...Because of the confusion and distraction raised by the question of antisemitism, I firmly believe that it is time to coin a new term to describe certain attitudes about Israel. A perfect word would be "Israelopathy."
Israelopathy refers to a pathological disorder. It is a pathological and irrational obsession with, and hatred of, Israel. Israelopathy is characterized in several ways.
#1
Love the distinction but the word bugs me. Is cardiopathy an irrationally uncordial attitude toward the heart, or neuropathy a shocking prejudice against nerves per se? Does retinopathy take a dim view of retinas? Do psychopaths suffer an unusually acute and critical awareness of souls? Okay, maybe. But for me this "Israelopathy" thing might be more annoying than our beloved "phobias." Wish the author would brush up his Orwell and have another go.
[Liberty] Attorney General William Barr is reportedly working closely with the directors of the CIA, FBI and Office of the Director of National Intelligence to review the origins of the Trump-Russia probe, as well as surveillance efforts against the Trump campaign.
[Liberty] On Tuesday, LU reported that California Gov. Gavin Newsom pardoned seven felons slated for deportation in an act of defiance against Donald Trump. So far none of the freed ex-convicts has gone on to become a repeat offender, but the day is young: Give it time.
Meanwhile, another liberal state governor who displayed similar defiance earlier this year is reaping the windfall of her spiteful behavior. In February, New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham ordered a withdrawal of the majority of the National Guard troops the administration had sent to her state’s border with Mexico, stating, "New Mexico will not take part in the president’s charade of border fear-mongering by misusing our diligent National Guard troops."
So how’s that working out for her and the state of New Mexico? The Denver Post reports that Lujan Grisham’s office paid out $4,000 in taxpayer money for a bus to transport 55 Central American asylum seekers to Denver this past Sunday. The reason is that shelters in Las Cruces, N.M. have become overcrowded with migrants and asylum seekers since April 12.
BLUF:
The sudden increase in criminal activity was a result of two border patrol checkpoints having had to be shut down following Lujan Grisham’s National Guard withdrawal.
#1
See. This is how libs think it works: I don't live in NM, didn't vote for their mongrel governor. When the social costs of her "policies" become evident, however, I will be expected to "chip in" to defray them. Got it?
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
05/18/2019 9:14
Comments ||
Top||
#2
Oh have no doubt, she pays no price.
Perhaps the rate needs adjusting, but I usually double the taxpayer cost as the actual taxpayer cost, with administration, waste, graft, etc. figured.
So, how much do you have to whomp your ass to come up with $8,000? All she has to do is say, "Send them to Detroit Denver."
*Please if somebody local or knows better, but I am hearing from refugees that Denver is turning into an expensive, dangerous to drive in, shithole.
#8
Should be shipped to Santa Fe and Taos, bastions of the progressives not Denver.
The problem for NM, is that the state GOP really has no one to offer up in competition with the Donks. The prior Trunk governor already took up the two term limit.
[The Economist] Brad hooper quit his previous job at a grocery in Madison because his boss was "a little crazy". The manager threatened to sack him and other cashiers for refusing orders to work longer than their agreed hours. Not long ago, Mr Hooper’s decision to walk out might have looked foolhardy. A long-haired navy veteran, he suffers from recurrent ill-health, including insomnia. He has no education beyond high school. Early this decade he was jobless for a year and recalls how back then, there were "a thousand people applying for every McDonald’s job".
This time he struck lucky, finding much better work. Today he sells tobacco and cigarettes in a chain store for 32 hours a week. That leaves plenty of time for his passion, reading science fiction. And after years of low earnings he collects $13.90 an hour, almost double the state’s minimum rate and better than the grocer’s pay. His new employer has already bumped up his wages twice in 18 months. "It’s pretty good," he says with a grin. What’s really rare, he adds, is his annual week of paid holiday. The firm also offers help with health insurance.
His making improvements to fortunes replicate unique good points for more than a number of The usa’s lowest-paid. Handwritten “aid wanted” indicators decorate windows of many cafés and shops in Madison. A pair of steps on from the cigarette shop is the city’s job centre, the build a supervisor with small else to gather aspects to a show veil that tallies 98,678 unfilled vacancies across Wisconsin. In 5 years, he says, he has by no methodology viewed such ask for labour. He says some employers now recruit from a vocational practicing centre for the disabled. Others tour prisons, signing up inmates to work straight on their unlock.
Continued on Page 49
[Independent] German lawmakers have condemned a movement that calls for a cultural boycott of Israel, saying it is anti-semitic and reminiscent of the Nazi campaign against the Jews.
In a vote on Friday, the German parliament said the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign, which wants to place financial pressure on Israel over its occupation of Palestinian land, uses anti-semitic tactics.
"The argumentation patterns and methods used by the BDS movement are anti-semitic," read the motion submitted by German Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservative party (CDU), their Social Democrat coalition partners (SPD) as well as the Greens and Free Democrats.
The move comes after BDS, which advocates boycotts, divestment and sanctions against Israeli businesses, universities and cultural institutions, called upon artists and pop groups to boycott the Eurovision Song Contest, held in Tel Aviv on Saturday.
During the vote, which took place on the evening of the music show’s final, German MPs likened BDS campaigns to "the most terrifying phase of German history" when an estimated six million Jews were murdered during the holocaust.
[SOL] Over the weekend, Daniel Greenfield reminded America of one father that blamed 2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden for his son’s death. Many in America have never even heard of the single largest loss of life in the War on Terror, Extortion 17. It was a scandal bigger than Benghazi. Yet, because Joe Biden compromised national security by speaking of who allegedly killed Osama bin Laden, it cost the lives of 31 Americans on board Extortion 17, including 17 US Navy SEALS.
Billy Vaughn, father of slain Navy SEAL Aaron Vaughn who was aboard Extortion 17, told Freedom Outpost that his family wants to see Vice President Joe Biden and former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta held accountable for national security breaches when they outed the SEALs of SEAL Team Six in the alleged killing of Osama bin Laden.
Not only were the SEAL team members furious and shocked over the big mouths of the Obama administration beating its chest with pride over the success of killing bin Laden, but the families were equally enraged. The message compromised the safety of the unit, as well as their families.
At a gathering at the Ritz Carlton hotel in Washington, D.C. for the 50th anniversary of the Atlantic Council, a mere two days after the raid, Vice President Joe Biden remarked to the audience:
"Let me briefly acknowledge tonight’s distinguished honorees: Adm. Jim Stavridis is the real deal; he could tell you more about and understands the incredible, the phenomenal, the just almost unbelievable capacity of his Navy SEALS and what they did last ‐ last Sunday."
"And what was even more extraordinary was ‐ and I’m sure former administration officials will appreciate this more than anyone ‐ there was such an absolute, overwhelming desire to accomplish this mission that although for over several months, we were in the process of planning it, and there were as many as 16 members of Congress who were briefed on it, not a single, solitary thing leaked. I find that absolutely amazing," Biden added.
In 2012, Karen Vaughn, joined by her husband Billy on Fox News said, "As soon as Joe Biden announced that it was a SEAL Team who took out Bin Laden, within 24 hours, my son called me and I rarely ever heard him sound afraid in his adult life.... He said, ’Mom, you need to wipe your social media clean...your life is in danger, our lives are in danger, so clean it up right now’."
Mr. Vaughn, showing his anger and disgust with Biden, ripped the media. "The media has let this man get away with saying ’Uncle Joe’s gaffes, Uncle Joe’s gaffes," he said. "This is not Uncle Joe and he’s not some senile old grandfather. He is the second in command of the most powerful country in the world and he needs to take responsibility for the comments he makes and quit being given a pass."
[France24] Taiwan’s parliament voted to legalise same-sex marriage on Friday, becoming the first in Asia to do so.
Lawmakers had a two-year window to make a decision after Taiwan’s constitutional court ruled that same-sex couples had a right to marry in 2017.
Tens of thousands of supporters waiting outside the Legislative Yuan in Taipei in the rain burst into celebration after the vote was announced.
"#LoveWon," President Tsai Ing-wen tweeted. "We took a big step towards true equality, and made Taiwan a better country."
The weeks leading up to the vote were marked in part by student-led "men in skirts" events that went viral. At New Taipei Banqiao High School, students organised a week-long event in early May encouraging male classmates to wear skirts to support gender equality and challenge societal norms of what men and women should wear.
[AlterNet] A bill making its way through the Texas legislature would make protesting pipelines a third-degree felony, the same as attempted murder. "It’s an anti-protest bill, favoring the fossil fuel industry,...
A bill making its way through the Texas legislature would make protesting pipelines a third-degree felony, the same as attempted murder.
"It’s an anti-protest bill, favoring the fossil fuel industry, favoring corporations over people." ‐ Frankie Orona, executive director of the Society of Native Nations
H.B. 3557, which is under consideration in the state Senate after passing the state House earlier this month, ups penalties for interfering in energy infrastructure construction by making the protests a felony. Sentences would range from two to 10 years.
The legislation was authored by Republican state Rep. Chris Paddie. It passed the state House May 7 on a 99 to 45 vote, with two abstentions. The bill is being cosponsored in the state Senate by Republican state Sen. Pat Fallon.
In remarks on the state House floor during the bill’s passage, Paddie sought to assuage the fears of those who believe the legislation will target non-violent protest.
#1
People who are against energy production and distribution should put their money where their big mouths are: No more car, train or plane rides. We'll be glad to come audit your homes to make sure you don't have any nasty natural gas, propane or electrical hookups, and sorry, but those water and sewage lines have to go too, energy is involved in installing and maintaining them. Oh, and, I hope you are at least somewhat aware how oil and coal feed stocks figure in pharmaceuticals and most all other aspects of daily modern life. Enjoy your hemp shirt and backyard organic garden...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
05/18/2019 7:48
Comments ||
Top||
#2
Coming soon, felonies for protesting abortion clinics, shoddy software companies and sleazy politicians. You either have free speech or you have Harvard.
#3
This is a lie of a headline. Complete and utter bollocks. This bill makes it far more illegal than it already it to interfere with construction on other people's property, which the left thinks is a form of protest (it is not; it is terrorism, or at best, looting).
#4
The text of the bill appears to make a felony of criminal trespass combined with vandalism or damage to facilities. Not a lawyer, but it doesn't say you cannot protest. It says you can't break somebody else's stuff.
[American Thinker] In The Washington Post's article, "Have the Palestinians received 'more aid than any group' in history?," published May 12, 2019, the author "fact-checks" this statement made by Jared Kushner. Before presenting any findings, however, the author chooses to highlight the fact that the Trump administration has cut off aid to the Palestinians after opening by saying the "Trump administration has been unbashfully pro-Israel in its approach to the long-running conflict," which leads the reader to believe that this aid money was withdrawn unjustly.
Not once in the very long article does the author mention why the aid money was withdrawn. The author even has the audacity to end the piece calling out Kushner as presenting an unbalanced view of history when the author hypocritically did the same as he accused Kushner.
Why did the Trump administration cut Palestinian aid money? Because approximately half of foreign aid money the Palestinians received was paid as stipends to convicted terrorists and their families through the Palestinian Authority Martyrs Fund! Interesting how The Washington Post conveniently leaves out relevant facts, leading to an unbalanced and biased view, during a fact-checking article. Paying the Paleos so they can pay those stipends effectively means we would be supporting terror. WaPo is OK with that
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/18/2019
06:58 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
[AlterNet] At a glance, the American economy is doing pretty well. Unemployment has hit a record low. The stock market just hit a record high. Millions of people are finding work in the "gig economy."
But this rosy picture isn’t telling the whole story. It ignores the many women and men who are working one, two, or more jobs, and still struggling to make ends meet. The middle class is shrinking, the wealth gap is growing, and most Americans don’t have an extra $500 laying around to cover an emergency bill.
You’ll find plenty of evidence of this side of the economy in Stockton, California. It’s just an hour and change drive from Silicon Valley, but essentially none of tech’s wealth has made its way to the city of 300,000. Stockton has had the dubious honors of being the foreclosure capital of America, the largest city to seek bankruptcy protection, and can often be found on lists of the worst and most dangerous cities in the United States. One in four Stocktonians lives below the poverty line. The time has come to try something radical.
#6
Yeah, the robots etc. are getting smarter than the average bear. And that’s a problem - the average worker will have no economic value. The productive value of the robots will only increase, but the return is paid to the robot’s master. So, how does that average worker participate in the economy? I say tax the hell out of the robots which have taken his place and provide UBI to everyone.
'The President's unlawful declaration over a crisis that does not exist does great violence to our Constitution and makes America less safe, stealing from urgently needed defense funds for the security of our military and our nation,' they said.
#4
"We never denied there was a crisis at the border. We just *said* there was no border crisis. You can't expect us to believe our own talking points."
[Al-Rooters] Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) are "highly likely" to have facilitated attacks last Sunday on four tankers including two Saudi ships off Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates, according to a Norwegian insurers' report seen by Reuters.
The UAE, Saudi Arabia and Norway are investigating the attacks, which also hit a UAE- and a Norwegian-flagged vessel.
A confidential assessment issued this week by the Norwegian Shipowners'; Mutual War Risks Insurance Association (DNK) concluded that the attack was likely to have been carried out by a surface vessel operating close by that despatched underwater drones carrying 30-50 kg (65-110 lb) of high-grade explosives to detonate on impact.
The attacks took place against a backdrop of U.S.-Iranian tension following Washington's decision this month to try to cut Tehran's oil exports to zero and beef up its military presence in the Gulf in response to what it called Iranian threats. "Gulf of Tonkin!!1!" cries our resident hysterical handwringer!
"False flag! CIA!"
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/18/2019
04:54 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[9 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran Proxies
#1
...Not sure if this is the dog not barking in the night, but:
1) Not seeing anything in the media about this at all.
2) Gas prices - at least as of this morning - are down almost .30/gal in the last two weeks. Could it be that the US is pumping enough oil that the markets just aren't going to move any more against the usual provocations?
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
05/18/2019 6:06
Comments ||
Top||
#2
The UAE, Saudi Arabia and Norway are investigating the attacks, which also hit a UAE- and a Norwegian-flagged vessel.
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Iranian forces in Syria have not made any threatening movements towards the U.S.-led Coalition, a source from the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) told A-Masdar last night.
According to the source, the Iranian troops have remained in the same area they were previously deployed to in eastern (Deir Ezzor) and northern Syria (southern Aleppo).
When asked about the situation at the border, the Syrian Army source said there has been no increased Iranian or Iraqi presence, nor has there been any military movements in this region.
He would add that the U.S. claims of an ‘imminent’ attack by the Iranian forces are highly exaggerated as many of these groups affiliated with Hashd Al-Sha’abi (Popular Mobilization Units) in Iraq have made similar threats over the last two years.
These threats by the Hashd Al-Sha’abi groups are often nothing more than some demand that the U.S. forces leave Iraq or else they would force them to withdraw.
Furthermore, it was Hashd Al-Sha’abi who said the U.S. and their proxy rebel forces were planning on launching an offensive in eastern Syria to capture the border city of Albukamal.
The claim alleged that the U.S. forces were seeking to block Iran’s access to the international highway, as they were planning on using it to evade sanctions.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
03:58 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[13 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
[BBC] Swiss voters go to the polls on Sunday to decide whether to tighten up their gun laws to conform with European Union regulations.
Switzerland is not a member of the EU, but is part of the Schengen open-border treaty.
After the 2015 Paris attacks in which 130 people died, the EU issued Schengen members with new restrictions on automatic and semi-automatic weapons.
The EU hopes the rules will help police in Schengen countries.
These states now work together and share information on a daily basis, to establish where weapons used in crimes came from.
But the proposals have raised hackles in Switzerland, which has a long, and for many Swiss, proud tradition of gun ownership. After Swiss men complete their obligatory military service, they are permitted to keep their assault rifles.
There are gun clubs in every town and village, and target-shooting is a hugely popular sport.
Swiss law does require gun owners to have a permit, but getting one is relatively easy.
#1
So, the eurine argument (and the dems in America) is be more like us. The other side of that coin is I could argue be more like me (my guns are locked up, never hurt anybody and have contributed to the economy in many ways)
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
05/18/2019 7:14
Comments ||
Top||
#2
The Swiss have lots of guns, low crime rate, and haven't been in a war for over a century. How does that compare with the ones criticizing them?
#4
I am sure many things have changed, but 35 years ago we had an exchange student from Winterthur, Switzerland. One the one hand, property is scarce so many Swiss have large, 2-3 generational houses. Next, most are required to complete 2 years of military service between HS and college. Finally, they are encouraged to take their (he called them machine guns) rifles home and maintain them. It's implied they are in the military reserves. So, it would not be uncommon to find a Swiss house with 3 men (son, dad, grandpa) armed and trained with powerful guns. I am not sure if the gals also participate in military service, so maybe double that. It would be like invading Texas, except it's surrounded by mountains.
The structure of the Swiss militia system stipulates that the soldiers keep their own personal equipment, including all personally assigned weapons, at home (until 2007 this also included ammunition[5]). Compulsory military service applies to all male Swiss citizens, with women serving voluntarily. Males usually receive initial orders at the age of 18 for military conscription eligibility screening. About two-thirds of young Swiss men are found suitable for service, while alternative service exists for those found unsuitable.[6] Annually, approximately 20,000 persons are trained in basic training for 18 weeks (23 weeks for special forces).
The reform "Army XXI" was adopted by popular vote in 2003. It replaced the previous model "Army 95", reducing manpower from 400,000 to about 200,000 personnel, 120,000 receiving periodic military training and 80,000 reservists who have completed their total military training requirements.[7]
#8
And they have somehow avoided war and global conflict in over 700 years. --Besoeker
??
The Swiss mercenary pikemen ruled the battlefield, they then exported Swiss Guardsmen to France (til 1789) and the Papal States (ongoing if mostly ceremonial at this point). IIUC, the entire Swiss Banking System was the result of returning mercenaries needing someone to bank their money -- having a town full of ex-soldiers handy to stop bank robberies sure helped.
...As far as avoiding foreign wars, one source mentioned that the urban cantons (such as Berne) had wealthy merchants all ready to conquer the neighbors after rebelling against the Austrians. The forest cantons, where the people making up the army of pikemen came from, all voted "Nay!" on this as they could get better pay as mercenaries. Democracy in action, ain't it grand. And it can be seen why they still have a militia mentality to this day.
[Fortune] The U.S. has reached an agreement to drop steel and aluminum tariffs on the two countries in return for preventing Chinese steel from coming over their borders into the U.S.
In a speech before the National Association of Realtors, President Trump said, "I’m pleased to announce that we’ve just reached an agreement with Canada and Mexico and will be selling our product into those countries without the imposition of tariffs or major tariffs," according to Bloomberg.
This would remove one barrier the new USMCA agreement, the replacement for NAFTA, has faced in getting passage from Congress. Reactions have been relatively positive. "It’s a pretty good agreement," said Usha Haley, a professor of management and director of the Center for International Business Advancement at Wichita State University and co-author of Subsidies to Chinese Industry. "It looks promising and I think it’s a win for Trump."
"One client of mine, who fabricates and sells critical components to the world’s leading airplane manufacturers, has resorted to stockpiling their own supply of internationally sourced steel in their parking lot as trade negotiations play out," Carlos Martinez, a principle with southern California-based accounting firm Haskell & White, wrote in an email to Fortune. "Today’s news comes as a relief as it brings some clarity to metal pricing in North America."
The United Steelworkers sent a statement to Fortune that quoted USW International President Leo W. Gerard as saying, "Today’s agreement will help restore confidence and stability to the North American steel and aluminum markets. From day one, we made it clear that the real problem isn’t Canada or Mexico, but those countries that are undermining the trading system through predatory trade practices and non-market policies that have created massive overcapacity and trade imbalance."
After the Bay Bridge bolt debacle, I'd recheck the metallurgy of any steel products from China
[Washington Examiner] Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not want an American war with the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Yes, Netanyahu's government would welcome the Iranian regime's sudden implosion, but not at the price of war. To suggest otherwise is to fundamentally misunderstand Israeli security strategy.
Still, as Noah Pollak observes, America's greatest strategic mastermind, Ben Rhodes, has joined Iranian foreign minister/troll Javad Zarif to warn that Netanyahu is desperate for a U.S.-Iran war. Predictably, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, D-Hawaii, shares this sentiment. America's greatest strategic mastermind, Ben Rhodes.
*SNICKER*
But the war worriers are only right about Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. The de facto Saudi ruler would be very happy to see American service personnel fighting to rid Riyadh of its ideological nemesis.
Netanyahu? Forget about it.
First off, Israeli security strategy toward Iran rests not on the pursuit of regime change, but on Iran's constant understanding of Israeli deterrent overmatch. Israel ensures that Iran knows any critical threat it poses to Israel will lead to far greater Israeli threat to Iran. While Israel's intelligence services act relentlessly to detect Iranian actions against Israeli interests, it's a misnomer that those services are primarily defined by force. In fact, the Israelis tend only to employ force where they believe doing so is the only option to save lives. The vast majority of Israeli intelligence activity is focused on gaining understanding of Iranian/proxy plans, interests, and activities.
The Israelis have good reason for this balanced approach. Ultimately, the Israeli security establishment recognizes that a violent escalatory struggle with Iran carries outsize risks. Don't believe me? Then let's apply the notion to a U.S.-Iran war.
[The Federalist] Conservatives cheered the recent news that Attorney General William Barr had assigned U.S. Attorney John Durham to investigate the launch of the investigation into the Trump campaign. After his name hit the press, journalists covering the Spygate scandal quickly realized that Durham was the prosecutor investigating former FBI lawyer James Baker for potential illegal leaks.
During his October 3, 2018, testimony to the House judiciary and oversight committees, Baker testified about his long-time friendship with Mother Jones reporter David Corn. But when Rep. Jim Jordan asked whether he had spoken with Corn about any FBI investigations, and specifically the Steele dossier, Baker’s attorney shut down the questioning. Baker’s lawyer told the committee Baker would not discuss any conversations with reporters because Baker was still the subject of a criminal investigation into illegal leaks. When pushed on who was handling that investigation, Baker’s lawyer said, "John Durham."
In addition to Durham’s appointment, we know that former attorney general Jeff Sessions tapped Utah U.S. Attorney John Huber more than a year ago to investigate aspects of the Russia-collusion hoax. The office of Inspector General Michael Horowitz is also conducting an internal review, focusing on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act surveillance order.
While the breadth of Huber, Durham, and Horowitz’s investigations are unknown, when Barr testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee earlier this month, he provided many clues to the scope of malfeasance the DOJ is looking at‐and it appears to be a wide-ranging investigation.
[American Thinker] NATO, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, remains a problem for the U.S. Did it lose its purpose and objective after the Soviet Union was declared dissolved by Mikhail Gorbachev on December 25, 1991, or is it still a useful instrument of Western military and political policies?
The organization did not disband, but rather altered its mission and expanded in numbers, including former Warsaw Pact members Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. The U.S., though troubled by these changes, did not withdraw from NATO. Germany remained as the crucial European partner. Though Russia was obviously concerned about these developments, it is unlikely that this NATO expansion was a significant reason for Russia's more aggressive posture in recent years.
On April 4, 2019, NATO celebrated its 70th birthday at a gathering of the foreign ministers representing the 29 countries now members of the military pact. The pact began with 12 members in the atmosphere of the Cold War as a shield against aggression of the Soviet Union. Seventy years later, fear of the return of the Cold War is a less substantial phenomenon, and the charge of "collusion" between the presidential campaign of Donald Trump and unnamed Russian officials has been dismissed by the Mueller Report. Yet, there is a hazy line between Russian attempts at subversion of the West, using modern scientific methods as well as traditional activity, and overt conflict. NATO has always differed from other military organizations in that it claims that it is not only a military pact, but also an alliance of countries with shared values, individual liberty, democracy, human rights, and rule of law, and it has a mechanism for collective defense and military command.
From the start, there have been ironies in the composition of this "North Atlantic" alliance and in these claims. Geographers have been obliged to accept Balkan countries, and Hungary and Bulgaria as well as Turkey, as countries within the designated region of North Atlantic. In addition, the portrait of Turkey is less democratic than autocratic, under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is the holder of all executive power and who in 1996 defined democracy as "not a goal, but an instrument."
[Politico] Felix Sater, who became an FBI informant after pleading guilty in a 1998 fraud scheme, later helped drive talks for a potential Trump Tower Moscow.
A federal judge has confirmed for the first time that Felix Sater, a former Donald Trump business associate who drove Trump Tower Moscow negotiations during the 2016 election, helped the U.S. government track down Osama bin Laden.
During a hearing on Thursday in the Eastern District of New York ‐ held as part of a lawsuit brought by First Look Media to unseal records related to Sater’s longtime cooperation with the government on various national security issues ‐ Judge I. Leo Glasser said the media group already knew all of the "very interesting and dangerous things" Sater had done through his decade as an FBI informant.
"He cooperated," Glasser said. "And you know what he did over the 10, 11 years, because you told me that you know. He provided the telephone number of Osama bin Laden. He has done an awful lot of very interesting and dangerous things."
The detail is just another bizarre side plot that has emerged over the two-plus years that federal investigators, lawmakers and journalists have tried to uncover every detail about possible interactions between the Trump campaign and Russian intermediaries during the 2016 election. The probes have put spotlights on a cast of figures in Trump’s extended orbit, many of whom possess unusual backgrounds.
Sater was pulled into the public eye because of his role in trying to build a Trump Tower in Moscow. The deliberations have been of interest to investigators for two reasons. One, they occurred as the Kremlin was orchestrating an extensive campaign to interfere in the U.S. presidential election. And two, Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen later lied to Congress about how deep into campaign season the negotiations lasted.
#1
Wiki: Sater was convicted of fraud in connection to a $40 million penny stock pump and dump scheme conducted by the Russian Mafia[9][10] involving his company White Rock Partners. In return for a guilty plea, Sater agreed to assist the FBI and federal prosecutors as an informant in organized crime.
Yet another FBI informant strategically placed within the Trump organization. Little wonder the documents pertaining to his involvement were sealed.
Anbar (IraqiNews.com) Three individuals have been tossed in the slammer Drop the rod and step away witcher hands up! by Iraqi authorities for attacks that targeted security forces, local media reported on Friday.
Alsumaria News quoted Hadi Rezeig, Anbar police chief, saying the trio confessed to targeting security forces at different areas of the province.
They were arrested among dozens others who fought on the side of Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... forces of Evil who had overrun large areas of Anbar from 2014 to 2017. Rezeig said the trio confessed to helping the holy warrior group hold off advancing Iraqi forces which were working to regain control over lands occupied by IS.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State
Interesting. Enough Egyptian Christians have migrated to Europe to necessitate formal churches for them.
[AlAhram] Pope Tawadros II of Alexandria and Patriarch of St. Mark Diocese inaugurated on Friday Saint Athanasius the Apostle Church in Bitburg, a city in Germany, in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate approximately 25 km northwest of Trier and 50 km northeast of Luxembourg city.
On Thursday the pope left the Swiss city of Zurich for Germany at the end of a three-day pastoral trip.
During his trip to Switzerland ...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell... , he inaugurated a church in Zurich and performed pastoral activities as well.
Gene Simmons, bassist and co-lead singer for the rock band KISS, made news when he visited the Pentagon on Thursday as part of an initiative to connect the American public to the United States military.
But it was his emotional remarks about what America meant to him and his late mother that were remarkable.
"I’m a proud son of a concentration camp survivor of Nazi Germany. My mother was 14 when she was in the camps. I’m measuring my words because I’m about to break up again ‐," he said, striking the podium.
"My mother just passed at 93. But if Americans could see and hear my mother talk about America, they would understand," he said.
He shared what it was like when he first came to America as a child from Israel, not speaking a lot of English. He said his mother worked six days a week, and in the evenings, they would watch the news together.
By midnight, the three or four TV stations at that time would go off the air. But before then, they would watch a jet fly through the sky and melt into an image of the American flag. The national anthem would play, he said.
"And every time my mother saw the flag, she’d start crying," he said. "As an eight-year-old boy, I didn’t understand why, but from my mother’s point of view, we were finally safe," he said, choking up.
"I may have been born in the country that people throughout history have referred to as the Promised Land, but take my word for it ‐ America is the Promised Land, for everybody. And don't be ashamed, don't hesitate.
"We need to teach young people to be comfortable with saying God bless America," he said. "End of my story."
Simmons’ visit to the Pentagon transpired months ago. A Pentagon civilian employee met Simmons backstage at a show and invited him to visit the Pentagon if he was in the area. Simmons took him up on that offer.
Simmons’ visit highlighted the Pentagon’s #KnowYourMil initiative, which aims to educate Americans on exactly what members of the U.S. military do, and what jobs they fulfill, including everything from veterinarians to lawyers.
"What a privilege it was to meet an American icon who has such love for country, family, and our military," said Anne K. Joiner, acting principal deputy assistant to the secretary of defense for public affairs.
"We appreciate Gene and his wife, Shannon, for taking the time to visit with us and express such gratitude for the service and sacrifice of our men and women in uniform."
The #KnowYourMil initiative was launched in February 2018, amid growing concern that the U.S. military was becoming increasingly disconnected from the public it serves, which affects future recruitment and the sustainment of an all-volunteer military force.
According to a fact sheet, fewer than half of 1% of Americans serve in the military, and fewer than 15% of young adults have a parent who has served. In addition, less than 30% of 17 to 24-year-olds are eligible for military service.
More and more, military service has become a family affair, with 80% of those in uniform today having had a family member serve in the U.S. military.
Joiner said the #KnowYourMil initiative is about "connecting Americans to their military."
"We want to create conversations that bring civilian and military communities together," she said.
[IsraelTimes] French jihadist, who killed four people in 2014 anti-Semitic rampage, is accused of acting as jailer to 4 French journalists taken hostage in Aleppo.
Belgian authorities have transferred Mehdi Nemmouche,
...the fatherless Algerian-Frenchman who spent his childhood between foster homes and jail before turning to radical Islam. He is linked to Salim Benghalem, the leader of the Buttes-Chaumont terrorist network and France’s chief ISIS recruiter, as well as several other significant personages in our archives. Mr. Nemmouche is said to be the first foreign fighter to return to stage a terror attack on European soil for his 2014 attack on the Jewish Museum of Brussels...
the French jihadist who killed four people at a Jewish museum in 2014, to Gay Paree for questioning over his suspected role in the kidnapping of four journalists in Syria in 2013, a legal source said Friday.
Nemmouche, 34, was sentenced to life in prison in March for the anti-Semitic rampage in Brussels, when he bumped off two Israeli tourists, a French volunteer and a young Belgian employee.
The museum attack came after his return from Syria’s battlefields, where Nemmouche is accused of acting as the jailer of four French journalists taken hostage by jihadists in the northern city of Aleppo in 2013.
During his Brussels trial two of the journalists testified they had no doubt Nemmouche was one of their captors.
He was brought to La Belle France on Wednesday and is being held at the Meaux-Chauconin prison east of Gay Paree, the legal source said, confirming a report in French magazine L’Express.
Nemmouche and Nacer Bendrer, his accomplice in the museum attack, were already expected to serve their sentences in La Belle France.
Even before the Brussels trial a French judge had summoned Nemmouche to La Belle France for questioning about the kidnapping, but he had refused to speak.
The journalists were held by the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group in Aleppo for 13 months until their release in April 2014, when they were found blindfolded and with their hands bound in the no-man’s land on the border between Syria and The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...Qatar's colony in Asia Minor.... Nicolas Henin, one of the kidnapped journalists, described Nemmouche in a magazine article later that year as "a self-centered fantasist for whom jihad was finally an excuse to satisfy his morbid thirst for notoriety. A young man lost and perverse."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Russian Air Force reportedly launched several Arclight airstrikes over rural Aleppo last night, targeting a number of sites belonging to the jihadist rebels.
Russian jets flying out of the Hmeimim Airbase in southwest Latakia made their way to the Aleppo Governorate last night, where they unleashed a flurry of airstrikes over Dart Izza, Kafr Hamra, Khan al-Assal, Rashideen 4.
The Russian Air Force also targeted some areas in the Idlib Governorate, including the western region near the city of Jisr al-Shughour.
The Russian airstrikes were launched shortly after the gunnies attempted to fire missiles at the Hmeimim Airbase.
No missiles managed to hit the Hmeimim Airbase, but the repeated attempts by the bully boy forces have prompted the Russian military to intensify their strikes across northwestern Syria.
Furthermore, the jihadist rebels of Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham prompted the response from the Russian Air Force when they once again attacked the Nayrab Refugee Camp in southern Aleppo.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[9 views]
Top|| File under: al-Nusra
[BALTIMORE.CBSLOCAL] Police have jugged Book 'im, Mahmoud! three teens in connection with the murder of a 14-year-old girl.
Ariana Funes-Diaz, 14, of Adelphi, was found dead in a creek on May 15 in the 6300 block of 64th Avenue in Riverdale, police said.
The suspects are 16-year-old Josue Fuentes-Ponce of Bladensburg, 17-year-old Joel Escobar of Northeast Washington, DC, and 14-year-old Cynthia Hernandez-Nucamendi of Lothian, Md.
Detectives are working to identify a fourth suspect. All three of the arrested suspects are charged as adults.
An autopsy conducted on May 16 found that Funes died from blunt force trauma and it was ruled a homicide.
On April 18, the three arrested suspects, a fourth unidentified suspect and the victim all drove together to an apartment complex in the 6300 block of 64th Avenue in Riverdale.
Police said they believed she planned to go to the police about a crime they had all committed on April 17 in Washington, DC.
"What we believe took place was that they were afraid she was going to go to the police department or the authorities and say what took place in a crime they were involved in," Maj. Brian Riley of the Prince George’s County Police Department said.
The group then allegedly walked into a wooded area behind the complex where they assaulted her with a machete and baseball bat, officials said. She then died from her injuries.
Police said Fuentes-Ponce and Escobar are members of an MS-13 clique based out of Prince George’s County.
When they were asked if there has been a rise in gang-related crimes in the area, police said they had not noticed a recent uptick.
The three arrested suspects are all charged with first-degree murder and related charges. Escobar and Hernandez-Nucamendi are in the custody of the Department of Corrections on a no-bond status.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[4 views]
Top|| File under: Narcos
#1
Pelosi first alluded to God, saying, “Some of us who are attracted to the political arena, to government and public service” believe that “we are all God’s children” and “there is a spark of divinity among every person on earth, and we all have to recognize that as we respect the dignity and worth of every person.”
She went on to say we must recognize that divinity in others, and it is our responsibility to do so because we have “divinity in us.”
Pelosi then took a soundbite that has been perpetuated throughout the media out of context from the president’s comments on MS-13 gang members and attributed it to all immigrants. “So when the president of the United States says about undocumented immigrants, ‘These aren’t people, these are animals,’ you have to wonder, does he not believe in the spark of divinity, the dignity and worth of every person?’
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/18/2019 5:08
Comments ||
Top||
#2
Nancy Pelosi is about as divine as an MS13 commander.
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Syrian military and their Paleostinian allies recently targeted a Death Eater ATGM nest near the Idlib Governorate border.
Backed by the Paleostinian paramilitary group, Liwaa al-Quds ...the Jerusalem Brigade is a Paleostinian-Syrian pro-Government group that operates in Aleppo, formed in 2013. The group is composed of predominately Sunni Paleostinians from the al-Nayrab district as well as the former refugee camp Handarat. It is believed to be the largest Assadist auxilliary force operating in storied Aleppo... , the Syrian military attacked the Death Eater ATGM nest, blowing up in order to prevent any more strikes from taking place there.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[12 views]
Top|| File under: al-Nusra
[ToloNews] Four members of the Public Protection Forces were killed after a group of button men attacked their outpost on the outskirts of Kabul city on Thursday evening.
Kabul police and the Public Protection Forces headquarters have not confirmed the causalities.
TOLOnews news hound Karim Amini visited the area on Friday. He said the security outpost is located on a hillside and it has been heavily damaged in the attack.
Local residents said the Death Eaters surrounded the outpost from all sides and fought against the soldiers for more than one hour until they all were killed.
"People were sleeping that we heard the sound of rocket firing and gunfire and then we saw that the outpost was attacked," said Gulab Khan, a eyewitness.
"They had torches. They came down, fought with security forces and then set on fire the outpost and left the area," said Faridullah, a eyewitness.
"They poured fuel on the soldiers’ bodies and burned them," said Kabir Khan, a resident of the area.
The outpost is only a few kilometers away from the Pul-e-Charkhi security belt, but the eyewitnesses said while the fights continued for over an hour, no reinforcement was sent to the area.
"Security forces stationed in the security belt should have hurried for saving their friends’ lives without the permission of their commander," said Agha Gul, a local resident.
So far, no group has grabbed credit for the attack.
Officials from the Ministry of Interior said the Public Protection Forces are maintaining security of nearly 200 projects being implemented by the private sector, government and the international organizations.
[Jpost] In a landmark vote the German Bundestag ruled on Friday that the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is antisemitic, calling on German Federal offices and bodies not to collaborate in any way with events that advocate to boycott or delegitimize the Jewish state.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu congratulated the Bundestag on its "important decision to recognize BDS as an anti-Semitic movement and that it is forbidden to support it."
"I particularly appreciate the Bundestag's call on Germany to stop funding organizations that work against the existence of the State of Israel," Netanyahu said, "I hope this decision will lead to concrete action and I call on other countries to adopt similar legislation."
Concrete action? Aye, there’s the rub.
Israel's Ambassador to Germany Jeremy Issacharoff tweeted,"The Bundestag has just adopted a Resolution condemning BDS and Anti-Semitism by a wide margin. We welcome this initiative by its sponsors. It has broader European significance given that BDS makes no attempt to build coexistence and peace between Israel and all of its neighbors."
The resolution was initiated by the governing Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the Social Democratic Party (SPD),
...their think tank is in the habit of of supporting official Iranian Holocaust deniers and blackballing anyone who supports Israel, but please don’t notice that at this particularly happy moment...
the Green Party and the Free Democratic Party (FDP).
The motion, termed "Resisting the BDS movement decisively ‐ fighting antisemitism," calls on the government to "not provide premises and facilities under the administration of the Bundestag to organizations that express themselves in antisemitic terms or question Israel’s right to exist."
In practicality, the motion is being understood as recognizing that Israel represents the Jewish people and is the home of the Jewish collective, therefore delegitimizing Israel is considered antisemitism.
[Rudaw] Three members of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) were killed in Raqqa governorate near the border with The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... , a UK-based monitor reported on Thursday. Separately, pro-SDF media reported a suicide truck bomb killed one person and injured six others on the same day in Manbij.
Leaders of the Asayesh (Kurdish security) and SDF died following the kaboom of improvised bombs (IEDs) and mines in the Tal Abyad countryside, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights wrote.
Neither official Ottoman Turkish or SDF media sources or officials confirmed the incident, nor did they reveal what leaders were killed.
Tal Abyad (Gire Spi) is located about 80 kilometers north of Raqqa city and sits on the border with Turkey. The border is known to be heavily mined.
Tensions between the Ottoman Turkish government and Kurdish fighters span roughly 750 kilometers from Afrin in northwest Syria to Qandil near the Kurdistan Region of Iraq's border with Iran.
In Manbij, Hawar News reported that a boom-mobilewent kaboom! on Thursday afternoon, killing one person and injuring six more including a child. The condition of the injured was described as stable.
Additionally, the reported kaboom caused material damage to vehicles and buildings.
The Manbij Military Council, which holds the security portfolio for the city, did not immediately comment on the reported bombing. ISIS through its propaganda channel on Telegram, Furat News, claimed a car kaboom in Manbij on Thursday targeting Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) elements.
The city is located in Aleppo governorate just west of the Euphrates about 30 kilometers south of the border with Turkey.
The SDF have served as the partnered ground force of the US-led international anti-ISIS coalition. On March 23, the SDF declared the defeat of the holy warriors following the liberation of al-Baghouz in eastern Deir ez-Zor governorate.
In December, Trump announced the United States would with draw all of its 2,200 forces from Syria. However, it's easy to be generous with someone else's money... he later backtracked to leaving 400 forces and implored on regional and international actors to play a greater role in stabilization and preventing an ISIS resurgence.
The United States plans to split the forces in the northeast and at its garrison on the Jordan-Iraq-Syria border at At Tanf. SDF Commander-in-Chief Mazloum Kobane says the US force levels would be "insufficient" to ensure the lasting defeat of ISIS.
Violence in northeast Syria, or Rojava, has persisted following the announcement nearly two months ago.
British Maj. Gen. Chris Ghika, a deputy commander in the anti-ISIS coaliton, told Pentagon news hounds on Tuesday that member militaries "must continue working with our partners to create the conditions in which ISIS cannot thrive again..."
The coalition and SDF helped to establish civil and military councils in northeast Syria as cities were liberated.
"Militarily, we continue our campaign to ensure the lasting defeat of ISIS. We cannot do it ourselves. Campaigns cannot be won by fighting alone. Instead, it requires a whole-of-government approach with the support of the international community, assisting the government of Iraq and the Syria civil councils to set the conditions for the stability and the prosperity that they crave," he said from Baghdad via teleconference.
Ghika acknowledged there will be stumbling blocks along the way.
"Having defeated ISIS's physical holdings in Baghouz, our partners are now progressing steadily back up the Euphrates River Valley, clearing the remnants of ISIS," he added. "The pace is slow and it's methodical, with the ground and buildings seeded with IEDs and booby traps. But progress is being made."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[10 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State
[BALTIMORE.CBSLOCAL] The crippling cybersecurity attack on Baltimore City enters its ninth day, as city officials continue to say they can’t say much about the investigation.
City Council President Brandon Scott has called for a committee to look into the city’s cybersecurity and its response to this attack.
Hackers are demanding a ransom from Baltimore City, and have warned the City would lose its data after 10 days.
The deadline is on Friday.
"I think if they delete data, we’re going to be in a world of hurt," said Chris Sachse, ThinkStack.
Sachse is the CEO at ThinkStack, a Baltimore cybersecurity firm.
He said if the hackers have access to any backup systems, it could mean trouble.
"It’s still somewhat of an active scene of the crime, so they’re trying to follow the bread crumbs to see who did this," Sachse said.
Wednesday afternoon, officials struggled to answer questions regarding the city’s preparation for a cyber attack like this, any contact with the hackers and who the city has hired to help them recover.
"Honestly, a lot of the lack of transparency is that they don’t’ know," Sachse said.
Experts claim hackers demanded 13 bitcoins within 10 days, which totals up to $100,000.
But that demand would keep going up every day after four days.
"It’s a fairly reasonable amount of money in the grand scheme of things to ask from a city," Sachse said.
However, there's more than one way to skin a cat... paying would not guarantee a solution.
"You have no idea if that hacker is going to give you what you need. Are they going to give you that decyrption key? If they give you the decyrption key, is it going to work?"
"How much money are going to spend to try to decrypt these passwords and how much risk are we willing to take that the guy won’t delete those files? To me, for 70 thousand, now 100 thousand, I would pay that." Sachse said.
The ransomware struck citywide, but particularly the City Finance Department.
Online billing remains down as does the ability to close real estate transactions, no title searches, no lien certificates.
"It will get resolved. It has to be resolved. There’s no way we can avoid that." said Bob Flynn, In-House Title Co.’s attorney.
In the only timeline to which officials Wednesday would commit, they said they hope the lien system will be up late next week.
Sachse said even if the city pays the ransom, which Mayor Jack Young said he won’t do, there is still no way of knowing whether other malware may be in the system- meaning the investigation and recovery would still be slow and intensive.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
If they don't pay the ransom will the evidence of corruption of the city administration get deleted?
[ECONOMIST] Pakistan has borrowed from the multilateral lender as often as Argentina has
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[11 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
Maybe if it completely folds into chaos there is a chance it can be rebuilt
However I believe pakastain is beyond help. All we can hope for is that we can control the metastasis into other countries
I pray every day that their nukes are somehow taken from them before a western city disappears
Police announced the arrests on Friday and showed off bomb-making evidence
They said they had learned of a plan to use WIFI to blow up explosive backpacks
The suspects are thought to have been plotting carnage when election results are announced next week
World's largest Muslim majority nation has seen a string of attacks by Islamists
Some 29 suspects were rounded up this month alone, with 60 in all detained since the start of the year in raids across the Southeast Asian nation, they said.
Eight other suspects had been killed in confrontations with authorities, police said, including the wife of a militant who blew up herself and a child following a dramatic standoff at their home in March.
Some arrested suspects were skilled bomb makers and had fought alongside the jihadist group in Syria, as well as members of local extremist network Jemaah Anshurat Daulah (JAD), police said.
JAD has pledged allegiance to IS and was blamed for a wave of suicide bombings at churches in Indonesia's second-biggest city Surabaya last year.
[Jpost] The U.S. embassy in Jakarta has issued a security alert ahead of election results due on Wednesday, as Indonesian authorities have arrested nearly 30 suspected militants, including some who police say are able to detonate bombs using Wi-Fi networks.
The embassy advised U.S. citizens to avoid areas where large demonstrations may occur in Jakarta, and in other cities including Surabaya in East Java and Medan in North Sumatra, in a statement that was dated on Friday, May 17.
Indonesian authorities have said they are heightening security ahead of May 22, when the official result of last month's presidential election will be announced.
Indonesian National Police spokesman, Muhammad Iqbal, told reporters in a briefing on Friday that police this month have arrested 29 suspects linked to Jemaah Ansharut Daulah (JAD) - the largest Islamic State-linked group in the country - and confiscated at least five homemade bombs in various locations across Java and North Sulawesi.
Some of the suspects have had paramilitary training and went to Syria as foreign fighters, Iqbal said.
Indonesian police also revealed that some of the suspects have learned how to use Wi-Fi to detonate explosive devices, but it was not immediately clear how advanced their plans were.
Detonating bombs using a Wi-Fi network is considered a new technique, Dedi Prasetyo, another National Police spokesman, told Reuters on Tuesday, and gets around using phone signals, which can be jammed during rallies involving large crowds.
"If there is (cell phone) jammer, then phones are not operable but the Wi-Fi signal will not be disturb, especially when using signal amplifier," Prasetyo said.
The police spokesmen did not answer or return phone calls on Saturday to get more information.
The police arrested EY, a local leader of JAD in Bekasi, near the capital Jakarta, on May 8 in the capital for plotting attacks during next week's announcement of the presidential election. The police identified the suspect only by his initials.
JAD does not have an official spokesman, and it is not known if any of the suspects have retained legal representation.
The arrests are part of the authority's efforts to tighten security ahead of an announcement by the General Election Commission (KPU) on May 22, when nearly 32,000 police and military personnel will be on standby in Jakarta.
The announcement is expected to confirm unofficial counts by private pollsters that showed incumbent President Joko Widodo as having won the race, a result which has been publicly disputed by his contender, ex-general Prabowo Subianto.
Prabowo's supporters have pledged to protest peacefully if the official result confirms Widodo's victory, and large groups of people could be out in the streets after the announcement.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[3 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State
[IsraelTimes] State news agency says Syrian air defenses shot down ’hostile targets’ coming from the Golan; sounds of kabooms reported near Damascus.
Syrian state media on Friday evening said that Israel had launched a strike against targets near Damascus and claimed the country’s air defenses downed a number of missiles.
"Aerial defenses detected hostile targets coming from the direction of Quneitra and dealt with them," the official SANA news agency quoted a military source saying, referring to a Syrian town in the Golan Heights bordering Israel. "We intercepted the missiles with several Iranian arms depots. All is well. Nothing to see here. Go about your business"
Reports in Syria said there were loud kabooms south of Damascus, the capital.
There was no response from the Israel Defense Forces, which rarely comments on reported strikes.
The Britannia-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor, reported three kabooms southwest of Damascus. It added that it was not immediately clear if the kabooms were caused by Israeli airstrikes or surface-to-surface missiles.
The Observatory’s chief, Rami Abdurrahman, told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named that the strikes targeted the area of el-Kiswah, which is home to positions and storage sites for Iranian and Leb’s Hezbollah forces allied with Syria’s government.
In November 2017, Western intelligence officials told the BBC that Iran had established a permanent military base in el-Kiswah. Israel has reportedly hit the base several times.
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Syrian air defenses were activated tonight after several enemy projectiles began targeting the Damascus and al-Quneitra governorates.
According to a military source, the air defense forces at Mezzeh Airport quickly engaged the enemy projectiles after they were fired from the Golan Heights region.
The source said some of the projectiles were shot down by their air defenses; however, several others were believed to have struck their intended targets in western Syria.
#1
"The source said some of the projectiles were shot down by their air defenses; however, several others were believed to have struck their intended targets in western Syria."
'Okay, how many?'
'All of 'em.'
'But I thought you said - '
'Shaddap.'
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
05/18/2019 6:10
Comments ||
Top||
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Approximately 30 students at Memorial High School in Hedwig Village dressed as 'thugs' for the special spirit week day.
#1
I'm unclear: Is the racism here from dressing like a black person or dressing like a particular sort of black person? What if they dressed like Clarence Thomas who, I presume, wears a suit and tie to work instead of some Compton rapper?
#3
dressing like a particular sort of black person
Embrace theoretical rigor!
The Negro who passes as whigger,
Co-opting the clothes
Of the culture he loathes,
Slides his universe sideways. "Muh trigga!"
Pretty spooky there, Pic-a-Nic! Sweat a gawd, I didn't touch it.
#6
America, please, some compassion
For kids that your culture is trashin',
And bet your sweet bippy
That thug garb, like hippie,
Is simply a statement of fashion!
“On the off chance those stupid Americans aren’t dramatizing themselves, the Iranian catspaws will attack them, not us. So no worries.”
[Rudaw] Germany wants to quickly resume its military training mission in Iraq by Monday and the Netherlands will likely resume its training program this weekend, the government officials in each country have told media.
Dutch Defense Minister Ank Bijleveld and Foreign Affairs Minister Stef Blok told the Lower House of Representatives in a letter that they "expect" to "resume" the training of soldiers in Iraq, the Dutch daily De Telegraaf published on Thursday.
"The government as always keeps a close watch on the situation and continuously assesses whether the training provided by the Dutch military is safe. The safety of our people is above everything else," the ministers said.
The Netherlands maintains a few soldiers in Baghdad and more than 50 in Erbil as part of the US-led Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS. Its military like Germany’s, as part of NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... , also works with that training mission for Iraqi Security Forces, including the Kurdistan Region's Peshmerga.
Germany announced it was suspending its training mission for Iraqi and Peshmerga soldiers on Wednesday, citing a "crisis" between the United States and Iran in the country. The Netherlands cited similar reasons for suspending its training on the same day.
Die Zeit, a German newspaper, reported on Thursday that the Defense Ministry in Berlin was re-evaluating the security situation in Iraq in coordination with coalition partners and unnamed ministry officials want to quickly resume their military training mission.
It added that Germany's military should restart its training mission this weekend or by Monday.
Germany has about 100 soldiers in Erbil and 60 more in Taji, north of Baghdad.
While the United States chose to pull non-essential babus government employees from its consulate in Erbil and embassy in Baghdad, neither European nation opted for that route.
The German consulate in Erbil tweeted on Thursday: "GermanyInKRI is continuing the Consulate’s regular business. Regarding the Bundeswehr, the Ministry of Defense front man clarified that the Bundeswehr has not left Iraq. They are merely staying inside the camp because of Coalition forces security advice."
While Deputy Head of Mission for the Netherlands in Iraq Eric Stratling tweeted on the same day: "Contrary to media reports, the Dutch Embassy in Baghdad and the Consulate-General in Erbil are not evacuating. Also, the Dutch trainers of the anti-ISIS coalition are just complying with increased security measures by the coalition leadership and will resume training asap."
Peshmerga Chief of Staff Jabar Yawar said on Friday the Kurdish forces would welcome the return of "many types of training including for urban warfare and demining."
"We have benefited from them a lot," he told Rudaw English. "They are more experienced. They have experienced trainers in all sectors of warfare."
The world is not safe from ISIS extremism, Yawar explained: "ISIS is a threat still to all over the world, not just Kurdistan. ISIS persists as a terrorist group in the world."
[FreeBeacon] Whatever the opposite of a rush to war is—a crawl to peace, maybe—America is in the middle of one. Since May 5, when John Bolton announced the accelerated deployment of the Abraham Lincoln carrier group to the Persian Gulf in response to intelligence of a possible Iranian attack, the press has been aflame with calls for America to show restraint, pursue diplomacy, and rein in the madman with the mustache before he starts a war.
Never mind that President Trump, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo, Patrick Shanahan, and Bolton have not said a single word about a preemptive strike, much less a full-scale war, against Iran. Never mind that the president's reluctance for overseas intervention is well known. The antiwar cries are not about context, and they are certainly not about deterring Iran. Their goal is saving President Obama's nuclear deal by manipulating Trump into firing Bolton and extending a lifeline to the regime.
It's a storyline that originated in Iran. Toward the end of April, Zarif showed up in New York and gave an interview to Reuters where he said, "I don't think [Trump] wants war," but "that doesn't exclude him basically being lured into one" by Bolton. On May 14, an adviser to Rouhani tweeted at Trump, "You wanted a better deal with Iran. Looks like you are going to get a war instead. That's what happens when you listen to the mustache. Good luck in 2020!"
And now this regime talking point is everywhere. "It's John Bolton's world. Trump is just living in it," write two former Obama officials in the Los Angeles Times. "John Bolton is Donald Trump's war whisperer," writes Peter Bergen on CNN.com. "Trump's potential war with Iran is all John Bolton's doing. But it might also be his undoing," says the pro-Iran Trita Parsi on NBCNews.com. "Is Trump Yet Another U.S. President Provoking a War?" asks Robin Wright of the New Yorker. Guess her answer.
Oh, and reading the article you see the French want-ta-be Kennedy but really just a one trick commie from Boston who is a billionaire's TOY BOY deep in the do do too.
Posted by: 3dc ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[7 views]
Top|| File under: Tin Hat Dictators, Presidents for Life,
[TakiMag] So, again, Cicero’s question: "Cui bono?" Certainly not the American people.
Who really wants this war? How did we reach this precipice?
I’m an American people. I don’t want this war, but I strongly suspect it is necessary. Not to protect Israel, which for some reason is Mr. Buchanan’s bete noire, but because I don’t want nuclear devices blowing up in the various locations scouted by Ali Kourani and his colleagues in the U.S. and elsewhere. And I would dearly love to tear Iran’s various catspaws away from the Hispano-American narco gangs that already own too many American nighbourhoods.
A year ago, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a MacArthurian ultimatum, making 12 demands on the Tehran regime.
Iran must abandon all its allies in the Middle East ‐ Hezbollah in Lebanon, the Houthis in Yemen, Hamas in Gaza ‐ pull all forces under Iranian command out of Syria, and then disarm all its Shiite militia in Iraq. All terrible and yadda yadda, but WAR? The extreme measure is worth this?
How do you suggest we end Iranian support of their jihadi catspaws, Herb?
Well wishes and kowtowing to a third-rate power Iran must halt all enrichment of uranium, swear never to produce plutonium, shut down its heavy water reactor, open up its military bases to inspection to prove it never had a secret nuclear program and stop testing missiles. And unless she submits, Iran will be strangled with sanctions.
Pompeo’s speech at the Heritage Foundation read like the terms of some conquering Caesar dictating to some defeated tribe in Gaul, though we had yet to fight and win the war, usually a precondition for dictating terms.
Iran’s response was to disregard Pompeo’s demands.
And crushing U.S. sanctions were imposed, to brutal effect.
You didn’t want open war. Crushing sanctions are the alternative. Or surrender, while Iran tries to do what Saddam Hussein tried a generation ago: to corner enough of the oil market to be able to blackmail the world into submission — starting with giving them Israel and Mecca, and ending with the world’s womenfolk showing no more than 1” of hair while the menfolk troop to Shiite mosques five times a day to pray properly to Allah.
Yet, as one looks again at the places where Pompeo ordered Iran out ‐ Lebanon, Yemen, Gaza, Syria, Iraq ‐ no vital interest of ours was imperiled by any Iranian presence.
No vital interest except Iran’s stated long term goal. Like the Soviet Union, the Iranians are content to conquer the world piecewise instead of in open world war.
The people who have a problem with Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon are the Israelis whose occupations spawned those movements.
I am willing to believe Mr, Buchanan is not, exactly as he has so often claimed, a Joo-hater. He sure is hung up on Israel, though. Why is that?
As for Yemen, the Houthis overthrew a Saudi puppet.
At the time the Saudis were still unofficially financing Al Qaeda, as I recall, which seems a bit contradictory. But the Saudis also had apparently endless funds at the time, and they did like to play Allah’s chosen philanthropists. Perhaps therein lies the confusion.
Syria’s Bashar Assad never threatened us, though we armed rebels to overthrow him.
He funded both Al Qaeda Lions of Islam and the fighting remnant of Saddam Hussein’s Baathists, allowing them to pass freely through his through his border to fight our troops, then return to shelter in his territory. It’s all in Rantburg’s archives.
In Iraq, Iranian-backed Shiite militia helped us to defend Baghdad from the southerly advance of ISIS, which had taken Mosul. We allied with al-Qaeda in Syria. Gave them arms. Training. Taught them how to kill. Let that sink in for a moment.
That was ordered by President Barack Hussein Obama (D-Moslem Brotherhood/Alinsky revolutionary) with the avid support of Senator John McCain (AZ-Republican of convenience), both of whom claimed those they were supporting were “moderate, democratic Islamists”. On the other hand, the Iranian-backed Shiites (mostly Sadr’s people in those days) had since the 2003 invasion and overthrow of Saddam Hussein been murdering American soldiers in significant numbers, though the American news media ignored it as hard as they could... and the DoD was under orders to not complain about it because President George W. Bush had lost momentum to Democratic posturing about the war.
Who wants us to plunge back into the Middle East, to fight a new and wider war than the ones we fought already this century in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya and Yemen?
All those are battlefields in the same war against the current wave of expansionist Muslim jihad, just like so many wars post-Korea were merely battlefields in the war against expansionist Soviet-Maoist Communism. I find it hard to understand how an intelligent man like Mr. Buchanan fails to see the existential parallels.
Answer: Pompeo and Bolton, Bibi Netanyahu, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and the Sunni kings, princes, emirs, sultans and the other assorted Jeffersonian democrats on the south shore of the Persian Gulf.
Ooooooh, sarcasm. How clever. And neatly avoiding the fact that the the “Sunni kings, etc” have found themselves on the wrong side of the war against expansionist Muslim jihad — or rather playing both sides as they openly waved their right hand in support of the West while quietly handing out funds and more to the jihadis with their left hand — until their endless oil income sharply fell in the wake of American fracking, forcing choices.
And lest we forget, the never-Trumpers and neocons in exile nursing their bruised egos, whose idea of sweet revenge is a U.S. return to the Mideast in a war with Iran, which then brings an end to the Trump presidency.
If President Trump fights a short, sharp war to win as he did against ISIS in Iraq and Syria, the deplorables will turn out in droves for him in 2020. Only if he lets the princes of the Pentagon play measured games that go on forever will he lose all.
Separately, this was perfectly formatted, Herb. Thank you.
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under:
#1
Neo-cons. Herb - 2003 wants their pejorative back.
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/18/2019 5:47
Comments ||
Top||
#2
...The only people who want a war with Iran is Iran. Their government considers them useful, expendable idiots who can be sent to their deaths to protect their money and power. A war with us would at least briefly unite the population against a common enemy and buy the mullahs just a little more time.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
05/18/2019 6:20
Comments ||
Top||
#3
Better missile shields and beefed up Prompt Global Strike.
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
05/18/2019 6:48
Comments ||
Top||
#4
It is possible to have a war without boots on the ground.
#8
Electronic state of the art warfare is in place. Trump merely has to only flip the switch and deliver an attack they so often wish they could do to us. The experiment is there. Put them back in the stone ages. Better them than us and bloodless.
Government Sources: Intelligence input warns against terrorists’ plans to carry out an attack on Srinagar and Awantipora air bases. Security forces on high alert in and around these bases. pic.twitter.com/tQfCSGpmGB
[ZeeNews] Terror groups in Jammu and Kashmire are planning a major attack in the Valley. Intelligence agencies have reported that murderous Moslems of Pakistain-based groups may carry out an attack on May 23, the day when counting of votes for Lok Sabha election 2019 takes place.
According to sources, Indian Air Force bases in Srinagar and Awantipora are among the targets. The security forces have recovered a sketch from the body of one of the murderous Moslems who was killed in Shopian on Thursday, which revealed that the terror groups were planning a fidayeen attack at Srinagar and Awantipora air bases.
A meeting was held between murderous Moslems commanders in Pulwama on May 14, which was attended by Hizbul Mujahideen ...Party of Holy Warriors, founded by Muhammad Ahsan Dar in September 1989. One of the Pak sock puppets waging jihad in Indian Kashmir. It was originally organized as the armed wing of Jamaat-e-Islami. In 1990, Dar declared Hizbul as the sword arm of Jamaat. Hizbul murdered many of the pro-independence intelligentsia in Kashmir. After the organization was taken over by Syed Salahuddin Dar and several other ex-Hizb leaders were assassinated between 2001 and 2003... 's Riyaz Naikoo, two Jaish-e-Mohammad ...literally Army of Mohammad, a Pak-based Deobandi terror group founded by Maulana Masood Azhar in 2000, after he split with the Harkat-ul-Mujaheddin. In 2002 the government of Pervez Musharraf banned the group, which changed its name to Khaddam ul-Islam and continued doing what it had been doing before without missing a beat... murderous Moslems and Lashkar-e-Taiba ...the Army of the Pure, an Ahl-e-Hadith terror organization founded by Hafiz Saeed. LeT masquerades behind the Jamaat-ud-Dawa facade within Pakistain and periodically blows things up and kills people in India. Despite the fact that it is banned, always an interesting concept in Pakistain, the organization remains an blatant tool and perhaps an arm of the ISI... (LeT) terrorist Riyaz Dar. All four of them have planned to launch an attack against the security and armed forces, sources say.
''The meeting was held to discuss and to plan a major terrorist action in the month of Ramzan, possibly around May 23, which marks the 17th Ramzan coinciding with the Battle of Badr. It's the day when counting of votes would take place for the Lok Sabha poll,'' said an official working in a central intelligence agency.
The group also want to take Dire Revenge for the death of Rizwan Assad Pandith in police custody in Awantipora a few days ago. One of the possible targets of the terrorist attack may be on the National Highway in Awantipora or the District Police Office complex, Awantipora.
The report just comes a day after army, Jammu and Kashmire Police and Central Reserve Police Force bumped off six murderous Moslems in Pulwama and Shopian. Two Indian Army soldiers also bit the dust.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[8 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistain Proxies
UK advice on travel to Iran states: British nationals, in particular dual British-Iranian nationals, face an unacceptably higher risk of arbitrary detention and mistreatment than nationals of many other countries.
[AlMonitor] Russian President Vladimir Putin has put Iran on notice that it will be on its own if Tehran overreacts to the United States" maximum pressure" campaign by lashing out militarily or pulling out of the 2015 nuclear deal.
Posted by: newc ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[10 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
[Hot Air] Critics are noting that Trump was warned by Barack Obama himself during their post-election meeting in the White House not to hire Flynn as National Security Advisor. Right, but Trump’s point is about Flynn being investigated. Did O warn him about that or did he express more general "concerns" about the general? Remember, Obama fired Flynn from the DIA for mismanagement in 2014. Trump might reasonably have assumed that O’s disdain for Flynn had to do with that, not with anything having to do with a federal probe.
[A-Times] Philippine leader’s political allies swept May 13 midterm elections, paving the way for constitutional change and fewer democratic checks on his controversial rule.
Posted by: 3dc ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Tin Hat Dictators, Presidents for Life,
*Snicker* Yeah, the rules are for you, too, doods.
[Townhall] The Federal Railroad Administration said Thursday it would be withdrawing nearly $1 billion in federal money it had promised to California for the state’s high-speed rail project.
The administration argued that California failed to hold up its end of the deal, including complying with the terms of the grant and making reasonable progress. Additionally, the FRA said California "abandoned its original vision" for a train between Los Angeles and San Francisco.
"After careful consideration, the Federal Railroad Administration (FRA) has terminated Cooperative Agreement No. FR-HSR-0118-12-01-01 (the FY10 Agreement) with the California High-Speed Rail Authority (CHSRA), and will deobligate the $928,620,000 in funding under that agreement," read a statement announcing the FRA’s decision. "FRA finds that CHSRA has repeatedly failed to comply with the terms of the FY10 Agreement and has failed to make reasonable progress on the Project. Additionally, California has abandoned its original vision of a high-speed passenger rail service connecting San Francisco and Los Angeles, which was essential to its applications for FRA grant funding." Good. This Browndoggle was a waste of money and a pack of lies sold to a compliant citizenry. Off schedule. Off budget. Will NEVER meet its mission or promises. A LIE
#1
...The real point is that the leftover money would have gone to connected contractors and consultants for 'cancellation fees' once the state officially recognized the obvious. The President and his men got inside their OODA loop yet again - they never considered this possibility.
Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski ||
05/18/2019 6:24
Comments ||
Top||
#2
As much as anything, it's probably an insufficiently discussed case of green law-fare coupled with graft. The Chinese are building High Speed Rail all over China(and it's wonderful), and now in Africa. It's possible a toad may have died, which cannot be allowed in Kalifornia.
China on Friday told the United States not to interfere in Hong Kong affairs and that law amendment in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (#HKSAR) must be respected, Foreign Ministry spokesperson said at a news briefing pic.twitter.com/BVrs9Rfyrk
[DAILYCALLER] President Donald Trump ...New York real estate developer, described by Dems as illiterate, racist, misogynistic, and what ever other unpleasant descriptions they can think of, elected by the rest of us as 45th President of the United States... is planning on using the Insurrection Act to remove illegal immigrants colonists from the United States, The Daily Caller has learned.
According to multiple senior administration officials, the president intends to invoke the "tremendous powers" of the act to remove illegal immigrants colonists from the country.
"We’re doing the Insurrection Act," one official said.
Under the Insurrection Act of 1807, the president has the authority to use the National Guard and military in order to combat "unlawful obstruction or rebellion" within U.S. borders. The act was last invoked in 1992 by George H.W. Bush to quell the Los Angeles riots, and was also used by Eisenhower in 1957 to enforce school desegregation in the south.
An official expressed concerns that Trump’s use of the act’s powers would face legal challenges, pointing to the lawsuits against the president’s travel ban from majority-Moslem countries. However, women are made to be loved, not understood... as the official noted, the travel ban ultimately prevailed in the Supreme Court.
In addition to the Insurrection Act, the president is also considering declaring the country full and insisting that the U.S. can no longer handle the massive influx of illegal immigrants colonists. 2019 is currently on pace to reach the highest levels of illegal immigration in a decade.
"If you take a ship and it holds 1,000 people maximum ‐ one more person and the ship is going to collapse," the official explained. "The country is full."
"Our hospitals are full, our detention centers are full," they added.
ICE facilities were forced to release 100,000 illegal immigrants colonists in the first three months of 2019 because of overcrowding in detention centers.
#2
Was some other universe buzzin'
Cuz Jerry Lee married his... cousin?
Did underage hookers
And blue-haired Good Book-ers
Pursue Jim and him by the dozen?
And all in vain? How fabulously romantic. Apologies to Mickey. Some other universe, maybe.
[KhaamaPress] A notorious leader of the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group was killed with his seven fighters in a U.S. dronezap in eastern Nangarhar The unfortunate Afghan province located adjacent to Mohmand, Kurram, and Khyber Agencies. The capital is Jalalabad. The province was the fief of Younus Khalis after the Soviets departed and one of his sons is the current provincial Taliban commander. Nangarhar is Haqqani country.. province of Afghanistan.
The 201st Silab Corps of the Afghan Military in a statement said the ISIS leader Abu Zar was killed in Khogyani district on Thursday.
The statement further added that Abu Zar was one of the most notorious leaders of the terror group who was involved in vicious activities against the local residents besides conducting other terrorist related activities including roadside kaboomings.
The anti-government armed bandidosturbans including ISIS sympathizers have not commented regarding the Arclight airstrike so far.
Nangarhar is among the relatively calm provinces in East of Afghanistan but the security situation in some of its districts has tanked during the recent years.
Taliban ...Arabic for students... and ISIS bandidosturbans are active in some of the remote districts of the province where they often attempt to carry out terrorist related activities against the government and security institutions.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[5 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State
“Let’s put the cart before the horse, because this time we are wise enough to make it work.”
[Rudaw] Sweden will host an international meeting on June 3 aimed at setting up a tribunal to judge faceless myrmidons who fought with the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) group in Syria and Iraq, the government said Thursday.
The tribunal would preferably be set up somewhere in the Middle East, Sweden's Minister for Home Affairs Mikael Damberg told AFP.
He said he believed a tribunal based closer to the region would have an easier time processing cases and securing convictions than countries such as Sweden and Britannia.
"A regional mechanism would be closer to both evidence and witness testimony, which could increase the number of convictions," Damberg said.
Damberg said several countries were looking into the matter, and therefore the Swedish government believed the time was right to host a meeting of experts and state officials to exchange knowledge and gauge whether it would be possible to move forward jointly.
Damberg said the Netherlands, Britannia, La Belle France and Belgium all planned to attend the Stockholm meeting.
The specific type of crimes the tribunal could pursue would be left up to the attending parties to discuss, and Sweden had actively chosen not to present its own model at this stage, Damberg said.
He conceded that the creation of a tribunal was still far off and the road ahead would be complex.
He noted that normally, a legal mechanism would be developed with the affected country ‐ but a cooperation with the Syrian regime appeared out of the question.
"Neither Sweden nor any country I've spoken with have any interest in having a collaboration with the Assad regime. That makes the situation more complicated," Damberg said.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Islamic State
#1
Are they gonna thaw out Carla Ponti to run the show. Schnork!
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
05/18/2019 8:19
Comments ||
Top||
#2
He noted that normally, a legal mechanism would be developed with the affected country ‐ but a cooperation with the Syrian regime appeared out of the question.
The war is being fought primarily within the boundaries of Syria and Iraq. The thought that they should have jurisdiction over crimes on their land seems too complex when .... time to break for lunch at a 5-star hotel, ♫ see you later ♫!
[KREBSONSECURITY] Law enforcement agencies in the United States and Europe ...also known as Moslem Lebensraum... today unsealed charges against 11 alleged members of the GozNym malware network, an international cybercriminal syndicate suspected of stealing $100 million from more than 41,000 victims with the help of a stealthy banking trojan by the same name.
The indictments unsealed in a Pennsylvania court this week stem from a slew of cyber heists carried out between October 2015 and December 2016. They’re also related to the 2016 arrest of Krasimir Nikolov, a 47-year-old Bulgarian man who was extradited to the United States to face charges for allegedly cashing out bank accounts that were compromised by the GozNym malware.
Prosecutors say Nikolov, a.k.a. "pablopicasso," "salvadordali," and "karlo," was key player in the GozNym crime group who used stolen online banking credentials captured by GozNym malware to access victims’ online bank accounts and attempt to steal their money through electronic funds transfers into bank accounts controlled by fellow conspirators.
According to the indictment, the GozNym network exemplified the concept of ’cybercrime as a service,’ in that the defendants advertised their specialized technical skills and services on underground, Russian-language, online criminal forums. The malware was dubbed GozNym because it combines the stealth of a previous malware strain called Nymaim with the capabilities of the powerful Gozi banking trojan.
The feds say the ringleader of the group was Alexander Konovolov, 35, of Tbilisi, Georgia, who controlled more than 41,000 victim computers infected with GozNym and recruited various other members of the cybercrime team.
Vladimir Gorin, a.k.a "Voland," "mrv," and "riddler," of Orenburg, Russia allegedly was a malware developer who oversaw the creation, development, management, and leasing of GozNym.
The indictment alleges 32-year-old Eduard Malancini, a.k.a. "JekaProf" and "procryptgroup" from Moldova, specialized in "crypting" or obfuscating the GozNym malware to evade detection by antivirus software.
Four other men named in the indictment were accused of recruiting and managing "money mules," willing or unwitting people who can be used to receive stolen funds on behalf of the criminal syndicate. One of those alleged mule managers ‐ Farkhad Rauf Ogly Manokhim (a.k.a. "frusa") of Volograd, Russia was placed in durance vile Drop the rod and step away witcher hands up! in 2017 in Sri Lanka on an international warrant from the United States, but escaped and fled back to Russia while on bail awaiting extradition.
Also charged was 28-year-old Muscovite Konstantin Volchkov, a.k.a. "elvi," who allegedly provided the spamming service used to disseminate malicious links that tried to foist GozNym on recipients who clicked.
The malicious links referenced in those spam emails were served via the Avalanche bulletproof hosting service, a distributed, cloud-hosting network that for seven years was rented out to hundreds of fraudsters for use in launching malware and phishing attacks. Avalanche was dismantled in Dec. 2016 by a similar international law enforcement action.
The alleged administrator of the Avalanche bulletproof network ‐ 36-year-old Gennady Kapkanov from Poltova, Ukraine ‐ has eluded justice in prior scrapes with the law: During the Avalanche takedown in Dec. 2016, Kapkanov fired an assault rifle at Ukrainian police who were trying to raid his apartment.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[4 views]
Top|| File under:
Our special report on bombers behind the Easter Sunday Sri Lanka attacks. It’s an attempt to pull together what we do know and what’s suspected but there are still many gaps in the overall picture...https://t.co/vRymHkacFu
[SUN] The tough-talking firebrand said: "We are on the cusp of a full-scale confrontation with the enemy.
"This moment in history, because the enemy has stepped into the field of confrontation with us with all the possible capacity, is the most decisive moment of the Islamic revolution."
And Iran's defence minister doubled-down on the tough talk by saying his country's military would defeat any US-Israel alliance.
"Iran has the highest level of defence-military preparedness to confront any type of threat and excessive demands," Amir Hatami told the Islamic Republic News Agency.
A senior Iranian official also told Reuters that Tehran was ready for any possible scenario from "confrontation to diplomacy" but the US could not afford another war in the Middle East.
Israel has vowed stand alongside the United States to confront Iran, said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Posted by: Besoeker ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[10 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
[THEGUARDIAN] Iran’s most prominent military leader has recently met Iraqi militias in Baghdad and told them to "prepare for proxy war", the Guardian has learned. "We go to the mattresses!"
Two senior intelligence sources said that Qassem Suleimani , leader of Iran’s powerful Quds force, summoned the militias under Tehran’s influence three weeks ago, amid a heightened state of tension in the region. The move to mobilise Iran’s regional allies is understood to have triggered fears in the US that Washington’s interests in the Middle East are facing a pressing threat. The UK raised its threat levels for British troops in Iraq on Thursday.
While Suleimani has met regularly with leaders of Iraq’s myriad Shia groups over the past five years, the nature and tone of this gathering was different. "It wasn’t quite a call to arms, but it wasn’t far off," one source said.
The meeting has led to a frenzy of diplomatic activity between US, British and Iraqi officials who are trying to banish the spectre of festivities between Tehran and Washington and who now fear that Iraq could become an arena for conflict.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[11 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
[ALMASDARNEWS] The Syrian Arab Army (SAA) continues its offensive in the Hama countryside in north-western Syria on Wednesday, after securing the Huwayz area.
The Syrian government forces reportedly established control of the entire Huwayz area, claiming to have reached the strategic Mount Zawiya, a highland region in the Idlib Governorate.
Footage shows smoke billowing in the distance from purported SAA artillery fire and soldiers loyal to the government in the area.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[9 views]
Top|| File under: al-Nusra
[IsraelTimes] More than 100,000 pray peacefully at al-Aqsa mosque on Temple Mount in Jerusalem for second Friday of Ramadan; Hamas, the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®, believed trying to calm situation.
Hundreds of coppers were working on Friday to maintain public order, direct traffic and ensure safety, a police spokesperson blurb reported.
Israeli security officers arranged shuttle services to allow worshipers easy access to the Moslem holy site and handed Paleostinians greeting cards wishing them a happy Ramadan.
[DW] A man has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for selling "top secret" information to Chinese agents. US officials said the betrayal is part of a worrying trend in the intelligence community.
A US court on Friday sentenced a former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) officer to 20 years in prison for spying on behalf of China.
The 62-year-old man was found guilty of selling "top secret" defense information to Chinese intelligence contacts when he visited Shanghai in 2017.
The defendant was a former US army soldier and later went on to hold several jobs at government agencies and defense contractors in which he had access to sensitive information.
"This case is one in an alarming trend of former US intelligence officers being targeted by China and betraying their country and colleagues," said Assistant Attorney General John Demers.
'NO BUSINESS PARTNERING WITH CHINA'
At least two other former US intelligence officers and a diplomat have pleaded guilty this year to spying for China.
Earlier this month, another ex-CIA officer pleaded guilty to conspiring with Chinese intelligence. His lawyer said there was no evidence that he had handed over classified information to Chinese agents.
Officials said the latest conviction formed part of the US' response to a worrying trend in the intelligence community.
"This sentence, together with the recent guilty pleas of Ron Hansen in Utah and Jerry Lee in Virginia, deliver the stern message that our former intelligence officers have no business partnering with the Chinese, or any other adversarial foreign intelligence service," said Demers.
[AlAhram] Britannia’s tumultuous divorce from the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... was again in disarray on Friday after the opposition Labour Party declared last-ditch talks dead due to Prime Minister Theresa May’s crumbling government.
Nearly three years after the United Kingdom voted 52% to 48% in a referendum to leave the EU, it remains unclear how, when or even if it will leave the European club it joined in 1973. The current deadline to leave is Oct. 31.
Continued on Page 49
[Red State] Have you ever been reeling in a largemouth bass and ‐ right at the point when the scaly, finned fighter popped out of the water ‐ thought, "Hey ‐ that thing would make some great genitals"?
Or have you ever been hunkered down at Red Lobster, fork in hand and bibb tucked in, and just before you stabbed that crispy red snapper, gone, "Wait a minute ‐ I think this should be in my pants"?
If so, apparently, you’re not alone.
A 35-year-old Brazilian man recently put the "lap" in "tilapia," courtesy of a groundbreaking procedure. The reason? He’d found himself in a pickle: His vagina was collapsing.
You see, when Maju was a young teen, he decided he was a woman trapped in a man’s body. So in 1999, he became the 4th person in the South American country to undergo an experimental operation to turn his #ToxicMasculinity into a #BelieveAllWomen.
But, as he relayed to FocusOn News, a problem arose:
CONFIRMED: Ongoing clashes between Afghan Army and Pakistan Army across Durand Line. Focus area is Zabul (Afghan province). Heavy artillery being used by both sides.
Video report from Zabul (via Shamshad News) from Friday, where intense clashes been taking place vs Taliban, showing Afghan Army in action. #Afghanistanpic.twitter.com/G4Mj18ZW1a
Posted by: 3dc ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan
#1
I haven’t seen anything about cross-border fighting in Khaama Press, Tolo News, or Dawn. This may be due to the fact that it was the weekend over there.
[PJ] "I’m not a member of any organized political party -- I’m a Democrat," Will Rogers is supposed to have quipped nearly a century ago, but his assessment has never been truer than it is right now.
Early polls show former Vice President Joe Biden -- who first ran for president when I was a freshman in college (I'm now 50) -- with a commanding lead, and that has some Democrats very upset. A recent Fox News poll shows Biden up 2-to-1 over nearest rival (and fellow Old White Dude) Bernie Sanders, 35-17. That puts Biden up a couple of points and Bernie down six since March.
But is Biden really the candidate Democrats crave?
Writer and progressive activist Touré went on quite the Twitter rant this morning, arguing that "it’s a mistake to take progressive voters for granted and think they’ll all come out based on Trump-hatred." He's calling for a more radical approach than Seemingly Safe Joe is willing to offer, and arguing that the nominee needs to excite the party's progressive wing: "Thinking 'the left is in the bag,' is a path to defeat. Serving the base has got to be priority #1. Not winning over the middle."
And Touré is hardly alone. True. Former MSNBC talking head Touré Neblett, like Joy Reid - another MSNBC hack. Owed $60K in taxes. Why can't these paragons of wisdom and virtue pay their taxes, like Al Sharpton...errr...nevermind
[AAWSAT] Kuwaiti National Assembly Speaker Marzouq al-Ghanim said on Thursday that the risks of war in the region were "very high," taking into consideration the arrival of US military troops to the waters of the Gulf to face Iran.
Following a secret meeting called for by the Kuwaiti National Assembly to discuss with the government the current regional challenges, Ghanim said in a press statement that the Kuwaiti government was expecting war to erupt in the Gulf.
The Speaker said that based on information revealed by the concerned ministers, the possibility was unfortunately high as the situation was alarming and going out of control.
Calling on the need to abide by the instructions of Kuwaiti Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad al-Jaber Al Sabah, Ghanim urged Kuwaitis to maintain unity in face of challenges ahead.
Posted by: Fred ||
05/18/2019
00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
E-Mail||
[6 views]
Top|| File under:
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Liberty] On Tuesday, LU reported that California Gov. Gavin Newsom pardoned seven felons slated for deportation in an act of defiance against Donald Trump. So far none of the freed ex-convicts has gone on to become a repeat offender, but the day is young: Give it time.
[Independent] German lawmakers have condemned a movement that calls for a cultural boycott of Israel, saying it is anti-semitic and reminiscent of the Nazi campaign against the Jews.
[France24] Taiwan’s parliament voted to legalise same-sex marriage on Friday, becoming the first in Asia to do so.
[AlterNet] A bill making its way through the Texas legislature would make protesting pipelines a third-degree felony, the same as attempted murder. "It’s an anti-protest bill, favoring the fossil fuel industry,...
[AlterNet] At a glance, the American economy is doing pretty well. Unemployment has hit a record low. The stock market just hit a record high. Millions of people are finding work in the "gig economy."
[Weasel Zippers]
[Al-Rooters] Iran's elite Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) are "highly likely" to have facilitated attacks last Sunday on four tankers including two Saudi ships off Fujairah in the United Arab Emirates, according to a Norwegian insurers' report seen by Reuters. 
[BBC] Swiss voters go to the polls on Sunday to decide whether to tighten up their gun laws to conform with European Union regulations.
[Fortune] The U.S. has reached an agreement to drop steel and aluminum tariffs on the two countries in return for preventing Chinese steel from coming over their borders into the U.S.
[The Federalist] Conservatives cheered the recent news that Attorney General William Barr had assigned U.S. Attorney John Durham to investigate the launch of the investigation into the Trump campaign. After his name hit the press, journalists covering the Spygate scandal quickly realized that Durham was the prosecutor investigating former FBI lawyer James Baker for potential illegal leaks.
...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell...
[IsraelTimes] French jihadist, who killed four people in 2014 anti-Semitic rampage, is accused of acting as jailer to 4 French journalists taken hostage in Aleppo.
[BALTIMORE.CBSLOCAL] Police have 
...the 
[ToloNews] Four members of the Public Protection Forces were killed after a group of 
[Jpost] In a landmark vote the German Bundestag ruled on Friday that the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement is antisemitic, calling on German Federal offices and bodies not to collaborate in any way with events that advocate to boycott or delegitimize the Jewish state.
[Rudaw] Three members of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) were killed in Raqqa governorate near the border with 
[BALTIMORE.CBSLOCAL] The crippling cybersecurity attack on Baltimore City enters its ninth day, as city officials continue to say they can’t say much about the investigation.
[ECONOMIST] Pakistan has borrowed from the multilateral lender as often as Argentina has
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] 
[IsraelTimes] State news agency says Syrian air defenses shot down ’hostile targets’ coming from the Golan; sounds of 
Whatever the opposite of a rush to war is—a crawl to peace, maybe—America is in the middle of one. Since May 5, when John Bolton announced the accelerated deployment of the Abraham Lincoln carrier group to the Persian Gulf in response to intelligence of a possible Iranian attack, the press has been aflame with calls for America to show restraint, pursue diplomacy, and rein in the madman with the mustache before he starts a war.
by Patrick J. Buchanan.jpg)
founded by Muhammad Ahsan Dar in September 1989. One of the Pak sock puppets waging jihad in Indian Kashmir. It was originally organized as the armed wing of Jamaat-e-Islami. In 1990, Dar declared Hizbul as the 
...the 
[Hot Air] Critics are noting that Trump was warned by Barack Obama himself during their post-election meeting in the White House not to hire Flynn as National Security Advisor. Right, but Trump’s point is about Flynn being investigated. Did O warn him about that or did he express more general "concerns" about the general? Remember, Obama fired Flynn from the DIA for mismanagement in 2014. Trump might reasonably have assumed that O’s disdain for Flynn had to do with that, not with anything having to do with a federal probe.
[Townhall] The Federal Railroad Administration said Thursday it would be withdrawing nearly $1 billion in federal money it had promised to California for the state’s high-speed rail project.
...also known as Moslem Lebensraum...
Prosecutors say Nikolov, a.k.a. "pablopicasso," "salvadordali," and "karlo," was key player in the GozNym crime group who used stolen online banking credentials captured by GozNym malware to access victims’ online bank accounts and attempt to steal their money through electronic funds transfers into bank accounts controlled by fellow conspirators.
[DW] A man has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for selling "top secret" information to Chinese agents. US officials said the betrayal is part of a worrying trend in the intelligence community.
[Red State] Have you ever been reeling in a largemouth bass and ‐ right at the point when the scaly, finned fighter popped out of the water ‐ thought, "Hey ‐ that thing would make some great genitals"?
