, in the West, as the Gilens and Page study outlined in the case of the USA, ONLY the wishes of the ruling parasite oligarchs are given any attention.
I’d wager that the physical infrastructure of the global communications network itself is designed, and built, in such a way that anything interfaced with it becomes vulnerable to its corruptability.
Baidu, WeChat, Youku, & Weibo are China’s versions of Google, Facebook, YouTube, & Twitter.
VK has video support, completely independent from youtube. Always worked fine for me.
Russian alternatives
Google – Yandex https://www.yandex.com
GMail – Yandex,Mail https://mail.yandex.com
GMail – mail.ru https://mail.ru
Facebook – VK https://vk.com
Facebook – OK https://ok.ru
Very troubling.
And, seems very “obvious” and primitive.
Surely the ME is the area that is relatively poorly covered while being of central significance to events in the USA and the world.
Next to go: Any news about Venezuela?
I mean, who is giving the orders to Google/YouTube? Yes, we already assume some kind of govt. control of Google here at The Saker. But a gross, clumsy move like banning MEO seems to be kind of a smoking gun.
I echo points made in all of the comments so far.
In a way it is surprising that anything at all controversial has been “allowed” on YouTube.
And: Why indeed has Russia not created an alternative?
It is the World Wide Web, not the USA Web.
I guess the takeaway is that one must “know” where one is going on the Web—soon the idea of “browsing” and finding new sources of information and ideas from a browser such as Google or othrs will likely be a thing of the past. I guess the results of “browsing” are already determined and controlled by algorithms.
Yesterday I read something pretty troubling in the email feed of teh Columbia Journalism Review—troubling for the unexamined (apparently ) premises.
“In a Wired magazine piece, Renee DiResta looks at how Amazon’s recommendation algorithms have created a treasure trove of dubious anti-vaccination books. “Once relegated to tabloids and web forums, ***health misinformation and conspiracies*** have found a new megaphone in the curation engines that power massive platforms like Amazon,” she writes”
What? There is quite a lot of data supporting caution regarding vaccines.
And, people have a right to write books on whatever they choose, and to read them.
The question here is: Who is deciding what is “health misinformation and conspiracies”?
Entitles that in the past been responsible for championing hundreds of stupid theories and presenting them as fact? Such as the systematic mistinterpretation of the Framingham Heart STudy. This is akin to the NYT proclaiming itself an arbiter of fake news after spreading the false WMD and many other lies.
Also, note how the author slides from “vaccines” to a more vast universe of material to be controlled in some way. Also, note the oxymoron “”curation engines.” Curation means choosing certain items. Yet the piece seems to be about not “choosing/censoring” books that the author considers to be questionable but merely aggregating them for potential readers.
For me the takeaway from all this is that Google, YouTube etc are indeed utilities and should be legally treated as public utilities. We simply cannot survive, intellectually, in a “globalized” world where only capital is globalized and only ideas that support the accumulation of profits and the exploitation of people and the environment for profit will get a hearing or be even allowed into the Idea-sphere.
Anyone who gives himself away to FB or Twitter is an idiot. Anyone in the alternative media who relies on FB seems to me to be brain-dead.
Katherine
Not that dissimilar to the destruction of library card catalogues. Sure, one can digitally locate a book one is looking for, but one now has to go to a physical library with open stacks if one wants to truly “browse” among the “nearby” books and find unexpected works.
when they have fully censored Youtube then I imagine they will take away access to foreign services like what the Russians offer
“Its time to break up Amazon, Google and Facebook”
by Senator and Presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren.
https://medium.com/@teamwarren/heres-how-we-can-break-up-big-tech-9ad9e0da324c
(Youtube is of course owned and controlled by Google)
“Today’s big tech companies have too much power — too much power over our economy, our society, and our democracy. They’ve bulldozed competition, used our private information for profit, and tilted the playing field against everyone else. And in the process, they have hurt small businesses and stifled innovation.
I want a government that makes sure everybody — even the biggest and most powerful companies in America — plays by the rules. And I want to make sure that the next generation of great American tech companies can flourish. To do that, we need to stop this generation of big tech companies from throwing around their political power to shape the rules in their favor and throwing around their economic power to snuff out or buy up every potential competitor.”
Making sure that ‘…everybody plays by the rules’, even the high tech companies, is the most disgustingly ‘antisemitic’ statement that I have seen for at least five minutes.
YouTube has something akin to a monopoly, similar to what used to be true about newspapers like the New York Times. They feel free to abuse their users with censorship and advertisements, and in the short run will probably get away with it. Its sad really. What started out as a public service was bought out, and turned into the worst possible internet institution. At least Wikipedia is still independent, despite some problems.
It is the start of the Purim month of Adar. It started on March 6 at sundown. March 7 and 8 are celebrated as Rosh Chodesh Adar – the beginning of the Adar month. It is fourteen days till the big Purim day on Adar 14 which starts on eve of March 20th. March 21 is the day. Purim is three days. Erev Purim the day before and it also Ta’aint Esther, the feast of Esther. That day starts on sundown March 19. March 20 is the day of the celebration. The day after Purim day is Shusan Purim. This Purim is celebrated in walled towns like Jerusalem. This is first Purim that Jerusalem has been promoted as a capitol by the US. This makes this a “special” Shusan Purim this year. MEO has been shut down at the beginning of this Purim month of Adar. Venezuela has electrical outage on Adar 2 – March 8. What else will the Old Testament Regime of USisrael have planned to celebrate Purim month this year? Venezuela said the US was celebrating the outage. The USisrael were. It is a holiday after all for doing such things.
On which day do the Gods Upon the Earth celebrate the slaughter of ‘75,000 followers of Haman'(c.6 million in today’s population numbers, oddly enough)get drunk, harass goyim and eat ‘Haman’s ears’? Of course, it’s all mythology, but genocide mythology, like Passover. Wouldn’t Bibi love to go down in history as a latter-day hero who delivered a Second Purim. A brief history, I fear, one glorious afternoon at most.
Thanks for this info
Eventually this, what I call “corporate censorship on behalf of ruling class” will block as much of “unapproved” information sources as they can.
Middle East Observer is one of the first casualties. In opposite the Canada government just gave $600M to its protégé MSM entities to report better!
Eventually we may devolve back to short wave radio or maybe pigeons. Many good independent news sources did and do exist on this archaic way of news propagation. Not a joke, Alex Jones (not that I like him) purchased cold war era SW radio station equipment and he makes regular appearance on SW. There are rumors about new SW stations constructed by private parties.
So, dear friends let’s enjoy and take advantage of what we still have on the net before this window closes and keep that old SW receiver/transceiver handy.
i recommend that you also make a mirror account on DTUBE or one of the other platforms available now, i noticed your channel was down yesterday when i was trying to find a Nasrallah speech.
i will bookmark your DM channel now and will see if i can scramble together a few dollars for your patreon.
FYI..
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2019/03/04/truth-tellers-are-being-censored/
The Zionazi War on Truth marches on, their designer jackboots, covered, well caked in, the blood of Lebanese, Gazans, Syrians, Iraqis, Libyans etc, not to mention little spatters of gore from the remains of UK Labour (with Corbyn STILL groveling to the ‘antisemitism’ lynch-mob) and other impudent goyim in the West. There being NO outer limit to Zionazi hatred, ambition and greed for power, this campaign has a long way to go. It can end in one of two ways-in total subjugation of the entire goy world to Zionazi diktat, a situation nearly achieved in the West, and realised, more or less totally in the USA, or in the revulsion of the world at Zionazi arrogance and barbarity finally causing some ghastly reaction. Both are dreadful outcomes, and the best, that Israel cease being a cancer on the world and become a more or less normal sane state, living in peace with its neighbours, seems utterly impossible. But with the rapidly worsening ecological Holocaust, even this catastrophe is a disaster of secondary significance.
No doubt with Trump in power (our first Likudnik President), international Zionist interests believe they have unrestricted freedom of action to move to eliminate dissenting voices in the media such as this.
Censorship of YouTube – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_of_YouTube
Know More News w/ Red Ice (Cohen, Censorship, Culture Wars)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTss3rip_mI
“…all great events have been distorted, most of the important causes concealed… If the history of England is ever written by one who has the knowledge and the courage, the world would be astonished.”
– Benjamin Disraeli
I think this censorship malarchy is just getting started. Not sure what the solution is, unfortunately in a relatively short space of time YouTube and their ilk have dominated where people go for info.
Time to start book-marking your sites and going there direct, but even then that might not work too far into the future either, nor for stuff you don’t know is out there or if you have information to share. Downloading videos and buying books is good for current and past events, but not so much for things yet to come. The control freaks don’t like their actions being exposed.
The “Ministry of Truth” strike s again.
As you stated “nothing new” with the cowardly vile censorship by D.I.A./Google/YouTube aka “GooTube”. This has been ongoing since DIA got control of “Google” and Google acquired YT.
Its been a sharp decline towards the Orwellian “Ministry of Truth” ever since.
Have you thought of another video platform… “Brighteon” … started by Mike “The Health Ranger” Adams after his battle w/ GooTube.
It has grown exponentially since its launch a couple of years ago.
Its crazy…but it is fun.
Russian film company “Star Media” has produced a number of interesting documentaries and historical reenactments from Soviet era. One of those was “Великая Война” (The Great War ), https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLhuA9d7RIOdZW5GMDfDzPZSIffFYUogL- , a truly spectacular 18-part historical reconstruction of the course of WWII as fought in the Soviet Union.
Originally produced in 2010 for Russian television audience, in 2011 it was re-issued as a full English language version, titled “Soviet Storm: World War II in the East”. See a trailer at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtpgjejmqL4
Unfortunately: this entire 18-part English version is now suddenly blocked on YouTube – without any explanation!
Clicking at the link given in the above trailer results only in “This video is unavailable.” (!)
(Attempting a YouTube search produces only a couple of partial results, in modified video formats, all posted by users other than StarMedia, obviously saved before this ban. To get the flavour of the English series, do try, for instance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LRf34bsUtMI )
Still another instance of “YouTube” censorship?
so for the past hour and a half I have been trying to answer my own question..and so far I am even more optimistic. I even see where in certain conditions there is a tremendous potential not only to build another internet..at a fraction of the costs anticipated that seems to be freaking everyone out.
and also in building another net it could open up related potential for the investor(s)
technology is advancing all the time which is another factor and infrastructure that cost huge a while ago is being constantly replaced by more easily installed smaller and cheaper devices.
a great author I admire once said that the problem with a certain people is that they no longer think Promethean like they used to, and so are stumped by long experience that they once overcame and prospered, set up the world in fact. we all now do not think Promethean, as if all that we face can be overcome and that we can put oppressive minorities to the side, out of our collective hair.
but another internet can be built..or the existing one revolutionized by simple, self interested collective thought and action by ordinary people..those victimized by the minority in everybody’s hair. that thought which should be natural has been tamped down in us by conditioning and fear of punishment. we we must regain such thought and put it into action
the internet is crucial now in human affairs and it is crucial for the net to be neutral. and we can and must make it so. and if we cant we must build a popular one owned by the people for the people and put the minority controlled on to the side
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjfWAbGfPh0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wA7FNV6U8rU
and this is the spirit that moves mountains
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1B0u6nvcTs
I am going to dig into this….its very interesting indeed
I used to read Counterpunch back in the 1980’s. I liked Alexander Cockburn’s writing. there a lot of left sites some of which I found interesting but never had the time to dig into. I used o look forward to the end of the week friday for the new Counterpunch edition
then I soured on Cockburn and had to give him up. I had to pay attention to my growing children. I did not have time for all of this. now Cockburn and all that crowd are gone and we have the Saker and Unz and a whole lot more. and today, this wednesday, more than any previous day I wondered what the hell all of this talk is about…where is it going?
I honestly cant see what is has achieved over a great many years of my life. I never posted on the net prior to this site..then the Unz site. but now that I am more directly engaged what is the point smacks me in the face. these days the bitching about the Khazars Jews has reached crescendo, a din now investing the wide heavens I am sure reaching out into endless space.
in this thread the Khazars are under attack for another attack on probably an undeserving customer that sets or continues undemocratic practices than infringes all we know to b right. but no one does anything about the Khazars. there are not 50 million Khazars in a world of 5-6 billion+ how have they managed to get power what appears to be total power over most of the world?
this all appears to be pointless to..all this talk because there is no truth to it. the Jews could have developed such power only with the collusion of lots of people who are not Jews..in all likelihood including all those who are bitching currently…bitching here in these pages
the Khazars who constitute almost all of current Jews are white people, Caucasian people and the complicity of the white world in the rise of the Khazars is clear. the Khazars could not have risen in the world as they have, were they not white. the white elites know the Khazars are Caucasian..and that no matter how the Khazars treat ordinary whites currently,they are not contemptuous of rich white elites. those groups are in collusion..rich whites and rich Khazars
so for all my life I have seen this talk..books, television, movies, now the net..political parties leaders etc. but none really threatened the Khazars… except John Kennedy and now that appears to have been an Irish Catholic/Khazar thing really. but JFK appears to have been an incompetent for he clearly had no idea what he was up against, and he should have, and prepared himself for a fight to the end in which he would give as good as he got. but he wasn’t prepared, and got himself and his whole family killed off
so here we are bitching about this latest censorship by the Khazar owners of everything and no one is doing a dam thing about it..only talk in the Saker and the Unz etc.
and when I say doing I am talking about simple obvious things..like making, creating alternate services that the Jews cannot interfere with.
I am talking about bringing the people into the game to cover the financial and political sides..for eg., that can get all monopoly regulation passed by Jewish political controlled regulatory power.
for instance make a popular internet cooperative… fully owned by people somewhere in america..or all over america, starting maybe with the active, like those in Detroit. but the people must be involved..the more the merrier. work out the trust, the program and set up the cooperate and they all own the dam thing..and where the regulations stop the effort bring them out into the streets in overwhelming numbers that’s what. get the regulations changed from th city to the state to DC..all the way.
where are all the brainy people, who are democratically-minded, and know that all democracy comes from the people in popular participation in and control of all social processes?
I get the impression that today, right now people the world over are ready for democracy, to take over and solve social problems. a Promethean view can help..th big picture and skills to organize popular movement right up to the national level and beyond. I see the people of Detroit moving and I wish I was young again. right there is where I would go and work along with them.
I am talking serious movement that is not even prepared to take no from the supreme court when the case is clearly on the popular side. the system simply must not be allowed to do as it pleases..that all is backstopped by the system and what they decide is final. no dam way! the people must be prepared to go all the way, overwhelmingly by numbers even the military would not shoot at..cannot shoot at.
that is one way to build another internet..the people finance it,own and run it, and make money off the profits. a share can be a few bucks. and the people in ownership can shake up the political situation, the regulatory situation in their favor. if the Supremes say no them get the politicians to change the law. I mean the people must select one of their own..or many of their own..ignoring totally the Repugs and Demorats..and elect these people and accompany them to the fora in which they must vote the peoples will
there are all kinds of ways out of this situation but they all involve popular participation. but few people who take here for example are not there with the people, helping the people to develop and hone their collective power..the power that can and will bell the Khazars.
all we get is talk..and publications on the net and more talk..and all the bright people are talking on the net. I get the impression they are all paid by the Khazars to keep the overall net discussion going, to occupy people with talk and divert them from action. the internet talk is a holding operation, a diversionary tactic big time
from boycott, to direct political action, to building alternatives financed and owned by the people..that’s the way to go..at least some real practical ways to go that should not bring anyone into risk of official violence etc. but we know that all such movements will be attacked, attempts to destroy them. so all can be prepared and ready for such attack with skill and sophistication, and the collective overwhelming power of the people to defeat all such
that would be a whole lot better than the bitching I see here and everywhere all the dam time. I am done talking myself. its altogether too much gas that takes us nowhere. it’s gas that wont make a car go