[Free Beacon] Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton told ABC Action News reporter Sarina Fazan on Wednesday that she didn’t need to take any neuro-cognitive tests.
After Clinton nearly collapsed a couple weeks ago as she was leaving a September 11 memorial in New York City, Clinton’s health has become a greater concern on the campaign trail. It was later revealed on that day that she had been diagnosed with pneumonia two days earlier, but she didn’t publicly disclose the illness until reporters started mounting pressure on the campaign to make a statement.
Fazan reinforced this concern in a portion of this interview, 2:59 to 4:20 in the video above, when she talked to Clinton about her health. She told Clinton that she knew that Clinton had released her records from her doctor saying that she was fit to be president; however, Fazan said that other doctors were concerned because Clinton and her Republican opponent Donald Trump are in an age group susceptible to dementia and Alzheimer’s.
#1
Theme song link fixed by removing the quotation marks around the URL. Sometimes, for reasons that passeth understanding, those quotes cause trouble.
#3
I give credit to Ted for meeting his commitment after the rancor and bile he had to swallow following the debates. Kasich, for all your loud noise about integrity....Bush..., Carly... time to man-up and prevent the most corrupt, criminal, venal, dishonest Presidential candidate in modern history from being President. The Republic is genuinely in grave peril folks!
"After many months of careful consideration, of prayer and searching my own conscience, I have decided that on Election Day, I will vote for the Republican nominee, Donald Trump,"
...and:
"Our country is in crisis. Hillary Clinton is manifestly unfit to be president, and her policies would harm millions of Americans. And Donald Trump is the only thing standing in her way," Cruz said in the statement. "A year ago, I pledged to support the Republican nominee, and I will honor that commitment."
There's a difference between endorsing a candidate and saying you're voting for him. Lots of 'wiggle room' here, folks. Just sayin'.
#5
Senator Cruz decided what was most important to him, and will act on it. Part of what is important to him turned out to be not splitting the Republican party over this issue. He needn't love the candidate he votes for to accomplish his goals.
Probably the majority of those who go to the polls this election will be voting for what they conceive to be the lesser of the evils, as will be those who cannot bring themselves to vote for either presidential candidate but still vote in the down-ticket races.
#6
Cruz stated to "Vote your conscience". Well, Apparently the whole world wanted him to "State his conscience". Now that he has, can we please move on to the General Election?
Posted by: Charles ||
09/24/2016 19:00
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As more pro athletes around the country follow San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick's lead and take a knee for the Star Spangled Banner in protest, a second sailor has gone public with her own gesture of solidarity.
Intelligence Specialist 2nd Class Janaye Ervin, a reservist on active duty within U.S. Pacific Fleet, is subject to administrative actions, still under review, for refusing to stand for the national anthem while in uniform Sept. 19, Bill Doughty, a spokesman for Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam Public Affairs told Military.com.
Mr/Mz Manning to the courtesy phone. When such behavior is publicly shown, yank the security clearance immediately. If you haven't reached the political officer (O8-9) level in grade, your oath still applies. To paraphrase a SCOTUS opinion, if you want to act as a lightning rod, don't be surprised you're struck by lightning.
#4
The media will make him a hero and the Pentagon will declare that actual loyalty is no longer a requirement for service. Indeed disloyalty will be rewarded with promotion.
#5
Warrants a Central Clearance Facility (CCF) suspension of access pending a formal investigation. Better to error on the side of caution. There could be other issues.
#6
We have a C-in-C who couldn't get a clearance without having been elected to his current position, and a CIA Director who admitted voting for the Communist candidate for Prez shortly after the end of the Vietnam War.
Pretty much par for the course in this day and age.
Makes you wonder what kind of personnel Obama will bequeath to his successor.
If Trump is elected, he'd better have a looonng purge list prepared.
#7
Article 15 Disciplinary action which would automatically trigger a CCF Clearance suspension. This person should by all rights be on the fast track to a DD 214 that reads Dishonorable. But....where is Bergdahl prosecution for a far greater crime? I no longer hav much confidence in the integrity of the senior officer corps when these kinds of things fester. Sadly, it will take years to flush out the garbage that Champ has allowed to be put in place across the spectrum of the services, and I doubt we have the years before the ChiComs or a resurgent Russia pushes the line.
[NY Post] Yet another surprise revelation suggests strongly that the FBI's probe of Hillary Clinton's e-mail mess was anything but a by-the-book investigation.
House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) said he learned only Friday that the Justice Department gave immunity deals to Clinton’s former chief of staff, Cheryl Mills, and two other aides. That brings to five the number of Clintonistas who got a pass in exchange for testimony and/or information.
But what makes it especially significant in Mills' case is that she was allowed to sit in on Clinton's FBI interview, asserting attorney-client privilege on Hillary's behalf. This, even though Mills was herself a witness, even a potential subject of, the investigation.
Indeed, she was a key player in the process that deleted tens of thousands of Clinton e-mails -- many later found to be classified -- before the FBI could subpoena them.
Mills' lawyers say her immunity deal was limited to the contents of her laptop, and was given because of ongoing debate over after-the-fact classification.
Prosecutors normally strike such deals only when they can't get the information any other way. But if Mills refused to turn over the computer without any immunity, why couldn't the FBI just subpoena the laptop?
After all, as Chaffetz notes, "immunity deals should not be a requirement for cooperation with the FBI." Yet in the Clinton case, he noted, "the FBI was handing out immunity deals like candy. No wonder they couldn't prosecute anyone."
Frankly, it's amazing that Hillary didn't get a deal herself. Then again, it's become clear that she didn't need one.
President Obama publicly declared months ago, at the start of the FBI investigation, that Clinton had done nothing wrong. As we said at the time: The fix was in.
#1
Prosecutors normally strike such deals only when they can't get the information any other way.
I thought it was usually because both parties acknowledged the witness was engaged in criminal activities for which they would otherwise certainly be successfully prosecuted. As I recall the immunity contract is also for specific acts which are explicitly detailed in the document.
"This is what I did. Now I'll tell you what she did."
[NY Post] One might think President Obama would have asked his top military officials to weigh in on his administration’s decision in January to send $400 million in cash to Iran. After all, Iran is the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism, and terrorists prefer cash to wire payments because it’s so difficult to track.
And its armed forces have both directly and indirectly threatened the US military in the Middle East.
But Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry did not consult Secretary of Defense Ash Carter or the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Joseph Dunford.
This news came out of a hearing Thursday before the Senate Armed Services Committee. In response to a question from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) about the cash payment to Iran, Carter made it clear that he had been out of the loop.
"We weren’t involved in this," Carter said, adding that it was part of the settlement of a decades-long legal dispute between Iran and the US over arms sales. "I don’t know all the details of it, and the chairman and I were not involved in that. It is a decision that was taken by the law-enforcement and diplomatic [agencies], and I would refer you there."
When Dunford was asked about the cash payments, he responded: "I am not trying to be evasive but I don’t know the details of that arrangement and it really was a political decision that was made to provide that money, and I don’t think it’s appropriate that I comment on that."
#1
This reminds me of an attacking bear story.
Bears are big omnivores and prefer to amble.
When they do run, it's about chasing prey.
When you see a bear, and you do run, Yogi assumes you are prey and gives chase.
Obama cannot, not give money away in an effort to make a problem go away and he thinks gratitude will follow.
Gennady Tsypkalov, a former top official in the breakaway republic of Lugansk, was found hanged in his cell in Lugansk city, according to Russian language news account.
Tsypkalov once headed the Lugansk Council of Ministers, and was a close adviser to Lugansk president Igor Plotnitsky.
Tsypkalov and several others had been detained by the Lugansk prosecutor last week for their alleged role in a planned coup d'tat, according to a new report in novorosinform.org.
Among the coup participants were Vitaly Kiselev and Alexei Karjakin. According to a press release by the Lugansk prosecutor's office, the three accused had been holding secret meetings since the very start of the republic. Those plans included murdering top officials and replacing them with coup participants.
The news release goes on to accuse unidentified un-indicted co-conspirators of seeking to eliminate the three men. The three had been ordered into preventative detention after appearing in a Lugansk court last week.
Among the other crimes detailed in the press release was smuggling, which is an activity that nearly every top official in both Donetsk and Lugansk has been linked to, including Plotnitsky.
Tsypkalov was found hanged in an administrative building Friday evening. It is apparent from the story the other two detainees are still alive, but being held.
#1
Tsypkalov was found hanged in an administrative building Friday evening. It is apparent from the story the other two detainees are still alive, but being held will likely commit suicide in the near future as well.
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/24/2016 9:32
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#4
Deaths of top officials are usually more spectacular than suicides.
Lugansk government officials aren't above using machine guns, thermobaric rocket launchers and roadside bombs when apprehending eliminating suspects. They've done it before.
#5
Tsypkalov was found hanged in an administrative building Friday evening. It is apparent from the story the other two detainees are still alive, but being held will likely commit suicide in the near future as well.
Russian military Boris journalist pretty much expects this as well.
As I have been saying since Lt. Colonel Bednov was ambushed in January, 2015, the leadership of Lugansk has been in trouble with its rank and files, its arms rank and file.
[GP] The University of Vermont this week flew the "Black Lives Matter" terrorist flag beside the American flag on campus.
This is what they are teaching America’s children today on college campuses‐That a terrorist flag is to be respected and the American flag is to be disrespected.
Campus Reform reported: The University of Vermont’s Burlington campus is flying a Black Lives Matter flag alongside both the American and state flags.
Several students from the school took to social media to express their support for the move, with some saying the school is "winning for this" and another noting that since the school is supportive of the movement, "we should be too."
One local news outlet is reporting that the flag is being sponsored by the school’s Student Government Association (SGA), whose president called the move a way to "show symbolic support for our community."
#8
Yes, shooting at police is a felony, and felons are not supposed to own firearms.
Report: Charlotte’s Keith Scott Had History of Violence Including Arrest for Shooting At Police…
Posted on September 22, 2016 by sundance
According to a story in The Christian Times, who they claim verified with The Charlotte Observer, Keith Lamont Scott had a two decades long history of gun violence, including an arrest/conviction for shooting at police officers in Texas. The New York Times has previously reported on his troubled past but not the 2005 shooting at police incident:
(Via NYT) […] According to court records, Mr. Scott was born in South Carolina, was about six feet tall and weighed 230 to 250 pounds. While living in South Carolina in the 1990s, he was charged with a number of offenses including check fraud, aggravated assault and carrying a concealed weapon. Later, he moved to Texas where he shot and wounded a man in San Antonio in 2002, for which he was convicted and sentenced, in 2005, to seven years in prison. He was released in 2011. (link)
The Charlotte Observer also reported on Scott’s extensive criminal career –SEE HERE– and we did independently identify a criminal record in Texas – SEE HERE – which aligns with all of these reports.
The 'victims' were thugs with a long criminal history including resisting arrest, weapons violations, etc... They were not members of the local choir as the media would have you think...
The 'victims' were armed (if only with their fists), or attempting to take the officer's gun to become 'armed'.
h/t Instapundit
The president of Northwestern University told students on Monday that anyone who opposes "trigger warnings" or who ridicules the pain of those "microaggressed" is an "idiot" and a "lunatic." And to think I used to get angry when they'd give tenure to people according to affirmative action status instead of ability.
#1
All of this bullshit about "microaggressions," "safe spaces,""trigger warnings" and the like is a very recent innovation. Is there something about the latest batch of larval-stage humans attending our universities these days that makes them uniquely vulnerable in ways we were not? Mankind got along just fine for thousands of years without this crap.
Posted by: Dave D. ||
09/24/2016 7:41
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#2
These people need to be committed for their own safety. Maybe after 30 years of ECT and lobotomy's they'll be able to live a normal healthy life as an organ donor or something else useful.
#3
I guess I'm among the legions of deplorables and idiots. Permit me to say "GFY." You can bet it doesn't mean "Good For You." "Safe Spaces?" Horsepucky, we have never been a country about safe spaces; how the hell do you think this country got settled or kept free? Guess you wouldn't know about that. The biggest threat to this country today is from demagogue community organizers like you and grifters like Hillary who are looting the country.
#4
The sorts of people who NEED "safe spaces" just means that when they come out into the real world...OUR world, BTW. We eat them for Lunch. We take their jobs. We father the children while they sit in each other's faces.
The world is competitive and the competitive aren't into micro aggressions. We are more into squashing you flat and leaving you beside the road. Too bad you lose, wussy ass.
#5
So much for the value of a piece of paper from NW. Think real hard about hiring a snowflake that can't handle the demands and stress of life. You'll be sued relentlessly by these types trying to turn the world into their personal fantasy. Best to cut it off in the hiring process before it impacts your paycheck.
#7
The world is competitive and the competitive aren't into micro aggressions
Amazing isn't it how the Left which thinks itself 'scientifically' based never heard of Darwin and adaptation. Yeah, I know they've corrupted science in order to twist their failed agendas into the system, debasing it just like the coinage. And they wonder why the fail, time and again.
#8
If this wasn't so sad it could be funny. Way back in 1981 I was introduced at work to New Age Thinking and Valuing Differences. Be tolerant of differences we were told, we asked will they be tolerant of me?
How far can you tolerate the intolerant and who gets to make the call on what is and isn't? Of course it was unanswerable and the whole program died with a whimper.
It was hilarious because in the software world few people put up with this nonsense.
Personally I find these calls for safe spaces etc. to be attempts to macro-aggress against me. These are just as insulting and stress inducing as anything that the snowflakes quake over so they should all be sanctioned severely.
#9
This isn't new. These snowflakes were bred and grown for this. From 'nobody loses' basketball games to participation trophy's. This is the result of decades of pampering and spoiling our children so they don't get 'emotionally scarred'.
And if you think they will go away when they graduate think again. They will be in your HR office. They will be the 'consultants' your upper management hires to tell people with decades of real-life experience how to do their job.
They are experts of concocting flashy power point presentations and 'expert' sounding titles to convince your management that they are much wiser than you would every be.
#10
IMO, you'all missing a point. Once they get some power, they'll try to make a worldwide safe space by eliminating dangerous characters like us. And their definition of dangerous is very different from ours. Like, for example, Stalin killing off the top 10% of the Soviet officer corp in 1940.
#12
I think grom has it: Hillary called us "deplorable", "irredeemable", and not fit to be Americans for a reason. It's all eliminationist rhetoric, carefully parsed (what Clintons do best) and fed to the media. Her most ardent supporters get the message.
When a thug says he doesn't like you and is going to do something about it the minute he gets power and the chance to do so, you should believe him.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2016 14:21
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#13
g(r)om beat me to it, and is right.
Humanity has not gone without this before, just a new package.
When Melissa Click calls for muscle, the spacers approach the BLM.
[Ynet] Sweden has charged three men with organising the smuggling of 170 migrants in minibuses from northern Italy across the EU's open-border zone to Scandinavia, prosecutors said on Friday.
Prosecutors said they believed the trio hired minibuses and drivers to transport the mostly Syrian migrants to Scandinavia from Milan train station in Italy in 2014.
"There they were simply walking around and asking if someone wants to go to Sweden or other parts of Scandinavia," presiding prosecutor Isabelle Bjursten told Reuters.
She said the suspects typically charged around 500 euros ($560) per person while often letting children travel for free, and earned around 150,000 Swedish crowns ($17,500), she said.
[Ynet] Greek police say they arrested a 19-year-old Afghan on suspicion of attempting to smuggle five Iraqis out of the country to Bulgaria. A police statement Friday said he was arrested while allegedly guiding the Iraqis on foot toward the Bulgarian border.
A Greek official says authorities caught 107 people, mainly Syrian families, entering Greece across the Evros river forming the border with Turkey.
[AnNahar] A Montenegrin went on trial in southern Germany Friday accused of helping to prepare a terror attack after he was found driving to Paris last November with Kalashnikovs and explosives hidden in his car.
The 51-year-old was arrested during a routine check on a Bavaria motorway on November 5, just over a week before 130 people were killed in coordinated suicide bomb and gun attacks in the French capital. Police discovered a cache of weapons in his car, including eight Kalashnikovs, handguns, two hand grenades and 200 grammes of TNT explosives.
The accused, named as Vucelic V., told a Munich courtroom at the start of his trial that he was aware the weapons were in the car but he denied any knowledge of an attack being planned.
What a charming wedding present! The bride will be so pleased -- she was hoping to complete the set.
The destination entered in the VW Golf's sat-nav system showed an address in Paris, according to the indictment. The same address was found on a handwritten note in the car, along with a phone number for a contact person in France. While no direct link has been established between the man and the Paris attackers, prosecutors say he was fully aware the weapons were to be used for a planned terror attack.
He stands accused of "acting as an accomplice in the preparation of a serious act of violence" threatening French state security. He also faces charges for the unlawful possession and transportation of assault weapons.
His trial is expected to last a week. If convicted, he faces a minimum sentence of three years and nine months, a court spokeswoman told AFP.
Golly. When he gets out he'll be fifty-four.
The November attacks in Paris were claimed by the Islamic State group.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
09/24/2016
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[AnNahar] Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him... accused the United States of sending more weapons to a Syrian Kurdish militia in defiance of Ankara's repeated insistence it is a "terrorist" organization.
Although the U.S. views the the People's Protection Units (YPG) militia as its most significant ground ally against jihadists, Ankara says the fighters are "terrorists" linked to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) which for decades has waged an insurgency in southeastern The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... Erdogan said late Thursday that three days earlier the U.S. sent "two planes with weapons" to Kobane in northern Syria for the YPG and its Democratic Union Party (PYD) political wing.
In a speech in New York after attending the UN General Assembly, Erdogan said Washington was mistaken in using the YPG as an ally in the fight against IS.
"If you think you can finish ISIS (IS) off with the PYD and YPG, you cannot, because they are terrorist groups as well," he said in remarks posted on the presidential website.
He added he had raised the issue of the alleged weapons delivery in talks with U.S. Vice President Joe Foreign Policy Whiz Kid Biden The former Senator-for-Life from Delaware, an example of the kind of top-notch Washington intellect to be found in the World's Greatest Deliberative Body... but said Biden insisted he had no information.
Erdogan added the U.S. sent arms to Kurdish militia during the battle for Kobane, a Kurdish-majority town, between IS and the YPG in 2014, saying half of the weapons fell into the hands of IS murderous Moslems.
The president's accusations risk causing further tension between the NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A cautionary tale of cost-benefit analysis.... allies over Washington's support for the YPG in its fight against IS.
Previously, the U.S. has insisted that any military equipment provided to the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the past has gone only to Arab fighters.
There are about 30,000 fighters in the SDF which is made up largely of Kurds, but also has a significant Syrian Arab component.
General Joe Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on Thursday that the U.S. was considering arming the SDF who would join the offensive to retake the IS stronghold of Raqa.
But Dunford said that the U.S. would work "very closely with our Turkish allies" to assuage Ankara's concerns over the Syrian Kurds' long-term political prospects.
Turkey's presidential front man Ibrahim Kalin said Thursday it was "out of the question" for Ankara to join any operation to take Raqa if it included the YPG or PYD.
Turkey has over the last month sent dozens of tanks and hundreds of troops into Syria to back pro-Ankara Syrian rebels fighting IS and the YPG.
[AnNahar] Lawyers for Dutch far-right MP Geert Wilders on Friday urged judges to drop an upcoming discrimination and hate speech case against the controversial politician, slamming it as a "political trial."
Wilders was appearing again
...is this the third time or the fourth?
before a top security court ahead of the start of his trial next month on charges of inciting racial hatred due to statements he made about Moroccans living in the Netherlands.
"Public prosecutors are asking the judges to hand down a political verdict," lawyer Geert-Jan Knoops told a three-judge bench at the preliminary hearing.
"That's unacceptable and irresponsible... and will have far-reaching consequences for democracy in the Netherlands," he argued at the hearing, held in a fortress-like courthouse close to Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport.
Knoops drew on a U.S. legal principle called the "political question doctrine" to underline his case, and argued that in his comments, Wilders had merely "put forward the political program of his party."
The case focuses on comments made by the populist politician at a March 2014 local election rally.
Wilders asked supporters in The Hague whether they wanted "fewer or more Moroccans in your city and in the Netherlands?"
When the crowd shouted back "Fewer! Fewer!" a smiling Wilders answered: "We're going to organize that."
The remark triggered 6,400 complaints from across the country, and Wilders even faced criticism from within his Freedom Party (PVV).
At least 56 people and five organizations have registered as victims of the comments and at least 34 witnesses have come forward ahead of a possible trial, judges said.
Knoops said his client had a fundamental right to freedom of speech, particularly as a politician, adding his client "did not make the statement based on a racial prejudice."
- Tight security -
Security was tight on Friday, but Wilders, wearing a dark suit, white shirt and blue tie seemed relaxed and smiled at onlookers.
Wilders is described as the "most heavily-guarded man" in the Netherlands. And since the 2004 liquidation of anti-Islam director Theo van Gogh, he has had around-the-clock protection.
The outspoken politician has drawn heavy flack from fellow MPs after saying he would close all mosques and confiscate Korans -- which he famously compares to Hitler's "Mein Kampf" -- should he take power in the Netherlands.
His party rode high in opinion polls as the migrant crisis polarized the country.
But in recent months, it has dropped back again ahead of general elections in March, in which observers say the outcome of his eventual trial could play an important role.
If found guilty, Wilders could face up to two years in jail or a fine of more than 20,000 euros ($22,000).
Wilders was acquitted during a first hate trial in 2011 which concluded his remarks targeted a religion and not a specific group of people.
[AnNahar] In the three days since the Iraqi city of Fallujah was reopened for residents following its recapture from the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... group, just over 500 families have returned home, Maj. Gen. Saad al-Harbea, the head of west Baghdad operations, said.
Hundreds more have massed around the checkpoints that block the city's entrance to await the multiple security approvals required to re-enter Fallujah, ... the City of Mosques, which might have somthing to do with why it's not called Center of Prosperity or a really nice place to raise your kids... which lies 40 miles (65 kilometers) west of the Iraqi capital. But the vast majority of the 300,000 people that made up the city's prewar population remain scattered across the country.
Fallujah was the first Iraqi city to fall to IS, in January 2014. Its civilian population steadily declined after the Death Eater takeover, with some families renting homes in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, or traveling further north to the country's semi-autonomous Kurdish region.
Many more civilians were forced out of the city by Iraqi troops as they pushed through Fallujah, leaving a ghost town in their wake. Fallujah was declared "fully liberated" in June, following an operation that officially lasted just over a month and was assisted by U.S.-led Arclight airstrikes. The tens of thousands of people who left the city last summer often ended up in desert camps with little food or water.
Al-Harbea defended the security checks outside Fallujah as essential to preventing IS from regaining power in the city. "Of course we need to turn some people away," he said.
He said Iraqi intelligence agencies had drawn up lists of IS collaborators based on information from local leaders and informants within the bully boy group. Ten families had been turned away so far because "they had sons or fathers with connections to ISIS," he said, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group.
Repopulating territory retaken from IS forces of Evil is a slow process, demonstrating how painstaking wider reconciliation efforts will be in Iraq, where suspicions and enmity plague communities long after the fighting stops and victory has been declared.
In Fallujah, the process is rendered more difficult by the town's history of anti-government sentiment.
After the U.S.-led invasion toppled Iraq's longstanding leader Saddam Hussein in 2003, many of Fallujah's residents initially supported the Sunni insurgency that rose up against U.S. forces and the Shiite-dominated government in Baghdad. Militants from al-Qaeda in Iraq fought two bloody battles with U.S. troops in Fallujah in 2004, in which more than 100 Americans were killed and over 1,000 maimed.
Inside the city today, little has changed since the aftermath of IS's overthrow.
Basic services like running water or electricity have not yet returned. Military vehicles line the streets and in many neighborhoods the only signs of life are the freshly-painted checkpoints.
As a military convoy rolled through a narrow residential street, a handful of children peeked out of garden gates. On one street corner a group of men sold cooking gas, and a local mosque handed out large bricks of ice and thin mattresses.
Basaad Jadoua, 58, along with her her daughter, son and husband, had waited for days for security approval to return to the city that has been their family's home for generations. Squeezed into a microbus between tanks of water and bags of dried food stuffs, they drove along a debris-strewn road, past rows of looted shops, burnt-out government buildings and razed homes. They had brought the essentials with them, they said, because they had heard they were impossible to buy in Fallujah.
The family had fled the city in 2013 when, following two years of instability, it became clear that IS was growing in power. They haven't returned since.
The bus stopped outside their house, on an empty street flanked on both sides by damaged or destroyed buildings.
"For 30 years this was my home," Jadoua said, looking over the garden wall.
Unlike many of the city's residents, her home is still standing, but it had been looted and a rocket that landed in the front garden destroying the driveway where her husband's car still stood. The windows were all broken and the rooms were filled with dust. Her husband and son busied themselves unloading the minibus and evaluating the damage.
Jadoua faltered as she walked up the driveway and began to cry. Her daughter, Imaa, 24, found an unbroken plastic chair for her to sit on in a room inside, and Jadoua seemed to recover her composure. "We knew there would be destruction, so we were prepared," she said, "once there is water and electricity, I know we can return to our old lives."
[PopularMechanics] The Ig Noble Prizes, the tongue-in-cheek scientific tradition going back twenty-six years, have just announced its latest winners.
First established at Harvard in 1991, the Ig Nobels celebrate odd and potentially uses scientific breakthroughs of the year. The awards weren't actually recorded until 1995, but ever since they've grown in popularity as a chance to view science from a unique, self-aware angle. Actual Nobel Prize winners hand out the awards. Most of those roasted by the Ig Nobles gladly accept the awards, both aware of the oddity of their work and eager for a chance to promote it.
In a rare use of the Ig Nobles to tackle scientific corruption, a Chemistry Ig Noble was given to Volkswagen this year "for solving the problem of excessive automobile pollution emissions by automatically, electromechanically producing fewer emissions whenever the cars are being tested." An obvious reference to last year's diesel emissions scandal, where the German car manufacturer was found to be tricking automotive inspectors into thinking their cars were cleaner than they actually were.
Other awards this year were more in line with Ig Noble tradition. The Physics Ig Noble was presented to Susanne Åkesson, who was part of a team that was given the award in recognition of "discovering why white-haired horses are the most horsefly-proof horses, and for discovering why dragonflies are fatally attracted to black tombstones."
The 2016 Economics Ig Noble had a geologic aspect to it, with Mark Avis and Sarah Forbes "assessing the perceived personalities of rocks, from a sales and marketing perspective." According to their paper, rocks were "chosen stimuli as they do not have any obvious commonalities with brands."
You can find all the other Ig Noble Prize Award winners here.
And the video of the ceremony, which for some reason Popular Mechanics neglected to mention, can be found here. Enjoy!
[IsraelTimes] Islamic Relief Worldwide was barred from operating in the West Bank amid claims of funds being funnelled to Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason,
A UK-based Moslem charity is taking legal action against the Israeli government after it was barred from operating in the West Bank, the Jewish News can reveal.
Islamic Relief Worldwide ‐ which works on health and education programmes in 40 countries and responds to disasters worldwide ‐ was placed on a banned list by former defence minister Moshe Yaalon two years ago amid claims of funds being funnelled to Hamas.
Islamic Relief strongly denied No, no! Certainly not! the claims and a subsequent independent audit of its work in the territories was said to have found "absolutely no evidence" of money being passed to Hamas or of any link to terrorism.
The charity has now confirmed to the Jewish News that it is bringing court action to overturn the ban, although it’s understood a date for a hearing has yet to be set.
A statement from the charity said: "Islamic Relief Worldwide commenced legal proceedings in 2014. We are bringing a court action against the State of Israel to overturn its designation of us as an ’unauthorised association’ by the Defence Ministry. We do not wish to prejudice legal proceedings and will be making no further comment at this time".
Israel has not elaborated on its allegations over the past two years but Shin Bet said at the time the banning order was "based on information that has been accumulated over years, that the fund is a central player in financing of Hamas... [and] on accumulated knowledge and experience in fighting terror and financing of terror organizations".
Islamic Relief is the largest Moslem charity in the UK and has received millions in support from the Department for International Development. The government said back in 2014 that it saw no reason not to continue its association with the charity.
The ban was announced weeks before the start of the last conflict between Hamas and Israel. Following the conflict, IRW said it would not use funds raised under the auspices of the Disasters Emergency Appeal while Israel’s claims were probed.
The charity has from time to time worked with UK Jewish charities and individuals, and was one of the key players in interfaith climate change event just yesterday.
[NYT - 14 Oct 2014] The soldiers at the blast crater sensed something was wrong. It was August 2008 near Taji, Iraq. They had just exploded a stack of old Iraqi artillery shells buried beside a murky lake. The blast, part of an effort to destroy munitions that could be used in makeshift bombs, uncovered more shells.
Two technicians assigned to dispose of munitions stepped into the hole. Lake water seeped in. One of them, Specialist Andrew T. Goldman, noticed a pungent odor, something, he said, he had never smelled before.
He lifted a shell. Oily paste oozed from a crack. "That doesn’t look like pond water," said his team leader, Staff Sgt. Eric J. Duling.
The specialist swabbed the shell with chemical detection paper. It turned red -- indicating sulfur mustard, the chemical warfare agent designed to burn a victim’s airway, skin and eyes.
All three men recall an awkward pause. Then Sergeant Duling gave an order: "Get the hell out."
Five years after President George W. Bush sent troops into Iraq, these soldiers had entered an expansive but largely secret chapter of America's long and bitter involvement in Iraq. Dated article? Yes, but the recent WMD rocketing by ISIS of U.S. troops necessitates a re-look at the all too familiar WMD false narrative. The graphic depicts the destruction of Iraqi WMD by UNSCOM inspectors and technicians.
We discussed it here at Rantburg the day after the New York Times article was published, including links to several reports about Iraqi WMDs over the years. I recall more articles as well as reports from Rantburgers over the years, but will leave that archive search to others. Suffice it to say, the reason people believe there were no WMDs is because the mainstream media and the anti-Bush Democrats loudly shouted down all claims to the contrary the start of the Iraq invasion until the NYT report came out.
#2
CNN's report on that day had a different take on the facts than the report we had at Rantburg, which followed the line laid down by the CIA: "However, a CIA official refused to call the discovery the "smoking gun" that would validate the Bush administration's claims that Iraq had an active program to develop a nuclear weapon."
From the CNN article:
Obeidi also said he was not the only scientist ordered to hide that type of equipment.
"I think there may be more than three other copies. And I think it is quite important to look at this list so they will not fall into the hands of the wrong people," he said.
And
David Kay, who led three U.N. arms inspection missions in Iraq in 1991-92 and now heads the CIA's search for unconventional weapons, started work two days ago in Baghdad. CNN spoke to him about the case over a secure teleconferencing line.
"It begins to tell us how huge our job is," Kay said. "Remember, his material was buried in a barrel behind his house in a rose garden.
"There's no way that that would have been discovered by normal international inspections. I couldn't have done it. My successors couldn't have done it."
Kay said he had mixed emotions when he saw the centrifuge components: "It was a realization that I hadn't gotten all the parts [of Iraq's nuclear program]. So there was a moment of regret, but there was also an exhilaration that now maybe we have a chance to take this to the very bottom."
CNN had this story last week but made a decision to withhold it at the request of the U.S. government, which cited safety and national security concerns.
And
Experts said the documents and pieces Obeidi gave the United States were the critical information and parts to restart a nuclear weapons program, and would have saved Saddam's regime several years and as much as hundreds of millions of dollars for research.
David Albright, who was a U.N. nuclear weapons inspector in Iraq in the 1990s, said inspectors "understood that Iraq probably hid centrifuge documents, may have had components, and so it is very important that those items be found."
"What it is that Obeidi was ordered to keep was all the information and some centrifuge components, so that if he was given the order, he could restart the centrifuge program," said Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington.
"In a sense, the program was in hibernation. He was the key to the restart of this centrifuge program, and he never got the order. So in that sense it doesn't show at all that Iraq had a nuclear program. And Obeidi told me that he never worked on a nuclear program after 1991."
#3
This is a photo of one of the reactor buildings at Osirak following Operation Opera in June of 1981. Saddam never gave up on his quest for WMD. In fact, the administration buildings at Osirak were used for WMD research long after the reactor was destroyed. Iraqi officials believed Osirak would be an ideal research site since the reactor had already been obliterated by Israel. Aerial photo imagery betrayed their ruse.
#5
Thanks for that Rant-link and memory jogger TW.
I blame movie maker Nakoula Basseley, polio vaccine project manager Dr. Shakil Afridi, along with physician, virologist and biological weapons expert David Hatfill.
#7
TW's memory is sadly spongelike. TW has therefore developed a reflex to googling anything that sounds vaguely familiar, followed by a stroll through the Rantburg archives.
You are very welcome, Besoeker dear.
Mr. Tennessee, your service was clearly performed on other battlefields. Thank you for stepping forward and doing what you did there; I hope your lot were permitted to finish winning. But if all you knew about Iraq was what you read and heard from the mainstream media, it's no wonder you came to believe nothing was found.
#8
#4 Tennessee note well - Declassified report on the recovery of chemical munitions. Procopius2kand TW
Thanks for the link - am familiar with it - one of our guys was on the assessment team that contributed to that report.
Three points:
1 - The Iraq Resolution stated that we were mad at Iraq over their pursuit of a "significant" Chem/Bio and Nuclear programs, as well as Iraq harboring AQ. No "significant" CBRN program existed. There were remnants of pre-91 munitions no doubt and you refer to these in your articles. Certainly not enough to go to WAR over. In fact, our "threat" of use of military force assisted the IAEA efforts. Saddam was weak and mitigated.
2 - The Iraq Resolution also stated that we were mad because Iraq harbored in AQ. AQ WAS NOT in Iraq in 2003 - Saddam and OBL were at odds and OBL was plotting against Saddam's regime. Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad - Zarqawi - was in the AO and only gained support only after the invasion...pledged to OBL/AQ...and this planted the seeds for ISIS.
3 - In 1991, we did not remove Saddam and destroy the Republican Guard in order to avoid occupation and the consequences we face today. We were told if we break it, we own it...on the last night of the ground war...we in the convoys pointed north understood this. We would rather a weakened Saddam control his own people and counter Iran than us stay and put up with that mess. Daddy Bush was wiser than his son.
If we did need to employ force, so be it, a raid to go in and break things would have been sufficient. Not invasion, "regime change" and occupation. This is my point.
So, by whose bidding and influence did we go to war? The KSA (AQs Daddy - see declas 9/11 report), Israel, pontificators like Cheney and VDH? All of the above? Probably.
Actions have consequences. Iraq broke our Army, Iraq and Bush and Obama's failures gave us ISIS.
We HAVE to finish ISIS. An honest assessment leads a reasonable individual to the conclusion that things are worse today than prior to the invasion in 2003.
Bottom line - We conservatives have to conduct hard, honest AARs of our policy. We have to talk this and argue it in order to make the right decisions in the future and prevent poor decisions from re-occurring.
[GP] Top American psychiatrist and author Dr. Keith Ablow told FOX Business Network he would advise Hillary Clinton to skip the debate on Monday. She could get hurt badly.
"Dr. Ablow: How do I think she should prepare? I think she should say I'm going to hold three press conferences, I'm not doing the debates. Because it's like the third rail. I don't know that debating Donald Trump is something you can plan for great success with. It's like getting in the ring with Muhammad Ali. Because you got the rodeo clown and the skilled boxer in one person. In a way if I would have been advising Hillary Clinton I would say listen, say that he's a reality TV host that's been beyond the pale and simply don't debate... I think she could get hurt and hurt badly."
"I think she could get hurt because Donald Trump says things that are true. He says things that are unfettered, the naked truth."
I've never thought she could stand the rigors of a debate. We'll soon find out.
#3
The only thing I feel fairly certain about regarding this debate is that one of the candidates is going to do a face-plant that will significantly affect the outcome of the election.
Problem is, I don't know which one...
Posted by: Dave D. ||
09/24/2016 7:32
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#4
She's not going to drop out. She wants the presidency so badly, she would do anything to get it ("Yes anything!). She expects it, it was promised to her, she thinks she is entitled to it and by damn she'd better get it. Besides, she's got her eyes on some of the boodle in the WH that she didn't steal the first time.
#8
1- What has NBC told the moderator, Lester Holt, to do if Hills coughs/faints/goes cross-eyed? What are the cameras going to do?
2- If Holt sticks his beak in, and he will, is the Donald better off going after Holt ("Lester, we all know what your game is...") or staying focused on HRC?
3- Just how doped up will HRC be? Uppers, downers, anti-seizure?
4- Is the Donald going to pay the slightest bit of attention to the debate "rules", and what happens if he doesn't?
Posted by: Matt ||
09/24/2016 11:01
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#11
Look for all sorts of 'techincal difficulties' during the debates. If Trump was smart he would have his own video crew to capture what happens during those 'technical difficulties'.
It is always recommended to have your own video crew when being interviewed by the media because they will creatively edit it.
#12
I've always thought her campaign would come apart after she tried to debate. She isn't good at it and with the trouble she is halving trying to keep the battleground states is nothing compared to what it will be if she self destructs on live TV.
Pretty much all Trump has to do is not come off as bat-shit crazy and look presidential for 90 minutes.
#14
Matt, you forgot laughers and screamers. A slim but non-zero she goes HST and sees blood in the carpet and demands Lester Hold take off his Lizard suit.
[Daily Caller] FBI Director James Comey should resign, according to former U.S. Attorney Joseph DiGenova, after giving immunity deals to Hillary Clinton’s chief of staff Cheryl Mills and four other aides in the investigation over the former Secretary of State’s use of a private email server for government business.
Matthew Whittaker, another former federal attorney, told The Daily Caller News Foundation that Congress should know why the Clinton aides were "treated differently than any other investigation has ever been done."
Mills got the immunity deal after refusing to let investigators examiner her computer, according to the Associated Press, which first reported on Friday the multiple agreements shielding key figures in the Clinton emails scandal from prosecution.
"This now gets to the point of a serious question as to the director’s fitness for office," DiGenova told TheDCNF. He said a grand jury should have been convened and they should have issued a subpoena for Mills’ computer.
Comey and the DoJ knew precisely what they were doing. By granting immunity to Clinton aides, they insulated HRC from harmful evidence and testimony. Essentially what you have here are advanced presidential pardons nullifying the judicial process.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Yemeni security officials say a suspected US drone has struck a car traveling in eastern Yemen, killing three suspected al-Qaeda gunnies.
They said the car targeted in the Friday attack was traveling in the province of Marib. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
This was the third US drone strike in a week. US drone strikes have killed dozens of al-Qaeda turbans in Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic... as part of Washington’s global campaign against the organization.
Al-Qaeda and ISIS have taken advantage of the chaos and lawlessness brought about by Yemen’s ongoing civil war to expand their reach.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Afghan Vice President Sarwar Danesh said the recent attacks in 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.... by the Taliban group and the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group were organized from inside Pakistain.
In his speech at the UN General Assembly, Danesh urged implementing international commitments and and avoiding a distinction between good and bad terrorists.
"Where are the previous leaders of al-Qaeda and the Taliban hiding," he asked, further questioning how and from where snuffies were being trained, equipped and financed.
Danesh further added that Pakistain had been requested to destroy safe havens, but the situation remained unchanged.
The remarks by Danesh came as the Afghan officials have long been criticizing Pakistain for allowing the Afghan murderous Moslem groups to use its soil for planning and coordinating attacks in Afghanistan.
The Afghan officials are insisting that the leadership councils of Taliban group and the notoriouss Haqqani terrorist network are based in 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. and Quetta cities of Pakistain.
In other parts of his speech, Danesh said the Quadrilateral Coordination Group (Afghanistan, China, Pakistain and the United States) could remain a useful platform as long as Pakistain acted in good faith to meet its commitments.
Welcoming efforts of any Islamic country to promote peace in Afghanistan, Danesh said "Those individuals and groups resort to violence, terrorism and killing are not acquainted with this religion."
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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Top|| File under: Govt of Pakistain Proxies
#1
Danesh further added that Pakistain had been requested to destroy safe havens, but the situation remained unchanged.
An excellent start would be the destruction of Pakistani frontier corps outposts.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Kyrgyzstan’s President Almazbek Atambayev has been transferred to Russia for treatment after suffering suspected heart trouble, his office said Friday, several days after he was reported hospitalized in The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... Atambayev arrived in Moscow and was admitted to the city’s presidential hospital "on the recommendation of specialists", the statement from the presidential administration noted. Atambayev, 60, was stopping off in Istanbul en route to the United Nations ...where theory meets practice and practice loses... General Assembly in New York when he was hospitalized following complaints of "chest pains", officials said Monday.
Turkish news agencies showed dramatic footage of the Central Asian country’s leader lying prone on a stretcher but his office later said his health was "satisfactory" in a statement. Atambayev has taken time off since the health scare but released a statement Wednesday calling on MPs to pass a law to allow a referendum on controversial constitutional changes to take place in the near future.
Impoverished Kyrgyzstan is commonly viewed as the most democratic country in ex-Soviet Central Asia, an authoritarian former communist region that gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.
Atambayev ‐ viewed as a close ally of Russia ‐ was elected to power for a single six-year term in 2011 and is due to leave power next year. But his political opponents, including predecessor Roza Otunbayeva, have raised concerns the changes are an attempt to "usurp power" in a country prone to political upheaval.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
and embalming
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/24/2016 9:22
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DEIR EZZOR – The Syrian airforce launched several airstrikes on the town of al-Muhasan in the countryside of Deir ez-Zor on Friday, causing casualties among civilians.
Al-Muhasan is held by the militant group of Islamic State (ISIS). The group also controls other major areas of Syria’s eastern Deir ez-Zor Governorate.
“The Syrian warplanes bombed al-Muhasan town with three airstrikes on Friday evening. The strikes targeted residential buildings, leading to casualties among civilians,” rights activist Bashir al-Hamid told ARA News.
At least seven civilians were killed and 12 others were injured in the raids.
“Rescue teams are still searching for victims under the rubble,” the local source reported.
In the meantime, clashes broke out between ISIS militants and Syrian army forces near the Sinaa District in Deir ez-Zor City on Friday midnight. At least 20 ISIS militants and 14 Syrian soldiers were killed in the clashes, media activists reported.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Former Cold War-era rivals Pakistain and Russia are due to hold their first ever military exercise this month, Pakistain’s military said on Friday, in another sign of shifting alliances in South Asia.
During the Cold War, Pakistain spent a decade helping the United States funnel arms and fighters into neighboring Afghanistan to help murderous Moslem groups fight Soviet soldiers following their 1979 invasion of Afghanistan.
At the time, the communist Soviet Union was closely aligned with Pakistain’s arch-enemy India, while the United States was a staunch supporter of Pakistain.
Pakistain’s top military front man, Lieutenant General Asim Bajwa, said a "contingent of Russian ground forces" arrived in Pakistain for a two-week exercise beginning on Saturday.
About 200 military personnel from both sides would be involved in the exercises, Pakistain’s Tribune Express newspaper said, citing military sources.
Pak media last year reported Islamabad had bought four Mi-35 attack helicopters from Russia in a first military deal of its kind between them.
While ties between Russia and Pakistain are growing closer, Pakistain’s relations with the United States have cooled. Washington accused Islamabad of harboring Afghan Taliban fighters, something that Pakistain denies.
The United States has also improved ties with India, which Pakistain views warily.
Pakistain’s relations with its steadfast, "all-weather" ally China have developed over the past year or so with a plan for $46 billion in Chinese investment in a road and rail energy corridor linking western China with Pakistain’s Arabian Sea coast.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
If only the United States weren't a 1-party country.
[IsraelTimes] Army, police each detain 23 suspects in the West Bank, East Jerusalem, following a sharp rise in attacks on security forces
The army and police tossed in the slammer ... anything you say can and will be used against you, whether you say it or not... close to 50 Paleostinians on Tuesday and Wednesday night in raids across the West Bank and East Jerusalem, many of them for rock throwing or taking part in violent demonstrations, officials said.
The Israel Police and Israel Defense Forces have stepped up arrest raids, as the West Bank and Jerusalem saw a sharp uptick in attacks and attempted attacks on Israeli security forces by Paleostinians over the past week.
Over the course of two nights, police picked up 23 people in the Issawiya neighborhood of East Jerusalem and in the Shuafat refugee camp on charges ranging from taking part in a riot and throwing rocks to drug possession, police said.
In the West Bank, IDF soldiers arrested 11 suspects on Tuesday night and early Wednesday morning. The following night, Israeli forces picked up another 12 Paleostinians, the army said.
Of the 23 arrested in the West Bank, 12 were for rock throwing and taking part in riots "against civilians and security forces," the army said.
Five of them were arrested for allegedly belonging to the Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, terrorist organization, while the remaining six were picked up for undisclosed reasons, according to the IDF.
In addition to the arrests, security forces seized illegal weapons, military gear and gun-manufacturing equipment.
Soldiers found a homemade submachine gun, magazines full of ammunition, a knife, components of an M-16 assault rifle and a stolen car in Jabel Juhar, just outside of Hebron, during an operation carried out on Tuesday night following an alleged stabbing attempt near the West Bank city’s Tomb of the Patriarchs pilgrimage site earlier that day.
On Wednesday night, Israeli troops found a gun and ammunition in Qarawat Bani Hassan, west of the settlement of Ariel, the army said.
In East Jerusalem, police confiscated billy clubs and some gun accessories -- holsters, bullets, a carbine conversion kit for a glock -- but officers found no actual firearms, according to police.
North Korea conducted a successful ground test of a new rocket engine on Tuesday as leader Kim Jong-un looked on, North Korean media claimed.
In the test of a rocket engine with 80 tons of thrust, "thrust and other technological indexes of the engine accurately reached the estimated values and its operational system remained stable during 200 seconds of working time," the official KCNA news agency said. That would mean the engine can endure an 80-ton weight for 200 seconds.
If that is true and the North makes a first-stage rocket of four such engines with a combined thrust of 320 tons, then it could build an intercontinental ballistic missile with a 1-1.5 ton warhead that would be capable of hitting any target on the U.S. mainland. The thrust is about about three times as strong as the 108-ton engine of a space rocket launched in February.
Kim said the North needs to "become a possessor of geostationary satellites in the next several years," according to the state media.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2016
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[ALMASDARNEWS] The media department of Jabhat Fateh al-Sham ...formerly al-Nusra, the current false nose and mustache of al-Qaeda in the Levant... (formerly Jabhat al-Nusra ...formally Jabhat an-Nusrah li-Ahli al-Sham (Support Front for the People of the Levant), also known as al-Qaeda in the Levant. They aim to establish a pan-Arab caliphate. Not the same one as the Islamic State, though .. ... , al-Qaeda franchise) has released footage of its fighters combating 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.... snuffies at Jabal al-Afa'i, a mountain in the Eastern Qalamoun region, northeast of Damascus.
Two sets of gentlemen in cool black track suits with matching ski masks striking cool poses as they shoot off vast streams of bullets in each other's general direction, occasionally actually hitting someone?
Jabhat Fateh al-Sham fights against ISIS alongside Ahrar al-Sham ...a Syria jihadi group made up of Islamists and salafists, not that there's that much difference, formed into a brigade. They make up the main element of the Islamic Front but they don't profess adoration of al-Qaeda and they've been fighting (mainly for survival) against the Islamic State. Their leadership was wiped out at a single blow by a suicide kaboom at a crowded basement meeting in September, 2014... and the Free Syrian Army ... the more palatable version of the Syrian insurgency, heavily influenced by the Moslem Brüderbund... (FSA) affiliated Ahmad al-Abdo Brigade; meanwhile, the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) is standing idle by while the Syrian Arab Air Force (SyAAF) carries out daily Arclight airstrikes on ISIS snuffies in the region, indirectly supporting the aforementioned Syrian rebel groups.
Eastern Qalamoun represents the only region in Syria with a somewhat pragmatic alliance between Salafist tough guys and the SAA, two otherwise staunch opponents.
For instance, when ISIS downed a SyAAF jet two days ago and the pilot subsequently parachuted onto rebel-held territory, he was returned by Syrian rebels to a nearby SAA checkpoint by the following day.
Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, Ahrar al-Sham and the FSA now control some 70% of Jabal al-Afa'i after gradually advancing on ISIS in the past few days.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The GOP-led House approved legislation late Thursday to prohibit the United States from making cash payments to Iran and require that Congress be notified before any future claims settlements with Tehran are conducted. The bill passed by a wide margin, 254-163.
The measure, an election-year broadside, won ample support from Republicans aiming to rebuke the B.O. regime for paying Iran $1.7 billion in cash earlier this year to settle a decades-old arbitration claim. Democrats have accused Republicans of trying to score political points with the bill.
Since the initial payment was made the same day Tehran agreed to release four American prisoners, GOP politicians decried the payments as ransom, a charge the White House has rejected. Citing Iran’s status as a leading state sponsor of terrorism, Republicans have contended the untraceable cash will be used to finance terrorism around the world.
Although the bill targets Iran, politicians also passed an amendment that would bar the US from paying cash to other designated sponsors of terrorism and North Korea. "Cash does not leave a paper trail," said Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., the Foreign Affairs Committee chairman and the bill’s sponsor. "Cash is the currency of terror."
The B.O. regime has threatened a veto of the bill, calling it "an ill-advised attempt to respond to a problem - so-called ’ransom’ payments to Iran - that does not exist." House Democrats accused Republicans of trying to score political points. Rep. Eliot Engel of New York, the top Democrat on the Foreign Affairs Committee, said holding Tehran’s money until Iran released the Americans "was a pretty shrewd bargain."
But by using the word ransom, Engel said, Republicans turned the bill "into a political hot button - a poke in the eye of the administration." An initial $400 million payment in euros, Swiss francs and other foreign currency was delivered on pallets on Jan. 17, the same day Tehran agreed to release the prisoners. The remaining $1.3 billion was paid in cash installments made on Jan. 22 and Feb. 5.
The administration has said the arbitration payment and prisoner release were separate, but later acknowledged that the cash was used as leverage until the Americans were allowed to leave Iran. Republicans on a House panel pressed Treasury Secretary Jack Lew Thursday about the cash payments at a Financial Services Committee hearing on the condition of the financial system. The exchanges became heated.
Lew insisted the payment wasn’t ransom. He said it complied with sanctions rules and said settling a contract dispute for less than what the Iranians had claimed "saved the American people billions of dollars." Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas, the committee’s chairman, cut him off. "Can you trace the money?" he demanded.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
One side *might* step up and represent this country.
[DENVER.CBSLOCAL] A CBS4 investigation has found multiple cases of dead men and women voting in Colorado months and in some cases years after their deaths, a revelation that calls into question safeguards designed to prevent such occurrences.
"We do believe there were several instances of potential vote fraud that occurred,"
No. If they were dead when "they" submitted their votes, that is actual vote fraud that occurred. The only potential is the number of times each of these known corpses voted, which unknown living people made it happen, and how many unknown corpses aided by unknown living people also voted unknown times.
said Colorado Secretary of State Wayne Williams after reviewing the CBS4 findings. "It shows there is the potential for fraud."
That, too. Which is why scrupulously keeping the voter rolls up to date, strictly limiting absentee voting, and requiring photo I.D. on voting day are all critical.
The cases of dead men and women casting ballots ranged from El Paso County in southern Colorado to Denver and Jefferson County. CBS4 discovered the fraudulent voting by comparing databases of voting histories in Colorado against a federal death database.
The CBS4 investigation has triggered criminal investigations in El Paso and Jefferson counties along with a broad investigation by the Colorado Secretary of State’s office.
"It’s not a perfect system. There are some gaps," acknowledged Williams.
One of the most glaring cases was that of Sara Sosa in Colorado Springs. She died on Oct. 14, 2009. However, you can observe a lot just by watching... CBS4 uncovered voting records that showed ballots cast for Sosa in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2013. Her husband, Miguel, died on Sept. 26, 2008. But CBS4 unearthed records showing that a vote was cast in his name the next year, 2009.
Fascinating.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
"We do believe there were several instances of potential vote fraud that occurred..."
I'd bet dollars to donuts that the significant majority of the "several instances of vote fraud" voted Democrat.
#2
DENVER.CBSLOCAL] A CBS4 investigation has found multiple cases of dead men and women voting in Colorado months and in some cases years after their deaths, a revelation that calls into question safeguards designed to prevent such occurrences.
"We do believe there were several instances of potential vote fraud that occurred,"
Does the author of that statement mean that these dead people may actually have voted? This would be an important discovery of previously unknown powers of ghosts, and an exciting contribution to science.
If not, then the facts claimed by CBS4 mean there definitely was voter fraud.
Why the word "potential"? Does the author believes in zombies?
#3
6 months after any gubernatorial election all voter registrations are cleared. Everyone must re-register to retain the vote. That's a purge every 4 years to clean out the deadwood. Cross check it with DMV records (that include street IDs*) and jury duty files. That'll keep a lot of party hacks busy.
* many states have laws that require new drivers licenses if you change address.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Barack Obama I mean, I do think at a certain point you've made enough money... will on Friday veto legislation allowing 9/11 victims to sue 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... , risking public outrage and the first congressional override of his presidency.
The White House confirmed Thursday that Obama would veto the legislation ‐ unanimously passed by Congress ‐ allowing 9/11 families to launch civil suits against Riyadh.
"We believe this is a bad bill," said White House front man Josh Earnest. "It’s why the president’s going to veto it."
The White House argues the legislation would undermine sovereign immunity and potentially expose US officials and service members to litigation.
Obama has issued 11 vetoes so far in his presidency, none of which have garnered the two-thirds opposition needed for an override.
That's two thirds of members of each House. Impossible to achieve in the Senate without the help of Democrats, who have been remarkably disciplined.
Update from The Times of Israel at 2:20 p.m. ET: He vetoed it.
US President Barack Obama rejected a bill Friday that would have allowed the families of 9/11 victims to sue the government of Saudi Arabia, arguing it undermined national security and setting up the possibility Congress may override his veto for the first time in his presidency.
The president said the bill, which doesn’t refer specifically to Saudi Arabia, could backfire by opening up the US government and its officials to lawsuits by anyone accusing the US of supporting terrorism, rightly or wrongly.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
Let's all watch and act surprised when the do-nothing and make-believe "opposition party" does not one damn thing to over-turn the veto.
#4
I understand newc's reticince, but BRING IT MOFO's.
Past time to be civil.
Past time to treat the Saudi's as anything less than treachers.
Kill them in the court of public opinion.
What are they going to do, STOP SELLING OIL?
They are a cancer on the world corpus.
Screw them.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:17
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#5
And if it reflects back, somehow, stretching reality, on the USA, screw them.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:19
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic... President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi vowed at the United Nations ...where theory meets practice and practice loses... on Friday to "extract Yemen from the claws of Iran" as he accused Tehran of impeding peace by taking a "multitude of actions and interventions."
A Saudi-led Arab coalition has been fighting Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... rebels in Yemen since March 2015 in a bid to restore the internationally-backed Hadi to power. 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... and Yemen accuse Iran of supplying the rebels with weapons. Iran denies the allegation.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[ALMASDARNEWS] The Iraqi Army's 2nd and 27th brigades of the 7th Division, backed by Hashd al-Sha'abi, liberated the key city of al-Baghdadi in the al-Anbar Governorate, killing a large number of Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not really Moslems.... bully boyz in the process of their advance on Friday.
According to the Iraqi Ministry of Defense, their armed forces managed to break-through the Islamic State's primary defenses at al-Baghdadi on Friday morning, paving the way for the liberation of the city by the early afternoon.
The Iraqi Armed Forces will now shift their attention to the strategic town of Hawija near the recently liberated village of al-Shirqat in Salehiddeen.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[ALMASDARNEWS] Jaish al-Islam ...Liwa al-Islam (Brigade of Islam) was established by Zahran Alloush, the son of Saudi-based religious scholar Abdullah Mohammed Alloush, after Syrian authorities released him from prison in mid-2011 where he had been serving time for his Salafist activism. The group claimed responsibility for carrying out the July 2012 Damascus bombing that killed Defense Minister Dawoud Rajiha, Deputy Defense Minister Asef Shawkat, and Assistant Vice President Hassan Turkmani. It was a driving force behind actions in the Damascus region. It cooperated and conducted joint operations with al-Nusra. In Sptember 2013 Saudi Arabia engineered Liwa al-Islam's merger with fifty other more or less Salafist groups as a counterweight to al-Nusra, which the Learned Elders of Islam considered was growing too powereful... (Army of Islam) is on the verge of collapse in the East Ghouta region of rural Damascus, as the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) prepares to surround one of the most important villages under Islamist control.
On Friday, the Syrian Arab Army's 105th Brigade of the Republican Guard, backed by the Paleostine Liberation Army (PLA) and National Defense Forces (NDF), launched a new assault at al-Reyhan, capturing a number of farms from Jaish al-Islam near the village's eastern flank.
According to a military source in Damascus, the Syrian Armed Forces killed 13 Jaish al-Islam turbans, while also reaching the gates of al-Reyhan tonight after an intense battle.
If the Syrian Armed Forces are successful in their military endeavor to capture al-Reyhan, then Jaish al-Islam will find themselves surrounded at the key mountaintop village of Tal Kurdi near Douma and 'Adra.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[Khaama (Afghanistan)] A prominent Pak politician and religious scholar Maulana Fazlur Rehman Deobandi holy man, known as Mullah Diesel during the war against the Soviets, his sympathies for the Taliban have never been tempered by honesty ... has slammed the Pak government for its hard stance against the Afghan refugees, saying forced repatriation of Afghan refugees is the worst example of cruelty.
Questioning the government’s stance against the Afghan refugees, Rehman said the situation in Afghanistan still remains hostile, emphasizing that there would be no need for the US and allied forces to stay in Afghanistan if there was peace in the country.
Rehman further added that the Afghan nationals must be treated well and should be repatriated with dignity and respect, calling the Afghan refugees as ’guests’ and ’brothers’.
Pakistain started crackdown against the Afghan refugees following a deadly attack on an army-run school in 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. city of Pakistain.
The United Nations ...the Oyster Bay money pit... refugee chief urged Paks asked the Pak authorities late in June not to blame Afghan refugees for terrorism in their country.
The call by UN High Commissioner for Refugees Fillippo Grandi followed amid growing public calls for their deportation and worsening relations between the two neighbours.
Warning that the roughly 2.5 million Afghan refugees in Pakistain risked becoming a "forgotten" crisis, Grandi called on the international community to invest more funds to help them.
"My appeal is that, not only to the authorities but also to the local population: refugees as you know are not terrorists," Grandi said during a visit to a repatriation centre outside the northwestern Pakistain city of Peshawar.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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"2.5 million Afghan refugees in Pakistain... " Some have been there since the nineteen eighties. They have much in common with the Arab refugee camps in the Levant that have been there since the nineteen sixties. Muslims seemingly enjoy enforced idleness.
[SemperFiNews] A recent policy-setting decision by the Los Angeles Police Commission (civilians with no law enforcement training), has told the LAPD to run when confronted by an armed suspect. No we didn't make that up.
Their decision stems from a September, 2015 officer-involved shooting in which a black woman, Norma Guzman, approached two LAPD officers with a large knife. The two officers had cars on either side of them, and had no place to "run."
"A female suspect, armed with an 8 to 9-inch knife, repeatedly ignored commands to stop, ran at the officers, and was even recorded yelling "shoot me," all the while brandishing the knife swinging it from side to side.
In less than 10 seconds the female suspect closed a 70 foot gap to just 5 feet prompting the first officer to fire his weapon. This left only 3 seconds for the second officer to react to the threat, prompting the Commission to conclude that ’it was reasonable for Officer C to believe, in the moment when the use of force occurred, that the subject would imminently assault him with the knife.""
"Redeploy" to "create distance"
The Chief of Police agreed with his officer’s decision to shoot her. But the Commission ruled that even though the officer was justified in feeling threatened, he should have "redeployed" to "create distance."
The officer commanded her to drop the knife 6 times as she advanced toward them, according to his body camera that was not released publicly. The woman shouted "Shoot me!" just before the fatal shot.
Guzman had been diagnosed as mentally ill previously, and family members say the officers should have known she was "harmless." There are hundreds of examples where a mentally ill person is not harmless. And especially not when someone is carrying an 8 to 9 inch knife.
The only way these officers could have "re-deployed" to "create distance" would have been to jump in their car and drive away ‐ IF there was time to do that. From the video, it appears there were only seconds in which to make that decision.
"YOU CAN SAVE YOUR LIFE OR YOU CAN SAVE YOUR JOB, BUT YOU CAN’T DO BOTH." JAMIE MCBRIDE, DIRECTOR OF THE LAPD POLICE UNION
#1
"A female suspect, armed with an 8 to 9-inch knife, repeatedly ignored commands to stop, ran at the officers, and was even recorded yelling "shoot me," all the while brandishing the knife swinging it from side to side.
#2
It would serve these idiots right if every police officer resigned.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
09/24/2016 1:04
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#2 It would serve these idiots right if every police officer resigned.
That's where I'm at. I'm now the biggest (police) union supporter in this country. The fact that a 12-time arrested asshole who required force on 4 of those arrests is somehow a "cause" in Tulsa,OK says it all.
Fuck him, and fuck those who won't stand up for the basics regarding the rule of law.
#5
At first, I thought this was from the Onion. Did the police commissioner say they should also go to their "safe spaces?" LA Police Commissioner should resign.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Human rights activists are accusing Kenyan police of executing three women who allegedly attacked a cop shoppe after pledging allegiance to ISIS.
In one video posted on social media by a human rights ...which are often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... activist, two of the women can be seen sprawled on the ground with severe burns on their bodies. A man with a rifle opens fire at them.
Another video posted online shows a woman burnt and lying on her back while being questioned about the attack.
Activist al-Amin Kimathi demanded Friday that the coppers responsible for the executions be prosecuted.
Police said they killed the three women on Sept. 11 after they attacked the cop shoppe in Mombasa with a petrol bomb and knife. Police said the wmen had pledged allegiance to ISIS.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
Give em a medal and a raise
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/24/2016 9:34
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[ENGLISH.ALMANAR.LB] Morocco on Friday made an official request to return to the African Union ...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful... , 32 years after quitting the bloc in protest at its decision to accept Western Sahara as a member.
"The Kingdom of Morocco has officially submitted a request to accede to the African Union (AU) Constitutive Act, and therefore, become a Member of the Union," the AU said in a statement.
Rabat first announced its intention to return to the club in July, with King Mohammed VI saying his country wanted to "take up its natural place within its institutional family."
Morocco quit the AU in protest in 1984 when the Saharan Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) -- commonly known as Western Sahara -- was admitted as a member.
Morocco quit the AU in protest in 1984 when the Saharan Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) — commonly known as Western Sahara — was admitted as a member.
Morocco has occupied the sparsely populated Western Sahara area since 1975 in a move that was not recognized by the international community.
It maintains that Western Sahara is an integral part of the kingdom even though local Sahrawi people have long campaigned for the right to self-determination.
In 1991, the United Nations brokered a ceasefire between Moroccan troops and Sahrawi rebels of the Algerian-backed Polisario Front but a promised referendum to settle the status of the desert territory is yet to materialize.
The Moroccan monarch in July said his nation’s decision to return to the AU did not mean it was changing its stance on Western Sahara.
Rabat’s membership bid must be approved by a vote of the AU Commission in order to be accepted.
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[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The bodies of 162 people had been pulled from the waters off the Egyptian coast by Friday, two days after a boat carrying hundreds of migrants colonists capsized in the Mediterranean while attempting to head to Europe.
Dozens more are feared dead, said Mohammed Sultan, the governor of Beheira, who provided The News Agency that Dare Not be Named with the latest corpse count. He also said that the search operation is still ongoing. Many of them are believed to be children and women who were unable to swim away when the boat sank.
Wahdan el-Sayyed, the front man of the Nile Delta province of Beheira, provided the latest figures and told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named that the search operation was ongoing.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
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#1
"Some of the interviewees said the traffickers asked for $6250 per family, to be given on arrival in Italia."
Fleeing war maybe. Fleeing poverty not so much at those prices.
[IsraelTimes] Protests break out along northern, central Strip; army pushes back rioters with live ammo, non-lethal means
Riots broke out along the border fence in northern and central Gazoo on Friday, with IDF soldiers driving back the participants using both non-lethal dispersal means and live fire against "instigators," the army said.
Sources in the Gazoo Strip said three Paleostinians were maimed in the festivities.
The television station run by the Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, terror group, which controls Gazoo, said that two of the maimed were at death's door, Israel Radio reported.
"Several violent riots took place in the northern and central Gazoo Strip. In order to prevent the threat of infiltration, forces responded with riot-dispersal means," the army said.
"In one of the riots, three instigators breached the buffer zone" -- an area surrounding the border where Paleostinians are not allowed to enter -- "and in order to prevent their further advance, the forces shot towards them," an IDF spokesperson said.
As of Friday evening, one of the riots was still taking place, while the other had been dispersed, according to the IDF.
Earlier Friday, a Paleostinian teenager was shot by Israeli security forces as he attempted to carry out a stabbing attack outside the West Bank settlement of Kiryat Arba, the IDF said.
No Israelis were maimed in the attack. The assailant, who, according to Paleostinian media, was 14 years old, suffered gunshot wounds to the leg and chest. He received treatment at the scene, before being taken by military ambulance to Jerusalem’s Shaare Zedek Medical Center for further medical care, the army said.
The assault was the 10th such attack in under a week, with the vast majority occurring in Jerusalem and the Hebron area, where Paleostinians live in close proximity to settlers and Israeli troops.
So what? Drones are relatively cheap and easily replaced. That's the point. Besides, they missed the radio-controlled squirrels and ditto flies while they were distracted. You should see the video they got... and the little gifts they left behind.
HASAKAH – The Islamic State (ISIS) radical group on Friday claimed responsibility for shooting down an American drone near the Shaddadi City in Syria’s northeastern Hasakah Governorate.
ISIS leadership said in a statement, released by the jihadi Amaq agency, that its fighters shot down the drone after targeting it with heavy machine guns.
Speaking to ARA News in Hasakah, media activist Muhammad Mardoud said that a US drone was downed in the southwestern suburb of Shaddadi, near the Syrian-Iraqi border.
“However, it was not immediately clear if ISIS was really behind the operation,” Mardoud said.
“Shaddadi and its countryside are under the control of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). ISIS has recently launched a series of attacks on the SDF positions there, and the group might has been able to infiltrate into southern Shaddadi to send a message to the US by shooting down one of its drones,” the activist said.
The Pentagon has not commented on the incident yet.
This is not the first time for ISIS to shoot down drones or warplanes in Syria.
Last Wednesday, the radical group shot down a Syrian jet in the Damascus suburb. “Short after taking off from the Dumair airbase in Damascus suburb, the warplane was targeted by terrorists’ fire and crashed over eastern Qalamoun,” a commander in the Syrian army told ARA News on Sept. 22nd.
On July 9th, two Russian pilots died near the Syrian city of Palmyra when their helicopter was shot down by ISIS fighters.
On July 22nd, ISIS shot down a Syrian army warplane in the central province of Homs. The jihadi Amaq agency released images showing a destroyed Syrian warplane, saying it crashed after ISIS militants hit it with a rocket. Local activists told ARA News that the warplane was hit after entering the airspace of Jib al-Jarrah district in Homs.
Posted by: badanov ||
09/24/2016
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[ALMASDARNEWS] ISIS have revealed in their latest propaganda video that they have massacred over 50 civilians and buried them in a mass grave, before they fled a town the town of al-Tarmia to the north of Baghdad.
Militants are heard celebrating the killings of dozens of people they have labelled kuffar, which is a derogatory term for a non-Moslem.
After they were labelled apostates the murderous Moslems kill all the men systematically with single shots to the back of the head at point-blank range.
It is not known when the video of the massacre was filmed, but it was only released online on 22 of September, 2016.
The ID cards show that those executed were soldiers in the Iraqi Army and Shi'ite civilians.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Hezb-e-Islami party led by Gulbuddin Hekmatyar ... who used to be known in intelligence circles as The Most Evil Man in the World but who now seems merely run-of-the-mill evil... has apologized to the victims of the devastating war the party was involved in 1990s, hours after the party signed the draft peace agreement with the Afghan government.
Two decades later? Golly.
A senior member of the party Qarib-ur-Rehman Syed told VOA’s Afghanistan service that "Hezb-e-Islami considers itself a member and party of the people. Hezb-e-Islami belongs to the people and people belongs to Hezb-e-Islami. In every and every second, we apologize from those who were hurt."
Clearly the people don't want Hezb-e-Islami, or Hezb-e-Islami would have been helped to glorious victory long ago.
Syed further added "We have in the past tendered apologies to the people since this is our home, village and people."
He said a special tribunal should be established to try those who have been involved in war crimes, including any member of Hezb-e-Islami.
Y'all know what you did. Why don't you just go on national television and confess instead?
The draft peace agreement with Hezb-e-Islami was signed during a ceremony in 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.... after almost six months of negotiations between the Afghan government and the party.
The agreement is expected to be signed by President Mohammad 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. .. and Hezb-e-Islami leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar.
Posted by: Fred ||
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[AAWSAT] Three members of the Libyan government of national accord’s forces and ten ISIS fighters were killed in Sirte yesterday after renewed fighting in the coastal city, according to military and medical sources.
A nice ratio, if true.
In a statement, government forces said that “Our troops continue to advance towards ISIS’ last strongholds inside Sirte, and they are targeting a group of ISIS fighters with heavy artillery in district No. 3 which is located in eastern Sirte (450 km east of Tripoli)”.
In another statement, the office of government forces said that they were able to foil three attempted car bombings before they reached their targets.
A field hospital run by government forces announced that three pro-government fighters were killed in Sirte yesterday, while government troops reported that at least ten members of the extremist organisation ISIS were killed.
Libyan government forces launched operation Al-Bunyan Al-Marsoos (“Solid Structure”) on the 12th of March to regain Sirte from the extremist organisation ISIS which has controlled it since June 2015.
According to medical sources, more than 450 pro-government fighters have been killed and some 2,500 have been wounded since the operation began. There are no statistics about the number of ISIS fighters that have been killed.
The fall of Sirte will be a painful blow to ISIS which is experiencing a series of setbacks in Iraq and Syria.
Meanwhile, the spokesman for the Secretary General of the Arab League Mahmoud Afifi yesterday revealed that a tripartite meeting on coordination will be held in Cairo on October the 25th between Arab League representatives, the African Union and the United Nations in an effort to address the crisis in Libya.
More from the Libyan Herald
The United States’ Africa Command (Africom) reported today that yesterday it carried out a further 8 new airstrikes against ISIS in Sirte.
These latest reported strikes bring the total of airstrikes in Sirte to 169 since Operation Odyssey Lightning commenced on 1st August this year, Africom reports.
The airstrikes conducted on 22 September were against the following eight targets:
o One Vehicle-Borne Improvised Explosive Device
o One enemy fighting position
o One enemy fighting position
o One enemy fighting position
o One enemy fighting position
o Two enemy fighting positions
o One enemy fighting position
o One enemy fighting position
To summarize: one VBIED and eight enemy positions
These latest airstrikes came as U.S. Defence Secretary, Ash Carter, reported earlier this month saying that the U.S.-backed Libyan Bunyan Marsous forces, affiliated to the internationally recognized and Faiez Serraj-led Presidency Council/Government of National Accord, are close to vanquishing Islamic State from its last holdouts in Sirte.
However, although the Misrata dominated Bunyan Marsous forces report that ISIS are confined to a small area of two to three square kilometres, ISIS have proved difficult to dislodge as they escalate their use of IED’s and vehicle borne IED’s causing Bunyan forces high casualties.
Posted by: badanov ||
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To summarize: one VBIED and eight enemy positions
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Afghan cops have reached something of an impasse with the Taliban, which has been unable to expand its grip on Afghanistan but still holds large parts of the country, a US general said Friday.
Army General John Nicholson, the US commander in Afghanistan, said local forces during the summer fighting season had thwarted a Taliban attempt to take over Kunduz province, and had improved security in Helmand ...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan... , western Kandahar and Uruzgan.
Afghan forces currently control or "heavily influence" 65 to 70 percent of the population, the Taliban controls about 10 percent in mainly rural areas, and the rest is contested, Nicholson told news hounds.
The top US military officer, General Joe Dunford, told politicians Thursday that the situation in Afghanistan was "roughly a stalemate."
"The Taliban have not been successful in achieving the goals that were outlined in their campaign plan, which they typically make public in the spring of each year, and on balance the Afghan forces are holding," said Dunford, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff.
Nicholson said another way to "think about stalemate is you’ve reached some sort of equilibrium."
A resurgent Taliban dealt Afghan cops serious blows in 2015, the first year the local forces led security operations in Afghanistan, taking over from NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... More than 5,000 Afghan police and troops died last year alone, and they have confronted multiple challenges apart from just the Taliban -- including attacks from ISIS and al-Qaeda.
The Taliban even managed to briefly capture the major city of Kunduz last year, jolting confidence Afghan government forces could hold their own.
The Taliban threat forced President Barack Obama Ready to Rule from Day One... to slow plans to draw down US troop numbers at the end of this year. Some 8,400 will remain in the war-torn country in 2017, compared with 5,500 initially planned.
Most US forces in Afghanistan operate under the NATO banner and work as trainers or advisers to Afghan forces.
Around 40 NATO members and partner countries currently contribute to the overall force of nearly 13,000.
The B.O. regime also announced looser rules making it easier for US troops to proactively target the Taliban and assist Afghan forces, instead of waiting to respond to an attack.
Nicholson also described the current situation with ISIS, which is trying to expand its self-declared "caliphate" in Khorasan Province, with Jalalabad as the capital.
"They’ve been frustrated in that by us, and the operations in July have pushed them down into the mountains of southern Nangarhar The unfortunate Afghan province located adjacent to Mohmand, Kurram, and Khyber Agencies. The capital is Jalalabad. The province was the fief of Younus Khalis after the Soviets departed and one of his sons is the current provincial Taliban commander. Nangarhar is Haqqani country.. ," Nicholson said.
He estimated ISIS numbers to be between 1,200 to 1,300, and said the murderous Moslems in Afghanistan were getting financial and leadership help from fighters in Syria.
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#1
Afghan forces currently control or "heavily influence" 65 to 70 percent of the population, the Taliban controls about 10 percent in mainly rural areas, and the rest is contested, Nicholson told news hounds.
So its basically under complete Muslim control, regardless of affiliation.
But hey! We're not supposed to be concerned about that.
Daud Shah Wafadar, 205 Atal Corps Commander in southern Kandahar province, on Friday said that Taliban insurgents on Thursday night carried out many group attacks on Trinkot city, the capital of Uruzgan province, in a bid to take control. However they failed to do so.
According to Daud Shah, police forces stationed in the area ceded 89 check posts to Taliban insurgents.
"The issue is not that Taliban are powerful, police forces in the area made a deal with them and ceded 89 check-posts to the insurgents," Daud Shah said.
Security officials have not released information on casualties among security forces, however, a security source told TOLOnews that 26 policemen were killed in the attack and six others were taken by the Taliban. Their whereabouts is unknown.
However, the Ministry of Interior denied these claims.
"It is not correct that police forces stationed in the area left the checkpoint to the insurgents, but some tribal issues exist in the region that we cannot deny it. The important point is that government has the motivation to maintain Uruzgan. We have that motivation," said Najib Danish, deputy spokesman for the ministry of interior.
"More forces have arrived from Kandahar and other provinces. We are trying to maintain the security," said Sayed Abbas Saqib, the acting police chief of Urozgan.
In the meantime, Uruzgan provincial council says that Taliban's activities increased in the region as a result of political deals in the government.
"If government does not pay serious attention to Uruzgan's security situation and does not bring reforms to the security leadership team in the province, Uruzgan will be under serious security threats that can cause the city to fall to Taliban," said Karim Khadimzai, head of Urozgan provincial council.
Local officials say that clashes between Taliban and security forces in Charmgar region lasted till late Friday and that the casualty rate among insurgents was high.
Taliban insurgents carried out a similar attack two weeks ago on the city. But security forces, along with the help of foreign troops' airstrikes were able to push the insurgents back from Uruzgan city.
Matt Vanderboegh has shuttered his father's blog, Sipsey Street Irregulars. He has not publicly said why, although one of his friends, War on Guns writer David Codrea apparently is privy to the wherefores. But, like Matt, he won't talk about it publicly.
Two deaths in the family, first Mike Vanderboegh and now his blog, taken over by Mike's son Matt.
I suspect a lot of it has to do with the fallout from this post, but I can't be sure it wasn't something else completely.
Prices for pistol ammunition were mostly steady. Prices for rifle ammunition were mixed.
Prices for used pistols were mixed. Prices for used rifles were mixed.
New Lows:
.40 caliber S&W (Glock or other semiautomatic), Texas, Kahr CW40: $240
Pistol Ammunition
.45 Caliber, 230 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (10 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Goose Island Sales, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Ammo Mart, Own Brand, Brass Casing, Reloads, .23 per round (From Last week: +.01 Each)
.40 Caliber Smith & Wesson, 180 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (9 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Ammo Mart, Buffalo Cartridge, FSFP, Brass Casing, Reloads, .20 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Ammo Mart, Own Brand, FSFP, Brass Casing, Reloads, .19 per round (From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (2 Weeks))
9mm Parabellum, 115 Grain, From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (8 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .15 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .15 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (8 Weeks))
.357 Magnum, 158 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2Q, 2016)
Cheapest, 50 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .23 per round
Cheapest Bulk: 1,000 rounds: Ammunition to Go, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel cased, .23 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (2Q, 2016))
Rifle Ammunition
.223 Caliber/5.56mm 55 Grain, From Last Week: -.01 Each After Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .21 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Cheaper Than Dirt!, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .21 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks))
.308 NATO 150 Grain, From Last Week: +.01 Each After Unchanged (2 Weeks)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Manventure Outpost, Tulammo, FMJ, Steel Casing, .37 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds: BulkAmmunition.net, Steel Casing, FMJ, .34 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (5 Weeks))
7.62x39mm AK 123 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (2Q, 2016)
Cheapest, 20 rounds: Munire USA, Wolf WPA, Steel Case, FMJ, .24 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 1,000 rounds: Ammunition to Go, Wolf WPA, Steel Case, FMJ, .23 per round (From Last Week: +.01 Each)
.22 LR 40 Grain, From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks)
Cheapest, 50 rounds (10 Box Limit): Ammomen, Federal, RNL, .06 per round
Cheapest Bulk, 500 rounds (1 Box Limit): Gander Mountain, Remington Thunderbolt, RNL, .06 per round (From Last Week: Unchanged (4 Weeks) )
#4
Whiskey Mike, I do not have any experience with AirForce, but reading about it got me as giddy as when I was a boy and we got the Christmas Sears catalog.
Daisy Avanti series is nice - competition barrel and sights. I have seen the manufacturer's sights removed and other optics mounted on a dovetail. Also, some models accommodate a five round clip (right word?).
#5
When I was looking for a grown up Red Rider, I saw basically three different genres - break barrel, under lever, and pre charge pneumatic (whose acronym I think ate my post).
I eliminated break barrel right off. I am sure they are fine, but I had issues with using my barrel as a lever.
The PC I found interesting - faster rate of fire, better eyes on target, selection of calibers. I eventually passed on account of a lack of immediate way to charge the cylinder and when you are out of pressure, you are out, but mostly because I remember the lack of consistent projectile velocity from my paintballing days. Perhaps that is not an issue, or as much as with a paintball gun. Don't know, would like to know.
#6
I totally agree re: ROF. It it the intrinsic ROF and the sub-sonic-ness (new word?) Of 1050 fps and 230 plus grains that I find exciting. New / old stuff.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:28
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#7
I can't say with any authoity. Nothing wrong with break barrel etc but not .45 cal at 1050 fps. Pre charged capsules, grav feed... ROF, wow.
WHOLE NEW VISTAS OPEN. NOT FIREARMS?
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:35
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#8
Jeez, AUTHORITY. hangs head.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:38
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#9
I tried to an intrinsically 'quiet' Mk48.Mod 2 for interested parties, but the platform was wrong. THIS has much more promise. Belt fed? No reason why it would not work. CC would be posivitey affected.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:42
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#10
Gah. Positively. Going to sleep now.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
09/24/2016 21:43
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#11
Know a guy who was talking about hunting with something like that Big Bore. Said he loves it. Said the rifle itself is a bit heavy, but offset by the lesser weight of ammo carried. Also, the comparative lack of sound is a plus.
The Daisy Avanti series is fairly popular out here, though only chambered in .177 the choice of pellet can offset the less mass; local club uses the 853 under lever and has a dovetail optic slide. Nice and precise. For instructional purposes, it is an easy step from Red Rider and can use a 5 round clip (belt, mag?). All you hear is whisp-crack.
[Ynet] Mali President Ibrahim Boubacar Keita warned the United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... on Friday that the failure to fully implement a nationwide peace accord was helping al-Qaeda and ISIS-affiliated groups spread their influence in the country.
UN peacekeepers are deployed across northern Mali to try to stabilize the vast region, which was occupied by separatist Tuareg rebels and al Qaeda-linked Islamist murderous Moslems in 2012 before La Belle France intervened in 2013. Tit-for-tat violence between rival gangs has distracted Mali from fighting Islamist murderous Moslems and the country has become the deadliest place for UN peacekeepers to serve.
"We have to admit that several factors are contradicting our will and effort," Keita told a high-level meeting on Mali at the annual United Nations General Assembly. "In particular the extension of terrorism and banditry in the centre of our country which is even putting into question the stability and security of neighbouring countries because of the desire of terrorist groups affiliated to al-Qaeda and ISIS seeking to expand."
A clash in the north this week between pro-government Gatia militia and the Tuareg separatist Coordination of Azawad Movements highlighted the fragility of a UN- backed deal signed last year between the government and northern gangs meant to end a cycle of uprisings.
[All Africa] criticism of its handling of the Ebola outbreak of 2014, the World Health Organization (WHO) has outlined institutional changes to address the shortcomings that led to a weak and ineffective response. While implementation is beginning under outgoing leader Dr. Margaret Chan, the ambitious reform agenda that global health leaders have demanded will depend on the next director-general, to be elected next year.
Unless WHO makes a wise choice, the organization will not become what the world needs it to be ‐ a fast-response organization that can actively coordinate health emergencies. Zika is a current example of how local threats quickly become global, but others are inevitable.
In addition, the unfinished business of reducing the health consequences of severe poverty - including disastrous rates of infant and child death and of mothers in pregnancy and childbirth - is both a human tragedy and a drag on the global economy.
The African region, through the African Union, ...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful...
is backing the candidacy of Dr. Tedros Adhanom of Æthiopia. Here's why.
He is minister of foreign affairs and a diplomat with extensive experience and the negotiating skills to craft international agreements. More importantly, as former minister of health, he acquired expertise in global health, accumulated from responding to some of the most devastating diseases of our time.
Some have argued that the world body should demonstrate its openness to diversity and change by electing an African as director general. But those who believe the position is too important to be decided on anything other than merit should be equally supportive of Dr. Tedros.
During this crucial period for the WHO, the organization needs an administrator of Dr. Tedros' stature. His work leading reforms in organizations such as UNAIDS, the Global Fund to Fight Aids, Tuberculosis and Malaria, and GAVI, the vaccine alliance, has been exemplary.
At the Global Fund, where Dr. Tedros was Board Chair at a critical time for that organization, his leadership was groundbreaking. He helped revitalize an organization that was at the risk of failing into the vibrant agency it is today. The fund's push for accountability in use of resources by recipient countries, while retaining flexibility to be creative, produced progress against disease and set it on the path of securing additional resources. Last week at a meeting in Canada the Global Fund raised a record $13 billion for its work.
During three decades, Dr. Tedros has tackled global health, security and development challenges in such global organizations, but he has also operated within government and at the level of local communities, where work is often constrained by limited resources. This depth of experience in varied settings is something the WHO of the 21st century needs.
As Æthiopia's minister of health, Dr. Tedros set his country on a road to remarkable health achievements. The country became a trailblazer among low- and middle-income countries, achieving milestones in primary health care. A strong believer in universal health coverage, Tedros supported an innovative health extension worker program, which has engaged 38,000 salaried extension workers and brought health care to the reach of all villages across Æthiopia. Thanks to that program, more than 95 percent of Æthiopia's population has access to primary health care within a distance of 10 kilometers.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
I rather think this is something of a good idea in the long run. Is WHO really anything more than another UN in white coats?
[ALMASDARNEWS] A Russian Arclight airstrike struck a cave in which Lions of Islam from Fursan al-Haq Brigade were positioned.
The region that was struck was in the vicinity of Taybat al-Imam in northern Hama where the "moderate" Jaish al-Izza and Free Idlib Army are fighting along the Jund al-Aqsa Qaeda affiliate.
Significantly, all the fighters killed were from Kafr Nabal, a town crested at the heart of Idlib.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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[6 views]
Top|| File under: al-Nusra
North Korea has covered the entrances to two tunnels at its remote nuclear test site, fanning speculation that it may be about to detonate another nuclear bomb. Camouflaged covers over tunnels at nuclear test sites are considered clear signs of an impending test.
The South Korean military believes the North could conduct another nuclear test around Oct. 10, the founding day of the North Korean Workers Party.
North Korea has dug three tunnels at the site in Punggye-ri, North Hamgyong Province. The first was used for the first nuclear test in 2006, while the second to fifth nuclear tests took place in tunnel No. 2. A government source here said, "There are suspicions that North Korea may conduct a sixth nuclear test at tunnel No. 3, which has never been used."
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2016
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#1
We should send one over...you know, in the spirit of a test.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Foreign ministers of the ministerial quartet on Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of. Except for a tiny handfull of Jews everthing there is very Islamic... have proposed a 72-hour ceasefire during their last meeting on Thursday in New York on the sidelines of the United Nations ...boodling on the grand scale... General Assembly.
The quartet ‐ made up of the United States, the United Kingdom, 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... and the United Arab Emirates ‐ met with the UN special envoy to Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed to propose the possible ceasefire.
A potential lull in the fighting between coalition forces and Houthi ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The Yemeni government has accused the Houthis of having ties to the Iranian government, which wouldn't suprise most of us. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews ... militias ‐ along with forces loyal to ousted former President President-for-Life Ali Abdullah Saleh ... Saleh initially took power as a strongman of North Yemen in 1977, when disco was in flower, but he didn't invite Donna Summer to the inauguration and Blondie couldn't make it... ‐ is being considered as an option for Oild Cheikh Ahmed to resume peace talks between all sides.
The quartet’s meeting comes following news that Yemen’s government lead by Prime Minister Ahmed Obeid bin Daghr arrived in Aden airport on Thursday for a final return from exile.
President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and his cabinet fled to Saudi Arabia, which led an Arab coalition against the Houthis in March 2015.
After 18 months of fighting, the Houthis and their allies control most of the north - including the capital Sanaa - while forces loyal to Hadi and the popular resistance control the south.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
I imagine the Saudis must be astonished they did not succeed in quickly conquering Yemen, given all their expensive, modern weaponry. How badly must their confidence be crumbling, especially coupled with the need to cut government spending to more closely match permanent revenue reduction?
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Warplanes bombed Aleppo on Friday with what residents described as unprecedented ferocity after the Russian-backed Syrian army declared an offensive to fully capture Syria's biggest city, killing off any hope of reviving a ceasefire.
Video images filmed by residents showed a young girl screaming as rescuers frantically dug her out of rubble, pulling her out alive. Another showed rescuers digging out a toddler with their bare hands, shouting "God is Great" as they lift him from the debris. The boy showed no signs of life as he was rushed off in a rescuer's arms.
The apparent collapse of US-backed peacemaking may mark a turning point in the five-year civil war, with the government and its Russian and Iranian allies now seemingly determined to crush the rebellion in its biggest urban stronghold.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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Top|| File under: Govt of Syria
Mentioned here repeatedly; as his Secretary of State, she had to be communicating with POTUS in some manner. If she had no active classified email accounts, that sort of narrows the available options. He's in it up to his neck and people within the inner circle and WH Communications Detachment are fully aware.
#1
It doesn't matter. We no longer have an "opposition party".
Its been said that Clinton could strangle an innocent on national television and still be elected. What hasn't been voiced strongly enough is that Obama could be recorded as laughing while watching and the do-nothing "opposition party" would make a meek statement of protest and subsequently withdraw from any further action.
Posted by: Penguin of the Desert ||
09/24/2016 1:13
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#5
Precisely why nothing has been done or will be done about HRC's classified email scandal. The trail leads directly back to the Champ. He's her insurance.
How about some "context " on the particular postings ?
he used a "pseudonym" ? But you can't or won't tell us what it is. Or give us any context to the time and details of the postings .
Is there a reason for your discretion and tact? Who do you work for, who pays you ? Politico has an agenda, perhaps?
The server story had two components: the security breaking (which she got a pass on, and O therefore will too) and the the C.Foundation quid-pro-quo operations, which O may or may not have been involved with--and I think she's cunning enough to have kept him out of that loop.
Posted by: james ||
09/24/2016 16:59
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PESHAWAR: Security forces personnel on Friday repulsed two attacks on security checkposts in Mohmand and Bajaur agencies by suspected militants from across the Pak-Afghan border, security sources said.
The militants opened fire on a security checkpost in the Sheikh Baba area of Mohmand and on the Nawa Pass security post in Bajaur agency, sources said.
Security forces repulsed both attacks by retaliating quickly. No casualties were reported on either side of the border.
The claims could not be independently verified as journalists do not have access to most parts of the restive agencies.
The Jamaatul Ahrar militant group claimed responsibility for the attacks.
Pakistan has long accused Afghanistan of sheltering militants who conduct attacks inside its territory, a charge Afghanistan denies.
Army Chief General Raheel Sharif, in a meeting with senior US officials at GHQ in June this year, raised the demand of targeting Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) militants and their chief Mullah Fazlullah in their hideouts in Afghanistan.
Mohmand and Bajaur are among Pakistan’s seven semi-autonomous tribal districts near the Afghan border, rife with homegrown insurgents and foreign militants.
Despite heavy military presence on both sides of the border, cross-border movements of militants (in both ways) have been a major area of concern.
Local militants have fled ongoing military offensives since 2008, taking refuge across the border and attacking Pakistani military checkpoints and civilians from there.
The army launched Operation Zarb-i-Azb in June 2014 in a bid to wipe out militant bases in the tribal areas and so bring an end to the bloody insurgency that has cost thousands of civilian lives since 2004.
As a result, security in the country has since improved. Scattered attacks still take place, but they are fewer and of a lesser intensity than in previous years.
According to data from the South Asia Terrorism Portal, 457 civilians and 182 members of the security forces were killed in Pakistan from January 1 to September 11, putting 2016 on course for fewer casualties than 2015.
Last year, the country recorded its lowest number of killings since 2007.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] A fire at one of Iraq’s major oil fields could hinder military and humanitarian efforts as operations to recapture ISIS stronghold of djinn-infested Mosul ... the home of a particularly ferocious and hairy djinn... get underway.
Black smoke continues to billow into the air from the Qayara oil field, damaged by ISIS bandidosturbans last month as they fled the town, creating health risks for civilians and troops amassing there. The fires are also clogging up the skies in the area, where critically important Arclight airstrikes and aerial reconnaissance missions are taking place almost daily.
Located on the west bank of the Tigris River, about 40 miles (65 kilometers) south of Mosul, Qayara has since become an important staging ground for military and humanitarian efforts ahead of the Mosul operation since it was recaptured by Iraqi forces last month.
"Stabilizing Qayara can’t wait - it has to happen now," Lise Grande, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator for Iraq, told The News Agency that Dare Not be Named.
"Everything for the Mosul operation hinges on Qayara," she said. "It’s the staging ground for military forces and it’s where 350,000 of the 1 million people who are expected to flee (Mosul) will either find shelter or pass through."
There are slow-going Iraqi efforts to contain the fires, but nearly a month after the town was recaptured from the myrmidons, smoke and toxic fumes continue to pollute the air in and around Qayara.
The Iraqi Oil Ministry front man, Assem Jihad, said Wednesday that ISIS bandidosturbans set fire to 11 oil wells in Qayara to derail security forces and wreak havoc in the area as they fled. He said fires at nine of the wells have been extinguished, but two continue to burn powerfully.
The images of smoke and flames from the oil wells are reminiscent of the oil fires in Kuwait after the Iraqi military reportedly set fire to hundreds of wells when Saddam Hussein invaded the neighboring Persian Gulf nation in the early 1990s.
"In putting out the fires in Kuwait the firefighters used water pipes and pumped the water from the Persian Gulf to spray at the base of the fires," said Kourosh Kian, an expert in petroleum drilling and reservoir engineering.
Kian, a system engineer at GE Aviation, said the simplest method to extinguish these types of fires is to inject water under high pressure at the base of the fire. Since Qayara is on the Tigris River, there would be no problem with the water supply, he said.
The two main fields in the area, Qayara and Najmah, had been producing about 30,000 barrels per day of crude before the ISIS took control of Iraq’s Nineveh Province in June 2014.
While Iraqi forces now remain in control of the area, it is far from stable. At the Qayara West air base, where hundreds of US troops are working to advise and assist their Iraqi counterparts, a small rocket that contained a mustard agent landed, Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told Congress on Thursday.
A US official, who discussed details of the incident on Wednesday on condition of anonymity, said a small group of US soldiers who inspected remnants of the rocket after it went kaboom! found a black, oily substance on a fragment of metal. An initial test of the suspicious substance showed it contained residue of mustard agent, but a second test was negative.
Militants continue to dwell around the town to the west and along the eastern bank toward the town of al-Alam.
The Iraqi military, backed by coalition Arclight airstrikes and coalition advise-and-assist operations, looks to recapture more territory from the military group, which at one point in 2014 controlled about a third of Iraq and neighboring Syria. US-led coalition forces have launched more than 460 Arclight airstrikes around Qayara since August 2014 and more than 1,800 around the city of Mosul itself.
But for aid workers in the country, the fires are an immediate primary concern as they prepare for a potential mass influx of displaced people as Mosul operations get underway.
"There is also a major effort to stabilize Qayara," Grande said. "Hundreds of thousands of people who may flee Mosul are likely to come in this direction."
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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Top|| File under: Islamic State
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] With US Secretary of State John F. I was in Vietnam, you know Kerry Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a lucky hat, conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State... invoking North Korea’s latest nuclear kaboom as a "reckless act of provocation," the UN Security Council on Friday approved a resolution urging quick global implementation of a treaty that would ban tests of such weapons.
Kerry said universal adoption of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty would result in a "safer, more secure, and more peaceful planet," as the United States and 18 other council members approved the resolution, with none opposed and Egypt abstaining.
Proponents of nuclear disarmament welcomed the vote. The Washington-based Arms Control Association called it "a very important reaffirmation of the global taboo against nuclear weapon test kabooms and strong call for ratification" by key nations.
Security Council approval comes as the Comprehensive Test Ban Organization set up to administer the treaty marks its 20th anniversary. Yet Friday’s move was mostly symbolic.
The US remains one of the holdouts among the 44 countries that are designated "nuclear capable" - the United States, China, Egypt, India, Iran, Israel, North Korea and Pakistain - that still need to ratify the treaty for it to enter into force.
The UN’s CTBTO already polices the world for any sign of nuclear tests with a global network of monitoring stations that pick up seismic signals and gases released by such events. But until those eight countries embrace the treaty it is supposed to administer, it cannot go on site to inspect for tests.
The White House has lobbied Congress for support since anti-treaty minded Republicans rejected ratification 17 years ago under President Bill Clinton ...former Democratic president of the U.S. Bill was the second U.S. president to be impeached, the first to deny that oral sex was sex, the first to have difficulty with the definition of is... , with Senate approval falling far short of the required two-thirds majority.
Posted by: Fred ||
09/24/2016
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#1
This paperwork will be so important...
...to somebody, somewhere.
It won't do a damn thing to detour N. Korea.
But hey! Lots of cocktails will be had, because some people will pretend that something took place.
Why we do continue to pay the salaries of people who participate in such farces?
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Free Beacon] Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton told ABC Action News reporter Sarina Fazan on Wednesday that she didn’t need to take any neuro-cognitive tests.
[NY Post] Yet another surprise revelation suggests strongly that the FBI's probe of Hillary Clinton's e-mail mess was anything but a by-the-book investigation.
Joe 
[AnNahar] Lawyers for Dutch far-right MP Geert Wilders on Friday urged judges to drop an upcoming discrimination and hate speech case against the controversial politician, slamming it as a "political trial."
[IsraelTimes] Islamic Relief Worldwide was barred from operating in the West Bank amid claims of funds being funnelled to 
[Khaama (Afghanistan)] The Afghan Vice President Sarwar Danesh said the recent attacks in 
DEIR EZZOR – The Syrian airforce launched several airstrikes on the town of al-Muhasan in the countryside of Deir ez-Zor on Friday, causing casualties among civilians.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Former Cold War-era rivals Pakistain and Russia are due to hold their first ever military exercise this month, Pakistain’s military said on Friday, in another sign of shifting alliances in South Asia.
[ALMASDARNEWS] The media department of Jabhat 
[DENVER.CBSLOCAL] A CBS4 investigation has found multiple cases of dead men and women voting in Colorado months and in some cases years after their deaths, a revelation that calls into question safeguards designed to prevent such occurrences.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] 
...Liwa al-Islam (Brigade of Islam) was established by Zahran Alloush, the son of Saudi-based religious scholar Abdullah Mohammed Alloush, after Syrian authorities released him from prison in mid-2011 where he had been serving time for his Salafist activism. The group claimed responsibility for carrying out the July 2012 Damascus bombing that killed Defense Minister Dawoud Rajiha, Deputy Defense Minister Asef Shawkat, and Assistant Vice President Hassan Turkmani. It was a driving force behind actions in the Damascus region. It cooperated and conducted joint operations with al-Nusra. In Sptember 2013 Saudi Arabia engineered Liwa al-Islam's merger with fifty other more or less Salafist groups as a counterweight to al-Nusra, which the Learned Elders of Islam considered was growing too powereful...
Maulana Fazlur Rehman
[SemperFiNews] A recent policy-setting decision by the Los Angeles Police Commission (civilians with no law enforcement training), has told the LAPD to run when confronted by an armed suspect. No we didn't make that up.
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Human rights activists are accusing Kenyan police of executing three women who allegedly attacked a 
[ENGLISH.ALMANAR.LB] Morocco on Friday made an official request to return to the 
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] The bodies of 162 people had been pulled from the waters off the Egyptian coast by Friday, two days after a boat carrying hundreds of 
[IsraelTimes] Protests break out along northern, central Strip; army pushes back rioters with live ammo, non-lethal means
[ALMASDARNEWS] ISIS have revealed in their latest propaganda video that they have massacred over 50 civilians and buried them in a mass grave, before they fled a town the town of al-Tarmia to the north of Baghdad.
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar
...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. ..
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] 
[ENGLISH.ALARABIYA.NET] Warplanes bombed Aleppo on Friday with what residents described as unprecedented ferocity after the Russian-backed Syrian army declared an offensive to fully capture Syria's biggest city, killing off any hope of reviving a ceasefire.
North Korea
