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Bomb injures top Talibunny Mullah Nazir
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Page 6: Politix
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Africa North
Benghazi explained - Canadian Free Press update
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/29/2012 09:23 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Gads, what lurid prose. Any relation between Canada Free Press and World Net Daily?

Aside from that, it's relatively accurate. There is one part, however, where the 'government insider' is a bit off:

Who is really benefitting from, say, what’s going on in Egypt? Mubarek is out, and the Muslim Brotherhood is in. Who does that benefit? Saudi Arabia.

The Muslim Brotherhood and the Saudis have been at odds for decades. Partly due to the differences between the origins and goals of the MB and those of the Wahhabis, but also because the Saudis consider the MB agenda to be rather subversive.

It's a rather odd statement; one that appears to be driven more by agenda of the "insider" than any sort of real inside knowlege.
Posted by: Pappy || 11/29/2012 14:04 Comments || Top||

#2  I agree Pappy, strange writing style indeed. The really sad part however, is we have to get this analysis from the foreign press.
Posted by: Besoeker || 11/29/2012 16:57 Comments || Top||

#3  The reason why we are getting information from the foreign press and not our MSM is that our MSM has always been leftard radicals under the surface but was not able to take the heat for letting it bubble up since for so long they were the journalists.

But with the advent of the internet up pops the citizen journalist, relieving pressure on MSM, so they realized they could now get away with taking off the cloak and letting themselves be what they trully are and not under pressure to let the world see it either.
Posted by: Percy Gurly-Brown5816 || 11/29/2012 17:09 Comments || Top||

#4  our MSM has always been leftard radicals under the surface

Debatable on all points. But if you were to say "since the mid-1960s," you'd be more accurate. Factor in the J-schools' save-the-world curriculum, and the limited entry into the field (plus the low starting compensation) and you get what you get.

And the advent-of-the-citizen-journalist claim is specious at best. The internet itself may have freed up the mainstream media to be more open in its biases, but more likely that was due to journalists essentially being ignorant and blabbing their views for all to see, and that nothing on the internet is really hidden (see: JournoList).

What the mainstream media has over the citizen-journalist is access. However, with more outlets competing for fewer eyes and ears, the pressure by media ownership to "put out a product" in order to sell advertising, and a media-savvy political structure - Republicans excepted - the mainstream media finds it easier politically and career-wise to break out the metaphorical kneepads.

The foreign press in this case has the advantage of not having to curry favor with, and maintain access to, the US political class. Nor do they have to cater to US advertisers. Plus there is that little 'bash America' thrill that lurks in the heart of every foreign journalist.
Posted by: Pappy || 11/29/2012 18:04 Comments || Top||

#5  The Muslim Brotherhood and the Saudis have been at odds for decades
Yes Pappy, but it's now kiss and makeup time.
SA has Egypts balls in an economic vice and unless they bow to the King, like Obama did, SA will turn off the spigot.
Posted by: tipper || 11/29/2012 18:53 Comments || Top||

#6  The biggest threat to the Saudis would be to move as rapidly as possible to develop energy independence in the U.S. Much of what is said by Hagmann and Michael Reagan makes sense. The prose reads like it is from someone hitting the sauce heavily while typing.
Posted by: JohnQC || 11/29/2012 19:08 Comments || Top||


The Brotherhood delusion
Posted by: tipper || 11/29/2012 08:18 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:


Arabia
Theatre of the absurd
After three failures, this year’s UN climate summit has only modest aims

NEVER let it be said that climate-change negotiators lack a sense of the absurd. Thousands of politicians, tree-huggers and journalists descended on Doha this week, adding their mite of hot air to the country that already has the world’s highest level of carbon emissions per head. The feeling of unreality is apt. The meeting comes amid gathering gloom about both the speed of climate change and the chances of implementing policies to keep the rise in global temperatures below 2°C.

The jamboree in Doha is the 18th UN climate-change summit, but the third since a landmark one at Copenhagen in 2009. That year, instead of negotiating a big new treaty to go beyond the timid Kyoto accords, America, plus China and other big emerging markets, announced a deal outside the UN framework, promising to cut emissions but leaving the talks in disarray. The next year, at Cancún in Mexico, others bowed to the inevitable and brought the “Copenhagen accord” within the UN framework. The year after that, at Durban, with the obligations that Kyoto put on rich countries about to expire, countries promised more talks about talks, saying they would negotiate a new climate regime by 2015 and have one in force by 2020. The Doha meeting begins that negotiation.

In other words, the first period of the Kyoto accord ends in December with no new treaty to replace it and no prospect of one till 2020. In its second period, Kyoto has been reduced to a shadow of its former self. Russia, Japan and Canada have either pulled out or said they will not make any new promises. A climate-finance system, Fast Start Finance, set up at Copenhagen to help poor countries pay the costs of mitigation and adaptation, also ends this year, without being fully funded. Worst of all, no country has made significant pledges to cut greenhouse-gas emissions since the Copenhagen conference and its aftermath. Climate policy is going nowhere fast.
Posted by: tipper || 11/29/2012 18:28 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Jeebus, climate change again? Time for the Excedrin headache pic.
Posted by: JohnQC || 11/29/2012 19:13 Comments || Top||

#2  The U.S. may not have made pledges, but our production of CO2 has fallen significantly, due to increased use of natural gas. Odd how the article missed that.
Posted by: trailing wife || 11/29/2012 20:06 Comments || Top||


Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Mowing the lawn
[Ynet] Analysis: IDF aware Operation Pillar of Defense in Gazoo not a long-term solution to Paleostinian rocket fire on south

After eight days of intense aerial bombardments of terrorist infrastructure in the Gazoo Strip, Israel agreed to an Egypt-mediated ceasefire, effectively marking the end of Operation Pillar of Defense. Despite the fact that over 70% of Israelis were against the ceasefire deal, the IDF raced to declare victory after the 9 pm deadline came into effect, touting its many, albeit minor, military achievements. And again, despite popular opinion, the IDF's case is strong.

Consider as a contrast the Second Leb War, widely perceived as a failure by the Israel public, and confirmed as such by the government-appointed Winograd Commission. In 2006, the IDF invaded Leb with a number of ambitious goals, including the toppling of Hezbollah and the engendering of long-term change in the Lebanese political system. Indeed, the loftiness of the goals rendered IDF action void ab initio, and doomed to insignificance even the military's considerable tactical victories.

Learning from its mistakes, for Operation Pillar of Defense the IDF set itself modest, achievable military goals. The first, tactical, was to deplete Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason,' stores of rockets and weapons systems.

The second, strategic, was to recreate a comprehensive deterrence capability that would cause bully boyz in the coastal enclave to hesitate before renewing rocket salvoes against Israel's south.

According to the IDF, during the course of the eight-day operation, Israel targeted:

o 30 senior Hamas and Islamic Jihad
...created after many members of the Egyptian Mohammedan Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the liquidation of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah...
terrorists
o 19 high-level command centers
o 980 underground rocket launchers
o 140 smuggling tunnels
o 66 tunnels used for terrorist operations
o 42 operation rooms and bases owned by Hamas
o 26 weapons manufacturing and storage facilities

To add a little bit of context, the IDF launched far more Arclight airstrikes in Gazoo during the first few days of Operation Pillar of Defense than during the same initial period of Operation Cast Lead of 2008-2009. The recent operation decimated Hamas' and other terrorist organizations' stores of Qassam rockets and mortars, while all but completely obliterating their Iranian-made Fajr-5 missiles.

On the diplomatic front, if Israel secures Egyptian cooperation over weapons smuggling into Gazoo, Hamas could find it exceedingly difficult to resupply and rearm. These represent incontestable tactical scores for the IDF, and could be considered, ipso facto, justification for Operation Pillar of Defense.

Which leads us to the IDF's deterrence capabilities: The IDF displayed the effectiveness of its budding UAV program, dubbed "Canopy of Fire," or hupat esh in Hebrew. The program is comprised of constant aerial surveillance of terrorist infrastructure in the Gazoo Strip.

Buzzing drones flying kilometers above the enclave use high-resolution cameras to monitor individual bully boyz conducting military operations, at times allowing the IAF to conduct rapid pinpoint strikes against the operatives. The program is increasingly successful, and will eventually threaten terrorists' ability to fire rockets into Israel without being targeted by an IAF strike.

Of course, the success of the operation will ultimately be judged in the coming weeks and months based on the stability of the ceasefire deal. If Israel has in fact managed to renegotiate the "rules of the game" to prohibit rocket fire on Israel's south, the operation will be deemed a success.

But be clear, there are very few within the IDF, if any, who believe that Operation Pillar of Defense is a long-term solution to Paleostinian rocket fire. Most expect the ceasefire to break down eventually, as Defense Minister Ehud Barak said, within "nine days, nine weeks, or more."

Far from being a regional game-changer, the operation was viewed as a tactical necessity, one which has frustrated the increasingly brazen terrorist attacks emanating from Gazoo, and which will have to be repeated in weeks, months, or years down the line.

It is viewed as both a sequel to Operation Cast Lead and a prequel to what will invariably be the next IDF operation in the Strip, and the next, until a diplomatic solution can be found.

In IDF slang, the process is known as "mowing the lawn." Only time will tell when the weeds will grow back.

Yoni holds a BA degree in Psychology with a minor in Political Science, from the University of British Columbia. He is currently working as a journalist in Israel, and his expertise lies in policy, conflict and Middle East affairs. Yoni was called up for reserve duty in the IDF's Strategic Division at the start of Operation Pillar of Defense.
Posted by: trailing wife || 11/29/2012 00:00 || Comments || Link || [0 views] Top|| File under: Hamas



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Two weeks of WOT
Thu 2012-11-29
  Bomb injures top Talibunny Mullah Nazir
Wed 2012-11-28
  Packed Tahrir Square defiant as deadlock prevails
Tue 2012-11-27
  30 Inmates Escape as Gunmen Attack Nigerian Police Unit
Mon 2012-11-26
  Syrian Rebels Claim Capture of Helicopter Base Near Damascus
Sun 2012-11-25
  Thousands of anti-Morsi protesters spend the night in Egypt's Tahrir square
Sat 2012-11-24
  7 People Killed in Pakistan Shiite Procession
Fri 2012-11-23
  IDF, Shin Bet Arrest 55 Terror Operatives In West Bank
Thu 2012-11-22
  Mashaal: I accept a Palestinian state on '67 borders
Wed 2012-11-21
  'Bomb blast' on bus in Tel Aviv
Tue 2012-11-20
  Female Suicide Boomer Targets Qazi
Mon 2012-11-19
  Israeli Strikes Kill 21 Palestinians, Gaza Rockets Wound 10 Israelis
Sun 2012-11-18
  Israeli air strikes pound Gaza as death toll hits 38
Sat 2012-11-17
   Israel air strikes hit Hamas HQ
Fri 2012-11-16
  Israel Warns of Escalation After Tel Aviv Missile Firing
Thu 2012-11-15
  Gaza missiles fired at Tel Aviv

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