When is a volunteer not a volunteer?

There’s another dose of White Helmets propaganda on view at the Globe and Mail today, courtesy of Mark MacKinnon.

Seems that a few of those brave White Helmet volunteers that Israel allowed transit to Jordan last year remain stuck in Jordan, instead of finding their way to a warm welcome in Canada. Apparently there are “security concerns,” and our Foreign Minister sounds like she’s trying to fob them off on some other Western country, one that doesn’t vet their young Muslim immigrants of fighting age, coming from combat zones, as thoroughly as Canada does.

Call me skeptical, but the White Helmets saga has smelled mighty fishy from the get-go. The official story, that these are local volunteers saving their neighbours from the vile Assad’s relentless attacks, sounds good on the face of it.

So why does that bit of local altruism require an ex-SAS guy from the British Army by the name of James Le Mesurier to organize it? And how can a “volunteer” group soak up well over $100 million in Western financing over four short years? That’s well over $25,000 per “volunteer.” To put that into context, $25k is about 20 years salary for a conscript in Assad’s Syrian Arab Army.

Either these are the best paid volunteers in the Middle East, or James and his Mayday Rescue outfit are siphoning off one hell of a management fee.

MacKinnon recycles the stale tale of the White Helmets expose of of Assad’s use of chemical weapons:

Videos made by the White Helmets also provided the initial evidence-later substantiated by the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons-that the regime had used chemical weapons against its opponents.

Mark is being disingenuous with that claim. Google “OPCW news” and see what comes up. The integrity of the OPCW has taken a huge hit in recent weeks, and Mark is surely aware of that fact. Why not mention in this story?

Instead, he quotes Chystia Freeland blaming Russian smears.

Not sure exactly what it is you’re doing, Mark, but it isn’t journalism.