Dear colleagues! I wanted to discuss a wide range of issues with you today. Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has returned from a business trip abroad and will talk about its results and report on the progress of the special military operation.

Of course, we will talk about the situation in the Middle East and ensuring law and order in Russia itself. We will talk about protecting the rights of our citizens and public safety, civil peace and interethnic harmony, including in the face of external threats.

At a recent meeting with the leaders of religious associations, as you know, I spoke about attempts to use the dramatic situation in the Middle East and other regional conflicts against our country, against Russia, to destabilise and split our multi-ethnic and multi-religious society. To do this, they use a variety of means, as we can see: lies, provocations, and sophisticated technologies of psychological and information aggression.

To reiterate, those who are behind the conflict in the Middle East and other regional crises will use their destructive consequences to sow hatred and pit people all over the world against each other. This is the real mercenary goal of such geopolitical puppeteers.

We remember how the current round of the Middle East crisis began — with a terrorist attack against civilians in Israel and other countries on the territory of that State. We also see that instead of punishing criminals and terrorists, unfortunately, they have begun to take revenge based on the principle of collective responsibility. The terrible events that are now taking place in the Gaza Strip, when hundreds of thousands of innocent people are indiscriminately killed, who simply have nowhere to run and nowhere to hide from the bombardments, cannot be justified by anything.

When you look at bloodied children, dead children, how women and the elderly are suffering, how doctors are dying, of course, you clench your fists and bring tears to your eyes. There’s no other way to put it.

But we shouldn’t, we don’t have the right, and we can’t afford to be guided by emotions. We must clearly understand who is really behind the tragedy of the peoples of the Middle East and other regions of the world, who is organising the deadly chaos and who benefits from it. Today, in my opinion, this has already become obvious and understandable to everyone – customers act openly and impudently.

It is the current ruling elites of the United States and their satellites that are the main beneficiaries of global instability. They extract their blood rent from it. Their strategy is also obvious. The United States, as the world’s superpower – everyone sees and understands this, even judging by the trends in the world economy – is weakening and losing its position. The American-style world, with one hegemon, is collapsing, disappearing, gradually but steadily becoming a thing of the past.

Let me repeat once again: the US ruling elites and their satellites are behind the tragedy of the Palestinians, the massacre in the Middle East as a whole, the conflict in Ukraine and many other conflicts in the world – in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and so on. This is already obvious to everyone. They are the ones who set up their military bases everywhere, constantly use military force occasionally and without any occasion, and send weapons to conflict zones. They are sending financial resources, including to Ukraine and the Middle East, and they are inciting hatred in Ukraine and the Middle East.

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Finally, even Putin is directly pointing to the cause of world misfortunes spreading back several hundreds of years. Anglo-Zionist Hegemon and subordinate Euro-Nazi-Satanists have shown their true face. There is no doubt what their true role is and what their goals are. This should also be a wake-up call to Eastern Orthodox Christians and Muslims worldwide. We are the victims of the same enemy. It is time to stand united.