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Gambia now an Islamic republic, says President
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
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00:00 18 21:26 Barbara []
Government
Report: Congress 'Misled' About Taliban Five to 'Settle a Campaign Promise'
[PJ Media] As the House Armed Services Committee released a lengthy report on President Obama's swap of five Taliban detainees for Bowe Bergdahl, one former Guantanamo detainee took a bow this week as a new spokesman for al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula.

The House report covers the transfer of Taliban communications chief Mohammad Nabi Omari, deputy minister of intelligence Abdul Haq Wasiq, interior minister Khairulla Said Wali Khairkhwa, deputy minister of defense Mohammad Fazl, and senior military commander Mullah Norullah Noori in May 2014 to Qatar.

Chairman Mac Thornberry (R-Texas) noted that since that moment, the committee has been conducting an investigation into the actions of then-Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and senior Pentagon officials.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 14:15 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Obastard lied to congress??

How unexpected.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 16:35 Comments || Top||


Britain
Ireland refusing entry to mooslims and potential terrorists
[PJ Media] The number of Muslims deemed to be a security risk and refused entry through Cork Airport has almost doubled in the past two months. Further armed gardaĂ­ are expected to be posted to the airport as concerns heighten about the continuing threat of Islamic extremist terrorist attacks in Western Europe. GardaĂ­ are also liaising closely with the Muslim community in Cork and monitoring its own ranks amid fears of infiltration by Islamic State (IS) cells or 'lone wolf' fighters.

Senior gardaĂ­ [coppers] say around 40 people who had arrived at the airport on foreign flights in the past two months had been refused entry. The figure compares to about 12 each month in the previous year. Chief Superintendent Michael Finn said gardaĂ­ were extremely vigilant in the wake of recent terrorist attacks in London and Paris. He said people were refused entry because of concerns about the validity of their passports and other paperwork they were carrying.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 14:05 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Coal to Newcastle?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 14:25 Comments || Top||

#2  "Potential terrorists" refused entry to Ireland.

Guess it takes one to know one.
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 14:52 Comments || Top||

#3  Exceeding the carry capacity Barb.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 14:56 Comments || Top||

#4  Only terrs who can hold their Jameson's allowed to remain.
Posted by: M. Murcek || 12/13/2015 15:54 Comments || Top||

#5  islamofascists targetting merry old ireland?

or people with fake IDs they got from IS trying to flee syria?

Ireland is a backdoor into britain
Posted by: anon1 || 12/13/2015 16:04 Comments || Top||

#6  Will they let Donald Trump in?
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 16:31 Comments || Top||

#7  Just as an interesting thought experiment, if the 1st world decided to stop all Muslim immigration until Islamic terrorism is ended, that would certainly motivate the Arab world to clean up its act in a way that nothing else would.
Posted by: Iblis || 12/13/2015 17:25 Comments || Top||

#8  No, Iblis. That would mean no more Muslim immigration.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 18:04 Comments || Top||

#9  Either way, would that be a bad thing?
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 19:41 Comments || Top||

#10  Sounds like the irish are gettin it right to me. Barbara, u can call them terrorist if u want to, but at least they tryin to take care of their own on this one.
Posted by: chris || 12/13/2015 19:43 Comments || Top||

#11  The Irish are getting it right. The Soddies wont allow them in either. Its pretty simple. You don't drink water tainted with poison, no matter how small the parts per million are...
Posted by: 49 Pan || 12/13/2015 19:58 Comments || Top||


Europe
Finland Charges Two Refugees With Terror Murder Of 11
[Daily Caller] Finland charged two 23-year-old Iraqi refugees Friday morning with a terror-related murder of 11 people, after they were allegedly spotted in an Islamic State (ISIS) execution video from 2014.

The execution video shows victims lying on the ground getting shot one by one by unmasked shooters. The men were detained Thursday and were charged Friday morning based on a probable cause. They both plead not guilty.

The executions were part of the June 2014 ISIS Camp Speicher massacre of unarmed Iraqi air force cadets near Tikrit, which is believed to have taken more than 1,000 lives.

They arrived in Finland as refugees in September. Detective Jari Räty declined to comment on whether or not they had filed asylum applications.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 12:36 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Would the U.S. be able to (or care enough to) determine whether the refugees Obama wants to bring in also had similar murder ties to ISIS. I doubt it if they were not able to pick out the San Bernardino Muslim shooters as threats.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 19:47 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Border Patrol Whistleblower explains Farook investigation shut down
[Daily Caller] A former Department of Homeland Security agent says that an investigation he was conducting into a fundamentalist Islamic group operating in the U.S. may have helped stop San Bernardino jihadi Syed Farook had the government not shut down his probe.

During an interview with Fox News' Megyn Kelly on Thursday, Philip Haney said that in 2012 as an agent with U.S. Customs and Border Protection's National Targeting Center, he opened an investigation into a Sunni Islamic group called, Tablighi Jamaat, a subset of the fundamentalist Deobandi movement.

But Haney said that just a year into the investigation it was shut down by the State Department and the Homeland Security Office for Civil Rights and Civil Liberties.

The reason the investigation was quashed? Because the federal government did not want to profile Islamic groups, Haney told Kelly.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 12:29 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Tablighi Jamaat

#1  Life is a civil liberty. The victim's family should sue.
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 13:53 Comments || Top||

#2  Maybe we should look to see if we have too many Muslims who are cozy with the Salafists in our government.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 19:24 Comments || Top||


-Short Attention Span Theater-
People who are really good at swearing have an important advantage
Those who are liberal in their use of swear words are not the lazy and uneducated individuals they are often made out to be, a new study claims.
Die fok ja se !
In fact, a well-stocked vocabulary of swear words is actually a healthy indicator of other verbal abilities.

Writing in the Language Sciences journal, US-based psychologists Kristin Jay and Timothy Jay, dismiss the long-held belief that swearing is a sign of inarticulateness.

Working with the "poverty of vocabulary" concept (the assumption that people swear because they lack the intellectual capacity to find another way to express themselves) their experiment aimed to find out whether those more fluent in the art of swearing are less fluent in other forms of vocabulary.
Au contraire - I just want to add some emotional punch to what I have to say. It's a valid tool. I'm gonna use it.
Using students as research subjects the psychologists then asked their participants to say as many different swear words as they could think of in 60 seconds. Other non-swearing tasks such as saying as many animal names in the same space of time were also set to compare the findings.

The results found that volunteers who could produce the greatest quantity of swear words could also produce the most words in other categories. If the "poverty of vocabulary" explanation was true then the opposite should have been the case.

In the journal entry, the co-authors wrote: "We cannot help but judge others on the basis of their speech. Unfortunately, when it comes to taboo language, it is a common assumption that people who swear frequently are lazy, do not have an adequate vocabulary, lack education, or simply cannot control themselves.

"The overall finding of this set of studies, that taboo fluency is positively correlated with other measures of verbal fluency, undermines the POV [Poverty of Vocabulary] view of swearing. That is, a voluminous taboo lexicon may better be considered an indicator of healthy verbal abilities rather than a cover for their deficiencies.

"Speakers who use taboo words understand their general expressive content as well as nuanced distinctions that must be drawn to use slurs appropriately."
Posted by: gorb || 12/13/2015 12:18 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  It has its place. Just don't f*&king overuse it
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 13:27 Comments || Top||

#2  Study sponsored by the American Association of Retired Drill Instructors ....
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 14:04 Comments || Top||

#3  In fact, a well-stocked vocabulary of swear words is actually a healthy indicator of other verbal abilities.
Speaks to the quality of Rantburgians.
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 15:17 Comments || Top||

#4  I even make up new swearwords!
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 12/13/2015 17:58 Comments || Top||

#5  I knew I was smart
Posted by: chris || 12/13/2015 19:50 Comments || Top||

#6  Very few of those who habitually cuss have a well-stocked vocabulary of strong language, as far as I can tell, though perhaps they just choose not to reveal that to me. Up the Z-axis, most soft science studies turn out to be worthless, so I'm not going to worry overmuch about the claims made for this one.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 22:03 Comments || Top||


The Grand Turk
Russia says it fired warning shots at Turkish ship in Aegean to avoid collision
The Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday one of its warships, the destroyer Smetlivy [Resourceful], had been forced to fire warning shots at a Turkish vessel in the Aegean Sea to avoid a collision and that it had summoned the Turkish military attache over the incident.

The Interfax news agency said that the Turkish vessel, which the ministry did not name, had failed to respond to earlier warnings, but had sharply changed course after shots were fired before passing within 500 meters of the Russian warship.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 11:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I believe sounding your horn is the custom, but warning shots will work, too.
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 12/13/2015 13:04 Comments || Top||

#2  Yelling "Ramming speed" over the bullhorn wasn't helpful either.
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 14:01 Comments || Top||

#3  Why bother defending actions to the media?
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 15:09 Comments || Top||

#4  ^^ ROFLMAO, Sven. :-D
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 15:10 Comments || Top||

#5  How many oars did the Turkish ship have?
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 16:33 Comments || Top||

#6  All it takes is one hot head...
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 18:07 Comments || Top||

#7  Personally, I'm more concerned about China firing shots at the USN or USAF in the South + East China Seas, espec at the USN, espec given China's histoire' of intiating sudden or "bolt from the blue", surprise MilActions agz its Rivals.

Worry more about IRAN versus Turkey + KSA, not Turkey-vs-Russia, as both Turkey + KSA curren have set up mil presence in Iran's "Sphere of influence" in the Persian Gulf + Iraq.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 19:41 Comments || Top||

#8  * RELATED SPUTNIK > TURKISH FISHERMEN CLAIM THEY DIDN'T APPROACH RUSSIAN [Naval] SHIP, + also didn't hear or see any warning shots.

Claim they were never closer than 1.1-miles = 1.8-kms to the Russians.

EVEN IFF THEY DID, MAY NOT HAD UNDERSTOOD THE WARSHIP'S RUSSIAN WARNINGS ANYWAY AS THE FISHERMEN DON'T SPEAK OR KNOW RUSSIAN???

VERSUS

* OTOH DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > TURKISH FOREIGN MINISTER: WE [Turkey + Allies, NATO] CAN OCCUPY RUSSIA IN LESS THAN SEVEN DAYS.

* SAME > RUSSIA DEPLOYS ATTACK HELICOPTERS TO ARMENIA, BUILDS MILITARY BASES IN CYPRUS + IRAQ.

Russia atempting to contain or isolate Turkey.

Not exactly sending RSAF TU-95 "BEAR" strategic bombers to Guam to deter Obama - you know, CHINA -but close enough for Darth Sith purposes.

* GROONG > [Fars News Agency = Iran] IRAQI VOLUNTEER FORCES VOW TO STRIKE AT TURKISH FORCES [in Iraq].

Ditto another Iraqi VSF TO STRIKE AT ANY NEW US MIL PRESENCE IN IRAQ.

* Also from FARS NEWS AGENCY = FNA > RUSSIA: TURKEY MILITARY PRESENCE IN IRAQ WIDOUT PERMISSION IS "UNACCEPTABLE".

Unlawful military incursion in violation of Iraq sovereignty.

* BLOOMBERG > IRAN ESCALATES ROW OVER TURKISH TROOPS [in Iraq = KAR] WID TRADE, UN STEPS.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 23:04 Comments || Top||


Russia Fires Warning Shots At Turkish Ship In Aegean Sea
[Hoffpoo] MOSCOW, Dec 13 (Reuters) - The Russian Defense Ministry said on Sunday one of its warships, the destroyer Smetlivy, had been forced to fire warning shots at a Turkish vessel in the Aegean Sea to avoid a collision and that it had summoned the Turkish military attache over the incident.

It said in a statement that the Turkish fishing vessel, which it did not name, had failed to respond to earlier warnings, but had sharply changed course after shots were fired before passing within just over 500 meters of the warship.

The incident, which occurred on Sunday morning, is likely to heighten tensions between the two nations who are seriously at odds over Syria and the Turkish shooting down of a Russian military jet last month.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, who called the downing of the plane a "stab in the back," has since imposed economic sanctions on Turkey as a retaliatory measure.

Earlier this month, Turkey complained to Russia over an incident in which a Russian sailor was pictured brandishing a rocket launcher on the deck of a naval ship passing through Istanbul.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 11:30 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Meh-h-h, tell Vlad = VladVedev to call me later this month as per any new USN FON patrols vee China in the South China Sea.

The US Navy-DOD has to be extremely cautious or careful wid China now in East Asia.

As a reminder from time back, THE BEST TIME FOR CHINA, IRAN, + RUSSIA, OTHER? TO MAKE THEIR MIL MOVES + UNILATERALLY EXPAND THEIR CO-SUPERPOWER SPHERE(S) OF INFLUENCE, ETC. VEE THE
"WEAK/DECLINING" USA IS WHILE THE PERT, MSM-NET VERIFIED "WEAKEST/WORST" POTUS [Obama] IN US HISTORY OCCUPIES THE WHITE HOUSE.

The above pertains to thos whom believe the Bammer sincerely or honestly doesn't know what he's doing.

What more iff, as a dedicated Anti-US US Globalist POTUS in support of setting up US-led Anti-US OWG-NWO, THE BAMMER IS ******* UP INTENTIONALLY OR DELIBERATELY!?
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 20:01 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Christian female fighters take on the Islamic State in Syria
[IsraelTimes] Leaving children, jobs behind, 50 soldiers in new battalion hope to push back jihadists
They're not going to go back to meek little dhimmis after this.
Babylonia has no regrets about leaving behind her two children and her job as a hairdresser to join a Christian female militia battling against the Islamic State
With its limited combat experience, the unit for now focuses mainly on protecting majority Christian parts of Hasakeh province.
...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 Syria.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 09:04 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State

#1  Real feminists. Not the coddled middle class prigs at American universities and in the media and government.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 20:11 Comments || Top||

#2  P2k; you spelled it wrong, there is no 'r' in.....
Posted by: USN, Ret. || 12/13/2015 22:21 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
A portrait of the terrorist as a young man, or woman
[IsraelTimes] After 20 years interviewing Paleostinian Lions of Islam in jails, Likud MK Anat Berko tries to explain the motivations of the current attackers

Ever since the current wave of stabbing, shooting and car ramming attacks began two and a half months ago, commentators have expressed perplexity at the seeming pointlessness of it all. Young people, many of them teenagers, set out to stab random Israelis, frequently losing their lives in the process. Are these stabbers lone wolves? Acting out of desperation? Incited by Facebook? What are they hoping to achieve?

Likud MK Anat Berko thinks she knows. Berko, who joined the Knesset this past March after two decades as a criminologist specializing in suicide terrorists, is sui generis. Her politics are aligned with those of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, but during her years of counterterrorism research she became the closest Israeli confidante of many Paleostinian Lions of Islam in Israeli jails.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 06:16 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  There was food, rivers of honey and alcohol.

Big Rock Candy Mountain - cue Woody Al-Guthrie
Posted by: M. Murcek || 12/13/2015 7:36 Comments || Top||

#2  One stops such things by reducing the motivations for them. To the extent that the perpetrators are unhappy naive teenagers, killing their daydreams of glory in death would be an effective answer. This could be done by routinely bathing the bodies of dead perps in pig fat, preventing their souls from entering paradise.
But it is incitement that leads to this. The incitement comes allowing it to go unpunished.
Incitement to violence is considered free speech only by Israel, and incitement to violence that actually leads to violence should be punished.
For example, one might order that streets named for murderers must have the names changed to that of their victims with use of the old name leading to demolitions.
Fines should be exacted from those making incitements.
These are perhaps foolish ideas, but if so find better ones, but mere reaction to incidents is not the best way to deal with this problem. Perhaps one should listen carefully to Anat Berko.
Posted by: Grins Snese4215 || 12/13/2015 10:32 Comments || Top||

#3  So, we've got to introduce these children(Mentaly) to the real world.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 12/13/2015 12:17 Comments || Top||

#4  "prisoners would . . . even give her their babies to hold"

And what the hell exactly are prisoners doing with babies?

They gave birth in jail, you say. Then take the children away from them (and give those kids a chance for a decent life) - unless you can prove the kids personally committed terrorist acts themselves.
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 15:00 Comments || Top||

#5  sounds like an airdrop of PS4s would kill this
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 16:25 Comments || Top||


Olde Tyme Religion
Christian genocide

The US State Department is reportedly about to designate the attacks by the Islamic State terrorist group on the Yazidis as genocide. As commendable as such a diplomatic gesture may be, the question that begs to be asked is, if the Yazidis, why not the Christians?

The 1948 Genocide Convention defines "genocide" as, among other things, "deliberately inflicting on" a religious group "conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part." As Islamic State continues to drive Christians from their homes, seizing their property, and offering them the "choice" between converting to Islam or being massacred, one must conclude that this qualifies as genocide.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 05:47 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Lurid Crime Tales-
Armed man shot inside Pennsylvania Walmart
Moved to non WoT
not clear at present where it belongs
A man armed with handguns and a rifle was shot on Saturday night as he wielded the weapons inside a Pennsylvania Walmart, according to media reports.

The incident took place at a Walmart in Stroudsburg, just west of the Pennsylvania-New Jersey border, CNN reported, citing emergency officials.

It was not clear who shot the man, who was not identified. No one else was reported to have been injured.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 05:44 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  As Robert Heinlein wrote: "An armed society is a polite society. Manners are good when one may have to back up his acts with his life."

It appears that the deceased individual forgot his manners.

Posted by: Lone Ranger || 12/13/2015 6:36 Comments || Top||

#2  Other news sez the police shot him, once, when he refused to drop'em. Suicide by cop?
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 12/13/2015 7:28 Comments || Top||

#3  "An armed society is a polite society.

Except Afghanistan and Somalia also are armed societies, as are the 'hoods of our inner cities. Perhaps it should be modified to something like An armed, sane society is a polite society.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 9:23 Comments || Top||

#4  Update:

Andrew Joseph Todd, 20, of Mount Bethel, armed with two handguns and a machete was shot and killed inside the East Stroudsburg Walmart on Saturday night, according to state police. Todd entered the Walmart, on Lincoln Avenue, at 10:11 p.m. and began threatening customers and pointing a gun at them, witnesses told state police.

Stroud Area Regional Police arrived minutes later and ordered Todd to drop his weapons. After he refused, SARP officers fired at the man, striking him in the upper chest. Police then did first aid on the man until EMS responded and took him to Pocono Medical Center where Monroe County Coroner Robert Allen pronounced him dead. State police said that no officers or customers were injured in the incident. At about 7:30 a.m. (EDT) Sunday, his name was released.

[Witnesses] described the man as a white male, about 5 feet 7 inches tall, wearing a black baseball hat, a black bandanna over his face and a black shirt and jeans, and a machete hanging off his belt.
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 9:38 Comments || Top||

#5  After he refused, SARP officers fired at the man, striking him in the upper chest.

I suspect a visit from DoJ is in the offing.

[Witnesses] described the man as a white male

Oh, never mind.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 9:43 Comments || Top||

#6  Clearly started his Christmas shopping too late.
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 15:20 Comments || Top||

#7  20-year-old white male. Another schizophrenic having his first psychotic break?
Posted by: RandomJD || 12/13/2015 15:43 Comments || Top||

#8  Nut jobs and drug addicts, often a combination.
I like the way a lot of states do it. You can't plead an insanity defense if you show any signs of remorse or evidence of that you knew what you were doing was wrong. Here locally we've had a couple that tried insanity but the made the mistake of calling the cops after they did it. They are now serving very long sentences. Barely missed execution.
Posted by: Chaith Oppressor of the Lutherans1517 || 12/13/2015 15:57 Comments || Top||


Britain
IDF reserve officer briefly detained in UK for war crimes
The BDS people should get what they deserve: a one-way trip to Raqqa...
An IDF officer in reserves who fought in Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014 was detained upon landing in the UK a few weeks ago due to a complaint made against him that he was involved in war crimes, Ynet has learned.

Any soldier who fought in the 50-day war, whose details or photos were posted online, may find himself on the blacklist of pro-Palestinian organizations who filed and are still filing complaints at European police stations.

The officer, who came to Britain on a business trip, was released a few hours after being detained, thanks to the intervention of the Foreign Ministry with the assistance of the IDF's Operations Directorate and the IDF's international law division. British authorities apologized to Israel following the incident.

The defense establishment believes that the name of the reserve officer, who served on the home front during the operation, got mixed up in the lists of soldiers and officers which pro-Palestinian organizations drew up. These organizations submitted these names to countries worldwide, especially in Europe, claiming that the soldiers and officers were allegedly involved in war crimes against Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

"Every soldier and officer who served in Operation Protective Edge whose name and picture were published in the media in the standard manner by the army but also on social networks, is liable to encounter such incidents while abroad," a source from the IDF's prosecutor's office told Ynet.

"This includes 60 recipients of citations for excellence during the operation whose names and photographs were released by the IDF. For the Israeli public, it's a badge of honor, but for pro-Palestinian organizations it's the bread and butter of their deligitimization war against Israel," the source continued.

"It is not just arrest warrants or delays of chiefs of staff or former generals, such as (former IDF chief) Gabi Ashkenazi, or (former head of Military Intelligence) Amos Yadlin, but the persecution of the every last soldier who served in the operation and whose identity was officially released," the source concluded.

These complications can also affect soldiers who took part in incidents in the current wave of terror attacks. A month ago, the IDF Spokesman's Unit released a visible facial image of Corporal T, a fighter in the Kfir Brigade who killed three terrorists in two attempted attacks at the Gush Etzion junction. The official image of the soldier became the focus of Palestinian threats against him and calls to harm him on social media.

Simultaneously, the IDF is attempting together with the Foreign Ministry to take preventative action against the arrests of soldiers and officers abroad, among other means, by having representatives of the IDF's prosecutor's division and the Operations Directorate brief soldiers and officers about traveling abroad. They also work with foreign countries regarding the issue and in exceptional cases also provide security to senior officials who travel abroad.

At times, trips abroad of IDF personnel are limited depending on the particular case. Military Intelligence's research division follows the activities of BDS organizations in an attempt to "return fire" in forums and international meetings abroad related to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and to prepare in advance of attack against the IDF from those organizations.
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 01:33 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  No problem. Cut intelligence sharing with British until the cops involved are fired.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 2:50 Comments || Top||

#2  Another example that the EU is a lost cause not worth supporting?
Posted by: 3dc || 12/13/2015 7:20 Comments || Top||

#3  I wonder if "Wet Work" against the BDS loons would be worth the cost?

Most of these BDS losers are abject physical cowards, and would instantly get silent if there were real lethal consequences for their actions.
Posted by: Nguard || 12/13/2015 7:21 Comments || Top||

#4  Dave Cowens once had an altercation with an official.

After a ticky tack foul was called on a teammate, the next trip down the court Dave "bumped" an opposing player into about the 3rd row and continued over to the official saying "Now THAT'S a foul!!"

I think the attitude needs to be messaged "Now THAT'S a war crime!" as BDS organizers start having fatal accidents.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 8:51 Comments || Top||

#5  Some of the BDS organizers are Scandinavian governments and the EU settlement-labelling committee, not to mention President Obama's Hanukkah candle lighter. So no.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 9:42 Comments || Top||

#6  AlanC - and who can forget the Kurt Rambis clothesline by Kevin McHale?

Now THAT'S a foul!
Posted by: Raj || 12/13/2015 10:48 Comments || Top||

#7  Then there was Kermit Washington's foul on Rudy Tomjanovich. Of course that one did have more than a one & one foul shot penalty.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 10:53 Comments || Top||

#8  The EUnuts seem to like to play free and loose with the rule of law. Remember the arrest of Pinochet, while he was travelling under diplomatic immunity?

The Europeans might find themselves on the hook for funding terrorist organizations one day...
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 12/13/2015 11:06 Comments || Top||

#9  ......was released a few hours after being detained, thanks to the intervention of the Foreign Ministry with the assistance of the IDF's Operations Directorate and the IDF's international law division. British authorities apologized to Israel following the incident.

Er, huh, oh fok Lionel! they're preparing to terminate our bloody terrorist intelligence data sharing ?

Oh sorry, here's your man back. Sorries all around, our bad. How about a nice beer, chips, or beans on toast ?

Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 11:15 Comments || Top||

#10  TW, I don't see how the list and the conclusions are not an oxymoron.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 11:32 Comments || Top||

#11  Nuke the site from orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/13/2015 11:47 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Leb Army Arrests IS Militant who Confesses to Terrorist Plans
[AnNahar] The army tossed in the calaboose
Youse'll never take me alive coppers!... [BANG!]... Ow!... I quit!
Lebanese runaway Ahmed Adnan al-Hamad in the Akkar town of Mashta Hasan for having links to terrorist groups, the Army Orientation Directorate said in a statement on Saturday.

Al-Hamad had links with terrorist Mohammed Ahmed al-Satem and had schemed to carry out attacks in the area of Wadi Khaled, the statement added.

The detainee had admitted that the so-called al-Satem had briefed him on the plans 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....
to recruit fighters and establish terrorist cells and gangs in Wadi Khaled in a bid to target army positions in conjunctions with military operations inside the Syrian territory.

Al-Hamad said that he had joined a group of five members and were all tasked with recruiting other units and with collecting information about collaborators with the security services to be eliminated afterward.

On Monday, the Security forces arrested two Islamic State jihadists who had plotted to carry out attacks inside Leb.

Dozens of suspects were arrested across the country in recent weeks.

The crackdown followed an IS suicide kaboom in the southern Beirut suburb of Bourj al-Barajneh that killed 44 people and maimed around 240 others.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 01:04 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


Home Front: Politix
An Encounter In Watertown (MA) Square
In which Rantburg's own Raj has a small but satisfying adventure.
I was going to a client in Belmont yesterday morning to do some year-end tax stuff when I drove through Watertown Square, a huge lefty section of Eastern Massachusetts. I spotted two Bernie Sanders supporters holding signs, with one sign urging people to 'Honk for Bernie'. During a minute at the stoplight, I noticed a number of people in BMW's and Mercedes cars doing just that with huge smiles on their faces while doing so.

I had a different approach. Recalling the opening scene of 'Die Hard With a Vengeance', I rolled down my window and yelled out 'What The Fuck?' and started abusing both of them. Among other things, I yelled out - 'He doesn't have a prayer in hell - he wants a 90% top tax rate - he's a fucking socialist!' The bearded guy says - 'I'm not gonna pay that rate!'. So I yell back - 'That's because you're a BUM - you don't make jack sh*t for money - just look at yourself!'

Yes, I'm just spreading the Christmas cheer!
Posted by: Raj || 12/13/2015 00:35 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I always wanted to be like Raj, down even to the bike.

Alas and alack, I lack a bike.
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 7:14 Comments || Top||

#2  Ship , I remember you referring to a bike you rode as your 'Cycle of Poverty'. You finally get off the cycle?
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 12/13/2015 7:23 Comments || Top||

#3  a huge lefty section of Eastern Massachusetts.

Um, Raj, I live in metro-west, lived on the south shore or out here for 45 years. How the hell do you tell the lefty sections from the "regular sections"? I've never figured it out. ;^)
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 10:33 Comments || Top||

#4  I lived in Watertown in the Summer of '91, then to Woburn. I have to second Alan C's comment.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 12/13/2015 11:45 Comments || Top||

#5  A Kennedy cousin from Woburn
Presented his midwife a Cuban.
"Let's check on my wife,
Then we'll celebrate life
With a scotch and a smoke for my newborn!"
Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 || 12/13/2015 16:58 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Enrique Marquez Built Pipe Bombs with Terrorists
[Breitbart] A new report on Friday suggests that Enrique Marquez, the neighbor and relative-through-marriage who bought the long rifles used by terrorists Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik in their attack on the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino last week, also helped them build pipe bombs.

CNN reports that Marquez told investigators that he had joined Farook in building potentially deadly bombs as a "hobby," though not the bombs used in the attack.

During the attack, Farook and Malik left pipe bombs at the scene of the shooting where they killed 14 and injured 21, hoping to kill medical personnel and law enforcement when they arrived on the scene. The bombs, which were to have been operated by remote control, failed to detonate. During their flight from police, Farook and Malik also tossed homemade bombs from the SUV in which they were fleeing from police--which also failed to explode.
Failed to explode? Very strange, very strange. Perhaps Farook forgot to add the explosives? Or perhaps he did and.....
After the FBI raided Farook and Malik's apartment, they found 19 pipe bombs, evidently stockpiled for future attacks. Catherine Herridge of Fox News reported last week that the bombs found were of a design popularized by Al Qaeda through its Inspire magazine, and lately adopted by followers of the so-called Islamic State.

Marquez, a convert to Islam, is thought to have plotted a previous terror attack with Farook that the two abandoned in 2012.
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 00:04 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Hope the FBI is squeezing this guy hard for any info he might have.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 8:57 Comments || Top||

#2  Since he has checked into a mental hospital, do we assume the FBI 'interview' happened there?
Posted by: Mugsy Glink || 12/13/2015 10:08 Comments || Top||

#3  Was Marquez an FBI plant? Is that why so much seeming stupidity in the investigation - more cover-up than fact-finding? It would explain a lot, if the attack was not the planned one, which would have been stopped.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 10:46 Comments || Top||

#4  All indications point to the FBI being aware [at some level] of Farook. It would seem entirely counter-intuitive that our Law Enforcement (LE) and national intelligence establishment are so richly blessed with counterterrorism leads that it tossed the data on Farook, his family, and connections to the cutting room floor.

Perhaps I'm giving them too much credit, but if we're that bad, we're really SOL.

Short Palantir Link Analysis Video
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 11:25 Comments || Top||

#5  Decent (and lengthy) timeline here. I'm leaning toward clusterf**k at the Federal level. The media's behavior is reprehensible as well.
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 12:44 Comments || Top||

#6  The media's behavior is reprehensible as well.

No news there. We used to mock the Soviets and their media puppets, the whole "In News there is no truth and in Truth there is no news" thing. But I'm having a hard time seeing the difference between CNN and Pravada.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/13/2015 14:01 Comments || Top||

#7  "I'm having a hard time seeing the difference between CNN and Pravda."

Pravda was more honest, Steve.
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 15:07 Comments || Top||

#8  Pravda's in Russia. CNN is here.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 18:10 Comments || Top||

#9  So what Ivy League or Top University will Marquez + the ITS-A-CLOCK-NOT-A-BOMB Kid be attending at public expence???

just wonderin'.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 20:04 Comments || Top||


The Grand Turk
Former AKP deputy detained in major ‘parallel state’ operation
[Hurriyet] A former Justice and Development Party (AKP) deputy was detained early on Dec. 11 in Istanbul as a part of a fresh wave of operations targeting the alleged "parallel state" of sympathizers of U.S.-based Islamic scholar Fethullah Gulen.

Counter-terrorism police conducted operations in 10 provinces across The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
including Istanbul, Ankara and Sanliurfa, and a number of detentions were reported.

Former AKP Izmir deputy Ilhan Isbilen was detained in Istanbul and was taken for a health check. He is expected to be sent to Ankara.

Isbilen had served as the general manager of daily Zaman and Samanyolu TV, outlets known as being close to Gulen. He had resigned from the AKP after the Dec. 17-25 corruption operations and stood as an independent candidate in the June 7 general election.

Meanwhile,
...back at the saw mill, Scarface Al had tied Little Nell to the log and was about to turn on the buzz saw...
police also sought to detain the medical doctor of Gulen, but he was not at home in Istanbul's Beylikduzu district when they arrived.

Detention warrant for Akin Ipek
...who is, presumably, someone we would know were we politically aware Turks...
A detention warrant was issued on Dec. 11 for 65 suspects as a part of an Ankara-based operation targeting top figures of alleged "parallel state," state-run Anadolu Agency reported.

The suspects included the former editor-in-chief of Daily Zaman Ekrem Dumanli, the CEO of the Koza Ipek group Akin Ipek, Samanyolu TV head Hidayet Karaca, who is already under arrest, and Fatih University rector Professor Serif Ali Tekalan.

Forty-three of the suspects are reported to have been abroad when the police arrived to detain them.

The massive prove of Dec. 11 came a day after a Turkish government-backed lawsuit has been filed against Gulen in the United States.

A lawyer hired by the Turkish government, Robert Amsterdam, provided a copy of the filing in the U.S. district court in Pennsylvania. The lawsuit alleges that Gulen orchestrated human rights
One man's rights are another man's existential threat.
abuses from his residence in Pennsylvania against three men in Turkey.

It alleges that Gulen ordered followers among the police and judiciary to plant evidence against the three men and build false criminal cases that led to their imprisonment.

The Turkish government claims Gulen has been running a parallel state by getting his followers into key positions in state institutions, including the police and judiciary.

It has labelled Gulen's movement a terrorist organization. Gulen has denied the allegations.
No, no! Certainly not!
The suit dated Dec. 7 alleges that Gulen targeted the three men because they were part of a rival spiritual movement critical of his teachings.
An Nahar adds some background:
Gulen went into exile in 1999 to escape charges leveled by the former authorities that were eventually dropped. He built up a vast array of interests in finance, the media and private education as well as enjoying influence in the police and judiciary.

The authorities now refer to his group, which calls itself Hizmet (Service) as the Fethullah Terror Organization (FETO), and accuse it of trying to overthrow the government. But Gulen supporters ridicule the claims, saying their only crime is to oppose Erdogan and press for their vision of combing Islam and progressive values.

The current campaign against Gulen dates back to December 2013 when the government blamed him for sensational corruption allegations against Erdogan's inner circle and has since accused the aging preacher, believed to be 74, of trying to overthrow the authorities.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Afghanistan
Taliban Deploys 100 Tons Of Weapons To Badakhshan-Nuristan Valley: Mohaqiq
[Tolo News] Afghanistan's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Abdullah Abdullah
... the former foreign minister of the Northern Alliance government, advisor to Masood, and candidate for president against Karzai. Dr. Abdullah was born in Kabul and is half Tadjik and half Pashtun...
's second deputy Mohammad Mohaqiq Saturday claimed that the Taliban has deployed a hundred tons of weapons into a valley between Badakhshan and Nuristan provinces.

"The information we received reveals the Taliban has deployed 100 tons of weapons in a valley between Badakhshan and Nuristan provinces and some other areas including thousands of weapons in Moman valley and likewise in southern Afghanistan in Bahramcha area. These all show that the war is not going to end easily," he said.

The remarks come a day after Afghanistan's Caped President Ashraf Ghani
...former chancellor of Kabul University, now president of Afghanistan. Before returning to Afghanistan in 2002 he was a scholar of political science and anthropology. He worked at the World Bank working on international development assistance. As Finance Minister of Afghanistan between July 2002 and December 2004, he led Afghanistan's attempted economic recovery until the Karzais stole all the money. ..
said peace talks with the Taliban will likely start within a few weeks.

However,
women are made to be loved, not understood...
Mohaqiq seems to be cautious about the peace talks.

"May God not engage someone with a bad neighbor, if a bad neighbor continues with bad deeds, then it becomes an obstruction, I seek refuge in God, now we have extended the friendship hand," Mohaqiq said, referring to President Ashraf Ghani's recent tour to Pakistain.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Taliban

#1  If you know there are a hundred tons deployed than you likely know where they are so "Bomb them".
Posted by: 3dc || 12/13/2015 7:31 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
US teacher asks 13-year-old Muslim student if she has a bomb
[ARABNEWS] The father of a Muslim middle school student says a teacher asked his daughter if she was carrying a bomb in her backpack. Somalia-born Abdirizak Aden said the teacher at Shiloh Middle School in Georgia, stopped his 13-year-old daughter, who wears a hijab, and asked if she had a bomb.

"The teacher said she knew her joke went too far, especially because of 'the things happening in the world right now,'" Atlanta Journal-Constitution (AJC) quoted the daughter as saying.

"It was very disrespectful. I came there to learn... At the end of the day I will still get my A or B and leave her class," she said.

Aden told AJC that his daughter was upset when she sent an SMS to tell him about the incident.

Sloan Roach, a Gwinnett County Public Schools spokeswoman, said the teacher's comment was inappropriate and the school's principal has apologized to the family. She said the comment came as the teacher was telling students to put away their backpacks and school officials don't believe it was made with ill intent.

Aden, a truck driver and grocery store owner, said he is going to pull out his daughter out from the school.

"We are from Africa, we are Muslims, we live in America. I didn't teach my children to hate people or to think they are better than other people. I don't want nobody to treat them like that," AJC quoted him as saying.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "We live in America" is your take-away phrase.
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 0:18 Comments || Top||

#2  Did she?
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 1:35 Comments || Top||

#3  Next time, Glenmore.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 3:22 Comments || Top||

#4  perhaps they will sue like hoax bomb boy
Posted by: anon1 || 12/13/2015 6:11 Comments || Top||

#5  The teacher is an idiot.
Posted by: Don Vito Whuth8374 || 12/13/2015 9:59 Comments || Top||

#6  Why is the teacher an idiot?
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 12/13/2015 11:02 Comments || Top||

#7  Idiot, or not, the teacher can't be fired.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 11:22 Comments || Top||

#8  See ya.
Posted by: regular joe || 12/13/2015 17:09 Comments || Top||

#9  Aden, a truck driver and grocery store owner, said he is going to pull out his daughter out from the school.


She's old enough to be married off.
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 12/13/2015 17:48 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Gaddafi son freed after kidnap in Lebanon
[Dhaka Tribune] Late Libyan leader Muammar Qadaffy
...a proud Arab institution for 42 years, now among the dear departed, though not the dearest...
's son Hannibal has been sprung after being briefly kidnapped by an gang in Leb, security sources say.

In a video shown on Lebanese TV, the captive businessman was seen appealing for more information concerning the 1978 disappearance of the prominent Lebanese Shia holy man Musa al-Sadr.

He was freed in the city of Baalbek and dispatched to Beirut, police told AP.

The 40-year-old former playboy was given sanctuary in Oman in 2012. His father Muammar was tossed by rebels in a 2011 uprising.

Al-Sadr, one of the most prominent Shia holy mans of the 20th Century, disappeared along with two others during a trip to Libya in 1978.

Muammar Qadaffy denied any involvement in his disappearance, but many suspect him of having orchestrated it. The case has long soured relations between the two countries.

It is not known how long Hannibal has been in Leb. He was under house arrest while in Oman with his sister Ayesha and mother Safiya.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring

#1  ...Likely the lad has a pretty good idea what happened to al-Sadr - Dad was never shy about keeping things from the family, and Hannibal was almost certainly being raised to join the family business until things went south.

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 12/13/2015 8:16 Comments || Top||


The Grand Turk
Fearing renewed clashes, residents flee Diyarbakir district
[Rudaw] Civilians in Sur, a troubled district in the Kurdish city of Diyarbakir in The Sick Man of Europe Turkey
...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire....
's southeast, have been fleeing their homes since Friday, fearing another curfew and renewed festivities between security forces and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

Turkey's Hurriyet Daily News reported on its website that residents had been fleeing in large numbers, taking whatever possessions they could carry.

The Turkish army declared a curfew in several neighborhoods of the Kurdish district on December 3. That followed the resumption of fighting with the PKK and the murder of a prominent Kurdish lawyer, Tahir Elci, in Diyarbakir city in early December.

"We were not able to go outside because of the intense festivities. We ran low on water and food and our homes were damaged," the Dogan News Agency quoted one Sur resident as saying.

Homes, mosques and civilian properties have reportedly been damaged in the intense festivities.

Mehmduh Tura, a junior governor in Sur, had justified the reason for the curfew to "ensure the security of life and property of our citizens," according to Turkish news agencies.

Following the curfew, the pro-Kurdish People's Democratic Party (HDP) expressed outrage, saying it was "worried about loss of lives."

"After the curfew declared in Sur, the district has been blockaded by security forces and afterwards festivities have begun. We want to note that we are worried about loss of lives following the curfew," the HDP had said in a statement.

Clashes and curfews have been the order of the day in parts of Turkey, ever since the government declared a war on terrorism in late July. But instead of smashing jihadi groups that have been operating with impunity from Turkey, the military began an intense and deadly campaign against the PKK.
Hurriyet has a photo gallery here.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Africa North
Egypt jails two policemen for beating lawyer to death
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] An Egyptian court sentenced two officers with the secret police to five years in prison on Saturday for beating to death an imprisoned lawyer, the second such verdict in a week.

The two officers, a lieutenant colonel and captain with the national security force, had been accused of torturing Karim Hamdi to death in a Cairo cop shoppe in February.

He had been held on suspicion of belonging to the Moslem Brüderbund movement, which the military had ousted from power in 2013.

Both defendants had been released on bail during the course of the trial and it was not clear when they would be detained. They can appeal the ruling.

The verdict came two days after another court sentenced an officer to five years in prison for beating a prisoner to death in a cop shoppe.

There has been an increase in reports of beatings and deaths in detention in recent months, prompting President Abdelfattah al-Sissi and the interior ministry to pledge they would hold to account those responsible.

The prosecution referred on Thursday nine coppers to trial on charges of beating a detainee to death in a cop shoppe in the southern town of Luxor.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Arab Spring

#1  Accident, time out fur coppers.
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 0:05 Comments || Top||

#2  It's testimony to the self-control of policemen everywhere that this is not common.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 1:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Red on Red?
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 8:56 Comments || Top||

#4  It's testimony to the self-control of policemen everywhere that this is not common.

In Pakistan it's the lawyers beating people up, for some reason.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 9:26 Comments || Top||

#5  Do not go there, James.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 12/13/2015 12:49 Comments || Top||

#6  Must feel funny being their court appointed attorney.
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 20:56 Comments || Top||


Africa Subsaharan
At Least 7 Civilians Killed in Suicide Attack in North Cameroon
[AnNahar] At least seven non-combatants were killed Friday in a suicide kaboom in Kolofata, northern Cameroon
...a long, narrow country that fills the space between Nigeria and Chad on the northeast, CAR to the southeast. Prior to incursions by Boko Haram nothing ever happened there...
, a region where Nigeria's Boko Haram
... not to be confused with Procol Harum, Harum Scarum, possibly to be confused with Helter Skelter. The Nigerian version of al-Qaeda and the Taliban rolled together and flavored with a smigeon of distinctly Subsaharan ignorance and brutality...
Islamists are highly active, local officials said.

"We've registered eight deaths at the site, including the jacket wallah," a regional security source said without saying if the attack on a food stall was carried out by a man or a woman.

A source close to regional authorities also confirmed the attack to Agence La Belle France Presse and put the toll at eight dead, including the attacker.

It was the second time that Kolofata, which is regularly targeted in attacks blamed on Boko Haram, has been hit by a suicide attacker. At least seven were killed there in a double suicide attack on September 13.

The town is located near Kerawa, another Cameroonian town which lies on the Nigerian border where up to 40 people bit the dust on September 3 in one of the deadliest attacks on Cameroonian territory.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Boko Haram


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Why Jenin is staying out of current wave of terrorism
Long piece from last week shows that West Bank Palestinians, at least, are capable of learning from experience.
[Ynet] Jenin, once the home of jacket wallahs, is now the quietest city in the West Bank. After 4 attempted attacks at the Jalamah checkpoint, the residents realized their economic prosperity could stop, and rushed to restore calm; 'an attack at the checkpoint is an attack against us,' says local businessman.

...But no kids have been seen on the Paleostinian side of the checkpoint for the past month. In fact, nobody walks there, stands there, or sells krembos there. The reason is that 100 meters away from the checkpoint, plain-clothed Paleostinian coppers are stationed, wearing black caps that broadcast their identity to all Paleostinians. Some check some of the cars that want to go through the checkpoint, others look around, trying to spot potential suspicious activity. Someone told us that there are also more coppers there, whose job is to see and not be seen. The efforts have borne fruit: The guards have already managed to stop three different women who each wanted to perpetrate a stabbing attack.

"The Paleostinian security forces are indeed on the Paleostinian side of the checkpoint and they prevent kids from coming to it, since we don't want these kids to die," says Jenin Governor Ibrahim Ramadan. "They've been there for 30 days, in several places, taking care of the Paleostinians' security."
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Palestinian Authority


India-Pakistan
Two TTP men killed in police 'encounter' near Sohrab Goth
[DAWN] Two suspected snuffies were killed by coppers in an 'encounter' in the outskirts of Bloody Karachi
...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous...
on Saturday.

Responding to a tip off, the police encircled an alleged myrmidon hideout near Sohrab Goth. The suspected snuffies reportedly shot up the police party.

In the exchange of fire, two snuffies were killed while four others managed to escape, claimed Malir SSP Rao Anwar.

SSP Anwar identified one of the dear departed as Abdullah, alias Kobra, a member of the outlawed Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain (TTP).

"The men were involved in incidents of extortion, kidnapping for ransom, as well as terror attacks," the SSP added.

Arms and kabooms have reportedly been siezed from the myrmidons' custody.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: TTP


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Afghan Teen among Latest Killed in Iran's Syria War Effort
[AnNahar] A 17-year-old Afghan was among almost 30 Iran-backed fighters killed in festivities in Syria since the end of November, according to Iranian media reports.

Teenager Mehdi Ahmadi, a member of the Fatemiyoun Brigade, was buried in Tehran on Wednesday, the Tasnim news agency said.

His death adds to a fast-rising casualty list that includes Paks and Iranian volunteers.

The Fatemiyoun Brigade, named after Fatima the daughter of Prophet Mohammad, whose mausoleum near Damascus is venerated by Shiites, is backed by Iran's powerful Revolutionary Guards in the Syrian war effort.

The Guards have provided military advisers to Syrian Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Leveler of Latakia...
's army as well as training and organizing militias and fighters against Sunni rebel forces seeking to oust Assad.

The latest deaths bring to about 80 the number of Iranians, Afghans or Paks killed in Syria and then buried in Tehran since the beginning of October.

The increased casualties reflect their greater role in frontline battles, according to Iranian commanders.

"Today we are fighting thousands of kilometers away for our defense," General Ali Jafari, commander of the Guards, said on Wednesday, according to the military's Sepah News service.

"The future of Islam and the world will be determined by the war in this part of western Asia," he said in a speech to families of fighters and Iranian volunteers killed in Syria.

Several generals, colonels and more junior commanders from the Guards have also been killed in Syria.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Iran


Terror Networks
What keeps ISIS alive, conspiracy theories or complex politics?
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Many people in the Middle East consider 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) a U.S. creation.

This sentiment is perhaps felt most strongly by Iraqis, who have since last year seen vast parts of their war-torn country overrun by ISIS bad boys. A recent Washington Post headline read: "Iraqis think the U.S. is in cahoots with the Islamic State, and it is hurting the war."
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State

#1  It's a lack of jobs and global warming (sarc on). These were excuses offered up by Obozo. Sane or not sane?
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 19:38 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Salman Khan's hit-and-run case: Was the car drunk?
[DAWN] Prem acquittal dhan se payo, Salman Khan's iconic screen name was trending on Twitter minutes after the High Court allowed him to walk free as the prosecution failed to establish its case against him.

The actor had been accused of killing a man sleeping on a footpath and injuring four others with his SUV in 2002. One of the men lost his foot, but Salman was hardly 'Being Human' when he decided not to stop and help.

Salman had reportedly been drinking that night but it seems the prosecution failed to convince the judge that Salman's cup was all full and not with water. In India, where not a lot surprises us, the Twitterati wanted an important answer:

If neither Salman nor his driver is guilty then was "the car drunk"?

In India, perhaps just like in Pakistain, governments can change but court cases still have a life of their own. Witnesses die, Witnesses become 'unreliable', documents go missing and as happened earlier in Salman's case, a faithful (or bought out?) driver takes the blame.

And now, it seems even the driver wasn't in the driving seat. A bewildered public is wondering 'if India had a driverless car much before Google's plans to invent one'?

It is not unusual for even the ordinary man to underestimate the influence of alcohol, especially in the recklessness of youth. I don't doubt that some of the loudest voices against Salman right now are those who drive back home equally inebriated every Saturday night.

But if you know you have killed, then you must also stand up and take the blame. We are being naïve if we hope that at least the influential among us will admit their mistake and repent. But then, who doesn't pull out all contacts when in trouble? Yet, some are more equal than others.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
ISIS says it was behind deadly attack in Syria's Homs
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] 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) group said it was behind a deadly attack in the central Syrian city of Homs on Saturday that killed at least 16 people and maimed dozens more.

"Abu Ahmed al-Homsi parked his car in the Zahra neighborhood and went kaboom! it among the 'rafidis' before detonating his explosives belt," an ISIS statement said, using a derogatory term for Shiites.

The statement said the twin blasts in a pro-regime area of the city killed more than 25 people and maimed 70. Earlier, the provincial governor and a monitoring group said 16 people died and 54 were maimed, speaking of a single kaboom.

A vehicle bomb detonated close to a hospital in the mainly Alawite neighborhood of al-Zahra in the east of Homs city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said.

The second large blast, originally suspected to have been a bomb, appeared to have come from an exploding gas canister and maimed people who had come to tend to victims of the first kaboom in the densely-populated neighborhood, state media said.

State television had earlier described the attack as "two large terrorist kabooms." News agency SANA said the vehicle bomb had been packed with 150 kg of explosives. It published a photo of two men carrying a woman away from burning wreckage.

Footage on state television
... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
showed a chaotic scene with black clouds of smoke rising above twisted metal debris. People stumbled over the rubble as they tried to ferry people away from the site.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


Europe
Syrian refugee family embraces Christmas spirit in Germany
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Christmas carols sound in the medieval square, and the scents of hot spiced wine, anise cookies and beeswax candles waft through the air at Zwickau's traditional Christmas market.

The four children of the Habashieh family, Muslim Syrian refugees, wander from stand to stand, looking with big eyes at all the mouthwatering delicacies -- filled with joy that they will be spending their first German Christmas in the warmth of their own home.

Only weeks ago, Khawla Kareem, the matriarch, was so desperate about life in Germany that she said she would rather brave the bombs in Damascus than spend another day in a cramped shelter with no privacy, no school for her children and fear of racist attacks.

Today, she couldn't be happier: Following months in a succession of squalid asylum centers, German authorities found them an empty apartment where they could live with modest dignity. The family has joined in the Christmas spirit of their neighbors, decorating the door of their flat with glittery red bells and tree branches in green and gold.

"We're fully integrated now," Reem Habashieh, the family's oldest daughter, says with a twinkle in her eye. Her little sister Raghad, 11, even has a toy Christmas calendar like most German kids, where each date is a door that opens to reveal chocolate in the countdown to Christmas eve.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Day 25 KABOOOOOOOM!
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 0:15 Comments || Top||

#2  Ship got there first.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 2:51 Comments || Top||

#3  Looking forward to the dark side of Christmas? Matthew 2:16
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 10:46 Comments || Top||

#4  Rome, Romans.
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 15:16 Comments || Top||

#5  No mention of the father; I'd bet the advent calendar goes into the trash as soon as a Muslim man enters the picture.
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 12/13/2015 19:04 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Cruz Soars to Front of the Pack in Iowa Poll; Trump Support Stays Flat
[BLOOMBERG] Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz has surged ahead to become the latest front-runner in the campaign for the Iowa caucuses, dislodging Ben Carson
... a neurosurgeon who is under the delusion that being brilliant qualifies him to be president....
and opening an impressive lead over a stalled Donald Trump, a Bloomberg Politics/Des Moines Register Iowa Poll shows.
The firebrand
...firebrands are noted more for audio volume and the quantity of spittle generated than for any actual logic in their arguments...
junior senator from Texas is backed by 31 percent of those likely to attend the Republican caucuses that start the presidential nomination season on Feb. 1. Trump is a distant second at 21 percent, up slightly from 19 percent in October, but below his peak of 23 percent in August.

Cruz's 21-percentage-point jump since October is the largest surge between Iowa Polls recorded in at least the last five presidential caucus campaigns. When first and second choices are combined, he has the support of 51 percent of likely caucus-goers. The senator's great leap forward comes largely at the expense of Carson, as Iowa's evangelicals appear to have picked the candidate they want to get behind. The retired neurosurgeon, now barely in third-place, is supported by 13 percent, down from the first-place showing he posted in October, when he was at 28 percent.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Good.
Posted by: newc || 12/13/2015 0:54 Comments || Top||

#2  Cowboy boots on the ground.
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 7:15 Comments || Top||

#3  Polls are manipulated? Who'd thunk? "Get on the bandwagon" now! From the news manipulators themselves. Who are you going to believe? And it's Iowa.

I thought we learned the game better at the Rant.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 8:43 Comments || Top||

#4  Oh, yes, wasn't he the one who voted for TPA so TPP could get an up or down vote? Seems he is next up for the GOPe splitter strategy.
Posted by: pyromancer76 || 12/13/2015 9:09 Comments || Top||

#5  Unfortunately, winning Iowa is no longer a big deal, and can even hurt your chances.
Posted by: Iblis || 12/13/2015 11:59 Comments || Top||

#6  Never trust polls with less than 1000 sample size even if I really want to believe they are legit.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 12/13/2015 20:36 Comments || Top||


Europe
Paris terror trail winds through Greece, Hungary and Belgium
[Ynet] Salah Abdeslam, still on the run, drove thousands of miles across Europe to buy gear, rent cars, book rooms, scout locations and move people into place for the Nov. 13 carnage that killed 130 people.

the height of Europe's vacation season, a young man with French and Belgian IDs caught a ferry from southern Italia to Greece. He and a companion returned to Italia four days later, then hit the road for La Belle France. The beginning of August marked the first known steps in a mission that crisscrossed Europe - taking advantage of the continent's open borders - to lay the groundwork for the Gay Paree attacks.

Over the next three months, authorities believe Salah Abdeslam drove thousands of miles across Europe to buy gear, rent cars, book rooms, scout locations and move people into place for the Nov. 13 carnage that killed 130 people and maimed hundreds. Sometimes his older brother helped out. At least twice he was accompanied by a friend from Brussels' Molenbeek neighbourhood, where many of the attackers had roots.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Hamas rocked by dispute over links with Islamic State, and a host of other frictions
[IsraelTimes] Gazoo's terrorist rulers are short of funds, worried by Israeli intelligence successes, torn over how to interact with Iran and the PA

This week once again news reached the Gazoo Strip that a local man had been killed fighting in the ranks 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....
in Syria. The slain man was named as Issa Lakta, a resident of the Sheikh Radwan neighborhood of Gazoo City.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Hamas

#1  if Hamas is OK with a 'hope and change' program, I can think of someone who will have some time to advise them in a year or so
Posted by: lord garth || 12/13/2015 0:27 Comments || Top||

#2  Maybe re-think. Find a GOD that actually cares for you, no?
Posted by: newc || 12/13/2015 2:36 Comments || Top||

#3  Iran & Saudis are both having a cash flow problems?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 5:36 Comments || Top||

#4  and the Egyptian Venice-Canal plan
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 14:03 Comments || Top||

#5  "Tossed in the Calaboose" > clearly must mean HOOSEGOW.

IIRC top PA Offcio is warning the PA to MAKE DE FACTO FINAL OR LASTING PEACE WID ISRAEL, OR SEE THE ISIS/ISIL TAKE OVER THE PA.

Read, PA = Paleos to lose their chance for independence + sovereign country to the ISIS/ISIL + Caliphate, to include alleged IS spnsor KSA???

* FYI see ZERO HEDGE> IS THE ISIS SIMPLY A "SAUDI [conquering = imperialist] ARMY IN DISGUISE"?

* THE DISCUSSIONIST > SAUDI ARABIA IS THE NEW SUPERPOWER!?
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 22:43 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
US, allies launch 17 strikes against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria
[Ynet] The United States and its allies targeted 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....
with 12 strikes in Iraq and five in Syria on Friday, the US military said.

Four of the strikes in Iraq hit Islamic State tactical units, three fighting positions and destroyed a machine gun position near djinn-infested Mosul
... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn...
, a statement issued on Saturday said.

In Syria, four of the strikes were near Mar'a and damaged four Islamic State buildings.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State

#1  Oh, good - that means there's seven more airstrikes available for later in the month - or for Tuesday, after Mr. Obama's visit to the Pentagon.
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 9:10 Comments || Top||

#2  Will nobody rid us of this noodle-thing?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 11:29 Comments || Top||

#3  17 Air Strikes Launched * 25 percent Effectiveness Factor = 4.25 Actual Air Strikes (AAS).
Posted by: SteveS || 12/13/2015 11:51 Comments || Top||

#4  #3 Will nobody rid us of this noodle-thing?

This slippery, noodlesome beast,
Whose posting your Pater has greased,
Supplies me with chuckles,
But, probably, Knuckles
Will prove a removable feast.

Now all I gotta do is set that to "The Musical Priest." Sob.
Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 || 12/13/2015 19:11 Comments || Top||

#5  Jeez, whatta lotta commas. As always, edit to taste.
Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 || 12/13/2015 19:14 Comments || Top||


Great White North
Trudeau Syrian refugees' hero
[ARABNEWS] Canada has set a humanitarian example by swiftly taking in some of the desperate Syrian refugees who continue to arrive in Europe in significant numbers in December, aid agencies said on Friday.

After months of promises and weeks of preparation, the first Canadian government planeload of Syrian refugees landed in Toronto, aboard a military aircraft met by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The 163 refugees will be followed by a second military airlift to Montreal on Saturday. Trudeau has said 10,000 will be resettled by year-end and a further 15,000 by the end of February, fulfilling his government's pledge to accept 25,000.

"Canada's programs are an expression of support to Syrian refugees but importantly for us they are a demonstration too of solidarity to countries in the region hosting more than 4 million Syrian refugees," UN refugee agency front man Adrian Edwards told a news briefing in Geneva.

"We encourage other states to engage in these programs."

Leonard Doyle, front man of the International Organization for Migration (IOM), said Canada's intake was "impressive by any standards." "The main point is that the program is going to unfold very rapidly. The Canadians are extremely welcoming."

The reception in Canada contrasted sharply with that in the neighboring US, where fear of Syrian refugees following the deadly Nov. 13 Gay Paree attacks spurred opposition to allowing them entry. Some US governors said their states would not accept Syrian refugees.

Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  canada's 'hate speech' laws discourage actual facts about the 'refugees' from being known

probably a bit of this 'extremely welcoming' is by professional charity types and career leftists
Posted by: lord garth || 12/13/2015 0:32 Comments || Top||

#2  I'm sure Canadians will regret it.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 3:23 Comments || Top||

#3  I'm sure Canadians will regret it.
Yes. And I'm sure we will too. Our northern border is even more porous than our southern one.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 10:55 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Separating violent and peaceful Islam: Spengler
Spengler walks through how we might separate peaceful and violent Islam. Among the things we'd do is designate the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization, and act accordingly. Interesting and nuanced read for a Sunday morning, and far more insightful than anything you'll see on the Sunday network news shows.
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Support the Caudillos in Dar by all means. Doesn't mean you should let any Muslims into USA---even "peaceful" Muslims are an economic burden (look at "Israeli" Arabs).
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 3:19 Comments || Top||

#2  the key is to separate secular from theocratic islam

that is the split that counts

secular islam by definition wants religion a private matter, separate from the state.

it is thus no problem.

they will obey the laws passed by parliament and will not seek to impose islam on everyone else.

theocrats by definition will seek to impose Islam on everyone else

google maajid nawaz and read a bit of what he has to say
Posted by: anon1 || 12/13/2015 5:52 Comments || Top||

#3  a major problem is that peaceful secular moslims can become violent islamists

also two first generation muslims who are both peaceful and secular may have offspring who choose the violent islamist path
Posted by: lord garth || 12/13/2015 9:14 Comments || Top||

#4  Only a reformation to upgrade this Islam to advance to the modern world. Never gonna happen.
Posted by: Dale || 12/13/2015 10:12 Comments || Top||

#5  The true peaceful, secular Muslims, assuming there really are any, have to loudly and continually voice their condemnation of the jihad and confront those in their Muslim communities, publicly about all such issues.

They have to spell out chapter and verse, or sura, what is in the Koran and why all those violent passages do not apply to the modern world and point out often how Islam allows for a separation between Mosque and State. Until they do that then there is no proof that peaceful and secular exist with regards to Muslims.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 10:28 Comments || Top||

#6  Put violent Islam in one room, peaceful Islam in another.

One of those rooms will be empty; violence is as essential to Islam as Christ's sacrifice is to Christianity.
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 12/13/2015 11:00 Comments || Top||

#7  It seems that we must teach moslems that causing your enemy death (By any means) is not going to get you to heaven
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 12/13/2015 12:34 Comments || Top||

#8  secular islam by definition wants religion a private matter, separate from the state.

The only problem with that lovely thought is that Islam itself does not make that distinction between state and religions matters that Western Civ does. Everything comes under Sharia law.

IMHO, the separation of Church and State is one of the more clever bits in the US Constitution.
Posted by: SteveS || 12/13/2015 15:13 Comments || Top||

#9  Make Muslim women read Lysistrata.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 18:33 Comments || Top||

#10  Dunno if that'd work though. After all, there will always be goats.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 18:48 Comments || Top||

#11  God will sort them out.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 19:35 Comments || Top||

#12  Lysistrata... there will always be goats

Will Muslimahs heed Lysistrata,
Declaring their Muslims non grata?
For bestowing wild oats,
There will always be goats
And boys kids who will sadly bleat, "Dada!"
Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 || 12/13/2015 19:35 Comments || Top||

#13  Secular and theocratic Islam are only a matter of timing and numbers. According to the Koran they should get along while they are in a weak position and assert themselves when the opportunity finally presents itself. Worldwide they have sensed weakness and are asserting left and right.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 12/13/2015 20:35 Comments || Top||

#14  Separating fly sh!t from pepper would be easier
Posted by: USN, Ret. || 12/13/2015 22:26 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
Zarb-i-Azb: Phenomenal success achieved, says ISPR
[DAWN] In a series of tweets, Director General of the Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR) Lieutenant General Asim Bajwa on Saturday said that phenomenal success has been achieved during Operation Zarb-i-Azb and the last pockets of militants are being cleared near the Pak-Afghan border.

The head of the army's media wing was tweeting to mark a year and a half since the launch of Operation Zarb-i-Azb and gave an overview of significant achievements.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan


China-Japan-Koreas
North Korea's girl band Moranbang cancels shows, leaves China abruptly
[CNN] North Korean girl band Moranbang have canceled their shows in Beijing, China's National Center for the Performing Arts (NCPA) confirmed.

Famously handpicked by North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un, they were originally scheduled to perform a week of shows in Beijing in a bid to improve relations between the two countries.

The all-female group, which sings synthesizer-backed paeans about the repressive leader's "warm heart" and "sweet smile," were scheduled to perform their first show on Saturday night.

But the NCPA, the venue for the shows, posted a statement on its official Weibo account saying the North Korean performances have been canceled "for a reason" and apologized to its audience.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies

#1  North Korean girl band Moranbang moron-bang
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 2:26 Comments || Top||

#2  I suspect real Kpop was in town.
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 7:10 Comments || Top||

#3  I suspect one or more members of the troupe tried to defect...
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 9:25 Comments || Top||

#4  Even in Peking, who would buy a ticket to such an event?
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 17:59 Comments || Top||

#5  A girl band "hand picked" could feasibly make good HUMINT on the tin pot. Maybe they were approached by Chinese spys.
Posted by: newc || 12/13/2015 19:27 Comments || Top||

#6  Uh, uh, GOOD THING NOKOR HAS THE HYDROGEN BOMB!?

gut nuthin.

Looks like Pudgy's = NOKOR's Anti-China version of Fifth Harmony or the Spice Girls is NOT off to a good start???

Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 19:49 Comments || Top||

#7  Looks like the cancellation is due to a NOKOR-Beijing tiff ... ...

* SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST > BEIJING NO-SHOW OF NORTH KOREAN LEADER'S HAND-PICKED BAND POINTS TO DUPLICITOUS RIFT WID CHINA: ANALYSTS, on various bilateral issues including but not limited to KJU's claim of a NOKOR-dev "hydrogen bomb" + NOKOR-China political protocols [NOKOR wants respect].
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 23:30 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Puntland decries Somaliland’s oil search
This may have consequences. The spat between Somaliland and Puntland is over the Sool region, which is pretty much a wasteland except for the fact that oil may lurk beneath. So all sides want their slice of the pie, and the other guy's slice as well. This could develop into an all-out military conflict -- or at least as "all out" as impoverished Somalis can get...
As Cain demonstrated on Abel's head, it only takes a rock and focussed intent.
GAROWE, Somalia -- Officials in Somalia’s Northeastern State of Puntland have condemned Somaliland’s pursuit of oil exploration activities, warning of grim consequences, Garowe Online reports.

Earlier on Wednesday, Puntland Information Minister Mohamud Hassan So’adde said that his administration is closely monitoring foreign companies conducting surveys in disputed Sool region, an area rich in acreages and straddles disputed territories between Puntland and breakaway Somaliland. He alleged that Somaliland is still acting in violation of international and domestic standards, questioning on its authority to exploit natural resources.

On Saturday, Puntland’s outcry intensified, with some MPs claiming that exploration activities were reported in Sool regional districts of Taleh and Hudun. Member of Parliament Ali Dhega Ade called survey of hydrocarbon fields ‘provocation’.

United Nations monitors have long expressed grave concerns over security threats emanating from western commercial oil exploration companies in northern Somalia.

Tensions have soured in Sool after foreign entities awarded contracts by Somaliland began explorations. The region is rife with opposing sides as Puntland, Somaliland and self-declared administration of Khaatumo are vying for broader military presence.
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Short Attention Span Theater-
This Week in Books
It was my intention to be reviewing The Conquerors - How Portugal Forged The First Global Empire.

However, I did not receive my copy until last Tuesday. I am shy of a quarter of the way through, sailing with Vasco de Gama. So far, I am enjoying it, but obviously I cannot review it this week.

So, I am going to share my favorite part of my most re-read book.

The French Recipe Cookbook
Carole Clements & Elizabeth Wolf-Cohen
Anness Publishing Limited, 1995

Boeuf Bourguignon, Page 158

3.5 lbs lean stewing meat (chuck or shin)
6 oz lean salt pork or thick bacon
3 tbsp. butter
0.75 lb pearl onions
0.75 lb button mushrooms
1 onion, finely chopped
1 carrot, finely chopped
2 or 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
3 tbsp. flour
3 cups red wine, preferably Burgundy
1.5 tbsp. tomato paste
bouquet garni
2.5-3 cups beef broth
1 tbsp. chopped fresh parsley
salt and freshly ground black pepper

It is a time of year when there are many potluck or bring a dish to dinner events, which means casserole season. This is an excellent alternative that can be made a day in advance, even tasting better as the ingredients get to know each other. I will put comments in after each step.

Cut the beef into 2 inch pieces and dice the salt pork or cut the bacon into thin strips.

Save yourself a half hour and buy the meat already cut, and use kitchen shears to cut the bacon.

In a large heavy flameproof casserole, cook the pork or bacon over medium heat until golden brown, then remove with a slotted spoon and drain. Pour off all but 2 tbsp. of the fat.

You are rendering fat here, not so much cooking the bacon, so low and slow. I prefer to keep all the fat, to make a heartier meal, so save enough to coat the pan to help brown the beef. If you pour it all out, substitute butter or oil. I use a large pan I can put directly from the burner to the oven.

Increase heat to medium-high. Add enough meat to the pan to fit easily in one layer (do not crowd the pan or the meat will not brown) and cook, turning to color all sides, until well browned. Transfer the beef to a plate and continue browning the meat in batches.

This will all go into the oven; if the pan you are browning with is not what will go into the oven, the browned meat can go right to your ovenware.

In a heavy frying pan, melt one-third of the butter over medium heat, add the pearl onions and cook, stirring frequently, until evenly golden. Set aside on a plate.

Now, I disagree. The onions and mushrooms should be added to the stew towards the end of the cooking to preserve their respective textures and flavors. Skip this step for now and come back after placing your ovenware.

In the same pan, melt half of the remaining butter over medium heat. Add the mushrooms and sauté, stirring frequently, until golden, then set aside with the pearl onions.

As I said, skip for now and get the beef in the oven, it will save you thirty minutes.

When all the beef has been browned, pour off any fat from the casserole and add the remaining butter. When the butter has melted, add the onion, carrot, and garlic and cook over medium for 3-4 minutes until just softened, stirring frequently. Sprinkle the flour and cook for 2 minutes, then add the wine, tomato paste and bouquet garni. Bring to a boil, scraping the base of the pan.

This is a good time to quote the book:

Tradition dictates that you should use the same wine in this stew that you plan to serve with it, but a less expensive full-bodied wine will do for cooking. The stew reheats very well.

Just so long as the chef is able to drink it. Oh, and don't overcook the garlic. You can make your own bouquet garni using cheesecloth, though I am sure they can be bought, and there are pre-made empty packets similar to tea bags.

Return the beef and bacon to the casserole and pour on the broth, adding more if needed to cover the meat and vegetables when pressed down. Cover the casserole and simmer very gently over low heat, stirring occasionally, for about 3 hours or until the meat is very tender. Add the sautéed mushrooms and pearl onions and cook, covered, for 30 minutes more. Discard the bouquet garni and stir in the parsley before serving.

See, three hours to prep and sauté the onions and mushrooms. When I made that adjustment I cut my prep-to-oven time thirty minutes. And yes - fresh parsley, the dried stuff does not do it.

I have made many adjustments, such as trying different wines and using coarse cut onion instead of pearl onions, but my favorite is cutting the carrots into circles instead of dicing. Saves prep time, and gives the stew a different appearance.

It serves well on its own, and also serves well over mashed potatoes or rice.

I have never done it, but I do not see why it could not be made in a large crock pot.

Leaving the fat in serves us (two adults and one child) three meals, all of the fat out is two meals, in between is in between.

The book itself is large, with full color pictures, a nice introduction, and is organized as one would expect. It claims over 200 recipes and everything I have made has been good, and fun to expand upon - the Apple Tart (page 188) I have used different kinds of apples and/or pears. After the Desserts Chapter, which a person can get lost in and includes sorbet and crepe recipes, is a Basics which covers stocks and sauces and pastry.

For fun, I looked up this recipe in my grandmother's Time Life French food book, 1968, and it pairs almost exactly with this one. Not necessarily the case with others, where the olde school calls for ingredients many consider unhealthy, such as the use of lard.
Link is to Amazon's 1995 edition, there is also a 1998 reprint.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Let's eat!
Posted by: badanov || 12/13/2015 0:12 Comments || Top||

#2  swksvolFF: in the recipe, what is the oven temperature, and do you use regular beef broth or low sodium?

I like it at 325F, 350F is good too, would not go much above that for three and a half hours or else the carrots/onions get a bit mushy. What I have found is that it needs just a small boil, a rolling boil is not only messy but mushy unless cutting cooking time. This is a recipe for the tough meats so low and slow, for me, is the goal.

As for sodium and other ingredients, the golden rule is once you put it in, you can't take it out, so for sharing yes low sodium people can always add salt.

The other rule is that soups/stews can only be as good as the broth. Obviously making one's own broth takes some time, so when buying stock I go with the richest most flavorful broth available.

*All that said, I am a standard carrier for the richer is healthier camp, as one serving cures the stomach instead of two. A very healthy dish anyways, nothing wrong with two servings especially on a cold windy morning like this out ourzway.

Thick cut, warm, quality bread is almost a must.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/13/2015 9:58 Comments || Top||

#3  More Sugar!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 12/13/2015 16:50 Comments || Top||

#4  I have a hunk of venison in the freezer and a bottle of old vines Zinfandel - looks like a perfect fit!
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 17:27 Comments || Top||

#5  What's 'bouquet garni'? - the only things I consistently add to my version of this are fresh rosemary and thyme.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 17:34 Comments || Top||

#6  According to the book:

A bunch of herbs, usually including a bay leaf, thyme sprigs, and parsley stalks, used to impart flavor during cooking, often tied for easy removal.


I also use rosemary, sometimes oregano, really anything to flavor the broth without having to eat it, bay leaves especially.

I take about a 6" square piece of cheesecloth, set it down like a diamond, put the herbs on the cheesecloth so they are secured in a burrito roll, then tie the ends together like a tortellini. When I stir during cooking, I give it a squeeze like when making tea. When the food it done, the satchel comes out and into the trash, no bay leaves or rosemary crunch, stringy bits etc. in the food.

Moar Sugar?
Chocolate Loaf with Coffee Sauce
Marquise au Chocolat
Page 221

Recipes may be my punt.

Ideally, kids and I will make the Bourguignon and French Onion soup on Saturday. Sunday, wife will bake bread and make mashed potatoes while kids and I make a Pear Tart. Dinner is salad with herbed vinaigrette, steamed artichoke with garlic butter sauce, fresh bread with butter, bowl of French Onion soup, Boeuf Bourguignon served over mashed potatoes, Pear Tart.

So good, it'll make you want to go to the range and drop your rifle. I kid, I kid.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 12/13/2015 18:37 Comments || Top||

#7  Cook's Illustrated has a coq au vin recipe where the bouquet garni comprises 1 tsp. dried thyme, 10 sprigs of parsley, and a bay leaf. Wikipedia says

There is no generic recipe for bouquet garni, but most recipes include thyme and bay leaf. Depending on the recipe, the bouquet garni may also include parsley, basil, burnet, chervil, rosemary, peppercorns, savory and tarragon. Vegetables such as carrot, celery (leaves or leaf stalks), celeriac, leek, onion and parsley root are sometimes included in the bouquet.

But it seems to me Wikipedia is venturing into the concept of removable flavorants, well beyond the traditional thing itself in French cooking.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 22:20 Comments || Top||

#8  What's 'bouquet garni'?

It is French for "a handful of leaves".
Posted by: SteveS || 12/13/2015 22:58 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
Police launch unit to seize suspicious drones
Tokyo police have launched a unit to catch suspicious airborne drones. New rules on drone use came into effect on Thursday.

The unit was formed in response to the landing of a drone on the roof of the Prime Minister's Office last April.

The riot police unit is equipped with a large catcher drone. The multicopter device is about 1 meter in diameter and has a net that's 3 meters long and 2 meters wide. Police video shows the drone capturing a target in the net.Police officials say the team is the first of its kind in the country.
Video at link.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:


Terror Networks
ISIS might have Passport-Printing Machines
[Khaama (Afghanistan)] American intelligence has issued warning of another serious threat posing from the terrorist group 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....
in Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

An intelligence report obtained by ABC News states that the terror group's followers may have infiltrated American borders with authentic-looking passports ISIS has printed itself with its own machines.

According ABC News, the 17-page Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) Intelligence Report which was issued to the law enforcement last week says that ISIS likely has been able to print legitimate-looking Syrian passports since taking over the cities of Raqqa and Deir ez-Zour, where blank passports and passport-printing machines were available.

"Since more than 17 months [have] passed since Raqqa and Deir ez-Zour fell to ISIS, it is possible that individuals from Syria with passports 'issued' in these ISIS controlled cities or who had passport blanks, may have traveled to the U.S.," the report states, according to ABC News.

ABC News has cited FBI Director James Comey as saying that the intelligence community is very concerned over the issue.

Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State

#1  may have infiltrated American borders with authentic-looking passports
Easier to move across borders on other continents.
Here they just need a student(or fiance) visa for entry.
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 2:15 Comments || Top||

#2  Many don't use passports who come across a porous southern border.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 8:53 Comments || Top||

#3  So, they're like the Fed and Treasury, printing stuff without any backing. You accept the paper, right?
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 8:56 Comments || Top||

#4  Not to worry - we've been assured multiple times that "rigorous checks" are in place, right?
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 9:11 Comments || Top||

#5  By top men. Top men.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 9:55 Comments || Top||


Europe
Helvetia: Two arrested on suspicion of terrorism offenses
[CNN] Swiss police have enjugged
Maw! They're comin' to get me, Maw!
two people with Syrian passports and found traces of potential bomb-making chemicals in a car as security remains high around Geneva amid a terrorism alert and a hunt for suspects, authorities said Saturday.

Authorities have been looking for at least two people with indirect links to suspects in the November 13 Gay Paree terrorist attacks. It was not immediately clear whether Saturday's arrests were linked to the attacks in Gay Paree, in which 130 people were killed.

The two were arrested Friday and charged Saturday, according to a statement Saturday from the Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland
...home of the Helvetians, famous for cheese, watches, yodeling, and William Tell...
They were arrested on suspicion of the manufacture, concealment and transport of explosives or toxic gases, as well as on suspicion of violating the prohibition of groups such as al Qaeda, ISIS and similar organizations.

Geneva Minister of Economy and Security, Pierre Maudet, told CNN two people of Syrian origin were arrested in the greater Geneva area.

The two suspects had Syrian passports, Geneva prosecutor Olivier Jornot told news hounds in Geneva Saturday.

Investigators still have to determine the link between the two suspects and the traces of explosives found in their vehicle, Jornot said. The presence of such evidence does not mean that the two were involved in transporting explosives in the vehicle, and they claimed that they had acquired the vehicle recently, the prosecutor said.

According to a European security source briefed on the investigation, the materials Swiss police found were traces of precursor products. Precursor products are chemicals which could be turned into explosives or other harmful substances.

'From a vague threat to a precise threat'
During a house search, which had no direct connection to the ongoing terror threat in the Geneva area, police discovered Thursday that an individual who was described as a right-wing sympathizer and survivalist had accumulated an "impressive" quantity of weapons, Jornot said.

The arsenal included Kalashnikovs, a M16, two Glock handguns, a MG42 machine gun and one pump-action shotgun, as well as other weapons, described as antique guns, Jornot said. Police also found a Nazi flag, he said.

The alert level in the city remains high, but Swiss authorities said various events planned over the weekend will go on.

The U.S. Embassy warned Americans in Switzerland to "maintain a high level of vigilance."

The Swiss alert came after a tip from U.S. intelligence officials, who told their Swiss counterparts that they had intercepted communications among bully boyz discussing the idea of attacking Geneva, as well as reliably Democrat Chicago, aka The Windy City or Mobtown
... home of Al Capone, a succession of Daleys, Barak Obama, and Rahm Emmanuel,...
and Toronto, a source close to the investigation told CNN.

Authorities were looking for at least two other people with indirect links to suspects in the November 13 Gay Paree terror attacks.

"We have gone from a vague threat to a precise threat," Emmanuelle Lo Verso, head of communications at the Geneva Department of Security, told CNN on Friday. She would not comment further.

Police chief: ISIS cell could exist in Geneva
Whatever the nature of that threat, it was likely more well developed than any possible danger for Chicago or Toronto, said CNN national security analyst Juliette Kayyem.

Kayyem said she suspects that "the intelligence about Geneva was stronger, more specific than it was about the other cities because you're simply not hearing about that kind of reaction from either Toronto or Chicago at this stage."
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


Southeast Asia
Thai policemen survive motorcycle bomb attack
[The Nation] Four forensic policemen and an accompanying security team had a narrow escape yesterday morning when a motorcycle bomb exploded just after their convoy passed it in Narathiwat province. Police inspected the scene and found what was left of the motorcycle that carried the bomb.

Police blame insurgents for the attack.

In related news, Ma-useng Sahoh, deputy police inspector of Ma Yor Police Station, was gunned down in front of his home in Pattani province on Friday night. Police suspect the motive for the murder was either a personal conflict or the ongoing insurgency.
Posted by: ryuge || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:


-Short Attention Span Theater-
Why Ted Cruz Is Worse Than Donald Trump
[GoodMenProject] If you can’t stand the thought of Donald Trump becoming president, the good news is that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) looks poised to upset him in the pivotal Iowa caucuses next month.
A lot can happen in 30 days, but in my mind that is cause for encouragement.
The bad news is that if Cruz succeeds and ultimately becomes the Republican nominee, he will prove to be far worse than Trump himself.
Or better, depending on your point of view.
For one thing, Cruz has proved himself to be far more ideologically narrow-minded than Trump. For better or worse, Trump has been willing to defy conservative dogma on a number of issues (e.g., social security reform, progressive taxation, the 2003 ),
Oh dear. Once again professional journalists and their editors completely miss something basic, in this case completing the thought. The writer is talking about Mr. Trump wishing Nancy Pelosi had impeached President George W. Bush over the 2003 invasion of Iraq.
indicating that at the very least he has a mind of his own. Cruz, on the other hand, has refused to waiver from the tenets of Tea Party doctrine even when the fate of America depended on it. That last statement isn’t an exaggeration, by the way—anyone with a reasonably comprehensive memory can recall his instrumental role in causing a government shutdown at the end of 2013, one that business interests and moderates across the board vehemently opposed.
Somehow I don't consider making a bloated government bureaucracy even fatter an existential issue with regard to the nation. It should be cut back and reined in for no other reason than the notion that a smaller, less powerful government can't harm its own citizens as much as a large, out of control government, which we have now. As to the dire warnings of the Tea Partier, I am a Tea Partier, and I just want government to become small, much smaller, and take much less that it currently does; to live within its means as practically every other entity on the planet must do. It's a freedom thing.
He has also, incidentally, emerged as the only Republican candidate to unequivocally side with Trump when it comes to all of his bigoted comments about women, Muslims, and Hispanics (despite Trump’s willingness to attack Cruz’s own Cuban heritage). Not only does this mean that Cruz is literally no better than Trump when it comes to the worst things Trump has said, but he has openly and cravenly parroted The Donald in order to benefit from the phenomena that have fueled the billionaire’s campaign. In short, if and when Cruz emerges as the “underdog” alternative who beats Trump at the last minute, this will not be a victory against the forces of darkness that Trump represents—indeed, it will be a confirmation of their ultimate triumph.

What can good people do about this? I suggest three things:

Hold Cruz as accountable as we did Trump. It will be tempting to celebrate Cruz’s victory on the grounds that at least that dastardly Trump is out of the way, so we’ll need to remember that the problem with Trump was what he said and believed, not merely who he was. If we substitute one Trump for another, that isn’t progress.
I doubt our paid press will stop crawling up Cruz's ass. As for progress, Barky's resignation and exit would be a good place to start.
Work to elect the Democratic candidate for the good of the country. This is one of those rare elections in which the partisan rhetoric stating “you must vote X for the good of America” is all too accurate. As with Trump, the election of Cruz to the presidency would signal a reactionary rejection of the progress made for marginalized groups in this country over the past few decades—for African Americans still struggling to attain full civil rights, for Hispanic and Muslim immigrants who come here seeking a better life only to face discrimination, for women fighting patriarchal institutions and members of the LGBT community who need the post-Obergefell precedents to remain in place.
Hahahahahaha! Oh wait. You were serious?
Learn from what we are witnessing today. When this political madness has ended, we need to make sure that the lessons from this toxic election cycle are permanently embedded into our national consciousness. Trump and Cruz have emerged as frontrunners by playing off of the American electorate’s basest prejudices, and this ordeal will have amounted to nothing if we simply wipe the slate clean and refuse to learn from these mistakes in the future.
Maybe, but I think it is much more likely they are saying what people want to hear, whether you want to accept it or not.
When I think of the possibility of a Cruz presidency, I recall the recent words of Bob Dole, the former Kansas Senator and 1996 Republican presidential candidate. “[Cruz’s] achievements are shutting down the government twice, and calling the Republican leader, Mitch McConnell, a liar on the Senate floor,” Dole told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell earlier this week. “It violates the rules of the Senate. And he doesn’t have a single Senate supporter.”

There is a reason why that historically cliquish body refuses to rally around one of its own as he remains within shooting distance of the GOP presidential nomination—and it’s the same reason you should do likewise. This is a man so devoid of loyalty to anyone but himself that, as Dole put it, “he used to make these speeches. ‘Remember President Dole, do you remember President McCain.’ The inference was that we were all a bunch of liberals, and only he is a true conservative. And he uses the word ‘conservative’ more than he ever uses the word ‘Republican.'”
Dole also lost in 1996.
Cruz is no more a good Republican–or a true conservative, for that matter—than Trump. He is in this for himself and only himself, and if he needs to drag America down to sate his ambition, so be it.
The writer is a student at Lehigh University. The Good Men project is a male feminist website for men who have been neutered.
Posted by: badanov || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Someone on the left understands that Cruz is a committed conservative. I guess some of them are not completely stupid.
Posted by: Raj || 12/13/2015 0:34 Comments || Top||

#2  No, I read that article, he is completely stupid.
Victim class at least.
Posted by: jvalentour || 12/13/2015 1:13 Comments || Top||

#3  Thanks jvalentour.

Beer out the nose burns like a fucking bitch.

:p
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/13/2015 17:24 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
The Navy’s newest ship breaks down, limps into port
ABOARD THE LITTORAL COMBAT SHIP MILWAUKEE, VIRGINIA CAPES – The littoral combat ship Milwaukee, the Navy’s newest ship, broke down Dec. 11 and had to be towed more than 40 nautical miles to Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek, Virginia.

The ship suffered an engineering casualty while transiting from Halifax, Canada, to Mayport, Florida, and ultimately its home port of San Diego. The cause is being evaluated by ship’s crew and technical consultants.

Initial indications are that fine metal debris collected in the lube oil filter caused the system to shut down, according to a Navy statement provided to Navy Times. The cause of the metal debris in the lube oil system is not known and assessments are ongoing.

The ship was commissioned Nov. 21 in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and has been making the long trek to San Diego through the Great Lakes since.

Problems with the propulsion plant began almost as soon as Milwaukee got underway from Halifax. The ship’s computer system triggered an alarm and the ship called away an engineering casualty.

Engineers cleaned out the metal filings from the lube oil filter and locked the port shaft as a precaution. In the early hours of Friday morning, the ship was conducting steering tests and lost lube oil pressure in the starboard combining gear due to the presence of the same metal filings in that filter.

The metal filings in the lube oil have not been a class-wide issue, according to the Navy.

The ship then dropped anchor while the engineers worked on the system. By mid-morning, the salvage ship Grapple rendezvoused with Milwaukee and connected a towing hawser line for the trip back to Little Creek.

The ship is currently manned by Crew 104, and was scheduled to swap with Crew 108 in Mayport. The crews will now swap in Virginia while the ship’s system is repaired.

News of the breakdown reached Capitol Hill by late Friday. Sen. John McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, said in a statement to Navy Times that the plant issues were troubling and called for accountability.

“Reporting of a complete loss of propulsion on USS Milwaukee (LCS 5) is deeply alarming, particularly given this ship was commissioned just 20 days ago,” McCain said. “U.S. Navy ships are built with redundant systems to enable continued operation in the event of an engineering casualty, which makes this incident very concerning. “I expect the Navy to conduct a thorough investigation into the root causes of this failure, hold individuals accountable as appropriate, and keep the Senate Armed Services Committee informed.”
Posted by: badanov || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ...Okay. On the one hand, Milwaukee is actually still in trials status, so yes, it's very bad this happened but better it happened now instead of once she was cleared for service. On the other hand, the USN BETTER be yanking a bunch of people at the yards by the neck. This is simply inexcusable.

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 12/13/2015 8:09 Comments || Top||

#2  The avoidance of the ugly expense of keeping expert contractor teams on pay while you systemically reduce the "military-industrial complex" means you limit yourself to the lowest 'qualified' bidder, who just so happens isn't half as qualified as granddad was in the 50s and 60s.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 8:52 Comments || Top||

#3  sounds like poorly fitting engine parts grinding themselves to size. Happens in cars with new engines fairly often. Still no excuse.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 8:56 Comments || Top||

#4  While I like the grinding to fit theory, whaddabout sabotage?
Posted by: Bobby || 12/13/2015 12:15 Comments || Top||

#5  Bobby, from what I've read the LCS is self-sabotaging. I think we built these in the hope that the Chinese navy would copy them.
Posted by: Matt || 12/13/2015 12:50 Comments || Top||

#6  The 2 Rolls Royce MT30 gas turbines have independent lube oil systems. A double failure points to something as simple as the wrong oil in the system or a more intentional act.
Posted by: Tzsenator || 12/13/2015 13:09 Comments || Top||

#7  Anyone remember what happened to a previous USS Milwaukee?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXS2Au43f94
Posted by: NoMoreBS || 12/13/2015 16:47 Comments || Top||

#8  Anti-US US OWG Globalist POTUS Obama still has 1-1-n-1/4 year to come up wid more anarchies-n-chaoses in US FP.

D *** NG IT, THIS IS NO TIME FOR THE USN TO START BEING THE RUSSIAN OR INDIAN NAVIES, WHERE THE MOST IMPORTANT SHIP IN THE COMBAT TASK GROUP OR TASK FORCE IS THE FLEET SALVAGE TUG(S).
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 19:45 Comments || Top||

#9  Engines making metal is bad Juju. At least the chip detection systems kept the turbines from blowing up. Though both engines showing chips is not good at all.
Posted by: Alaska Paul || 12/13/2015 21:45 Comments || Top||

#10  Turbines on a boat that size is dumb. fuel consumption and (gads!) the carbon foot print compared to bunker fuel oil.
Posted by: USN, Ret. || 12/13/2015 22:20 Comments || Top||

#11  USN, the steam powered ships (except for nukes) went away a long time ago. Yes, the turbines are gas hogs, but they don't take hours and hours to build up a head of steam to get underway.

Of course, eventually they will probably try sails again - those are definitely carbon neutral, as long as you have a favorable wind.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 12/13/2015 22:40 Comments || Top||

#12  Of course, eventually they will probably try sails again - those are definitely carbon neutral, as long as you have a favorable wind.

I wouldn't be surprised to see that as a requirement coming out of Paris - at least for developed nations.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 12/13/2015 22:54 Comments || Top||


China-Japan-Koreas
UN rights chief: 'Essential' to refer North Korea to ICC
The U.N. human rights chief has told the Security Council it is "essential" that the council refer North Korea's bleak human rights situation to the International Criminal Court, a proposition that the reclusive country views with alarm.

Zeid Raad al-Hussein spoke Thursday after China tried to keep the meeting from happening. China, North Korea's neighbor and a traditional ally, demanded a rare vote on whether to discuss the issue, saying the council is not the place to discuss human rights.
You can see why discussing human rights would make China nervous...
Russia, Venezuela and Angola backed China,
...thus demonstrating their nervousness as well...
but the United States and eight other countries voted to go forward. Nigeria and Chad abstained.

U.S. Ambassador Samantha Power, the current council president, replied to the objections with an incredulous "Really?"
She then giggled like a schoolgirl...
And without mentioning China by name, she called for an end to the practice of sending North Korean refugees back to their country, where they can face imprisonment and torture.

The council put North Korea's rights situation on its agenda a year ago, and this was its second meeting on the issue. The council took up the issue after a U.N. report, based on interviews with scores of defectors, detailed widespread government abuses such as mass starvation.

The U.N. report also recommended a referral to the ICC, an idea that 112 countries supported last month in a vote in the U.N. General Assembly's human rights committee. The assembly itself is expected to vote on the non-binding resolution next week.

North Korea rejects criticism of its human rights record, but in September its foreign minister extended an unprecedented invitation to Zeid to visit the country. Zeid told reporters after Thursday's meeting that he hopes to go to North Korea "in the near future" and that discussions on the details continue.
Whereupon an accident will happen and Zeid will never be seen again...
U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said last month that he will try to visit North Korea "at the earliest possible date" in an effort to promote peace on the Korean peninsula. Zeid said Thursday that "mine is a separate invitation."
Josh Stanton at One Free Korea has an interesting analysis of these events and actually praises Samantha Powers.
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Commies


Home Front: WoT
Obama visiting Puzzle Palace Monday; Islamic State on Agenda
The president will visit the Pentagon on Monday to discuss the country's strategy against the Islamic State with members of his national security team.

Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said Friday that the president's meeting will focus on steps to "strengthen the execution of our strategy and hasten the defeat of ISIL."

Obama will hear from the Defense Department, senior commanders in the field, and the National Security Council during Monday's meetings, after which he is expected to address the press.

It will mark his second visit to the Pentagon this year. During the first in July, he championed progress in the fight against the terrorist group, while stating that there will always be set-backs in any military campaign.

The meetings come as both lawmakers and the public are calling for the president to step up his strategy against the terrorist group.
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  The president will visit the Pentagon on Monday to discuss the country's strategy against the Islamic State with members of his national security team.
Thought they met every morning?

he is expected to address the press
Ohhh, a fotop.
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 2:23 Comments || Top||

#2  Pure P.R. Remember, everything is political with this bunch. Everything.

He must have some really horrific polling & focus group data if he is doing this.

Even flatworms have enough of a nervous system and will turn away from pain stimuli.
Posted by: Nguard || 12/13/2015 7:27 Comments || Top||

#3  I'll go with a sub-agenda of "enforcing discipline." He's getting grief from the Pentagon and there's been quite a few press-leaks from the Puzzle Palace. I suspect there's also DOD and service-wide morale issues to be "addressed."

I might even go out on a limb and speculate on there being retirements over the holidays and the January-February doldrums.
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 9:27 Comments || Top||

#4  Checking on the political reliability of his appointees. How'd that work in Iraq? The fool doesn't understand its the middle grades that make it work. He can remove people from their duty appointment, but he can't fire them. Just hanging on obstructs promotions of subordinates as the law restricts the number of officers and ranks. The management of which resides basically with Congress.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 10:41 Comments || Top||

#5  Dyslexia? I first read the headline as "Obama visiting Islamic State; Puzzle Palace on Agenda.
It could be true...
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 10:57 Comments || Top||

#6  Doesn't matter where you go if you refuse to listen.
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 11:14 Comments || Top||

#7  Probably checking affirmative action compliance.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 12/13/2015 11:20 Comments || Top||

#8  ... or making sure the transgendered bathrooms are working.
Posted by: Raj || 12/13/2015 11:27 Comments || Top||

#9  "One last bullshit photo op to calm the rubes then I'm off for Hawaii"
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 13:15 Comments || Top||

#10  I think #9 Frank nailed it.
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 15:12 Comments || Top||

#11  One small point: I always thought that the NSA was the puzzle palace. The Pentagon was Fort Fumble or something like that.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 12/13/2015 15:39 Comments || Top||

#12  Tried placing a call, and who answered?
You'd swear it was old mother Bamford:
"I've sent your brochure,
And would like to assure
You, our AI has set a new standard!"
Posted by: Zenobia Floger6220 || 12/13/2015 16:28 Comments || Top||

#13  Lets not bring innocent fishbait into this.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 23:07 Comments || Top||


Bangladesh
Put an end to mob justice
[Dhaka Tribune] The incident of eight robbers being beaten to death in Narayanganj once again brings to light the dangers of mob-enforced justice, and just how common the culture of street violence has become.

The robbers were reportedly caught red-handed stealing rice from a store. Disturbingly, out of the eight who were beaten to death, four were killed before the police even arrived on the scene.

While the frustration of locals with the incompetence of law enforcement in the face of repeated robberies is understandable, a culture of dishing out justice without due process is a dangerous one, and flies in the face of our attempts to establish a credible rule of law.

All citizens are entitled to a fair trial before being punished, and that punishment must be decided by the law courts to suit the crime. But because of a growing frustration with the legal system, many citizens are opting to do away with the police altogether and take things into their own hands. The mob mentality that arises from it can get extremely dangerous, as things often spiral out of control.

Ain o Salish Kendra reports that this year alone, between January and September, 104 people have been killed in mob beatings in the country. Almost half of these killings took place in the capital.

These numbers are alarming. We cannot allow chaos to rule our streets. It is up to the government to improve our law enforcement and justice systems so that ordinary citizens can have more faith in them. Furthermore, all perpetrators of mob violence must be brought to book without delay.
"Judge Henry," said Molly Wood, also coming straight to the point, "have you come to tell me that you think well of lynching?"

He met her. "Of burning Southern negroes in public, no. Of hanging Wyoming cattle thieves in private, yes. You perceive there's a difference, don't you?"

"Not in principle," said the girl, dry and short.

"Oh—dear—me!" slowly exclaimed the Judge. "I am sorry that you cannot see that, because I think that I can. And I think that you have just as much sense as I have." The Judge made himself very grave and very good-humored at the same time. The poor girl was strung to a high pitch, and spoke harshly in spite of herself.

"What is the difference in principle?" she demanded.

"Well," said the Judge, easy and thoughtful, "what do you mean by principle?"

"I didn't think you'd quibble," flashed Molly. "I'm not a lawyer myself."

A man less wise than Judge Henry would have smiled at this, and then war would have exploded hopelessly between them, and harm been added to what was going wrong already. But the Judge knew that he must give to every word that the girl said now his perfect consideration.

"I don't mean to quibble," he assured her. "I know the trick of escaping from one question by asking another. But I don't want to escape from anything you hold me to answer. If you can show me that I am wrong, I want you to do so. But," and here the Judge smiled, "I want you to play fair, too."

"And how am I not?"

"I want you to be just as willing to be put right by me as I am to be put right by you. And so when you use such a word as principle, you must help me to answer by saying what principle you mean. For in all sincerity I see no likeness in principle whatever between burning Southern negroes in public and hanging Wyoming horse-thieves in private. I consider the burning a proof that the South is semi-barbarous, and the hanging a proof that Wyoming is determined to become civilized. We do not torture our criminals when we lynch them. We do not invite spectators to enjoy their death agony. We put no such hideous disgrace upon the United States. We execute our criminals by the swiftest means, and in the quietest way. Do you think the principle is the same?"

Molly had listened to him with attention. "The way is different," she admitted.

"Only the way?"

"So it seems to me. Both defy law and order."

"Ah, but do they both? Now we're getting near the principle."

"Why, yes. Ordinary citizens take the law in their own hands."

"The principle at last!" exclaimed the Judge.

"Now tell me some more things. Out of whose hands do they take the law?"

"The court's."

"What made the courts?"

"I don't understand."

"How did there come to be any courts?"

"The Constitution."

"How did there come to be any Constitution? Who made it?"

"The delegates, I suppose."

"Who made the delegates?"

"I suppose they were elected, or appointed, or something."

"And who elected them?"

"Of course the people elected them."

"Call them the ordinary citizens," said the Judge. "I like your term. They are where the law comes from, you see. For they chose the delegates who made the Constitution that provided for the courts. There's your machinery. These are the hands into which ordinary citizens have put the law. So you see, at best, when they lynch they only take back what they once gave. Now we'll take your two cases that you say are the same in principle. I think that they are not. For in the South they take a negro from jail where he was waiting to be duly hung. The South has never claimed that the law would let him go. But in Wyoming the law has been letting our cattle-thieves go for two years. We are in a very bad way, and we are trying to make that way a little better until civilization can reach us. At present we lie beyond its pale. The courts, or rather the juries, into whose hands we have put the law, are not dealing the law. They are withered hands, or rather they are imitation hands made for show, with no life in them, no grip. They cannot hold a cattle-thief. And so when your ordinary citizen sees this, and sees that he has placed justice in a dead hand, he must take justice back into his own hands where it was once at the beginning of all things. Call this primitive, if you will. But so far from being a DEFIANCE of the law, it is an ASSERTION of it—the fundamental assertion of self governing men, upon whom our whole social fabric is based. There is your principle, Miss Wood, as I see it. Now can you help me to see anything different?"

She could not.

"But perhaps you are of the same opinion still?" the Judge inquired.

"It is all terrible to me," she said.

"Yes; and so is capital punishment terrible. And so is war. And perhaps some day we shall do without them. But they are none of them so terrible as unchecked theft and murder would be."

After the Judge had departed on his way to Sunk Creek, no one spoke to Molly upon this subject. But her face did not grow cheerful at once. It was plain from her fits of silence that her thoughts were not at rest. And sometimes at night she would stand in front of her lover's likeness, gazing upon it with both love and shrinking.
The Virginian, by Owen Wister
Judge Henry to Miss Wood after The Virginian & Co. have lynched some horse thieves, among them his old friend.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Mob justice exists when - and only when - justice does not.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 1:41 Comments || Top||

#2  Good luck finding any liberals who will listen as well as Molly Wood.
Posted by: Abu Uluque || 12/13/2015 18:30 Comments || Top||


Afghanistan
Spanish Officials Took Cover In Safe Room During Kabul Attack: Local Official
[Tolo News] A security official said Saturday that Spanish officials had taken cover in a safe room in a guest house that came under attack by the Taliban on Friday night.

At least four bandidos krazed killers launched the attack on the guesthouse in the Spanish Embassy compound in Sherpor area, in downtown Kabul
...the capital of Afghanistan. Home to continuous fighting from 1992 to 1996 between the forces of would-be strongman and Pak ISI/Jamaat-e-Islami sock puppet Gulbuddin Hekmayar and the Northern Alliance, a period which won Hek the title Most Evil Man in the World and didn't do much for the reputations of the Northern Alliance guys either....
, on Friday evening shortly before 6pm - leaving eight dead, said officials Saturday.

Spanish officials in the house at the time had to take cover in a safe room. Among them was the deputy ambassador to Kabul, said the security official on condition of anonymity.

Eight people were however killed in the incident -- excluding the four krazed killers. Two were foreigners, five were coppers and one was an Afghan civilian.

Residents in the area meanwhile told TOLOnews on Saturday of the heavy initial kaboom followed by a shootout that lasted 10 hours.

"I fled the area when the kaboom happened, my car's windows were shattered and I was injured," one Sherpor resident said.

"The kaboom happened and security forces came to the blast scene, they rescued me and I got away but I could still hear gunfire coming from inside the embassy [compound]," another local resident Mohammad Wali said.

Meanwhile,
...back at the the conspirators' cleverly concealed hideout Montefiore's foot was still stuck and the hound had completely soaked his uniform with slobber...
Engineer Mohammad Khan, first deputy of CEO Abdullah Abdullah
... the former foreign minister of the Northern Alliance government, advisor to Masood, and candidate for president against Karzai. Dr. Abdullah was born in Kabul and is half Tadjik and half Pashtun...
blamed Pakistain on Saturday for being behind the attack.

"Such attacks are planned in Pakistain, this will not be the last attack until sustainable peace is restored in the country," Khan said.

"This is another trick by Pakistain, the attack probably indicates that Pakistain has surrendered to U.S and Chinese pressure to endorse peace negotiations, in other words, Pakistain could try to score more points in the talks through such attacks," former deputy minister of interior Mirza Mohammad Yarmand said.

The attack happened shortly before 6pm on Friday night when one krazed killer detonated a boom-mobile, blowing through a wall into the compound. Three others then stormed the property.

According to officials, high-ranking Spanish officials had been in the house at the time of the attack -- including the deputy ambassador to Kabul.

However,
some people cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go...
all residents took cover in a safe room where they hid until the raid ended at 4am on Saturday morning.

Kabul police confirmed a ten-hour shootout took place but ended with the three bandidos krazed killers being killed.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Haqqani Network

#1  Bad novella?
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 0:11 Comments || Top||

#2  "It was horrific! The empanadas were cold and we had no bottle opener"
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 12:36 Comments || Top||


India-Pakistan
TTP claims responsibility for killing retired Major of Pakistan Army
[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain (TTP) grabbed credit for a string of attacks across Pakistain which left four security personnel and a retired major of Pakistain Army killed.

According to reports, unidentified gunnies riding on cycle of violence fired indiscriminate bullets on Ali Raza, a retired Major of Pakistain Army, in Phase-I of Bloody Karachi
...formerly the capital of Pakistain, now merely its most important port and financial center. It is among the largest cities in the world, with a population of 18 million, most of whom hate each other and many of whom are armed and dangerous...
's Defence Housing Authority (DHA) neighbourhood on Saturday and fled the area. Ali Raza was struck down in his prime.

The second attack was carried out in Quetta, the picturesque provincial capital of Balochistan
...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it...
province. A bomb went off close to a security check post in Brewery road leaving a number of casualties.

Local media outlets have published different accounts regarding the casualties, some suggest one security personnel belonging to the Frontier Corps
...a provincial paramilitary force. Total manpower is about 80,000. They are tasked to help local law enforcement in the maintenance of law and order, and to carry out border patrol and anti-smuggling operations....
was killed and four others maimed but some others state that four coppers were killed in the kaboom.

The third attack was carried out in a Qazi Kalay area of Beautiful Downtown Peshawar
...capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (formerly known as the North-West Frontier Province), administrative and economic hub for the Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan. Peshawar is situated near the eastern end of the Khyber Pass, convenient to the Pak-Afghan border. Peshawar has evolved into one of Pakistan's most ethnically and linguistically diverse cities, which means lots of gunfire.
, the capital of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa
... formerly NWFP, still Terrorism Central...
province.

A Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) belonging to the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) sustained serious injuries in the shooting.

Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [2 views] Top|| File under: TTP


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Hizbullah Buries Commander Killed in Syria
Hizb'allah appears to be losing the cream of their fighters in Syria, poor dears.
[AnNahar] Hizbullah
...Party of God, a Leb militia inspired, founded, funded and directed by Iran. Hizbullah refers to itself as The Resistance and purports to defend Leb against Israel, with whom it has started and lost one disastrous war to date, though it did claim victory...
buried a leading commander in the south of the country on Monday, after he was killed "performing his jihadist duties in Syria", his party said.

"The Islamic Resistance (armed wing) is celebrating a leader from its heroic, sacrificing forces, the martyr Hassan Hussein al-Hajj... who died while performing his jihadist duties in Syria," it said in an official obituary.

Hizbullah has intervened in Syria on behalf of the embattled regime of Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Before going into the family business Pencilneck was an eye doctor. If he'd stuck with it he'd have had a good practice by now...
, dispatching fighters and commanders to various fronts around the country.

According to the South Leb local news website, which is close to Hizbullah, Hajj was "the head of Hizbullah's operations inside Idlib" in northwest Syria.

He was killed in fierce festivities between Hizbullah fighters and "a takfiri
...an adherent of takfir wal hijra, an offshoot of Salafism that regards everybody who doesn't agree with them as apostates who most be killed...
(extremist Sunni) group", it said.

Although Hizbullah did not specify when Hajj was killed, local media said he died on Saturday.

Phillip Smyth, an expert on Shiite militias in Syria and Iraq, told AFP that Hajj was a "leading command element" in Hizbullah and killed in Idlib.

Hajj was buried in al-Louaizeh village. The funeral was attended by large crowds including Hizbullah officials.

It was a rare move for the party, which has normally refrained from giving details on its military losses in Syria.

Hizbullah's obituary said Hajj had led "some of the most famous special operations" against Israeli forces.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Hezbollah

#1  /donkey laff
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 0:08 Comments || Top||

#2  Arc light raids could bury lots of them. Without proper religious ceremony though, which must be why we don't do them.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 10:49 Comments || Top||

#3  Hajj was buried in a coffee can in al-Louaizeh village
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 12:34 Comments || Top||

#4  21 kazoo salute.
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 14:06 Comments || Top||


Africa Subsaharan
Dozens of corpses on streets of Burundi day after attacks
[ARABNEWS] Horrified residents awoke Saturday to find at least 39 dead bodies scattered in the streets of the Burundi capital, Bujumbura, a day after coordinated armed assaults on three military installations.

Witnesses and journalists in Nyakabiga neighborhood, a hotspot of anti-government protests in recent months, reported seeing at least 20 corpses.

One witness described some of the victims as "kids" and said they had been shot execution-style "through the top of the skull."

"It is an absolute horror, those who committed this are war criminals," the witness said.

As the extent of the bloodshed became apparent government supporters held marches in Bujumbura and other towns to celebrate what the administration portrayed as its victory over the Death Eaters.

Demonstrators marching in the capital under police protection said they were "celebrating the victory of our valiant army over the enemy."

In the Rohero II neighborhood, close to Nyakabiga, at least five bodies -- also of young people -- were found on the main road, residents said.

In Musaga, close to a military college that was attacked by gunnies early on Friday, a local official said there were more than a dozen corpses in the streets. "I have counted 14 dead bodies with my own eyes," he said, blaming "soldiers and police" for the killings.

Several residents contacted by AFP accused the police of rounding up young men after Friday's attacks and executing them.

"Most of those killed are young heads of households who were at home... it's carnage, there is no other word for it," said an outraged resident of Nyakabiga.

Residents said the killings appeared to have taken place late Friday, hours after the early-morning assaults on the Ngagara base and a military training college, both in the capital, as well as on a base in Mujejuru, 40 kilometers (25 miles) away.

Burundian officials did not comment on the overnight killings but army front man Col. Gaspard Bratuza said on Twitter that a "final assessment" of Friday's operations was underway.

A senior police officer, speaking on condition of anonymity
... for fear of being murdered...
, told AFP that all those killed were "Lions of Islam firing at the police and the army... who responded to defend themselves."

The officer said he expected the eventual toll from Friday's festivities would "far exceed" 40. Burundi's army has so far said that 12 gunnies were killed and another 21 captured.

A European diplomat in Bujumbura claimed the government was seeking to downplay the extent of the killings. "There are dozens of bodies in other protest districts, such as Mutakura and Cibitoke, but the authorities are trying to make them disappear," the diplomat said.

Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Another colonialist massacre?
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 10:02 Comments || Top||

#2  "Forget it. It's Africa, Jake"
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 13:30 Comments || Top||


Africa Horn
Grenade blast at mosque in Addis Ababa injures six
A hand grenade was hurled at a mosque in the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa on Friday and the blast injured at least six people, witnesses said.

The attack took place just after Friday’s prayers at Anwar Mosque in Addis Ababa’s Mercato district, a predominantly Muslim neighborhood. Witnesses said at least six people were taken to a nearby hospital.

“I saw three people with heavy injuries, one of which looked like he had lost both hands,” said Sileshi, a witness who did not wish to reveal his full name.

Government spokesman Getachew Reda confirmed the attack and said the number of wounded was not yet established. He said it was not clear who was responsible for the attack.
Lutherans? Amish? Esquimaux?
An Nahar has a higher number:
At least 17 people were maimed when a grenade was thrown into the main mosque in the Æthiopia capital Addis Ababa after Friday prayers, a government front man said Saturday.
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Lutherans? Amish? Esquimaux?

Depends on who's doing the reporting.

BBC sez: "Several rebel groups are fighting low-levels insurgencies in Ethiopia. A court in Ethiopia sentenced 18 Muslims, including clerics and a journalist, to up to 22 years in prison under controversial anti-terrorism legislation in August."

VOA is going with Al-Shaboob.

Al-Jizz is alluding to "Muslim-Christian relations," though they also report Oromo protests against government plans to "better integrate development across the wider region".

Al-Najar and other regional press are also going with "Christian-Muslim tensions" as well as citing armed rebel groups.

It's a Sunni mosque, at least based on open-source. The Saudis seem to use it for visiting-official functions.
Posted by: Pappy || 12/13/2015 8:57 Comments || Top||

#2  The ghost of Haile Selassie
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 10:45 Comments || Top||

#3  Late on the protection payments?
Posted by: Sven the pelter || 12/13/2015 10:55 Comments || Top||

#4  More, more.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 12/13/2015 12:51 Comments || Top||


-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
Obama hails 1st global climate pact as 'huge'-TERRORISM, not so much
Good summary of what was approved, including the American team getting "should" instead of "shall". Also this, from The Guardian::
James Hansen, father of climate change awareness, calls Paris talks 'a fraud'
The former Nasa scientist criticizes the talks, intended to reach a new global deal on cutting carbon emissions beyond 2020, as ‘no action, just promises’
Posted by: Sloluth Protector of the Weak7539 || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Why does anybody ever listen?
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 12/13/2015 12:13 Comments || Top||

#2  Blah blah blah. Watch the other hand. This is nothing but a con to take the people's money and hand it to the oligarchy. To the tune of 1 Trillion dollars a year.
Posted by: BrerRabbit || 12/13/2015 16:26 Comments || Top||

#3  I look for the middle class (rapidly becoming the poor class) to just say at some point enough is enough. They will be bringing tar and feathers out or worse.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 19:33 Comments || Top||


Iraq
Daesh bomber kills six guards on Iraqi border
[ARABNEWS] A jacket wallah struck an Iraqi position on the border with Soddy Arabia
...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual hajj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. When the oil runs out the rest of the world is going to kick sand in the Soddy national face...
, killing six guards, officials said Saturday, an attack claimed by the Daesh [Islamic State] group.

The bomber detonated an explosives-rigged truck at a border post in Iraq's vast Anbar province on Friday and also maimed 14 guards, an army lieutenant colonel and a local official said.

Daesh [Islamic State] issued a statement claiming the attack, which it said was carried out by a bomber identified as Abu Ali Al-Ansari.

The statement was accompanied by photos, some of which were apparently shot from a drone.

One showed a truck trailed by a long cloud of dust approaching a small outpost in the desert, while another pictured a massive column of smoke tinged with fire almost completely obscuring the position.

Other shots showed fighters with machine guns and a mortar who were said to have supported the attack.

The truck itself was shown swathed in home-made armor that covered all but a small window for the driver and an air intake for the engine.

Daesh [Islamic State] has overrun significant territory in Anbar province, which stretches from the borders with Syria and Jordan to the western approach to Baghdad, including scenic provincial capital Ramadi.

Daesh [Islamic State] used dozens of car and truck bombs in the operation in which it seized Ramadi in May, and bombs are a key aspect of the jihadists' offensive and defensive tactics.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


India-Pakistan
Madressah reforms
[DAWN] IN the National Action Plan (NAP), points 10 and 18 convey the state's resolve to register and regulate madressahs and eradicate sectarian terrorism. Both actions fall primarily within the preview of the criminal justice system but we are still far from achieving these objectives. We need to undertake a forensic analysis of the madressah landscape in Pakistain before we can move forward.

The commonalities and differences bet­ween formal education and madressahs can be identified through a diagnostic approach whose terms of reference should include the following: what percentage of school dropouts is attracted by madressahs? Is there any established link of madressah curriculums with militancy and terrorism? Are madressahs really spreading sectarianism and extremism? Is integration of madressahs into the formal education system a viable option?

Would it be appropriate to reform madressahs in isolation or should such reforms be part of broader educational reforms? What are the hurdles in communication between government and madressahs? What is the actual number of madressahs and their students?

Where schools are absent, madressahs are an alternate educational facility. Our madressahs have multi-dimensional characteristics, including political, sectarian and foreign leanings. According to the report The Madressah Conundrum, there are approximately 35,000 seminaries in Pakistain. Organised under five boards of different ideologies, most of them are of Deobandi and Barelvi persuasion and, according to media reports, are imparting religious education to approximately 3.5 million students.

There has been a mushroom growth in the number of women's madressahs, and the reasons for this should be explored. Although a clear breakdown of male and female madressahs is unavailable, it is estimated that girl students constitute 30pc of the total strength.

Foreign students in madressahs are not really an issue. Over the years, strict government regulations as well as the obsolete curriculums taught at madressahs, have led to a 74pc reduction in foreign students' enrolment. In 2006, there were 10,117 foreign students from 45 countries enrolled in Pak madressahs; currently, the figure is down to 2,673 from 37 countries.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan


16 held for attacking election office
[DAWN] Police have arrested 16 people in connection with an attack on the election office of a PML-N leader and the main accused in the murder of the nephew of former Punjab law minister Raja Basharat.

On the other hand, Numbardar Asad Mehmood, who was the ruling party candidate for the slot of chairman UC-86 Dhamial, was brought back to Rawalpindi along with his two facilitators after his arrest in Karachi. The ex-law minister’s nephew, Raja Shoaib, was killed outside a polling station in Dhamial on December 5.

When contacted, SP Ghayas Gul confirmed that Asad Mehmood had been arrested and police were also hunting for his brother, Ikhlaq. He said 18 suspects had already been detained in connection with the murder, including Asad’s father.

The SP said police had also detained 16 people suspected to be involved in the attack on the election office of Asad Mehmood at Dhamial Chowk. The protest was held against police failure to arrest the main accused in the murder case.

When asked how the police identified the suspects, the SP said they were traced during an investigation though there were no CCTV footages of the incident.

As many as 60 protesters were booked on the charge of damaging the election office of Asad Mehmood. However, none of the protesters was nominated in the FIR registered with Saddar Barooni police on the complaint of Constable Mohammad Imran.

The constable in his complaint stated that 60 unidentified people, chanting slogans and carrying sticks and batons, attacked the office and damaged its furniture and windowpanes.

The protesters also stormed Chaudhry Subtain’s mansion located in the neighborhood and set a vehicle on fire.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistan


Europe
Suspected ISIS recruiter arrested in Spain's Ceuta
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] A Spaniard has been jugged
Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'!
in the Spanish north African territory of Ceuta on suspicion of recruiting youth to fight for 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) in Syria, the interior ministry said Saturday.

The 34-year-old Ceuta resident, arrested at dawn in the Mediterranean peninsula bordering Morocco, "was carrying out recruitment and indoctrination of youths with a vulnerable profile," the ministry said in a statement.

He offered them "help to travel to conflict zones and join the Daesh [Islamic State] terrorist organization," it said, using the Arabic acronym for ISIS.

The suspect was known for "his adherence to Salafist ideology," it said, referring to a fundamentalist branch of Islam.

The ministry has said it has arrested around 100 suspected jihadists this year.

Spain has been on a heightened anti-terror alert -- level four of a possible five -- since June.
Posted by: Fred || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [1 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State


Arabia
Yemeni missiles hit Saudi military bases
The propaganda here is almost as blatant as the anti-Trump writings of the MSM...
The Yemeni army and popular forces conducted several retaliatory attacks against key military bases and positions in two Saudi provinces, inflicting heavy losses on the kingdom's forces, IRNA reported. Yemeni forces fired 13 missiles at al-Jamarak region in the Saudi province of Jizan, killing at least two Saudi military men.

Meantime, the Yemeni forces took control of the villages of Al-Khadmeh and Al-Wastah in addition to three military positions in Jizan province, FNA reported.

The army and the popular forces also hit the Jebel Hamr, al-Hazar and al-Sadis military bases in the province of Najran, and killed tens of Saudi troops and destroyed their military hardware. The Yemeni forces' missile and artillery fire has destroyed tens of Saudi military sites in Najran, Jizan and Asir provinces in the last three days. A large number of Saudi troops have been killed and many more wounded in the Yemeni forces' retaliatory attacks on their positions.

The Yemeni forces also destroyed a Saudi Abrams tank and four Bradleys in the outskirts of Al-Muhdef military base on Friday.

On Wednesday, the Yemeni forces launched missile attacks on the Saudi military bases in the province of Jizan with their new home-made missiles named 'Cry'. The Yemeni missiles destroyed al-Ain al-Harreh and al-Salah military bases in Jizan province, inflicting heavy losses on the Saudi army. The Yemeni forces also hit several Saudi military centers in the Southern parts of Al-Khuba region.

Al-Hamdani noted that the army and popular forces also seized the Riyadh government's strategic military positions in Najran province after several hours of clashes with the Saudi forces, seizing heavy machinery and a large cache of weapons and military tools, including mortar-launchers.
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Houthis

#1  "We moiderized 'em!"
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 11:46 Comments || Top||

#2  Anybody have a link to what REALLY happened?
Posted by: Old Patriot || 12/13/2015 15:27 Comments || Top||


Africa Subsaharan
Gambia now an Islamic republic, says President
The Gambia has been declared an Islamic republic by President Yahya Jammeh who said he wanted to further distance the west African state from its colonial past. The tiny, formerly secular country – named after the river from which British ships are said to have fired cannonballs to fix its borders – joins the ranks of other officially Islamic republics such as Iran and Afghanistan.
Good company...
“In line with the country’s religious identity and values I proclaim Gambia as an Islamic state,” said Jammeh on state television. “As Muslims are the majority in the country, Gambia cannot afford to continue the colonial legacy.”

The Gambia’s population of 1.8 million people are 95% Muslim. Jammeh said citizens of other faiths would still be able to practise.
I think there's a book somewhere that describes exactly how that is to be done...
Jammeh, an animated orator who has earned the reputation for making surprise declarations over the course of his 21-year presidency, pulled the Gambia out of the Commonwealth in 2013, calling it neo-colonial. In 2007 he claimed to have found a herbal cure for Aids.
A loon leads an islamic republic. What could go wrong?
Despite strong commercial ties with Britain and other European countries whose citizens are regular visitors to the Gambia’s white-sand beaches, relations with the west have deteriorated in recent years.

The European Union temporarily withheld aid money in 2014 over Gambia’s poor human rights record. The Gambia, whose main industries are agriculture and tourism, ranks 165 out of 187 countries on the UN development index.
I think I'll take the waters elsewhere...
The blogger Sidi Sanneh, a former foreign minister who has become a US-based dissident, said: “Starved of development funds because of his deplorable human rights record and economic mismanagement, Jammeh is looking towards the Arab world as substitute for and source of development aid.”
I guess El Jefe didn't hear about the collapse in the price of oil and the problems of the Soddies...
Posted by: Steve White || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I guess El Jefe didn't hear about the collapse in the price of oil and the problems of the Soddies...


...True enough, but on the other hand the Saudis could be down to a buck fifty they found in the throne cushions and a couple of bus tokens and they'd still have more money than the Gambia.

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 12/13/2015 8:14 Comments || Top||

#2  ^ true and lol
Posted by: Shipman || 12/13/2015 8:45 Comments || Top||

#3  The Gambia?

Rickey Henderson approves
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 12:38 Comments || Top||

#4  I suspect the fickle response to ISIS will result in a number of nations with high Muslim populations to become Islamic Republics.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 12/13/2015 20:32 Comments || Top||

#5  See RELATED WORLD MILITARY FORUM > GAMBIA DECLARES ITSELF TO BE AN ISLAMIC STATE, SECOND TO DECLARE AFTER MAURITANIA. PRO-TAIWAN, ANTI-BEIJING PRESIDENT JAMMEH ONCE TOLD FORMER US POTUS GEORGE BUSH [Dubya = Bush 43] IN 2007 HE CAN SEND GAMBIAN TROOPS TO ATTACK MAINLAND CHINA'S COASTAL ECONOMIC ZONE TO DETER EXPANSION BY BEIJING ACROSS THE TAIWAN STRAIT, + TO BASE GAMBIAN TROOPS ON TAIWAN TO HELP DETER ANY MILITARY ATTACK FROM BEIJING.

The above being said, looks like LIBERIA + SOUTH AFRICA are now that much important to US AFRICOM.
Posted by: JosephMendiola || 12/13/2015 23:15 Comments || Top||


Home Front: WoT
Obama Dragged To Address Terror Threat, "Kicking & Screaming"
[DC Whispers] Immediately after the San Bernardino terror attack, the President of the United States was said to be initially interested in the events to the point of outright excitement for the opportunity to once again make a call for enhanced federal gun control measures -- which he did.

Within hours of the attack it became clear to federal officials that Islamic terror played an integral role.

Once that was known, Mr. Obama's enthusiasm is said to have "waned considerably." And then when the L.A. FBI office went public with calling San Bernardino a terrorist attack, both Barack Obama and Valerie Jarrett went into "warpath mode."

Jarrett's displeasure was apparently first to make itself known. She was outraged the FBI had done so without first getting prior approval from her. Jarrett was said to be particularly concerned with the proximity of the FBI's terror designation and the president's quick words on calling for more gun control measures soon after the actual San Bernardino terror attack.

They're making us look like fools!"

The focus of the White House's ire soon became FBI Director, James Comey.

Some of that conflict was outlined earlier here: BREAKING: Obama/Jarrett Warn FBI Director Over Anti-Muslim Tone

At one point, the president is said to have flung several papers onto the floor of the Oval Office as he sat behind his desk stewing over Director's Comey's now-infamous terrorist attack remarks.

"This was supposed to be a gun issue for us, not some anti-Islamic bullsh*t!"
Posted by: Besoeker || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "They're making us look like fools!"

That's because you are fools.

I decided to finally read that copy of the Quran that I had CAIR mail to me on their dime a few months after 9/11. I'm 23 pages in. I understand that the word kufr does not mean nonbeliever, but rather 'those who deny the truth'. Someone explain to me why I should bother to read further.
Posted by: Raj || 12/13/2015 0:31 Comments || Top||

#2  Someone explain to me why I should bother to read further.
because you'll love the flying donkey story(actually you need to read the hadith as well...yeah I was bored)
Posted by: Classer || 12/13/2015 5:52 Comments || Top||

#3  highly stupid to link san bernadino to gun control

Islamist terrorists had a pipe bomb factory

so you kill 2 campaigns by making it look exploitative of the tragedy

especially as everyone can see that the Islamists would have just used the pipe bombs if they did not have guns
Posted by: anon1 || 12/13/2015 6:05 Comments || Top||

#4  ValJar said: They're [FBI} making us look like fools!"

Easy pickins. Not a hard task to make fools look like fools.
Posted by: JohnQC || 12/13/2015 8:32 Comments || Top||

#5  What happens when the imperial staff start worrying about their own safety (and that of their families) over obeying ever more irrational direction from the emperor's inner circle? What happens when they stop obeying the decrees? What happens when self preservation means looking beyond 2016?
Posted by: Procopius2k || 12/13/2015 8:40 Comments || Top||

#6  During the intense back and forth among speech writers and Jarrett, was a moment where Barack Obama is said to have pointed defiantly at Jarrett and declared, “This is just as much an Israel problem as it is a gun problem! Nobody wants to say it, but it’s true!”

Huh?

Posted by: Matt || 12/13/2015 10:04 Comments || Top||

#7  It's becoming ever more clear how much Obama hates Israel.
Posted by: Deacon Blues || 12/13/2015 11:50 Comments || Top||

#8  Fools and thin skinned petty tyrants.

If they keep going as they are, they won't make it to the end of 2016 to leave peacefully.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/13/2015 11:51 Comments || Top||

#9  He wants to create so much utter confusion, that he'll look Presidential, and the sheepul will want him to stay President, it won't work.

number two. He's a fool , and a traitor.
Posted by: Redneck Jim || 12/13/2015 12:10 Comments || Top||

#10  As the end draws nigh, the mask slips more and more and the nature of the ValJar/Champ presidency and its agendas show more and more...
think back to how many at the beginning of his run asked questions that were dismissed as ridiculous that now seem so obvious.
Posted by: NoMoreBS || 12/13/2015 15:46 Comments || Top||

#11  I hope ValJar has a huge pile of money to pay for her security. Because she isn't eligible for Secret Service protection post Obammers term.
Posted by: Glearong Lumumba8690 || 12/13/2015 16:07 Comments || Top||

#12  I am way to humble, and to addicted to the 'burg, to believe that I'm the only one that saw through this traitorous clique from day 1.

I'll be pleasantly surprised if a violent revolution does not begin in the next 12 months.
Posted by: AlanC || 12/13/2015 16:51 Comments || Top||

#13  #11. She'll have Quds' forces
Posted by: Frank G || 12/13/2015 17:04 Comments || Top||

#14  @#12

I believe Obumble and his ilk will do everything they can to manufacture one so they can declare martial law and do whatever the heck they want.
Posted by: DarthVader || 12/13/2015 17:23 Comments || Top||

#15  Martial Law has the serious risk of resulting in civil war.
Posted by: Glenmore || 12/13/2015 17:42 Comments || Top||

#16  This...uhhemm...article reads like a cheesy fuckin' dimestore crime novel from the '50's.
Posted by: DepotGuy || 12/13/2015 18:15 Comments || Top||

#17  ValJar said: "They're [the FBI} making us look like fools!"

No, you idiot, you're making you look like fools.

BECAUSE YOU ARE FOOLS.
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 21:23 Comments || Top||

#18  Sorry about the enlarged font in #17, mods.

It was just supposed to be the last sentence. :-(
Posted by: Barbara || 12/13/2015 21:26 Comments || Top||


Iraq
US-led warplanes slam ISIS on Gwer front
[Rudaw] A Peshmerga official said Saturday that his forces repulsed an attack by 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) snuffies on the Gwer front shortly after coalition fighter jets bombed the group's bunkers in the area.

"At around 7:00am ISIS fired mortar shells at the Peshmerga frontlines and later the Peshmerga repulsed an attack," Brig. Tahir Jadir, a Peshmerga commander on the Gwer front, told Rudaw via telephone.

Jadir added that coalition warplanes "launched 10 consecutive Arclight airstrikes, destroying an ISIS base."

The confrontations ended without any losses to the Peshmerga casualties. ISIS casualties remains unknown.

Meanwhile on Friday coalition fighter jets destroyed 15 ISIS tunnels south of Kirkuk.

Peshmerga commander Kemal Kirkuki told Rudaw that his forces did on the same day capture a number of ISIS snuffies disguised among civilians returning to their liberated areas.

ISIS has been pushed back in all Kurdish areas in the past several months, but the group engages the Peshmerga in daily skirmishes along the Kurdistan Region's 1050KM border with the hard boy group.
Posted by: trailing wife || 12/13/2015 00:00 || Comments || Link || E-Mail|| [0 views] Top|| File under: Islamic State



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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.
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Two weeks of WOT
Sun 2015-12-13
  Gambia now an Islamic republic, says President
Sat 2015-12-12
  US sez 3 ISIS Top Dawgs die in airstrikes
Fri 2015-12-11
  North Korea claims it has hydrogen bomb; experts skeptical
Thu 2015-12-10
  37 killed in Taliban siege at Khandahar airport
Wed 2015-12-09
  Daesh loses large part of Ramadi
Tue 2015-12-08
  Clash among the supporters of Taliban chief and Mullah Rasool leaves 24 dead
Mon 2015-12-07
  Yemen's Aden governor killed in car bombing claimed by Islamic State
Sun 2015-12-06
  AQIM shares responsibility for Mali hotel killings
Sat 2015-12-05
  Still No Confirmation On Reports Of Mullah Mansour's Death
Fri 2015-12-04
  They're here
Thu 2015-12-03
  Syed Farook is religious, sez Dad
Wed 2015-12-02
  Dozens of Houthis killed in major offensive across border from Yemen
Tue 2015-12-01
  Russia Arms Su-34s with Air-to-Air Missiles in Syria for First Time
Mon 2015-11-30
  Suspected Jihadists Attack Cash Truck in Burkina Faso
Sun 2015-11-29
  Pakistan Airstrikes Kill 17 Militants

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