#4
I watched Taylor Sheridan's LIONESS, season 2.
Just as engaging and realistic but closer to home than season 1.
Almost as if the story was taken from the pages of Rantburg.
[IsraelTimes] The IDF announces the formation of a new division that will be tasked with defending Israel’s eastern border.
The move was approved by Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi.
The IDF says the establishment of the new eastern regional division comes following an examination of the military’s “operational needs and defense capabilities in the area, in accordance with the planning of the IDF’s force build-up, in the light of the lessons of war and the situational assessment.”
The division will be subordinate to IDF Central Command.
“The mission of the division is to strengthen defenses in the border area, Route 90 highway and the communities, and to respond to terror incidents and weapons smuggling, while maintaining a peaceful border and strengthening cooperation with the Jordanian army,” the IDF says.
Currently, the Jordan Valley Regional Brigade, under the Central Command, is tasked with defending about 150 kilometers of the eastern frontier, from the northern part of the Dead Sea in the West Bank to the Hamat Gader hot springs in the Golan Heights.
The Yoav Regional Brigade, under the Southern Command, is responsible for the sparsely populated southern section, from the Dead Sea to the Red Sea resort city of Eilat.
#1
Wiki: Highway 90 is the longest Israeli road, at about 480 kilometres (300 mi), and stretches from Metula and the northern border with Lebanon, along the western side of the Sea of Galilee, through the Jordan Valley, along the Dead Sea's western bank (making it the world's lowest road), through the Arava Valley, and until Eilat and the southern border with Egypt on the Red Sea. The central section of the road traverses the Israeli-occupied West Bank. While it passes near the city of Jericho, it runs through Area C and does not enter areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority.
Posted by: Albert Pelosi3459 ||
10/31/2024 5:19
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#2
So, Combat Command A, Combat Command B, and Combat Command Reserve, just like the US heavy divisions of WWII.
[IsraelTime] The US has informed Israel of its displeasure over legislation passed by the Knesset yesterday banning the opening of new foreign consulates in Jerusalem that serve the Paleostinians, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller says.
Get in your car and drive over to Ramallah. It’s a small territory — you’ll get there in plenty of time for lunch.
The law was largely seen as aimed at putting a further obstacle to the US reopening its consulate after former president Donald Trump ...Perhaps no man has ever had as much fun being president of the US... shuttered the diplomatic mission to the Paleostinians in 2019.
Such insight! That’s why he gets the big bucks.
US President Joe The Big Guy Biden ...46th president of the U.S. The man who made Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter look competent, if only by comparison.... came into office pledging to reopen the mission but the move requires Israel’s acquiescence since the building is located in Israel’s sovereign territory in West Jerusalem. Successive governments have refused to sign off on the move, and yesterday’s legislation will likely make it even more difficult to carry out.
"We oppose that legislation, have made clear to them that we oppose the bill and continue to believe that opening a US consulate in Jerusalem would be an important way for our country to engage with and provide support for the Paleostinian people," Miller says.
That’s nice, dear. Here, have a cookie.
He notes that the US continues to engage with the Paleostinian people and the Paleostinian Authority through its Paleostinian Affairs Bureau in the US Embassy in Jerusalem and the Office for Paleostinian Affairs in Washington, which was formed earlier during Biden’s tenure in order to boost ties with the Paleostinians.
See? You have no need for that musty old consulate in Jerusalem anyway.
Asked whether the US would consider closing Israeli consulates throughout the US in retaliation for the move, Miller says this is not a move that Washington is considering.
[IsraelTimes] A Hamas member planning to carry out imminent terror attacks was killed by Israeli special forces in the West Bank city of Tulkarem a short while ago, the IDF, police and the Shin Bet say.
According to a joint statement, members of police’s Yamam counter-terrorism unit and Shin Bet agents, with IDF support, operated in Tulkarem to eliminate Hussam al-Malah, who they identify as a prominent Hamas member.
The statement says al-Malah was involved in planning imminent terror attacks with Islam Odeh and Zahi Oufi, two Hamas operatives killed by Israel in separate incidents in recent weeks.
The three, along with other members in a Hamas network in Tulkarem, were allegedly planning a major terror attack on the October 7 anniversary.
The military says that after Odeh and Oufi were killed, al-Malah continued to lead the Hamas network and worked to plan imminent attacks in recent days.
[IsraelTimes] The Israel Defense Forces says the military is carrying out a counter-terror raid in Nur Shams in the central West Bank, with an airstrike targeting gunmen who opened fire at troops.
The military says the operation includes forces from the army, Shin Bet and police.
In a statement, the military says the operation began shortly after troops killed Hussam al-Malah in the West Bank city of Tulkarem, Malah was a prominent Hamas member who planned to carry out imminent terror attacks, officials said.
War is not healthy for children and other living things, ‘tis said. The IDF did suggest you remove yourselves from the line of fire, but you chose the big, stupid gesture. Enjoy your consequences.
[IsraelTimes] The UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon recorded more than 30 incidents this month resulting in property damage or injury to peacekeepers, about 20 of them from Israeli fire or action, a spokesman says.
The UN peacekeeping force has been thrust into the front lines of the new war between Israel and Hezbollah, with Israel repeatedly calling on peacekeepers to abandon their positions, and UNIFIL refusing.
Of the 30 incidents this month, “about 20 of those we could attribute to IDF fire or actions, with seven being clearly deliberate,” Andrea Tenenti, a spokesman for the force, known as UNIFIL, tells a news conference held by video.
“What has been very concerning are incidents where peacekeepers performing their monitoring tasks, as well as our cameras, lighting and entire watchtowers, have been deliberately targeted by the IDF,” Tenenti says.
Israel maintains it does not target UN forces, but that they are sometimes caught in the crossfire with Hezbollah.
On Monday, a rocket that was probably fired by Hezbollah or an affiliated group hit the headquarters of the UN mission in the Lebanese city of Naqoura, he says.
For about a dozen other incidents, the origin of fire could not be determined.
[IsraelTimes] State media outlets reports two other people arrested after infiltrating from Iraqi Kurdistan with plan to cause ‘riots, terror and insecurity’
Iranian state media on Wednesday said intelligence services killed a member of a separatist group, which it accuses of links to Israel, and arrested two others in the country’s northwest.
"Intelligence service agents killed one of the main members of this terrorist group, and two others were arrested," state television ... and if you can't believe state television who can you believe?
reported, adding that their weapons had been seized.
It said they were detected trying to enter Iran’s West Azerbaijan province from northern Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, where several exiled Iranian Kurdish groups are based, "with the aim of causing riots, terror and insecurity."
It did not specify what group the members belonged to, only claiming that it was a "group affiliated with the Zionist regime."
Iran regularly accuses Kurdish groups in Iraq of staging cross-border attacks and, since 2022, of fueling the protests sparked by the death in jug of Iranian Kurdish woman Mahsa Amini.
The reported execution comes days after Israel carried out targeted strikes on Iranian military assets on Saturday, in retaliation for the massive ballistic missile attack launched by Tehran on October 1.
Tehran frequently claims to foil Mossad operations in the country, although the veracity of such claims is unclear.
Iran in January claimed it carried out strikes on what it said was the "headquarters of the Zionist regime’s spies" in northern Iraq, referring to the Mossad.
In the same month, it said that it had executed four men for collaborating with Israel on a plan to bomb an Iranian Defense Ministry center in Isfahan, central Iran.
[IsraelTimes] ‘You wanna piss on everyone’s night?’ Thom Yorke responds to protester yelling about Gaza death toll before storming off stage; he then returns for final song, ‘Karma Police’
The lead singer of Radiohead clashed with an anti-Israel heckler before storming off stage at a concert in Melbourne, Australia on Wednesday night.
Thom Yorke, whose English rock band has defied boycott calls to perform in Israel three times, was nearing the end of his solo show when a protester began yelling about the Jewish state.
While it was not entirely clear what the protester said from the footage, reports said the heckler referenced the corpse count of Paleostinians in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... during the Israel-Hamas ..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",... war.
"Come up here and say that, right now," Yorke responded.
"Come up on the f*cking stage and say what you want to say. Don’t stand there like a coward, come here and say it," he said, as the crowd roared in approval of the singer.
"Come on. You want to piss on everybody’s night? OK, you do, see you later then," Yorke said, and then left the stage. Many in the crowd cried "no" in disappointment.
Yorke later returned to the stage to perform a final number, Radiohead’s "Karma Police."
[X]
Thom Yorke discutiu com uma pessoa pró-Palestina na pista e abandonou palco do show na Austrália (info do @nme). Segue o vídeo
“Come up and say that. Right here. Come up on the fucking stage and say what you want to say. But don’t stand there like a coward, come here and say it" pic.twitter.com/ZKXgDCEYTK
Radiohead, which has won several Grammy Awards and sold millions of records since the 1990s, has been the target of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel, especially in the lead-up to its 2017 concert in Tel Aviv. In response, Yorke called BDS protesters "offensive" and "patronizing."
The band first performed in Israel in 1993 and then again in 2000.
Lead guitarist Jonny Greenwood, who is married to Israeli visual artist Sharona Katan, partnered for an album last year with Israeli singer Dudu Tassa, along with artists throughout the Middle East, including Paleostinian singer Freteikh, Egyptian singer Ahmed Doma and Moroccan singer Mohssine Salaheddine.
Greenwood pushed back on critics this year who urged him to cancel a planned tour with Tassa in Europa ...the land mass occupying the space between the English Channel and the Urals, also known as Moslem Lebensraum... due to the ongoing war.
[IsraelTimes] Paris Commercial Court blocks Macron’s second attempt this year to bar Israeli defense firms from a trade show, following petition by Israeli companies and trade groups
The Gay Paree Commercial Court ruled Wednesday that the Euronaval arms show cannot keep Israeli companies from exhibiting at the event based on their nationality, and ordered organizers "to suspend the execution of the measures adopted against the Israeli exhibiting companies."
French President Emmanuel Macron decided earlier this month to ban Israeli firms from exhibiting at the naval arms show, a decision that Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called "a disgrace."
"This is a huge victory for the rule of law and the independence of justice," said Patrick Klugman, one of the attorneys representing Israeli firms.
"Whatever the stated intention, from the highest level of the State to the organizing company, the action which we had to take note of here was manifestly ill-founded and illegal," he said.
The petition to overturn the ban was submitted by the Manufacturers Association of Israel, together with the Israel-La Belle France Chamber of Commerce, Israel Shipyards, and representatives of five additional Israeli defense firms that have been banned from exhibiting at the event.
Among the Israeli firms represented in the appeal were the country’s largest defense heavyweights, including Elbit Systems, Rafael Advanced Defense Systems and Orbit Communications Systems.
Some 500 exhibitors are expected to partake in the expo from 30 countries around the world, attracting 25,000 visitors. It will take place November 4-7 in Villepinte, near Gay Paree.
Foreign Minister Israel Katz said earlier this month the ministry would take "legal and diplomatic measures" against the decision to bar the firms, which was issued as Macron has grown increasingly critical of Israel’s offensives in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... and Leb ...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers... Earlier this month, the French president provoked an outcry in Jerusalem over his demand for an arms embargo on Israel, asserting it was the only way to end the fighting in Gaza and in Lebanon, a former French colony where Gay Paree still wields great influence.
The ban from Euronaval was the second time this year that La Belle France tried to ban Israeli firms from a major defense show, and had the decision struck down by the Gay Paree Commercial Court.
In May, La Belle France said conditions were not right for Israel to participate in the Eurosatory military trade show, and banned Israeli manufacturers. The court overturned the decision, but only after the conference had already begun.
[IsraelTimes] After cultural boycott call, literary and entertainment figures back those who ‘don’t share one-sided narrative’ about Oct. 7, slam ‘censorship based on identity or litmus tests’
A group of over 1,000 figures from the literary and entertainment industries have signed a letter rejecting attempts "to boycott, harass and scapegoat Jewish and Israeli authors and literary institutions."
Their letter came after some 1,000 authors and literary professionals signed a pledge to boycott Israeli cultural institutions. The signatories pledged not to work with Israeli publishers, festivals, literary agencies and publications that are "complicit in violating Paleostinian rights," including "whitewashing and justifying Israel’s occupation, apartheid, or genocide."
The signatories rejecting the boycott pledge included Bernard Henri-Lévy, Lee Child, Herta Muller, Howard Jacobson, Yossi Klein Halevi, Elfriede Jelinek, Mayim Bialik, Debra Messing, Julianna Margulies, Haim Saban and many more.
They declared that they "continue to be shocked and disappointed to see members of the literary community harass and ostracize their colleagues because they don’t share a one-sided narrative in response to the greatest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust."
"Regardless of one’s views on the current conflict, boycotts of creatives and creative institutions simply create more divisive ...politicians call things divisive when when the other side sez something they don't like. Their own statements are never divisive, they're principled... ness and foment further hatred," they said.
"Israel is fighting existential wars against Hamas ..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,... and Hezbollah, both US, UK, and European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... designated terrorist groups. The exclusion of anyone who doesn’t unilaterally condemn Israel is an inversion of morality and an obfuscation of reality.
"We call on our friends and colleagues worldwide to join us in expressing their support for Israeli and Jewish publishers, authors, and all book festivals, publishers, and literary agencies that refuse to capitulate to censorship based on identity or litmus tests."
The letter also said that "history is full of examples of self-righteous sects, movements and cults who have used short-lived moments of power to enforce their vision of purity, to persecute, exclude, boycott and intimidate those with whom they disagreed, who made lists of people with ’bad’ views, who burned ’sinful’ books (and sometimes ’sinful’ people)."
Ouch. That slices deep.
"The instincts and motivations behind cultural boycotts, in practice and throughout history, are directly in opposition to the liberal values most writers hold sacred."
The boycott call endorsed by Rooney
…Irish writer Sally Rooney, who regularly indulges her hobby of urging the literary world to join her anti-Israel boycott, an urge that long predates the current excitements…
and others follows numerous other campaigns around the globe urging individuals and institutions to cut ties with Israel amid the ongoing war in the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... Strip
[IsraelTimes] European Legal Support Center files suit in name of three Gazans, claiming MV Kathrin’s cargo is en route to defense contractor and could be used for alleged war crimes in Strip
Human rights lawyers have filed a court appeal in Berlin seeking to block a 150-metric-ton shipment of military-grade explosives aboard German fat merchantman MV Kathrin which they say is to be delivered to Israel’s biggest defense contractor.
The European Legal Support Center (ELSC) said on Wednesday the action was filed on behalf of three Paleostinians from Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... , arguing that the shipment of primarily RDX explosives could be used in munitions for Israel’s war against the Hamas ..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,... terror group in the Gaza Strip, potentially contributing to alleged war crimes, which Israel strenuously denies.
Germany-based Lubeca Marine, which owns the MV Kathrin, said the ship "was never scheduled to make any port calls in Israel" and had recently discharged its cargo in Bar, Montenegro.
The company declined to disclose details of the cargo for contractual reasons, but said it complied fully with all international and EU regulations, ensuring necessary permits are obtained before any operations.
The ELSC said the RDX shipment was destined for Israeli Military Industries, a division of Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest defense contractor. Elbit Systems declined to comment.
"We never claimed that the Kathrin was bound for Israel (itself), it’s the cargo which is bound for Elbit Systems," ELSC lawyer Ahmed Abed told Rooters with respect to the group’s appeal filed at Berlin’s Administrative Court. "The company ignored all the warnings."
LSEG data and vessel-tracking website Marine Traffic indicated that the MV Kathrin had docked in the major Egyptian Mediterranean port of Alexandria on Monday and was last seen there.
According to the port of Alexandria’s website, the ship, which it identified as German, unloaded military equipment in Alexandria and was set to depart on November 5.
The Egyptian foreign ministry did not immediately respond to a Rooters request for comment.
The MV Kathrin has been denied entry at several African and Mediterranean ports, including in Angola, Slovenia, Montenegro, and Malta, according to the ELSC. It said Portuguese authorities recently required the ship to switch from a Portuguese flag to a German flag before it could continue.
In August, Namibian authorities blocked the vessel, which departed from Vietnam’s port of Haiphong, from entering its main harbor, Amnesty International has reported.
Germany’s economy ministry, named in the case because the ship is German-owned and flagged, said it had received letters from lawyers on the matter but declined to comment on them.
The ministry said the MV Kathrin shipment did not constitute an export from Germany, as the explosives were neither loaded nor dispatched from German territory. It said there was no legal basis for requiring an export license under German law.
The war in Gaza began on October 7, 2023, when thousands of Hamas-led forces of Evil invaded southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
Israel denies accusations it has committed war crimes in its campaign, stressing that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools, and mosques.
[IsraelTimes] Israel struck over 100 terror targets in Lebanon yesterday and killed dozens of Hezbollah operatives from the air, the IDF says.
Among the targets was the launcher used in a rocket barrage that hit and killed a man in the town of Ma’alot Tarshiha, the military says.
It adds that ground forces from the 146th Division have located weapons and attacked dozens of terror targets, including military buildings and an anti-tank missile launching post.
Forces from the 91st Division have continued to blow up underground shafts, seize arms and take out terror operatives, locating anti-aircraft missiles and maps containing outlines for attacks targeting Israel. The IDF says troops found rocket launchers pointing toward northern Israeli towns that were placed “in the heart of civilian population.”
Turning to Gaza, the army says forces from the 162nd Division are continuing to operate in the northern city of Jabalia, taking out dozens of terror operatives in close-quarters combat or by directing airstrikes.
Another Harris-Biden knife in the Israel back. How many involve the human shields Hamas is famous for?
[IsraelTimes] US State Department officials have identified nearly 500 potential incidents of civilian harm during Israel’s military operations in Gaza involving US-furnished weapons, but have not taken further action on any of them, according to three sources, including a US official familiar with the matter.
The Washington Post reports that the reports have come from various US government agencies, aid organizations, nonprofits, media reports and other eyewitnesses, the Post says.
While State Department guidance directs US officials to complete investigations and recommend a response to such claims within two months, no single case has gotten this far in the process, according to the report.
Some of the cases likely amount to violations of US and international law, sources familiar with the matter tell The Post.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken submitted a report to Congress earlier this year concluding that it is reasonable to assess that US weapons have been used by Israel in ways that are inconsistent with US law. However, he also said Israel’s assurances to the contrary are “credible and reliable” and that the US could not at the time provide a conclusive determination.
[IsraelTimes] Since the US sent a letter to Israel warning that continued security assistance was at risk if it doesn’t take significant steps to improve the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, the measures Jerusalem has taken have been minor and insufficient, State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller says.
While there has been some improvement in the number of delivery routes to aid, the uptick has been minor and the humanitarian “situation still remains at a level that we don’t find acceptable,” Miller says during a press briefing.
He says there continue to be breakdowns in communications between the IDF and aid agencies and issues in which approvals aren’t granted by the IDF for aid workers to operate throughout Gaza, or issues where authorizations are given but they aren’t transmitted to officers on the ground. There are also still Palestinian armed gangs that have been looting some of the aid coming into Gaza, Miller says.
[KhaamaPress] Local sources report that after the shooting by Iranian border guards on Afghan refugees, six injured individuals were recently transferred from Pakistain to Nimruz province.
The news site Hal Vash, sharing images of Afghan refugees, reported that dozens of Afghan refugees, including six injured individuals, were attacked by Iranian border guards at the Kalgani border.
According to sources, the condition of two Afghan refugees is reported to be critical.
According to videos released by Hal Vash, the refugees stated that groups of 50, totaling around 300 people, were trying to enter Iran ...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate JewsZionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol... when they encountered an ambush by Iranian forces.
The refugees reported that after the attack, they fled to Pakistain. After several days of efforts, they managed to return to Nimruz with the help of Pak forces.
Despite nearly 20 days having passed, the results of the Taliban ...Arabic for students... ’s investigation have not yet been made clear.
I can’t imagine that the Talib “interim government” actually wants to know — unlike the IDF, their jihadis can’t stand up to the Iranian military, even with the myriad modern weapons the Americans left behind.
According to reports, over 250 Afghan refugees were killed in the Kalgani border region, located between Pakistain and Iran, as a result of gunfire.
Several UN agencies, including UNAMA, have called for a comprehensive investigation into the incident.
Hal Vash, which covers news in Sistan and Baluchestan, cited sources stating that dozens of Afghan refugees, including six injured, were transferred to Nimruz by the Mighty Pak Army on Sunday, October 27.
One refugee recounted, "We were a group of 300 people divided into groups of 50 to cross the border, but we were ambushed by Iranian border forces. Dozens were killed and injured, and we had to flee to Pakistain.
The incident raises serious concerns about the violation of human rights ...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty... and the protection of refugee rights by the Iranian authorities.
IDF confirms: Irans air defenses have been put out, and allows Israel free range over Iran.
The Israeli military has announced the creation of new units within its Intelligence Directorate and Air Force aimed at facilitating “repetitive actions” in Iran.
… A dedicated Iran department has been set up in the Intelligence Directorate’s Research Division, along with a “depth” unit in the Air Force’s Intelligence Department.
Additionally, the military reports that the Air Force conducted extensive training exercises in preparation for last weekend’s long-range strikes. More than 100 IAF aircraft participated in the strikes early Saturday, targeting Iran’s strategic long-range air defense systems and impacting its ballistic missile production capabilities.
According to the military, the destruction of Iran’s air defenses has granted “freedom of aerial action” for future operations, while the strikes on missile production sites have “eliminated an immediate and future threat to the State of Israel.”
Posted by: 3dc ||
10/31/2024
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[11181 views]
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#1
A new division facing Jordan, new units just for Iran? No longer business as usual, no matter what The Powers That Be in Washington and elsewhere might demand.
Kudos to the IDF generals who were able to turn themselves around despite loathing their prime minister
[JustTheNews] GOP lawmakers worried foreign adversaries like China, Iran, Venezuela and Russia are exploiting loopholes to route illicit foreign money to Democrat candidates.
House investigators formally subpoenaed the Democrat donations platform ActBlue in a rapidly expanding probe into possible illicit foreign funding in the 2024 election after the Treasury Department confirmed to Congress its money laundering detection system has generated hundreds of suspicious activity reports related to the online fund-raising giant.
The dramatic developments were communicated to House members and ActBlue itself in a series of memos this week obtained by Just the News that reaffirmed that lawmakers fear foreign adversaries like China, Iran, Venezuela and Russia may be routing illicit foreign money into Democratic coffers by using the names of unsuspecting American donors.
"Although Treasury has not yet produced any records, it is currently reviewing hundreds of potentially responsive records according to three video conference calls between Committee and Treasury staff since the initial request," House Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer wrote colleagues in a confidential memo Tuesday night.
Comer's committee, House Administration Committee Chairman Bryan Steil and Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., recently requested access to suspicious activity reports (SARs) filed by financial institutions concerning money flowing through ActBlue, and "Treasury revealed this is one of the largest records reviews it has conducted this Congress," according to the Comer letter obtained by Just the News and first reported by The New York Post.
As Comer's team awaited a review of the SARs, Steil's committee sent a subpoena Wednesday afternoon to ActBlue demanding the massive fund-raising platform turn over records on how it confirms donors' identities and endures no fraud or money laundering occurs with contributions going to Democratic candidates and groups.
"The Committee is compelling, via the attached subpoena, the production of documents and communications related to ActBlue’s donor verification policies and the potential for foreign actors, primarily from Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and China, to use ActBlue to launder illicit money into U.S. political campaigns," Steil wrote in the letter to ActBlue CEO Regina-Wallace Jones.
Steil said he was concerned about the fund-raising platform’s security practices after ActBlue disclosed to his committee last year that it did not require from donors on all transactions the credit card verification value (“CVV”) associated with the credit or debit card used by the contributor, a key protection against identity fraud and money laundering.
“You explained that your platform did not require contributors to provide their CVV when making an online contribution in all transactions,” he wrote.
Specifically, Steil's letter demanded that ActBlue turn over to his committee:
Any changes to ActBlue’s CVV verification policy since October 2023;
All documents relating to contributions ActBlue has processed via prepaid cards, including a breakdown of any contributions from cards originating outside the United States;
Any entities that ActBlue has deplatformed due to a decision “not to process” by any third-party payment processors or because the source of funding came from a foreign or sanctioned source;
All reports received from U.S. citizens alleging unauthorized or fraudulent donations made in their names.
#3
Dinesh went to jail for what ActBlue is doing. His was a single offense to help a friend’s campaign. He knew she had no chance. ActBlue is systematically violating federal law in an organized fashion. It deserves a RICO case. We’ll see what the TrumpDOJ is made of.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
10/31/2024 12:25
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#4
So they wait until 5 days before an election to do this. In other words, let them cheat, if the Dems win, it will all be swept under the trash heap called AMerica.
Posted by: 49 Pan ||
10/31/2024 14:53
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[BBC] Author Charlie MacLean has made a life out of rating Scotch whisky. Here are his favourite ways to enjoy a dram, from cosy city pubs in Edinburgh to Victorian hotels in the Highlands.
Edinburgh, Scotland's cosmopolitan capital, is brimming with Unesco cache. Both its architecturally splendid medieval Old Town and Neoclassical New Town are World Heritage sites, while Edinburgh itself was named the world's first City of Literature in 2004.
Overseas, Edinburgh is equally as revered for its whisky culture. There are more than 385 pubs in the city where you can savour the peat-flavoured drink right in its country of origin.
"It's growing," says esteemed scotch writer Charles "Charlie" MacLean. "A lot of bars have expanded the range of whiskies and the knowledge on part of the bar staff in order to be able to advise customers. So Edinburgh has become a hub."
[Washinton Examiner] A lonely young man traveling abroad falls in love with a "China doll" who’s connected to the Communist Party. He thinks the affair is a distant memory. Thirty-five years later, Beijing reminds him that it knows what he did during that hot summer.
What if, decades later, that young man winds up the vice president of the United States?
This sounds like the plot of a cliched spy thriller, but something similar involves Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN), the Democrats’ No. 2 for the 2024 presidential election. That’s according to the Daily Mail, which has published an exclusive detailing an alleged love affair between Walz and a Chinese lady. A 59-year-old woman calling herself Jenna Wang, Walz’s purported lover, is the source of the story.
Wang said she met Walz in the summer of 1989, when the Nebraskan was in China’s Guangdong Province teaching English in a high school. Wang was teaching English in a nearby middle school. Young love blossomed. Walz complimented Wang on her looks and excellent English. She fell for the midwestern boy: "Tim was very passionate and very romantic. I can still remember dancing with him to our favorite song, ’Careless Whisper,’" she recalled. Holding hands soon moved to sex, but not sleepovers. "I remember he had busy 'jazz' hands"
#1
Looks as though someone neglected to mention some foreign contacts on their 5 year (security clearance bring-ups). Reporting of foreign contacts to Special Security officer (SSO) neglected as well.
#5
Confucius say, "Busier beaver
Can maybe explain yellow fever...
Although there is talk
About big Chinese--"
"Duck!"
[cook chase donkey through kitchen with cleaver]
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] "possibly with the help of Russia."
"anywhere in the mainland United States within range."
The launch marked the country's longest ever ballistic missile test, with a flight-time of 87 minutes, according to South Korea, while state media in the North gloated that it set new records for its missile capabilities.
The muscle-flexing comes amid a storm of international condemnation and rising alarm over what the US and others say is North Korea's deployment of 11,000 troops to Russia - 3,000 of them close to the western frontlines with Ukraine.
A day earlier, Seoul reported signs the North may test-launch an ICBM or conduct a seventh nuclear test around the U.S. presidential election on Tuesday, seeking to draw attention to its growing military prowess.
[JustTheNews] A variety of election irregularities — at least ten of them — have occurred across the country in the weeks leading up to Election Day, as some states have reported record-breaking turnout during early voting.
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] The US Geological Survey (USGS)detected the massive tremor at 1:15pm local time, with its epicenter located about 170 miles west of Bandon and 250 miles west-southwest of Salem.
The have been no immediate reports of injuries or damages, but officials ensured a tsunami was not expected to form in the Pacific Ocean.
The tremor occurred in the Blanco Fracture Zone (BFZ), deemed more active than California's San Andreas Fault.
Harold Tobin, director of the Pacific Northwest Seismic Network, shared on Facebook: 'This is a very typical mag[nitude] 6 earthquake in the Blanco Transform fault, very far offshore of Oregon.
'We see at least one such earthquake nearly every year.'
The tremor occurred at a depth of about six miles, and light-to-medium shaking was probably felt throughout parts of western Oregon and northern California.
#3
I'm gonna project the Turkey event isn't USGS reported because of instrumentation. No sensors.
OR
The seismic sensor network used to determine tunnel digging location and depth could be compromised.
Air force hits Hezbollah sites in Baalbek and Nabatieh
[IsraelTimes] Israeli fighter jets struck Hezbollah command centers and other infrastructure in Baalbek and Nabatieh earlier today, in the northeast and south of Lebanon, respectively, the IDF announces.
Before the strikes were carried out, the IDF issued evacuation warnings for the entirety of both cities.
The IDF accuses Hezbollah of “systematically” taking over civilian areas in Lebanon for its activities.
Additional strikes earlier today near Baalbek hit Hezbollah fuel depots.
In a statement, the IDF says the fuel sites were located within Hezbollah military compounds belonging to the terror group’s Unit 4400, which is tasked with delivering weapons from Iran and its proxies to Lebanon.
“These sites provided fuel for vehicles in the service of the terror organization and served as a significant means of operating its military infrastructure,” the IDF says.
According to the military, the fuel at the depots was provided by Iran.
“Iran finances more than half of Hezbollah’s budget, via the [IRGC’s] Quds Force, which transports oil and money through various routes to Lebanon,” the IDF says.
[KhaamaPress] The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) conducted a chartered deportation flight for Indian nationals without authorized residency, repatriating them to India. This action is part of DHS’s ongoing enforcement of U.S. immigration laws and is carried out in coordination with international partners, including the Indian government, to address irregular migration and encourage lawful immigration processes.
The operation aligns with the Securing the Border Presidential Proclamation introduced in June 2024. Since this policy was enacted, encounters at the southwest U.S. border have reportedly dropped by 55%, indicating a decrease in unauthorized entries. In total, over 160,000 individuals have been deported from the U.S. in the current fiscal year, with repatriation flights to over 145 countries, including Colombia, Egypt, China, and India.
According to DHS Acting Deputy Secretary Kristie A. Canegallo, unauthorized migrants colonists colonists from India are subject to repatriation and are advised to avoid misinformation from smuggling networks. DHS has stated its focus remains on promoting legal migration options and collaborating with other countries to ensure a structured immigration process.
The U.S.-India cooperation on repatriation reflects a broader effort to address human smuggling and ensure the return of individuals lacking legal residency. DHS has indicated that it will continue working with various countries to maintain secure border practices, offering legal migration channels while deterring unauthorized pathways. As the U.S. presidential election approaches, future immigration policies may be influenced by the elected administration’s stance on these issues, potentially impacting the structure and focus of future immigration and border enforcement efforts.
[BreakingDefense] The troubled OCX ground system to allow users access to the jam-resistant M-Code GPS signal will go into operational tests by the end of the year, and the Space Force also has shaken up its effort to field M-Code radios and receivers, said Cordell DeLaPena, who heads those programs for Space Systems Command.
[IsraelTimes] A major international LGBTQ rights group has dismissed out of hand a motion by an Israeli member organization to host its World Conference in Tel Aviv, proceeding to suspend the Israeli organization.
ILGA World, in a statement, apologizes for even considering bringing for a vote the proposal by Aguda, the umbrella organization for the LGBTQ community in Israel.
Ahead of an upcoming ILGA World Conference in Cape Town, South Africa, the group says it received "significant and legitimate disconcert regarding a member organization bidding to host the World Conference in Tel Aviv, Israel in 2026 or 2027.
"In response to these multiple concerns, the ILGA World Board held an emergency meeting and unanimously decided to remove the bid from The Aguda from consideration," it says, claiming that this is to "ensure we fully uphold universal respect for human rights ...which are usually entirely different from personal liberty... , equal representation, and the elimination of barriers to participation for all members — including in our conferences."
The bid "will not go forward and will not be put to a vote" as it "was found in violation of ILGA World’s aims and objectives set out in our Constitution," the statement continues.
"The ILGA World Board is also reviewing The Aguda’s compliance with our Constitution and has decided to suspend the organization from our membership to allow for that to happen," it says.
"ILGA World apologises. We know that seeing the Tel Aviv bid taken into consideration caused anger and harm to our communities... We recognise the historical experience with apartheid and colonialism in South Africa: even the possibility of voting on such a bid in their home country would have been at odds with the unequivocal solidarity for the Paleostinian people."
Aguda responds, according to Hebrew media, that it is "deeply disappointed by the fact that ILGA chose to boycott those who work for LGBTQ rights and for a more just society. The Aguda has been working for over 50 years to aid the LGBTQ community and preserve all human rights, including helping LGBTQ people from the Arab community and Paleostinian asylum seekers persecuted over their sexual and gender identity."
A Wider Bridge, a pro-Israel US LGBTQ rights organization, slams ILGA’s decision as "outrageous and unacceptable."
"By singling out Israel and Israeli LGBTQ people for opprobrium, ILGA violates its fundamental principles," it says. "We urge ILGA World to withdraw its discriminatory decision immediately."
NEW: Dominique Morgan, an LGBTQ activist and former executive director of a nonprofit that supports Black Trans people, was just indicted for siphoning nearly $100,000 in donations meant for bailing people out of jail and using it for her own personal expenses.
[FoxNews] Senior ISIS leaders taken out in latest US strike in Syria
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) on Wednesday said its forces in the Middle East conducted a "series of strikes" on several ISIS locations in Syria earlier this week in an operation that killed up to 35 terrorists.
The operation, which targeted multiple camps across Syria on Monday evening, also successfully took out "multiple" senior ISIS leaders, confirmed CENTCOM.
The release also confirmed that no civilian casualties have been "indicated" in the sweeping strikes.
U.S. soldiers have been fighting ISIS alongside coalition forces in Iraq and Syria since the terrorist group first emerged in 2014.
Less than 1,000 U.S. troops remain in Syria while roughly 2,500 remain in Iraq.
Last month, the Pentagon said that it plans to change its "footprint" in Iraq in 2025, but it refused to detail what that means in regard to the number of troops that will remain.
Posted by: Skidmark ||
10/31/2024
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[BreakingDefense] Most cases are probably just hobbyists flying too close, according to Gen. Gregory Guillot, who said he has not seen evidence of a concerted campaign by an adversary to fly small drones over US bases.
The US military has collectively reported hundreds of drone flights over Pentagon installations on American soil in the past few years, and that’s just the ones US Northern Command (NORTHCOM) knows about.
“I have no doubt that there’s significantly more incursions that we don’t see, either with a system or with our eyeballs,” Gen. Gregory Guillot, the commander of NORTHCOM and North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), said during a roundtable today with a small group of reporters at Peterson Space Force Base, the dual headquarters for both commands.
Unmanned aircraft system (UAS) sightings over US military bases have raised alarm at the Defense Department, as incursions at sensitive installations like Langley Air Force Base — where the Air Force keeps F-22s — have mystified officials, as the Wall Street Journal previously reported. According to data shared by NORAD, drone sightings in 2022 numbered 250, but that figure has dipped somewhat in recent years, numbering 202 in 2023, and 163 so far this year.
Guillot said the events are likely gaining more attention due to the spread of systems that are able to detect and track UAS with greater “fidelity.” The UAS sightings at places that contain highly classified programs have also raised questions about the drones’ provenance, including whether they reflect operations of an adversary nation, though Guillot said today that he has not yet seen evidence of any “organized or unorganized foreign nexus.”
Instead, he said “the overwhelming majority of them are probably local hobbyists that are just flying too close to the base.”
And while he said there are certainly more events that have gone undetected, Guillot cautioned that many observed phenomena could be duplicate sightings, such as multiple servicemembers calling in the same event. Others could be a case of mistaken identity, like if a servicemember mistakenly identifies blinking lights on a civilian airliner miles away as a closer UAS. Several reports could even concern the same drone flying back and forth over a base repeatedly, he said.
Tackling the UAS problem on US soil has flummoxed officials, in part, because of regulations that protect civilian air travel — preventing commanders from taking steps like simply shooting down potential threats or taking other steps to disable them.
“The threat, and the need to counter these threats is growing faster than the policies and procedures that [are] in place can keep up with,” Guillot said.
One solution the general pointed to is disrupting position, navigation and timing capabilities for a UAS, otherwise known as GPS jamming or spoofing. But as the conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East have shown, GPS interference can pose hazards for civilian travel if painted with too broad a brush. Tight coordination with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is needed, Guillot stressed, to ensure counter-UAS capabilities are responsibly used.
With established ties to the FAA, Guillot said NORTHCOM can step up to play a greater role in defeating drone incursions. One example would be developing preset approvals to engage UAS under specific parameters, obviating the need for a potentially days-long process to get an FAA greenlight.
[KhaamaPress] Ahmad Reza Radan, the General Commander of Iran’s security forces, announced that 850,000 undocumented Afghan migrants colonists have been deported from the country.
On Tuesday, October 29, Tasnim News Agency reported, quoting the Iranian official, that foreign nationals without proper documentation are not allowed to work or reside in Iran.
This comes amid increasing pressure and restrictions by the Islamic Theocratic Republic against Afghan migrants colonists, with authorities frequently emphasizing the deportation of undocumented migrants colonists from the country.
Just yesterday, Nasser Farshid, the Police Commander of Kerman, stated that more than 38,000 undocumented migrants colonists have been deported from the province this year alone.
He urged employers to refrain from providing work to undocumented migrants colonists.
Previously, Iranian officials warned that by the end of this solar year, a total of two million undocumented migrants colonists would be deported from the country.
According to Iranian media statistics, around 90 percent of foreign nationals in Iran are citizens of Afghanistan, most of whom enter the country illegally without valid documents.
The large-scale deportation of Afghan migrants colonists highlights the growing strain between Iran and its migrant population, as Tehran tightens its policies on undocumented individuals.
The emphasis on deporting millions by the end of the year raises humanitarian and regional concerns, as a significant number of Afghans continue to seek refuge in Iran amidst ongoing challenges in Afghanistan.
The situation calls for coordinated regional efforts and international attention to address the underlying issues and humanitarian impacts of such mass deportations.
[BreakingDefense] The Army is upfitting vehicles with big 24 or 32-inch displays that present multiple sources of data for a full operational picture.
Army formations face threats that extend from kinetics to unmanned ISR drones to electronic warfare, which means much of their situational awareness comes from displays and visualization systems inside vehicles like Bradley infantry fighting vehicles.
We discussed these challenges and how advanced capabilities in visual displays present data for decision making with Neal Toso, director of technical business development for ScioTeq.
Breaking Defense: What are the lessons learned from Ukraine as they relate to rugged visualization solutions for mission and/or safety critical applications?
Toso: Lessons from Ukraine show that if you’re stationary you’re an easy target. Instead of having a fixed shelter for a command post – they’re too easily detected because of electronics and their digital signatures – the military needs to find modern ways to keep command posts mobile. That’s our focus, giving the Army larger-size, qualified display options for mobile command and control.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/31/2024
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#1
A mosque in Milan was the central nexus of Al Qaeda operations in Europe beginning in the nineteen nineties. No surprise here.
Posted by: Albert Pelosi3459 ||
10/31/2024 5:12
Comments ||
Top||
#2
The pouting, the strutting, the passion!
Tut-tutting but looking so dashing,
Mohammedans rise,
Flash bright knives and dark eyes,
Crash the catwalk... and don't attack Fashion?
Poems more than any other style of fiction hold within themselves the form of what they need to be. One must do like Michelangelo — merely carve away all that is dross, excess to the thing itself.
Article Linked Is Available Only Via VPN.
[EngMilRu] The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation continue the special military operation.
In Kharkov direction, the Sever Group of Forces defeated formations of 3rd, 116th Territorial Defence brigades, 4th and 5th Border Detachments of the Ukrainian border service near Shestakovo, Volchansk, Odnorobovka, and Goptovka (Kharkov region).
Two counterattacks of the AFU 82nd Air Assault Brigade were repelled.
The AFU losses were up to 70 troops, four motor vehicles, and three 122mm D-30 howitzers.
The Zapad Group of Forces liberated Kruglyakovka in Kharkov region.
Russian units engaged 14th, 63rd, 92nd Mechanised brigades, 3rd Assault Brigade near Petropavlovka, Berestovoye (Kharkov region), Nadiya (Lugansk People's Republic), and Serebryansky forestry.
Five counter-attacks of 14th Mechanised Brigade, 77th Airmobile Brigade of the AFU, and 1st National Guard Brigade were repelled.
The enemy lost up to 410 troops, two infantry fighting vehicles, a Kazak armoured fighting vehicle, six pick-up , a 152mm D-20 gun, a U.S.-made 105mm M-119 gun, a 122mm Verba MLRS, an Anklav-N electronic warfare station. Five ammunition depots were destroyed.
The Yug Group of Forces continued to advance into the depths of the enemy's defence, hit 30th, 33rd, 54th, 72nd Mechanised brigades, 46th Airmobile Brigade, 79th Air Assault Brigade, 143rd Infantry Brigade, 10th Mountain Assault Brigade of the AFU, and 18th National Guard Brigade close to Aleksandro-Shultino, Zaliznyanskoye, Sukhiye Yaly, Chasov Yar, Markovo, Dalneye, Romanovka, Kurakhovo, Nikiforovka, Reznikovka, Seversk, and Slavyansk (Donetsk People's Republic).
Two counterattacks by AFU 24th and 28th Mechanised brigades were repelled.
The enemy's losses amounted to up to 520 troops, a U.S.-manufactured M-113 and a 155mm M-777 howitzer, a Kazak armoured fighting vehicle, seven motor vehicles, a French-made 155mm Caesar self-propelled artillery system, two Anklav-N electronic warfare stations, and two ammunition depots.
The Tsentr Group of Forces liberated Selidovo (Donetsk People's Republic).
Russian units hit 114th Mechanised Brigade, 95th Air Assault Brigade, 25th Airborne Brigade, 68th Jaeger Brigade, 38th Naval Infantry Brigade, 109th and 122nd Territorial Defence brigades close to Promin, Rozovka, Lysovka, Vishnyovoye, Leninskoye, Druzhba, Aleksandropol, and Dimitrov (Donetsk People's Republic).
Ten counter-attacks of the AFU 93rd, 100th Mechanised brigades, 49th Assault Battalion, 35th, and 37th Naval Infantry brigades were repelled.
The AFU losses amounted to up to 515 troops, an armoured personnel carrier, two armoured fighting vehicles, three motor vehicles, and a 122mm D-30 howitzer.
The Vostok Group of Forces improved the situation along the front line, defeated 21st National Guard Brigade and 35th Naval Infantry Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine close to Ravnopol and Oktyabr (Donetsk People's Republic).
Two counterattacks of AFU 425th Assault Battalion and 113th Territorial Defence Brigade were repelled.
The AFU losses amounted to up to 115 troops, a tank, eight motor vehicles, and a French-made 155mm Caesar self-propelled artillery system.
The Dnepr Group of Forces engaged the manpower and hardware of the 82nd Air Assault Brigade of the AFU, the 35th Naval Infantry Brigade, the 110th, 124th, and 126th Territorial Defence brigades near Belogorye (Zaporozhye region), Nikolskoye, Tokarevka, and Otradokamenka (Kherson region).
The AFU losses amounted to up to 55 troops, three motor vehicles, a French-made 155mm Caesar self-propelled artillery system, and two Anklav-N electronic warfare stations.
Operational-Tactical Aviation, attack drones, Missile Troops and Artillery of the Russian Groups of Forces have engaged the infrastructure of military airfields; the oilbase used to fuel AFU positions in Zaporozhye and South Donetsk directions; ammunition depots; temporary deployment areas; and clusters of enemy manpower and military hardware in 147 areas.
Russian air defence have shot down a U.S.-made HIMARS MLRS projectile, a French-made Hammer aerial guided bomb, and 67 fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicles.
In total, since the beginning of the special military operation, 647 aircraft, 283 helicopters, 34,850 unmanned aerial vehicles, 584 anti-aircraft missile systems, 18,911 tanks and other armoured fighting vehicles, 1,482 MLRS combat vehicles, 16,989 field artillery guns and mortars, and 27,755 units of support military vehicles have been neutralised.
Wow! York County, Pennsylvania, received THOUSANDS of potentially FRAUDULENT Voter Registration Forms and Mail-In Ballot Applications from a third party group. This is on top of Lancaster County being caught with 2600 Fake Ballots and Forms, all written by the same person. Really…
… on top of Lancaster County being caught with 2600 Fake Ballots and Forms, all written by the same person. Really bad “stuff.” WHAT IS GOING ON IN PENNSYLVANIA??? Law Enforcement must do their job, immediately!!! WOW!!!
Posted by: Fred ||
10/31/2024
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#1
Start making arrests.
That's 2600+ violations of 52 U.S. Code § 20511 and/or 18 U.S. Code Chapter 29 - ELECTIONS AND POLITICAL ACTIVITIES Each good for 3 to 5 years.
Even at State level its a crime to:
* intimidate, threaten, or coerce a voter in an effort to influence their vote or decision to vote,
* offer a bribe or other compensation to influence someone's vote,
* tamper with a person's ballot,
* make a counterfeit ballot, or,
* interfere with a voter's access to the polling place (physically or by deception).
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] The docking of the Chinese manned spacecraft Shenzhou-19 with the Tiangong orbital station was successful. This was reported on October 30 by China Central Television.
It is specified that the docking took place in an accelerated autonomous mode. Three crew members, two men, Cai Xuzhe and Song Lingdong, and one woman, Wang Haoze, entered the main module.
There are currently six people on the orbital station at any one time, three of whom are the crew of the Shenzhou-18 spacecraft, which will return to Earth on November 4. The crew has successfully completed its six-month mission and is preparing to complete its rotation.
Earlier, Regnum News Agency reported that the Shenzhou-19 spacecraft was launched from the Jiuquan Cosmodrome in Gansu Province in northwestern China. The launch of the CZ-2F/G carrier rocket took place on October 30 at 04:27 Beijing time (23:27 Moscow time, October 29).
The Shenzhou-19 crew members will stay on the orbital station for about six months, until April-May 2025. They will perform 86 scientific and technical experiments and tests.
[IsraelTimes] Hezbollah demands that Germany be permanently removed from the UNIFIL peacekeeping force in Leb ...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers... after it became an "accomplice of the enemy," according to the Lebanese daily al-Akhbar, affiliated with the Shiite terror group.
On October 17, a German warship operating as part of the United Nations ...aka the Oyster Bay Chowder and Marching Society... ’ peacekeeping mission brought down an unmanned flying object off the coast of Lebanon. Berlin has also authorized over $100 million in military exports to Israel in the last three months, according to foreign ministry data.
Al-Akhbar further outlines Hezbollah’s position in ongoing talks for a ceasefire. The terror group demands that Israel completely cease its "aggression" as a necessary precondition for further negotiations, adding that it has "not made any commitment" to disconnect the Lebanese front from the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... front, since this would run counter to its ideology of a "united resistance."
Hezbollah reportedly insists that no amendment be made to Security Council Resolution 1701, the UN decision that ended the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah and calls for southern Lebanon to be free of any troops or weapons other than those of the Lebanese army.
The resolution has gone largely unenforced since it was passed, allowing Hezbollah to build up a formidable arms cache and defensive capabilities, with neither UNIFIL peacekeepers nor the Lebanese army willing to challenge the Iran-backed terror group.
Al-Akhbar says that the terror group is not opposed in principle to increasing the number of Lebanese or international armed forces, but refuses to add new countries to the peacekeeping mission.
According to a report in Axios last week, Israel has demanded that even after a ceasefire deal is concluded, IDF troops be allowed to engage in "active enforcement" to make sure Hezbollah doesn’t rearm and rebuild its military infrastructure close to the border.
The terror group further says that it will not negotiate over giving up its weapons and that after the war, it will do "anything in its power to preserve them," according to al-Akhbar. In the meantime, Hezbollah says it is prepared to confront Israel in a long war, and it will keep fighting despite liquidations of its leaders, thanks to the organizational structure of its jihadists, the paper adds.
Al-Akhbar confirms that the terror group is represented in ongoing negotiations by Nabih Knobby Berri
...perennial Speaker of the Lebanese parliament, head of the Amal Shiite party aligned with Hezbollah, a not very subtle sock puppet of the Medes and Persians... , the Shiite speaker of the Lebanese Parliament and a Hezbollah ally. Talks have been ongoing with foreign mediators Egypt, Algeria, Qatar ...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi... and La Belle France, and there is an open communication channel with caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati, the paper adds.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. by Aleksandr Kots
[KP] - Now we are walking along the conveyor line where the bodies arrive. At this stage, the chassis is assembled, - Alexey, deputy head of the production shop, leads the tour in a casual manner.
And I still haven't recovered from the first armor-piercing impression. From the outside, the 130th workshop didn't look so... epic.
"Uralvagonzavod" is a city within a city. With a huge number of production facilities, numbered with three-digit numbers. Moreover, they are scattered around the territory without any topographic logic. If, for example, there is hangar 250, then it is not a fact that 251 will not be at the other end of the industrial "agglomeration". "So that a spy does not guess," I noted to myself.
To navigate here, an inexperienced driver (and the scale is such that you need to get from point A to point B by car) would need a special navigator. However, I had no reason to complain about the driver. He knew the huge territory of Uralvagonzavod like his own home district. And when I slowed down at the legendary 130th workshop, I did not immediately understand that this was the main tank "maternity hospital" of the country. The "misunderstanding" evaporated as soon as I crossed the threshold of the checkpoint.
WORLD OF MILITARY GIANTS
In a large hall with high ceilings and a pile of armored metal, you feel like a little tin soldier who has found himself in the world of military giants. True, there are ordinary people around you who work around the clock, in two 12-hour shifts, for our future victory. And it, as we know, is forged in the rear. Right here.
Two very long spans. The hull is being assembled on the right, the towers on the left.
- Then the product moves to the next stage - this is the assembly of the engine and transmission compartment. At the same time, pipelines are laid in the fighting compartment, electrical installation is underway, - Alexey continues the tour.
On the world's first tank conveyor, the machine gradually acquires muscles, nerves, arteries. For hundreds of meters, as far as the eye can reach, there are hulls, turrets, engines... And everything is boiling, moving, spinning, knocking, rumbling.
YOUTH WITHOUT DAYS OFF
But it wasn't always like that. Veterans of the plant remember sadder times.
- In the 90s, the shop practically didn't work. You could take a month off at your own expense and work somewhere behind the fence. Or just come - they let us go home, because there was no work at all. Those were hard times, what can I say, - sighs the site manager Vladimir. - Now we work in two shifts for 12 hours without days off.
He came to the plant in 1985, following his mother and father. He started as a mechanic, just like his son Daniil does now. For him, a tank is not a foreign organism. He himself managed to fight in the SVO as a T-72 gunner.
- After the army, I took a little rest and followed my father to get a job at Uralvagonzavod, - he recalls today. - I have an education in "Special Machines and Devices", and since childhood I have been attracted to military equipment. Now I am installing ammunition racks and a drum in a tank. I install a shovel on an BREM (armored repair and recovery vehicle - Ed.), and I assemble compartments for grenade launchers on a BMPT (combat tank support vehicle "Terminator" - Ed.).
- In general, we recruited a lot of young people, - Vladimir assures. - Training right away. We assign a mentor, and the newcomer begins to delve into the profession. I recruited more than 40 people for my section, most of them guys who just came from the army.
- Daniil, how come you're so young - and don't have days off? When should I start my personal life? - I ask the still very young guy.
- After the victory, we'll have a rest! - he smiles, turning something in the tank drum with a tricky key. - I just moved in with my girlfriend to spend more time together. She understands everything. And as a person who saw with his own eyes what the SVO is, I understand how much my work is needed now. And if something is urgent, the management always meets me halfway.
"MOCKING THE CAR"
The turrets are assembled on the Daniil run. While on the adjacent belt, engines and radiators are installed in the hulls, technical fluids are poured in, all systems are checked, and the "head" is covered with "brains". The gun is rolled in, sighting systems and digital displays are mounted. And then, after the engine tests, the two runs inevitably intersect - when the "head" is put on the "body". Here they call it a "sketch". Although, of course, no one throws the heavy turret. It is carefully installed on the hull, after which everything is checked again. Only now special attention is paid to the fire control system.
On a special stand, the vehicle is tilted left, right, up, down, and the automatic loading system is tested under increased loads. I have worked with tank crews in the SVO zone many times, and I can imagine the conditions in which they have to squeeze all the capabilities out of the tank. And it must fire from any position. The lives of the crew depend on it. That is why the factory workers “torture” the vehicle so much at the assembly stage - so that there are no failures in combat. But this is not yet a proving ground, where the vehicle is driven hard and fast. And where the first combat firing will finally take place. There are specially trained people here for this too.
POLES, GERMANS, ITALIANS, THEY RAN AWAY
Viktor, a tester of weapons for combat and special vehicles, came to the plant in 2022. Before that, he served in the army, fought in Chechnya, worked in the OMON. And with the beginning of the SVO, he went to the front as a volunteer. Battles for Lisichansk, the liberation of Maryinka, he was discharged after being wounded in Kleshcheyevka, near Artemovsk (Bakhmut). According to combat geography, I immediately read serious front-line experience. Viktor says that he could not sit at home. His grandfather fought in the Great Patriotic War, his father - in Afghanistan. Upbringing. He just finished his night shift, but he does not refuse to talk.
- I had never worked with tanks before, - the veteran smiles. - But they taught me everything here. In principle, I have always worked with weapons, I get the hang of it, I understand what is required of me. And I like working with weapons. We check the automatic loader, do sighting… In general, our tanks showed themselves excellently in the SVO, I saw for myself how they helped us in the breakthrough.
- Where?
- At Maryinka, I was then put in charge of the group, we needed a roll in the morning. Before dawn we were sitting and thinking about it - a difficult task. Then we heard a loud roar - seven of our tanks were moving. And behind them armored personnel carriers, planes appeared, helicopters... It was like in the movies. I look at my guys, their spirits even rose when they saw the tanks. They were ready to tear the enemy apart with their bare hands. In my direction there were Poles, Germans, Italians... I can say one thing, they abandoned everything - their positions, weapons and just ran away.
SON AT THE FRONT
Moving to the next workshop, I catch myself thinking that the connection between the home front and the front at Uralvagonzavod is directly tangible. Here, civilian plant workers, veterans of the SVO, and those who are waiting for their relatives from the front to come back work without days off. For example, Yulia with her unfeminine set of professions - a lathe operator, a blacksmith, a chipper... She stamps bolts for tanks - such weighty dumbbells that need to be heated on pliers over a fire, put under a press and thrown into a box of finished products. And so on for 12 hours!
“We’re helping our guys,” she says, embarrassed, standing at her machine with a large Z sticker.
My son is fighting... And imagine - in a tank. Platoon commander, four vehicles under his command.
And some factory workers even work close to the front lines - at collection points for damaged equipment. They bring back to life what the soldiers themselves are unable to repair.
"TSAR-MANGAL" AND "TAGLIOCHKA"
- “Heavy” vehicles are brought to the points where the electrical wiring is burnt, the mounting brackets are destroyed, where the bottom needs to be unscrewed, all the units that were torn out need to be welded,” says the site manager Andrey.
- What are the most common injuries now?
- Cumulative penetrations. At least two or three holes in each tank. There are record holders - several dozen hits. About 40 drones flew into one "Tsar-Barbecue" based on an old T-72! We assembled it completely, shook out the entire transmission, changed everything from the bottom, installed everything. Off we go!.. And there is one vehicle with the inscription "Tagilochka" on the side, it has come to us about 30 times. Everything has already been changed in it, even, probably, for the second time. But if it comes to us that many more times, we will restore it just as many more times.
- They make durable tanks in the Urals! - I give them a well-deserved compliment.
- The main thing is that they are repairable, - confirms the department specialist Mikhail. - There are hexacopters that drop a bunch of cumulative charges, 10, 12, 15 pieces. One or two will still penetrate, but there were no such machines that we would not put on the move after that. Well, plus our tanks have such potential that even if everything completely breaks down, but if the machine is moving, it will still shoot. You can manually aim, manually target, everything is duplicated. The gunner fails, the commander can lead. Or vice versa - the commander's connection is lost, the gunner can work. How can we not win with such machines? We will definitely win!
CONVERSATION WITH THE CHIEF DESIGNER "There's a lot of PR in Leopards"
- There is a common opinion that the time of tanks is passing. And perhaps we are seeing the last major conflict in which they are used for their intended purpose. What will replace them then? And was scientific and technical thought in tank building going in the right direction, if we look back 2.5 years?
- Of course, we analyzed the use of armored vehicles in Syria, Karabakh, - the chief designer met me in his office. - Before the start of the Second World War, we strengthened the protection, made it all-round, reduced the area of weakened zones. Plus the total equipment of tanks with thermal imagers. Digital communication on new vehicles. And, probably, everyone has heard of the T-90M tank - it appeared before the start of the Second World War.
- But did you have to rethink something?
- Of course! At the first stage - mass use of close combat weapons and modern high-precision anti-tank guided missiles, including "Javelin" and "Stugna". Special protective structures were introduced.
At some point, the nature of the threats changed. With the advent of kamikaze drones, the life of everyone who uses armored vehicles has become much more difficult. Today, this is the most common anti-tank weapon. The overwhelming percentage of disabled vehicles is the result of using FPV drones. Today, we produce tanks, without exception, with EW kits (electronic warfare systems. - Ed.). Various protective barriers have been introduced. They do not reduce the functionality of the tank. If used correctly, the machines will cope with their combat mission.
- Do you have feedback from the front?
- From the very first days! We obtain information about the efficiency of our vehicles from various sources. This includes, of course, the tank crews themselves. Plus, we conduct continuous analysis of open sources on the Internet, where there are a huge number of videos, both from our side and from the other. There are also official channels - these are our customers, who periodically provide their analysis. I am sure that we have a complete picture of the weak points - both in the equipment itself and in the tactics of its use.
- Recently, a captured Leopard was delivered to Uralvagonzavod (part of Rostec - Ed.). What can you say about this equipment of a potential enemy?
- We have been constantly analyzing Western armored vehicles even before the SVO. There are strong differences between our approaches. You have probably noticed that our vehicles are lighter and more compact. At the same time, our weapons are more powerful. This is a powerful 125-mm cannon, automated shot preparation, including automatic loading, while Western models have manual loading. We are superior to our opponents in many ways.
Of course, there are some things where there is parity or we are lagging behind. But it is already obvious that Western models have not proven their worth in the conditions of the SVO. We waited for them to appear on the battlefield so that everyone could see that there was too much PR around these machines.
- Is it possible to draw the appearance of the tank of the future today?
- I don't think so. The only thing I can say is that people should be removed from the front line. No matter how perfect the machine is, the risk of its destruction remains. Unmanned vehicles are already commonplace today. So, most likely, the trend will go in this direction. But everything that concerns firepower, protection and mobility will also be improved. Our path is compact, relatively light vehicles with a high level of automation.
- Your favorite tank?
- An unexpected question! In the 60s and early 70s, Soviet designers created the T-72 tank. Even today, in the T-72B3M modification, it performs combat missions on the front lines with dignity. I would highlight this machine. The T-90M tank borrowed a lot from the T-72. Our predecessors very correctly identified the trend in the development of tank building for many years to come.
- You watch videos from battle sites on social networks. What do you feel when you see a tank you created being hit?
- You know, when you realize that there is a crew there... - the chief designer asked to turn off the voice recorder.
It was all written on his face. And he takes every such loss personally...
In fact, I asked this question to almost everyone I spoke to at Uralvagonzavod. Perhaps the general answer was formulated by father and son Vladimir and Daniil from the 130th workshop:
- Every combat vehicle has its own fate, depending on your luck. One can fight for several months, another can burn out in 10 minutes, war is war. It hurts for the crew... But we will build new tanks!
#3
And there is one vehicle with the inscription "Tagilochka" on the side, it has come to us about 30 times.
One of the themes we constantly hear from our betters in the military/intelligence community is that huge numbers of Russian tanks and infantry fighting vehicles are being destroyed. Since we have pix and video, there is no doubt the machines are being struck and disabled. But if the vehicles are being retrieved and sent to the factory to be rebuilt, perhaps those "losses" are not as unsustainable as they might appear.
Sad for the country. Look at what President Biden says about Americans who support the Republican nominee for President: “The only garbage I see… are his supporters.” pic.twitter.com/BvnmtpQOnG
BREAKING: One day after Joe Biden called Trump supporters “garbage,” Donald Trump gets picked up in Green Bay, WI by a Trump branded garbage truck flying an American flag.
After Joe Biden smeared President Trump’s supporters as human “garbage,” President Trump is taking press questions in a Wisconsin garbage truck. pic.twitter.com/gqeGEUA0JA
#12
"In 2021 Kamala told German Chancellor Angela Merkel that Donald Trump and his supporters were "an illness just beneath the skin" and a "bubbling up of a contagion." Reporters now pretending that Biden and Harris would never suggest that half the country is garbage is risible."
29 people were hanged to death in Iran for opposing the Islamic regime, one of the deadliest single days of executions in recent history.
Where’s the UN? Where’s the university students and pro-Palestinian protesters? Where’s the so-called human rights activists?! pic.twitter.com/rO25vdx4iU
[TheRegister] A Russian court has ruled that Google owes Russian media stations around $20 decillion in fines for blocking their content, and the fines could get bigger.
To put that into perspective, the World Bank estimates global GDP as around $100 trillion, which is peanuts compared to the prospective fine. Google would therefore have to find more money than exists on Earth to pay Moscow - but on Tuesday fell a little short of that mark when it posted $88 billion quarterly revenue.
The bizarre amount has been calculated after a four-year court case that started after YouTube banned the ultra-nationalist Russian channel Tsargrad in 2020 in response to the US sanctions imposed against its owner. Following Putin's illegal invasion of Ukraine in 2022 more channels were added to the banned list and 17 stations are now suing the Chocolate Factory, including Zvezda (a TV channel owned by Putin's Ministry of Defence), according to local media.
"Google was called by a Russian court to administrative liability under Art. 13.41 of the Administrative Offenses Code for removing channels on the YouTube platform. The court ordered the company to restore these channels," lawyer Ivan Morozov told state media outlet TASS.
The court imposed a fine of 100 thousand rubles ($1,025) per day, with the total fine doubling every week. Owing to compound interest (Einstein's eighth wonder of the world), Google is now on the hook for an insane amount of money, or what the judge on Monday called “a case in which there are many, many zeros.”
Not that there's much chance of bankrupting Alphabet over the issue. Google in Russia has been inactive since 2022 after the search giant effectively pulled out of the country following Putin's special military operation. Google says the Russian authorities had seized its bank accounts and the offshoot was essentially bankrupt. The ad-spreader had over 200 staff in Russia and, while some have been relocated, others were laid off.
The battle is now on in courts around the globe as Russia seeks to seize Google's assets, with little success. The Chocolate Factory certainly seems sanguine about it.
[IsraelTimes] As some UAVs from Hezbollah and other Iranian proxies keep evading Israel’s air defenses, tech execs say detection is the first step to remedying this defensive weakness
This month, explosives-laden drones fired by the Lebanese terror group Hezbollah have targeted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s private home in Caesarea and the dining hall of an IDF training base in the northern town of Binyamina.
The attack on the military base killed four soldiers and wounded dozens. Netanyahu’s home suffered minor damage — the reinforced glass of a bedroom window was cracked — and there were no injuries, as the prime minister and his wife were not home at the time.
Both drones flew undetected by Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system and triggered no warning sirens, leaving victims completely vulnerable. They are the latest examples of the lethal threat drones pose to military and civilian assets, and expose the IDF’s struggle throughout the ongoing multifront war to effectively identify and detect unmanned aircraft coming from as nearby as Lebanon and Gaza, and as far away as Yemen, Iraq and Iran.
One Israeli startup working on a technological solution to counter this threat is R2 Wireless, a developer of deep signal processing technology designed to improve the detection of deadly drones and UAVs.
Founded by electrical engineer Dr. Yiftach Richter about four years ago, the startup came out of stealth eight months ago with a system that uses machine learning algorithms to detect, classify, geolocate, and track in real time any kind of flying threat that transmits a signal, whether it is airborne or grounded, on land or at sea. The proprietary sensing tech scans for wireless threats and is tailored to detect multiple signal types and protocols that could be coming from a drone, a tactical radio, Bluetooth earphones, a smartwatch, or a cellphone.
Over the past few months, the startup has started to pilot with the Israeli military, its system has been trialed by the UK military, among others, and it has recently participated in an exercise with NATO countries.
“This is just the tip of the iceberg,” R2 Wireless CEO Onn Fenig told The Times of Israel. “We will continue seeing UAVs that succeed in breaching Israeli air defenses, and it shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone as the current military systems weren’t designed to counter the rapidly evolving threat.”
“The biggest challenge is not in the interception, but in the detection — because if you don’t know what you are looking for and where the threat is, you will not be able to effectively intercept it in time,” he said.
Recognizing that Israel needs better counter-drone systems, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant asserted shortly after the deadly drone strike on the IDF dining hall that the army is shifting “significant efforts to developing solutions to address the threat of UAV attacks.”
Despite having one of the world’s best defenses against missiles and rockets, Israel has struggled to deal with the drone threat throughout the current war. It was Hamas drones that first crossed from Gaza into Israel on the morning of October 7, 2023, to disable electronic monitoring systems and pave the way for the massive cross-border onslaught in which terrorists brutally killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped 251 to the Gaza Strip.
Since last October 8, Hezbollah forces have attacked Israeli communities and military posts along the border on a near-daily basis, with the terror group saying it is doing so to support Gaza during the war against Hamas there. Drones launched by Hezbollah in Lebanon and Houthi rebels in Yemen have also managed to cause fatalities after evading Israel’s air defenses.
Throughout the yearlong war, some 1,200 drones have been fired at Israel, and 221 have gotten through Israel’s air defense system causing casualties and property damage.
One of the main difficulties in the ongoing drone war is that the Israeli army isn’t prepared for the challenge, according to Fenig.
“The IDF has focused on countering missiles and rockets and didn’t view drones as a strategic threat, as it treated them as something that has minimal destructive capability and they thought that the solutions they have are good enough — but they have been proven wrong,” said Fenig. “It is no secret that there aren’t good enough technologies on the detection side as the IDF system is heavily reliant on radar, which continuously proves to be mostly irrelevant for this threat.”
Fenig emphasized that the ongoing war, especially the recent heightened fighting with Hezbollah, has highlighted how the terror group improved its capabilities from the deployment of surveillance drones that fly over military bases to Iranian-designed explosive drones and so-called first-person-view drones, or FPVs, that are often mistaken for birds.
“The rapid advancement in technology has made them faster, cheaper, and much more difficult to detect,” said Fenig. “They have relatively small radar cross-sections and are made out of cheap composite over-the-counter materials like plastic or wood, which makes them hard to detect and track because they fly at low altitude and are slow-moving compared to high-speed metal objects such as missiles that Israel’s much more expensive Iron Dome and other Israeli aerial defense systems were designed to counter.
“If 10 years ago you could have just flown one, now you can fly a swarm of 100 for the same price. And also in terms of precision and the optical payloads you can put on these UAVs everything has changed, so that has made the usage much more effective and popular — it’s not new, but October 7 demonstrated what drones could do,” he said.
Fenig welcomed a recent exercise held earlier this month by the Defense Ministry’s Directorate of Defense Research and Development (DDR&D, or MAFAT in Hebrew) to help bolster the military’s counter-drone capabilities, but lamented that it focused solely on scouting for novel technologies to intercept deadly drones and not on detection as well.
“Countering the UAV threat is a critical national priority,” stated Defense Ministry Director General Eyal Zamir. “To date, the Defense Ministry has invested hundreds of millions of shekels in developing, extensively procuring, and deploying defensive capabilities.”
“Our objective is to expedite the development and deployment of new interception systems… These will constitute a more comprehensive defensive strategy with the laser system and other technologies we are advancing.”
The DDR&D conducted what it described as a “first-of-its-kind” operational trial among eight defense tech firms and startups that showcased their solutions to intercept UAVs at various ranges and altitudes. Among the firms participating in the competition were the large incumbents Elbit Systems, Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, and Israel Aerospace Industries, alongside startups Xtend, Airobotics, Smartshooter, and General Robotics.
“Many of the participants were the large defense players, the same companies the IDF has been working with supplying extremely expensive solutions, and that so far haven’t demonstrated a good capability to deal with this threat,” said Fenig.
[Bee] NEW YORK, NY — The entire cast of the all-female talk show ’The View' was forced to get rabies shots this week after Whoopi Goldberg bit all of them.
The incident occurred after Goldberg said on-air that Trump would banish interracial marriage if elected. Following her comments, she then ran around the studio biting all members of the cast and crew, prompting doctors to rush on stage and give everyone a rabies shot.
"He's gonna deport you and put the white guy with someone else!" Goldberg yelled before biting every person in the room, running directly through a plate glass window, and rampaging through the streets of New York City.
"I'm worried she might have had rabies," Doctor Leo Martin told members of the press. "The way she was acting, sort of foaming at the mouth and yelling nonsense; these are classic signs of rabies. We were able to apprehend her in Midtown and subdue her before crating her in isolation for a few days, as is standard procedure."
The cast of ’The View' said they were grateful for the fast action of the medical crew and believed it saved their lives. Animal Control released a statement saying if Goldberg recovers she can be rehomed to a new show at a farm upstate.
How much of the upcharge is due to extra stringent DoD requirements beyond what can be found on the shelf in a standard suburban HomeDepot?
[FoxNews] The IG's review of 46 spare parts revealed that only nine were purchased at 'fair and reasonable' prices.
Boeing overcharged the Air Force for simple spare parts on C-17 aircraft by $1 million over a four-year period, according to the Pentagon.
The defense giant marked up the cost of soap dispensers by 8,000%, putting taxpayers on the hook for such items that cost 80 times more than market value.
While the cost that Boeing charged per dispenser was redacted from a new audit released this week, in total, the Air Force overpaid for the dispensers by $149,072 from 2018 to 2022, according to Pentagon Inspector General Robert Storch.
"The Air Force needs to establish and implement more effective internal controls to help prevent overpaying for spare parts for the remainder of this contract, which continues through 2031," said Storch.
"Significant overpayments for spare parts may reduce the number of spare parts that Boeing can purchase on the contract, potentially reducing C-17 readiness worldwide."
An anonymous tip about the exorbitant soap dispenser prices prompted the inspector general’s audit into spare parts.
Boeing has a 10-year contract with the Air Force that allows it to purchase the spare parts needed for C-17s and the Air Force reimburses Boeing for the spare parts.
The IG's review of 46 spare parts revealed that only nine, or 20%, were purchased by the Air Force at "fair and reasonable" prices, totaling $20.3 million.
The IG found that the Air Force did not pay "fair and reasonable" prices for about 26% of the spare parts reviewed, about $4.3 million worth of equipment. For another 54% of the spare parts, valued at $22 million, the IG was not able to determine whether the Air Force paid fair prices: the service branch did not maintain historical data on pricing and they were unable to obtain supplier quotes for similar products.
The IG found the Air Force failed to validate the accuracy of data in contract negotiations for spare parts, review price increases during contract execution, and review invoices to determine whether prices were "fair and reasonable" before paying them.
Boeing said in a statement it was reviewing the report but cautioned that it appeared to compare prices for the parts that met aircraft standards to "basic commercial items" that wouldn't meet the qualifications for military aircraft. "It must dispense 0.66 oz of soap, no more, no less. And leave that little 'ice cream' swirl on top"
"We are reviewing the report, which appears to be based on an inapt comparison of the prices paid for parts that meet aircraft and contract specifications and designs versus basic commercial items that would not be qualified or approved for use on the C-17. We will continue to work with the OIG and the U.S. Air Force to provide a detailed written response to the report in the coming days."
An Air Force spokesperson said they would implement new controls on payments.
"The Air Force is working with the Defense Contract Management Agency to develop controls to ensure the accuracy of payments. We are also updating contracts to include additional subcontractor information sharing."
They only have a few more days when they can share the wealth
[FoxNews] The Harris campaign cut multiple six-figure checks last month for left-leaning groups that have been vocal about defunding the police, reparations, and are tied to radical activists who have supported notorious antisemite Louis Farrakhan.
The Harris campaign gave hundreds of thousands of dollars to a handful of Black advocacy groups who are mobilizing Black voters ahead of November's election next week, according to FEC filings released last week.
Black Voters Matters Fund, which received $150,000 from the Harris campaign on Sept. 19, has repeatedly called for defunding the police and has been vocal about pushing for reparations.
"The answer to police violence against communities of color is not more money for police," the group wrote in February 2023. "It's time to defund the police and redirect those resources into building strong, healthy communities."
In 2020, the group also tweeted, "We are proud to be partner in the #DemocracyFrontlinesFund, created to leverage millions of new dollars to fund Black-led organizers fighting for free and fair elections, and working to defund prisons and police."
"There are more than 3,000 sheriffs in the US, nearly all are elected, the group said in another post. "We are working to defund sheriffs and build voter power. Reimagining the system also comes with taking action!"
The group's co-founder Latosha Brown, who has been a frequent visitor to the Biden-Harris White House, has repeatedly posted about the group's reparations push and said in a 2021 X post that she has been working on the issue for 27 years.
"We deserve to be compensated for the literal blood, sweat and tears our ancestors were forced to put into this country," Black Voters Matters Fund posted in May. In another post last year, the group called reparations "crucial for acknowledging past injustices and moving towards a more just and equitable future."
Black Church PAC, which also received $150,000 from the Harris campaign last month, has multiple controversial religious leaders on its board and recent social media posts show it is partnering with a defund the police group to help with "Get out the vote" efforts in Georgia, Pennsylvania and North Carolina.
"We’re mobilizing 100K Strong: Knock for Change, Vote for Justice volunteers across GA, PA, and NC to knock on doors and have REAL conversations with REAL voters about the REAL issues that matter most," the Black Church PAC posted last week on social media. The post also mentioned that they were partnering with Until Freedom, which was co-founded by disgraced Women's March leaders Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour.
Until Freedom has repeatedly advocated for defunding and abolishing the police and sells a "defund the police" shirt on its website.
Mallory previously came under fire for her close ties to Farrakhan and calling him the "GOAT," which means "greatest of all time." Her social media profiles are also littered with social media posts showing her attending Nation of Islam events and praising Farrakhan.
"One of the reasons why I support Kamala Harris is because I know about the things she was doing while she was in the Senate," Mallory said during a "Breakfast Club" interview a couple of months ago.
Mallory also pushed back against people who claim Harris doesn't support reparations, saying she's heard Harris say "over and over again" that she supports reparations. While Harris has been coy about what her reparations plan would look like while campaigning for president, she previously told The Root during her failed 2019 campaign that she believes "there has to be some form of reparations" for Black Americans.
The Black Church PAC board includes several pastors who have either called for defunding police, reparations or have praised Farrakhan, including Pastors Jamal Bryant, Frederick D. Haynes III and Michael McBride.
McBride, the lead pastor of The Way Christian Center in Berkeley, California, ranted in support of defunding police in 2020, saying on a livestream that defunding the police "ain't a slogan" and that it is a "declaration of a future that we deserve."
"We do not deserve police departments to have 40, 50, 60% of the general funds of every single black majority, brown majority city in this country while we don't have food, while we don't have housing, while we don't have equitable education, but we got an expanding police budget," McBride said.
"Yes, we want these [police] departments to be shrunk," McBride added.
The Harris campaign also doled out $2,050,000 to the civil rights group National Urban League; $300,000 to the Power Rising Action Fund, an "intergenerational power force of Black women from various sectors"; and $250,000 to the National Action Network, which was founded by controversial MSNBC anchor Al Sharpton, whose ties to Farrakhan go back decades.
Perhaps if the Harris campaign had handed out the green stuff earlier, it might have done some good, but by now not only are most minds made up, but most early voters have already mailed in their ballots or gone for early in-person voting.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
10/31/2024 12:40
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#3
"A few more days"? They're there thru January, at least.
It's outright bribes for troops.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
10/31/2024 12:45
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#4
Seeing as how the Dem platform has seemingly been "Trump bad", pregnancy termination and "Soak the Rich" so far, the 'payments for votes' is about the only thing left for them to get more votes.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
10/31/2024 12:53
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Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[Regnum] The first law of English physicist and mathematician Isaac Newton has been misinterpreted for over 300 years due to an error in translation from Latin. This is the opinion expressed by philologist Daniel Hook in an article published in the journal Philosophy of Science.
Newton formulated three laws of motion in his seminal work, Principia Mathematica, published in 1687. As Hook pointed out, the most common formulation is: "A body remains at rest, or moves uniformly, unless acted upon by external force." The mistake is the mistranslation of the conjunction "nisi quatenus," which was incorrectly translated as "if," and which actually limits the extent to which a body's state of motion can change as forces act upon it.
"A strict interpretation of the first law has never been formulated or defended in print. Simplified interpretations have been unequivocally approved by many historians, physicists and philosophers... It is worth clarifying the situation by clearly formulating convincing arguments and providing evidence in their favor," the article says.
According to Hook, Newton's first law, as formulated by the English physicist and mathematician, describes a more general principle that limits the motion of all bodies.
In the article, the philologist, to simplify the narrative, called the above formulation the variable W1, and the formulation that sounds like “Every change in the state of a body performing uniform rectilinear motion is caused by forces acting on this body” — the variable S1. Hook insists that the formulation S1 is a stronger and more correct reading.
He explained that according to W1, a body maintains its momentum if no forces act on it, while S1 states that every change in the momentum of a body is due to the forces acting on it. Thus, W1 is included in the domain of S1.
The difference between the formulations is that S1 fixes a limitation on the degree to which bodies can change their state of motion, while W1 ignores this point. At the same time, Hook emphasized that the two formulations are not contradictory.
As reported by the Regnum news agency, in 2023 the Nobel Prize in Physics was awarded for experimental methods that produce "attosecond light pulses to study the motion of electrons in matter." The laureates of the prize were the French-American scientist Pierre Agostini, the Hungarian-Austrian researcher Ferenc Krauz, and the representative of France Anne L'Huillier.
#6
The nature of the body's "compulsion" remains unspecified.
Come on, man! We all have our urges.
Since we know that math is racist, this implies that Physics is merely a tool of Western imperialists seeking to colonize the space-time continuum. Or should that be "Western empiricists"?
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. by Kirill Velesov
[REGNUM] On October 29, Verkhovna Rada deputy Anna Skorokhod said on television that more than 100,000 cases of SZCh have already been recorded in Ukraine. Translated from Ukrainian, it means unauthorized abandonment of a military unit, i.e. desertion. At the same time, only 10-15% of military personnel, Skorokhod claims, are at the front.
“Ordinary people have a question: why should I, yesterday’s service station worker, be in the trenches when our big officers are not fighting, but are in the rear?!” the deputy said, hinting that 100 thousand is far from the final figure, and there are actually many more deserters.
The head of the Supreme Court of Ukraine, Stanislav Kravchenko, also spoke on this topic the day before. According to him, the situation with the increase in the number of cases of unauthorized abandonment of the unit, as well as refusals to follow orders from the command among Ukrainian military personnel is extremely serious.
“We haven’t analyzed it yet, I can’t give specific figures, but there is a significant trend towards increasing the SZCh,” Kravchenko confirmed in a comment to the Interfax-Ukraine publication.
The figure cited by the media, he noted, "slightly exceeds the real one," but "the situation remains threatening." The head of the Supreme Court believes that the blame for everything lies in the negative coverage of the work of the TCC (military commissars), which everyone is already calling "busification," weak patriotic education, and insufficiently stimulating salaries for the military.
As for the frightening footage of "busification", the Ukrainian authorities have long been trying to restrict the media (especially city or regional Telegram channels) from publishing these videos. But videos of passersby, men entering a store, or drivers being "packed" still leak onto the Internet.
In late October, the court sentenced an Odessa resident to a year of probation for the first time for a video of a force mobilization at the intersection of Grushevskoho and Khimicheskaya streets in the city. The prosecution asked for five years, but an agreement with the investigation and admission of guilt saved the man from a real term.
"I CAME OUT OF THE HOOKAH BAR"
The loudest story about the SZCh in Ukraine is the escape of a serviceman of the 56th separate motorized infantry Mariupol brigade, Sergei Gnezdilov. He announced his decision to leave the unit live on air on one of the state radio stations.
"I voluntarily demobilized. They can just arrest me now, but at least in prison there are clear terms," the man said.
That same day, he wrote on his social networks that the only thing five years of contract service in the Ukrainian Armed Forces convinced him of was that “no one is born for war.”
Public opinion was divided over Gnezdilov's actions. A huge number of military personnel supported him, since they too were at the front without a specific end date for their service, while public figures and "activists" predictably condemned him.
"The beautiful and public abandonment [of the military unit] did become an example. And some followed. And some stayed. Stayed so that tomorrow Russian tanks would not come to Kiev," political expert and serviceman Kirill Sazonov commented pompously on Gnezdilov's actions.
He also spoke out sharply about an article in the American newspaper The New York Times, which in those same days published a hopeless story for Kyiv about the dire situation, mortal fatigue and despair of the Ukrainian military. Journalists also took a comment from Gnezdilov, who said that he “had no choice but to leave, slamming the doors very loudly, and finally make people talk about the problem” – the problem of demobilization, which simply does not exist in Ukraine.
Before Gnezdilov, journalist Viktor Tregubov attracted a lot of public attention to his actions when he left his military unit last fall and called it "the act of a tired infantryman." Tregubov was undergoing treatment in Kiev and did not return to the front, but "left the hookah bar and went his own way."
“Heroes are not slaves” - with such posters, again and again, relatives and wives of military personnel who have not seen their loved ones since February 2022 take to the streets of Kyiv’s Khreshchatyk.
In a comment to Channel Five during one of the rallies, the wife of a serviceman, Ekaterina, said that she had participated in collecting signatures for a petition addressed to Vladimir Zelensky so that the term of service would be 36 months with combat coefficients.
"Sergey Gnezdilov, let's be honest, sacrificed himself to draw the attention of the authorities and society to the fact that the military is exhausted, they need to be replaced, because otherwise there will be mass SZCh. From systemic combat exhaustion, they lose motivation, coordination and health," explained Ekaterina.
The appeal did not produce any results.
"DIED OF PSYCHOSIS"
In an article for the newspaper Espreso, serviceman and blogger Alexey Petrov draws attention to the fact that the problem lies not only in the timing and demobilization.
The main problem is with motivation, which simply does not exist, including due to the illegal, cruel and demonstrative actions of employees of territorial assembly centers (TACs).
"For example, a guy was stopped on the street by the Tetsek workers and mobilized right in his slippers, that is, sent to the troops. They didn't even let him go home, hug his wife, children, mother and father. And the military registration and enlistment office did its job in the meantime," writes Petrov. - <…> And so, a person who is offended by everyone and everything ends up in the Training Center and at the first opportunity "gets on skis."
Despite the bans, videos of “TCK work” are becoming more numerous every day: another riot against military commissars was staged on Tuesday by women from the Volyn village of Karpilovka, who nearly overturned their car and fought off their men.
The highways of Kharkov and Khmelnitsky look frightening: the roads in the city are blocked not just by patrols, but by dozens of TCC “patrols” that stop literally every passing car and drag men out.
The day before, lawyer Serhiy Kasyanchuk stated that employees of the Zhytomyr TCC, while detaining him "for a document check," broke his collarbone, and a mobilized resident of the Lviv region died under strange circumstances two days after "busification." The official reason is "psychosis," but photos published by relatives show that he was brutally beaten.
The key reason why Ukrainians are fleeing the front is the understanding that they have only two options: to become SZh and save their lives or to die defending yet another “fortress,” which is falling in Donbas one after another. Even the authorities no longer hide the fact that they lack people to plug the holes in the defense. This means that “mobilized” men, that is, men taken from the streets, after two or three weeks of preparation and with minimal equipment, will be thrown into the hottest spots of the front. The chances of survival for former SZh workers and other Ukrainians are close to zero.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited.
[NewsFront] 23:57 Official summary of the DPR Representative Office in the JCCC from 00:00 10/30/2024 to 00:00 10/31/2024.
A total of 34 cases of armed attacks by the Ukrainian Armed Forces were recorded by the DPR Representative Office in the JCCC over the past 24 hours.
There were reports of two civilians being injured.
DAMAGED:
Nine residential buildings.
Three civil infrastructure facilities.
A total of 34 artillery attacks in the Gorlovka direction.
A total of 116 units of various ammunition were fired.
21:50 Aerospace Forces crews strike at Ukrainian Armed Forces positions in Sumy Oblast.
19:28 Ukrainian naval infantry destroyed missile strikes in the Ivolzhanskoye area in the Sumy region. The equipment and fighters of the 36th Naval Infantry Brigade of the Ukrainian Armed Forces were located there.
19:17 UAV operators of the North group of troops destroyed stronghold of the Ukrainian Armed Forces
19:05 Destruction of a Ukrainian Armed Forces pickup truck by fighters from the 16th Special Forces Brigade in the village of Golubovka –video.
18:50 Situation in the South Donetsk direction.
Fighting for Shakhtarskoye continues, the presence of the Ukrainian Armed Forces remains in the western part of the village and the surrounding forest belts.
There are also battles for Yasnaya Polyana and Novoukrainka. In Novoukrainka, Ukrainian units are sitting in the basements of northern houses and adjacent forest belts, trying to cling to a gas station in the northeastern corner of the village.
North of Dobrovolye, the assault aircraft of the Vostok group of forces reduced the distance to Trudovoye to less than two km. The forest belts to the west and northeast of the settlement were taken under control.
18:31 Su-35S crews provide cover for aircraft carrying out strikes against the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Kursk region. –video.
17:55 By air strike of the Russian Armed Forces destroyed PVD of units of the 106th MB of the 63rd Separate Mechanized Brigade in the settlement of Zarechnoye. Up to 15 militants occupying four buildings of private households were eliminated.
17:29 Russian troops are "cutting" the logistics of the Ukrainian Armed Forces to the north and south of Chasov Yar DPR. About thisreportedTASS in the security forces.
"The enemy's logistics are undergoing some cataclysms towards the northern and southern parts of Chasov Yar. They are simply being cut off. This applies to both full-fledged highways and secondary and even country roads," the security forces reported.
17:17 Crews of 122mm 2S1 self-propelled howitzers "Gvozdika" of Tula paratroopers prevented an attempt by Ukrainian Armed Forces equipment to break through into the Glushkovsky district of the Kursk region.
17:05 Servicemen of the "West" military group using attack drones applied strikes on the strongholds of the Ukrainian Armed Forces and puts Ukrainian nationalists to flight.
16:40 Kupyansk direction: confident offensive of the Russian Armed Forces on the southern section of the front
On the southern borders of the Kupyansk direction, units of the Russian Armed Forces continue confident offensive actions, actively advancing under the cover of artillery;
The Russian Armed Forces destroyed the defensive positions of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Glushkovka and Kolesnikovka areas;
Taking advantage of the withdrawal of Ukrainian units to reserve positions, Russian assault groups are expanding their zone of control, consolidating the results of the latest attacks;
Liberation of Kruglyakovka: units of the 1st Tank Army of the Russian Armed Forces liberated the settlement of Kruglyakovka. The offensive continues along the Oskol River in the direction of Zagryzovo, where the enemy is trying to hold its reserve positions in order to contain Russian assault units. A breakthrough in this direction allows for an expansion of the zone of control along important transport routes and pressure on the enemy's defensive lines;
Advance north of Vyshneve: Russian forces are advancing north from Vyshneve towards Kupyanskaya Lozovaya. During the assault, several strongholds were cleared and an enemy firing position was destroyed. Taking control of new lines strengthens the positions of Russian troops and creates conditions for further advances deep into the Ukrainian Armed Forces' defenses;
The offensive in the southern section of the Kupyansk direction demonstrates the targeted efforts of the Russian Armed Forces aimed at expanding the operational space and strengthening control along the Oskol River, which threatens the enemy's retention of key defensive lines in this area, reports Donbas Partisan.
15:42 Sumy region is under KAB shelling.
15:34 Operational data is coming in about the liberation of Martynovka near Sudzha in the Kursk region, wrote military correspondent Sinyaya Z Boroda.
15:16 90% of the village of Kolesnikovka in the Kupyansk direction is for the Russian Armed Forces, the Khar'kov direction reported.
15:05 Snipers of the Pacific Fleet naval infantry brigade helped advance of assault units of the "East" military group near Ugledar.
14:55 The Russian army is rapidly advancing in the direction of Kupyansk.
14:25 A Pantsir-S air defense missile and gun system crew from the Dnepr group of forces destroyed a foreign-made reconnaissance UAV of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the Orekhov direction –video.
14:07 Crews of the 122mm 2S1 Gvozdika self-propelled guns of the separate guards motorized rifle brigade daily are destroying armored vehicles and manpower of the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
14:00 One of the buildings of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in Kyiv was damaged after a UAV attack, — former MP Igor Mosiychuk.
13:50 In Donbass, Russian troops are “about to take Kurakhovo in pincers.”
Russian troops continue to approach Kurakhovo from the southwest, the Ukrainian publication Strana reported. From the east, they have already come very close to the city. This important stronghold of the Ukrainian Armed Forces will soon be "taken in pincers" and cut off from supply routes.
13:49 The liberation of Kruglyakovka in the Khar'kov region by the Russian Armed Forces will block an important transit supply route for the Ukrainian Armed Forces.
For the Ukrainian army, this also means the loss of access to the right bank of the Oskol River in this section of the front, said the head of the Khar'kov region Military State Administration, Vitaly Ganchev.
13:46 The result of the Russian Armed Forces' missile and artillery strike on the temporary deployment point of Ukrainian artillerymen. A vehicle and an American-made 155mm M-109 self-propelled gun were destroyed –video.
11:21 After taking an important height beyond Stelmakhovka in the Kupyansk direction, units of the Russian Armed Forces managed to build on their success and have already advanced 2.5 kilometers toward Lozovaya.
11:05 The 114th Motorized Rifle Brigade of the Russian Armed Forces liberated most of Kurakhovka and the Kurakhovskaya Central Defense Plant, the Divan General Staff reported.
10:37 Another destroyed captured Turkish armored vehicle BMC Kirpi –photo.
10:00 The village of Novoukrainka has been cleared of the presence of the Ukrainian Armed Forces' Nazis. The Russian Army is approaching the "closing of the ring" around Kurakhovo from the southwest.
09:27 Russian aviation carried out strikes at night on enemy positions in the areas of Orekhov and Malaya Tokmachka in the Zaporizhia direction –video.
08:44 Ka-52 helicopter crews destroyed armored vehicles and personnel of the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the border area of the Kursk region.
08:37 Russian Armed Forces strike targets in the Khar'kov region.
08:14 Assault groups of the 20th Motorized Rifle Division of the "Southern" group of Russian troops during the liberation of Katerinovka in the DPR discovered the enemy positions are mainly occupied by NATO weapons.
08:09 Video From liberated Selidovo to the DPR – Russian military destroys the enemy and takes dominant positions.
The footage shows attack aircraft from the 15th and 30th Motorized Rifle Brigades of the Center group of forces, operating in their areas of responsibility and with the support of an armored group, quickly penetrating forests and destroying the enemy in fortified positions. At the same time, attack drone crews strike at enemy personnel and equipment, which facilitates the advance of the attack aircraft.
08:04 The Russian Armed Forces took control of Bogoyavlenka and Novoukrainka, and also advanced into Selidovo and Yasnaya Polyana.
08:00 The Russian Armed Forces carried out a series of strikes on enemy targets in Kyiv throughout the night. Explosions were also heard in Poltava, in the Kramatorsk area (occupied DPR), Pavlograd in the Dnipropetrovsk region, Poltava region, Khar'kov region (numerous strikes throughout the night), and Khmelnytsky region.
Sweden has begun carrying out its plan to deport foreign criminal nationals. The first batch included well-known Islamist preachers and suspected terrorists from Iraq.
Some of these individuals had lived in Sweden for more than 2 decades!
Worth noting, korrespondent.net has compiled its Invasion of Ukraine series into separate months, beginning May 9th, 2023. Linked in the title.
[Korrespondent] 21:45 Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic said he discussed a ceasefire in Ukraine with Putin during a phone call in October, but the Russian leader "expressed no interest" in the idea. Vucic also called on the West to end the war in Ukraine: "Make a ceasefire as soon as possible. Then there will be ways to achieve long-term peace - but make that first step as soon as possible."
21:38 South Korean Defense Minister Kim Yong Hyun supported sending military experts to Ukraine to study the actions of North Korean troops if they appear in the combat zone. "We have established that North Korean troops have been transferred to Russia. I believe that this could be an excellent opportunity for our analysts and observers to study the actions and trends of the North Korean army," he said at a joint briefing with Pentagon Secretary Lloyd Austin.
21:31 Russians shelled the Dnieper, a 14-year-old child was wounded, reported the head of the OVA, Serhiy Lysak.
21:23 During his visit to Odessa on October 29-30, Norwegian Defense Minister Bjørn Arild Gram announced additional military support for Ukraine related to the maintenance and use of F-16 fighters. Norway's new aid of up to 109 million euros will be allocated as a grant through the American JUMPSTART mechanism. The funds will be used to purchase weapons and spare parts for the F-16.
21:18 Head of the Presidential Office Andriy Yermak reported that during his visit to Canada he met with the Minister of State for International Cooperation of the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs Reem Al Hashimy. They discussed the implementation of the peace formula, the return of captives and children abducted by Russia, and the "victory plan."
20:35 The Russian army shelled the city of Kupyansk in the Kharkiv region - two police officers who were patrolling the city were injured, three more people were wounded. A police service car and private houses were damaged, the prosecutor's office reported. A little later, the enemy shelled the village of Kucherovka in the Kupyansk district - one person was killed, one was wounded.
18:57 Ukraine is already producing almost 20 Bohdan self-propelled howitzers per month thanks to assistance from Denmark, which is investing in Ukrainian defense production, Zelensky said in an evening video address. According to him, there are "good results in other areas" and there will be more such results - in particular in the production of shells, equipment, drones. The president said that he has already completed his visit to Iceland and is in Transcarpathia, where he met with Ukrainian businesses.
18:09 Lithuania has transferred a new batch of military aid to Ukraine, which included, in particular, shells, mortars and generators, the country's Defense Ministry reported.
17:36 Pokrovsk in Donetsk Oblast will be completely closed for entry and exit for defense purposes, said Sergei Dobryak, head of the city's military administration. According to him, Russian troops are already 6.7 km from one of Pokrovsk's outskirts. There are 11,900 residents left in the city, including 55 children. "We urge people to leave at least for the winter, because it will be very difficult in the cold. There will be no heating season, but there will be heating points," Dobryak emphasized.
17:28 The US Treasury Department announced new sanctions against 30 individuals and over 360 companies from 17 countries cooperating with the Russian military-industrial complex, including India, China, Switzerland, Thailand, Turkey and Uzbekistan. The sanctions are aimed at combating the circumvention of previously introduced restrictive measures. The list also includes Russian companies and enterprises associated with the military-industrial complex, design bureaus and research institutes, as well as six deputy defense ministers of the Russian Federation.
17:21 The European Commission has approved the annual enlargement package, stating that Ukraine is making progress in meeting the criteria for EU membership and hopes to open cluster negotiations in 2025. At the same time, the European Commission noted that "despite progress in implementing fundamental reforms, further efforts are needed," in particular in the fight against corruption, reform of the judicial system, protection of the rights of national minorities, etc.
16:42 In the morning, Russians dropped a KAB on the Khotyn community of the Sumy district. The bomb fell on the territory of a local cemetery - one person was killed, one was wounded, the regional prosecutor's office reported.
16:15 The UN Security Council will meet today at the request of the Ukrainian delegation to discuss Russia's involvement of North Korean troops in the war against Ukraine.
16:07 South Korea is considering sending a military team to Ukraine to observe and analyze the expected deployment of North Korean troops by Russia on the front line, Reuters writes.
14:28 Zelensky said that Ukraine could have seized the Kursk NPP, but never wanted to: "Russia thinks that they are very strong, but if we wanted to seize their nuclear power plant, we would have done it. We could have done it, but we never wanted to."
The president also confirmed that, according to Ukrainian intelligence, about 3,000 soldiers and officers from the DPRK are on Russian territory and "preparing for battle." In addition, according to him, "additional thousands are already on the way." In total, about 12,000 soldiers from North Korea are preparing to participate in the war against Ukraine.
Zelensky also noted that this winter will be decisive and will be a big challenge for Ukraine, while some Western partners have not provided the promised assistance. In particular, Ukraine has received only 10% of the aid package that Congress voted for in 2024. "When they told us that they cannot accept us into NATO in a state of war, but promised 6-7 systems to protect the skies... You can't compare these things, but during the war we agreed because we need to preserve ourselves. And these systems are very important for us. But we still have not received and cannot count on this major air defense support during the heating season," the president noted.
14:16 Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico gave an interview to Russian propagandist Olga Skabeeva on the Rossiya 1 TV channel. In it, he repeated many Kremlin narratives, in particular that sanctions against Russia are not working, and the war could have been ended in the spring of 2022. According to Fico, Zelensky allegedly asked the EU to deploy nuclear weapons in Ukraine, but the allies refused due to the "instinct of self-preservation."
He also claims that the EU is allegedly tired of war, and Zelensky's "victory plan" is an escalation of the war, not a way to end it. In addition, Fico said that he would be "very happy" to come to Moscow for the May 9 parade next year and is ready to talk to Putin.
14:09 Zelensky, in an interview with leading media outlets in Northern Europe, confirmed the NYT report that the request for Tomahawk missiles was one of the secret parts of his "victory plan." According to the president, this was confidential information that Kiev passed on to Washington. "How should we understand these messages? This means that there is nothing confidential between the partners," Zelensky added.
13:23 Russians shelled Nikolskoye, Daryevskaya community, Kherson region, one person was killed. Another person was injured as a result of the enemy attack in Priozernoye, OVA reported.
12:30 All of Ukraine's Nordic partners - Denmark, Iceland, Norway, Finland, Sweden - supported the "victory plan," Zelensky said following the fourth Ukraine-Northern Europe summit. These countries are also ready to increase support for Ukraine's defense, in particular, they discussed the possibility of transferring additional air defense systems. The summit participants agreed to increase defense production both in Ukraine and among partners, as well as to work on strengthening sanctions against the Russian Federation, in particular on limiting the ability to use a shadow tanker fleet to finance aggression.
12:17 Peskov said that Ukrainian troops must leave Russian territories, including "new regions of the Russian Federation." The Kremlin spokesman recalled that this was "a set of conditions that President Putin voiced, or rather, it was his peace initiative." Commenting on media reports about alleged negotiations between Russia and Ukraine to stop attacks on the energy structure, Peskov said that there are "many rumors that have no connection to reality."
11:08 About 3,000 North Korean troops are located 50 km from the border with Ukraine in the Kursk region, the Financial Times writes. According to South Korean intelligence, the first North Korean troops, who arrived in Russia in early October, belong to the elite 11th Army Corps of the North Korean army, known as the "assault corps." At the same time, Ukrainian intelligence expressed doubts about the combat capabilities of the North Koreans, calling them "inexperienced infantrymen."
10:24 Head of the Presidential Office Andriy Yermak discussed the situation on the front and the "victory plan" with US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken during his trip to Washington. The parties also discussed the possibility of using frozen Russian assets, strengthening the sanctions regime against the Russian Federation, Euro-Atlantic integration of Ukraine, and support for the energy system in the autumn-winter period.
09:32 The death toll from the Russian strike on Krivoy Rog on October 28 has risen to two - one of the wounded died in hospital, said Serhiy Lysak, head of the Dnipropetrovsk OVA. Another 13 people were injured. A day of mourning has been declared in Krivoy Rog today.
09:27 On the evening of October 29, Russians shelled the village of Bezruki in the Kharkov district, three people were injured, including a ten-year-old child. Another person was injured as a result of a night attack in the village of Tsaredarovka in the Lozovsky district.
09:10 In the morning, Russian troops struck Antonovka in the Kherson region, wounding one person, the OVA reported. Over the previous day, three people were killed and 15 wounded as a result of Russian shelling in the region.
08:41 In the Khotyn community of Sumy region, two people were wounded as a result of a missile strike, OVA reported. Another person was injured in the Velykopisarevska community.
08:16 In Donetsk Oblast, one person was killed as a result of Russian shelling on October 29 - in Sukhi Yal. Another ten people in the oblast were injured in the past 24 hours, reported OVA head Vadim Filashkin.
08:09 The General Staff announced the estimated losses of the Russian Federation as of the morning of October 30:
personnel - about 693,640 (+1,560) people,
tanks - 9137 (+8),
combat armored vehicles - 18,433 (+29),
artillery systems - 19,955 (+38),
MLRS - 1242 (+1),
air defense systems - 986 (+2),
aircraft - 369 (+0),
helicopters - 329 (+0),
Operational-tactical level UAVs - 17,979 (+40),
cruise missiles - 2625 (+0),
ships/boats - 28 (+0),
submarines - 1 (+0),
automotive equipment and tank trucks - 27,840 (+91),
special equipment - 3567 (+1).
07:28 Air defense destroyed 33 of 62 Russian drones (Shahed and unspecified types) in Kyiv, Cherkasy, Khmelnytsky, Kharkiv, Zaporizhia, Donetsk, Dnipropetrovsk, Sumy, Chernihiv and Poltava regions at night. Another 25 drones were lost, the Air Force reported. In addition, the enemy struck a private sector in Sumy region with an unspecified type of missile at night.
05:52 At night, the Russians attacked Kiev with drones - all of them were neutralized, but as a result of falling debris in the Solomensky district, a fire broke out in several apartments in a multi-story residential building, nine people were injured, including a child, said the head of the Kyiv State Air Defense Forces Sergei Popko.
01:50 Ukraine and Russia, with Qatar as the mediator, are holding talks to end mutual attacks on energy infrastructure, The Financial Times reports, citing sources. According to a senior Ukrainian official, Russia and Ukraine have already reduced the frequency of attacks on each other's energy infrastructure in recent weeks as part of an agreement reached by their intelligence services. At the same time, he noted that Kiev plans to continue to strike targets, including oil refineries, in order to force Russia to negotiate.
00:17 The US has called on China to put pressure on North Korea to withdraw its troops from Russia, CNN reports, citing sources. At the same time, the channel's interlocutors are "not optimistic" that Beijing will hinder North Korea's plans - in particular because it supports the Russian military-industrial complex.
00:06 US Defense Department spokesman Patrick Ryder announced the presence of a "small number" of North Korean troops in the Kursk region. According to him, initial signs indicate that Russia may use them as infantry against Ukrainian troops. At the same time, the Pentagon cannot confirm that North Korean troops are on the territory of Ukraine itself.
A federal lawsuit has been filed against the Wisconsin Department of Transportation for allegedly turning over confidential DMV data containing the "personal info of millions of Americans and non-citizens for targeted voter… pic.twitter.com/tAWYjpZ1O1
… for targeted voter registration and outreach efforts."
@_CitizenAG
filed the federal lawsuit after discovering Wisconsin's DOT gave the two nonprofits the confidential DMV data.
This is a major breach of voter trust.
As the litigants describe it, the lawsuit centers around David J. Becker and his two nonprofits, the Electronic Registration Information Center (ERIC) & the Center for Election Innovation and Research (CEIR).
The Complaint maintains that ERIC and the CEIR abused the data for an array of illegal political activities, all of which are prohibited under the DPPA (Driver's Privacy Protection Act).
The plaintiffs make the case that ERIC exists to bloat voter rolls, as demonstrated by statistics that show states that don't use ERIC have cleaner voter rolls.
The CEIR was implicated in the Zucker Bucks scandal and received $70,000,000 in the lead-up to the 2020 election.
The CEIR issued grants to states ahead of the 2020 election based in part on this DMV data, the litigants claim.
The lawsuit points out that the Wisconsin Election Commission (WEC) confirmed the state isn't an ERIC member just weeks ago.
On September 17, WEC's written discovery responses reveal "WEC has not entered into contracts with ANY third-party to maintain the database."
ERIC is also implicated in the recent Colorado election scandal, as well as issues reported by Secretaries of State across the country regarding difficulties cleaning up dirty voter rolls.
Colorado's Deputy Secretary of State, Christopher Beall, testified in a July 2024 court case that 30,000 non-citizens in Colorado were sent postcards because of ERIC.
"Our efforts to remove individuals who DMV had identified as noncitizens was ineffective because of data coding mismatches between ERIC's data and DMV data, resulting in 30,000 of 51,000 postcards."
It turns out, these voting non-profits that claim to be safeguarding elections may be the actual "threat to democracy."
[NATIONALREVIEW] The Supreme Court ruled Wednesday that Virginia is entitled to remove noncitizen aliens from its voter rolls, siding with the commonwealth over lower courts less than a week out from the election.
The order comes two days after Virginia attorney general Jason Miyares filed an emergency application, requesting that the Court stay an injunction that ordered Virginia to restore some 1,600 suspected noncitizens who are ineligible to vote to the state’s voter rolls. A federal appeals court upheld the injunction on Sunday, quickly prompting the attorney general to appeal to the Supreme Court.
The Court released the one-page order Wednesday morning, noting that liberal-leaning Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, and Ketanji Brown Jackson would have denied Virginia’s emergency request for an appeal.
The Department of Justice sued Virginia earlier this month, targeting an executive order signed by Governor Glenn Youngkin that formalized a program to remove noncitizens from the state’s voter-registration lists. On Friday, a Biden-appointed federal judge took issue with Virginia’s purging of aliens from the voter rolls because the action came too close to the November election and therefore violates the National Voter Registration Act of 1993.
The federal law includes a so-called "quiet period" provision that prevents states from removing voters less than 90 days before an election. Youngkin issued the order exactly 90 days before Election Day. The provision is meant to prevent last-minute mistakes.
Miyares and Youngkin, both Republicans, said they are "pleased" with the Supreme Court’s ruling.
"This is a victory for commonsense and election fairness," Youngkin said in a statement. "I am grateful for the work of Attorney General Jason Miyares on this critical fight to protect the fundamental rights of U.S. citizens. Clean voter rolls are one important part of a comprehensive approach we are taking to ensure the fairness of our elections."
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] I’m very glad he was not harmed by the experience, as so many January 6 prisoners have been.
Trump's former strategist was released from prison in the early hours of Tuesday
Steven Bannon served four months for contempt of Congress
Hours after being released from federal prison, Donald Trump's former chief strategist Steve Bannon said he had a warning for the Biden family: Pardon Hunter before he has to serve a sentence that could destroy him.
'I don't think Hunter Biden would last 48 hours in a federal prison,' he told DailyMail.com
'I think that it would be too much for him, particularly with his previous drug addiction.'
The president's son could face years in prison when he is sentenced for gun and tax crimes in December.
Bannon detailed the hardships of life inside during an exclusive interview at the end of his four-month sentence for contempt of Congress. He left Federal Correctional Institution in Danbury, Connecticut, in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
After broadcasting his War Room livestream show from a Manhattan hotel suite he sat down with DailyMail.com to talk about the lowest point of his incarceration, what he learned from the inmates and how life in the U.S. Navy had prepared him for being cooped up with so many men.
'I'm 70 years old. I can tell you, there's not many 70-year-olds I know on Wall Street or in the political class that could go to a federal prison for four months,' he said.
'It's extremely difficult.
'These places are violent places. There's lots of drugs. This drug, K2 is all over these prisons.'
K2 is synthetic marijuana, also known as 'spice', that can be sprayed onto paper and smuggled into jails.
'That's why you have to be maniacally focused 24 hours a day. I think it's evident to me that Joe Biden is going to have to pardon his son.'
Biden has repeatedly said he will not use his powers to pardon his son. But insiders say the thought of Hunter, who is five years sober, spending time in prison has been a drain on the family.
Bannon was convicted in 2022 on two counts of defying subpoenas issued by the congressional investigation into the January 6 attack when Trump supporters ransacked the U.S. Capitol in 2021.
His release just a week before Election Day frees one of the most powerful Trump voices back on to the airwaves just as the two candidates hammer their closing messages.
Polls put Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris neck and neck.
Bannon was straight back into the swing of the campaign on Tuesday morning. He returned to the airwaves at 10 am and used his show to accuse former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of trying to silence him.
'She sent me to a federal prison as a political prisoner, to do two things, to make sure that she tried to tamp down the power of this show, right, tamp down the power of the show, and also to break me,' he said.
'Nancy Pelosi, take out your number two pencil and write this down: this show has never been more powerful.'
He urged supporters to ensure Democrats 'cannot steal the election,' showing that the prison sentence had not dimmed his fire. Later in the day it was on to a press conference, where dozens of journalists crammed into an upscale hotel suite to hear him repeat the unfounded claim that the 2020 election had been stolen.
Dressed in his trademark double-shirt and Barbour jacket getup, he said he had already spoken to Trump, but declined to offer further details of their conversation.
Victory would come down to getting the ground game running and turning out the vote, he said. But he had a warning for anyone who thought it would be over quickly.
'My focus is on victory next Tuesday and the biggest number possible, because folks: don't think it's going to end on Tuesday,' he said. 'This is going to take a while to sort through.'
Talking to DailyMail.com later, he described how the strict regimen and outdoor exercise had helped him lose weight and that time spent with other inmates energized him for the political struggle ahead. But he said it was wrong for anyone to think prison was a camp. And Biden should think hard about what it would do to Hunter.
Command is/was the logical heir to Harpoon, but it is about to the supplanted by another similar game with improved graphics: Sea Power.
Still, Command is so good because it has a very small requirement in processor power and for memory.
[Sandboxx] The U.S. Air Force’s latest way to prepare for a global conflict? Video games. The Air Force is increasingly using video games as a cheap, detailed, and internal way to test potential war scenarios. And it’s increasingly using one game in particular: Command. And as of this past week, airmen can play the game’s professional edition on the Air Force’s internal network.
One unusual aspect is that the game the Air Force turned to isn’t some in-house project developed by the Department of Defense for the military or a blockbuster release like Call of Duty or Total War, but rather a popular game studio that specializes in detailed two-dimensional combat.
The Wall Street Journal reported on additional details on the Air Force’s approval. The big update is that the game can run on the service’s secure networks. Matrix Games elaborated on that in its own update announcement, noting that “various security vulnerabilities have been identified and removed or mitigated. [‘Command Professional Edition’] is now included on the USAF Evaluated Products List (EPL), which clears it for deployment on USAF-protected systems and networks.” This allows members of the Air Force to play the game using classified and internal information, which won’t run the risk of being leaked to outside players. And there are a lot: about one million people play Command.
The Department of Defense has been in contact with the publishers since 2016 and using it for certain wargaming tests since 2017. One former Air Force officer said that when he was with Air Force Air Mobility Command, he had to work to convince his superiors of the benefit of these types of simulators.
The game itself lets players, over a two-dimensional map, outline potential defensive and offensive tactics, ranging from low-cost options to a more expensive and fortified strategy. Advocates told the Wall Street Journal that ‘Command’ helps with improving tactical decision-making and seeing the big picture in a possible confrontation.
[KhaamaPress] The World Health Organization (WHO) has reported a new environmental case of polio ...Poliomyelitis is a disease caused by infection with the poliovirus. Between 1840 and the 1950s, polio was a worldwide epidemic. Since the development of polio vaccines the disease has been largely wiped out in the civilized world. However, since the vaccine is known to make Moslem pee-pees shrink and renders females sterile, bookish, and unsubmissive it is not widely used by the turban and automatic weapons set. Currently the disease is only found in Pakistain and Afghanistain... in Helmand ...an Afghan province populated mostly by Pashtuns, adjacent to Injun country in Pak Balochistan... province, Afghanistan.
According to the WHO’s latest report, the new polio sample was identified in Lashkargah, the capital of Helmand province.
With this new case, the number of positive environmental polio cases in Afghanistan this year has increased to 85.
Notably, at least three cases of polio were detected alone in October in the provinces of Kandahar and Helmand.
The polio virus has been eradicated globally, except in Afghanistan and Pakistain.
Currently, Pakistain has the highest number of recorded polio cases.
The increasing number of polio cases in Afghanistan highlights the urgent need for effective vaccination campaigns, which face mounting challenges due to the restrictions imposed by the Taliban ...Arabic for students... Women healthcare workers, who are crucial to the success of these campaigns, face significant limitations and increasing pressure in the country.
The recent restrictions on female employees have significantly hindered efforts to reach vulnerable populations, particularly children.
The international community continues to urge the Taliban to lift these barriers to ensure successful polio eradication and safeguard the health of future generations in Afghanistan.
[IsraelTimes] Terror group likely to feel pinch after strikes on banking arm, but its network of charities is too entrenched in Lebanon’s Shiite community to be extracted easily, expert says
Last week, Israel’s military launched a series of Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... s across Leb ...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers... targeting branches of al-Qard al-Hassan, an unlicensed credit association considered to be Hezbollah’s bank.
The sorties marked a shift from strikes against military objectives alone to targeting infrastructure ostensibly in the civilian realm, underlining the challenges posed by the terror group’s deep integration in Lebanese society.
Due to its networks of welfare organizations, clinics, and extensive patronage system among Shiites, extricating Hezbollah from Lebanon’s civil fabric could prove a more complicated and daunting task than destroying the Iran-backed group’s military capabilities.
The Hezbollah that existed before the launch of the ground offensive no longer exists, "but it still is dangerous and it’s not going to disappear," Hezbollah expert Matthew Levitt told The Times of Israel in a recent phone conversation.
"Hezbollah really is a movement. It’s not just a terrorist organization, or a militia, or a political party. It’s also deeply involved in social and religious activities," said Levitt, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and former FBI counterterrorism expert.
Hezbollah’s military capabilities are weakened and ostensibly crumbling. Last week, the IDF said it had killed over 2,000 members of the Iran-backed group since October 2023, including many of its commanders, and destroyed about 70-80% of the rockets it possessed before the war. It also said it defeated Hezbollah’s forces in every area where its troops operated in southern Lebanon.
And while the terror group recently appointed a new leader, Naim Qassem ... the Grand Vizier of the Hezbullies... , to replace its slain Secretary General His Eminence Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah ...The late, lamented satrap of the Medes and the Persians in Leb...> , it is not clear who is leading the terror groups’ military strategy on the ground.
However,
a clean conscience makes a soft pillow... "much of Hezbollah’s social welfare infrastructure remains intact, because the IDF is targeting its weapons caches and command and control centers. They are not targeting Hezbollah-run medical clinics and welfare programs," Levitt said.
The Hezbollah expert described the terror group’s wide range of social activities as a "shadow governance," providing critical services to a country long on the brink of financial and political collapse, plagued by perennial corruption and sectarian strife. This has created a "shadow constituency" dependent on its assistance, Levitt said.
"Hezbollah today has the best of both worlds — it is part of the Lebanese state, with members holding cabinet positions and seats in parliament, but remains an independent group that operates apart from the state," Levitt wrote in a recent article for the Washington Institute. Thus, "it avoids the accountability that typically comes with holding elected office."
HEZBOLLAH’S VAST NETWORK OF CHARITIES
The financial group al-Qard al-Hassan, or AQAH, was founded by Hezbollah in 1983, one year after the terror group’s establishment, to provide interest-free loans in line with Islamic principles. Over the years, AQAH grew into a major financial institution with branches throughout Hezbollah strongholds in Lebanon.
The US blacklisted AQAH in 2007, saying Hezbollah uses it as a cover to manage the group’s financial activities and gain access to the international financial system.
However,
a clean conscience makes a soft pillow... Hezbollah’s civilian infrastructure extends far beyond, constituting a system of patronage that fills the gaps left by the inefficient Lebanese government and strengthens its clout over the country’s Shiite community of some 2 million, effectively creating a Shiite "mini-state."
It includes a network of medical centers known as the Islamic Health Organization, which provides healthcare services for free or at a reduced cost to Shiites, while also treating maimed Hezbollah fighters, according to the Israeli Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center.
In 2021, Hezbollah also launched the al-Sajjad supermarket chain, named after a revered figure in Shiite Islam. These supermarkets sell products (often of Iranian, Syrian or Iraqi origin) at significantly reduced prices for customers who present Hezbollah-issued cards.
Additionally, Hezbollah controls a chain of gas stations, the Amana Petroleum Company, which sells Iranian fuel at discounted rates, sometimes in defiance of the Lebanese government. It has been under US sanctions since 2020.
Hezbollah’s construction arm, Jihad al-Bina, was instrumental in rebuilding areas destroyed in the 2006 Second Lebanon War. Today, the foundation, established in 1988, manages various large-scale projects in civil engineering, agriculture, and industry, and runs vocational training centers, according to the Meir Amit Center.
On the propaganda front, Hezbollah runs its own TV channel, al-Manar, and various educational programs, including a youth group known as the Mahdi Scouts, used to indoctrinate young Shiites, according to the IDF.
The terror group also claims to be involved in environmental sustainability. It operates Green Without Borders, a nonprofit, which claims to manage reforestation projects in southern Lebanon. According to Israel, the group actually provides cover to Hezbollah positions; it was sanctioned by the US for alleged terror activities last year.
HEZBOLLAH’S FINANCIAL STRUGGLES
Last week, the IDF revealed that it had located a Hezbollah bunker under a Beirut hospital. Inside, the army said, was more than $500 million in gold and cash being stored by the terror group.
Despite its fortune, though, Hezbollah is reportedly undergoing a liquidity crisis, with the IDF’s airstrikes on branches of AQAH likely adding to the growing financial strain on the Iranian proxy.
Lebanese and foreign sources cited in a recent Voice of America report claimed Hezbollah was running out of cash and unable to pay its members. Its access to Lebanon’s formal banking system is also reportedly curtailed, as the country’s wealthiest bankers have fled abroad, fearing they could be targeted next by Israel for helping Hezbollah, according to VOA.
Until recently, the terror group was awash in cash, thanks to Iranian money transfers and its own illicit activities — chief among them its vast international drug smuggling network, according to experts. Hezbollah used that liquidity to keep its Shiite constituents happy, handing out monthly stipends in stable foreign currency.
A Shiite woman who recently evacuated from south Lebanon to Beirut told The Guardian that the group had doled out monthly cash payments of $200, as well as food parcels, praising them for "taking incredible care" of her family.
It is not clear how long Hezbollah will be able to continue disbursing those payments. The social welfare network also faces a labor shortage, as many of Hezbollah’s members whose day jobs were in its charities have been called up to fight or are incapacitated due to injuries sustained in pager and walkie-talkie explosions in September.
Furthermore, the displacement of over a million people from Shiite-majority areas in southern Lebanon and elsewhere has put additional pressure on the informal welfare system.
"This is going to be another significant layer of demands at a time of diminishing resources and competing demands for those resources," Levitt said.
WILL HEZBOLLAH TURN ITS WEAPONS AGAINST THE LEBANESE?
As Israel works to dismantle Hezbollah’s military and financial capabilities, the terror group may resort to using guns instead of butter to maintain its grip over Lebanon, Levitt warned. The group has a long history of using violence to suppress its critics.
With Iran’s backing, the terror group is likely to attempt to rearm and refill its coffers at the earliest opportunity. It remains unclear whether the international community would be able to step in and keep Tehran’s influence from infiltrating Lebanon, and whether the Lebanese Armed Forces would be capable of reasserting illusory sovereignty and a state monopoly over the legitimate use of force, Levitt said.
"Hezbollah will fight hard to prevent it," he predicted, "and it will still have the means to do so even after Israel removes a significant proportion of its strategic threat."
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Expert warns leaving it too late 'could lead to a disaster that would kill not only the astronauts, but also NASA's reputation'.
OR.. they could put one of the large Sierra inflatable space stations docked to the ISS for a new crew quarters and seal up the bad Russian module until the problem is solved. The Sierra module could be launched by Falcon Heavy or Vulcan or Blue Origin near term. Out 1/2 a year they could just doc a starship to the ISS. It has more interior volume than most of the ISS modules in total. Also, an F9 based rocket system is contracted for, already, to de-orbit ISS. I think it's a waste as ISS is Mass in Space that can be repurposed for raw materials.
Nick Pope, a former civil servant who once ran the British Government's UFO project, told MailOnline that the space agency's 'wait-and-see' attitude could have devastating consequences.
'Leaving it too late could lead to a disaster that would kill not only the astronauts, but also NASA's reputation,' he said.
His warning comes as NASA revealed it is tracking 50 'areas of concern' related to a growing leak on the Russian side of the ISS.
American astronauts have been instructed to wait near the escape hatch in case of an emergency evacuation whenever the hatch to the leaky section is open.
NASA has now promoted the leak to a 'top safety risk'.
However, it insists that its astronauts will remain aboard the station.
But as NASA and its Russian counterpart, Roscomos, fail to patch or even find the leak there are now growing concerns over the safety of the ISS.
The leak was first detected in 2019 in the Russian Zvezda Service Module Transfer Tunnel which provides station living quarters, life support systems, electrical power distribution and data processing, flight control and propulsion systems.
However, despite the space agencies covering potential cracks with 'a combination of sealant and patches' the leak has only grown faster in recent years.
In February, NASA was forced to hold a press conference on the issue as the amount of air escaping temporarily increased from 0.2 lbs per day (0.09 kg) to 2.4 lbs (1.08 kg) per day.
The leak then hit record rates in April, losing 3.7 lbs (1.68 kg) of air every day according to a report from NASA's Office of the Inspector General (OIG).
As the leak continues to grow, the situation was declared a 'top safety risk' this September and escalated to the highest level on NASA's risk scale.
NASA officials say they have reached a deal with Roscomos to only open the hatch to the leaking section when necessary and to keep it sealed during the evenings.
Whenever the hatch is open, NASA has instructed all astronauts to remain on the American side of the station so they can be nearer to their spacecraft in case of an emergency.
However, Mr Pope says that this has put NASA in a 'tight spot'.
He says: 'Evacuating the ISS too soon will increase the gap between NASA and Elon Musk and make NASA look like a declining force, but leaving it too late could lead to a disaster.'
While NASA maintains that the Zvezda module's hatch remains closed as much as possible, if the leaks become severe the station could rapidly lose pressure and oxygen.
In the case of such an emergency, all astronauts would need to climb aboard their assigned 'lifeboats' docked with the station.
The capsules have been stocked with emergency suits, allowing the crew to quickly put on the proper gear as they flee the orbiting laboratory, saving more valuable time.
NASA's Commercial Crew Program Manager Steve Stich said that in the event of an emergency, SpaceX's Dragon could be powered up within minutes.
However, the space agency has also admitted that the ISS is not sufficiently prepared for capsule failures which could leave some astronauts stranded.
The OIG report says: 'Due to the high costs and a limited budget, the lack of ready-to-launch vehicles prevent the Agency from having an immediate response capability if crew vehicles encounter significant damage and are no longer safe for crew evacuation.'
In the event of an impact from a micrometeor or piece of space debris, this could lead to a situation in which astronauts have no way of fleeing the damaged station.
NASA says that an impact of this kind could cause 'serious damage or catastrophic failure, and can be a threat to astronauts'.
However, due to the costs of performing upgrades in space, NASA has said it will not provide any additional shielding to protect the station from objects larger than 3cm.
Mr Pope adds: 'Space is inherently dangerous and the space program carries with it a degree of risk. But with lives at stake, a wait-and-see option has higher consequences.'
However, not all experts are convinced that the Zvezda module leak is likely to lead to catastrophic failure.
Dr Simeon Barber, a space scientist at The Open University, told MailOnline: 'Although this is seen as a high priority issue to resolve, it is not putting astronauts in immediate danger.'
By closing the hatch to Zvezda, the leak can be contained no matter how fast it becomes.
'The problem is that if the leak gets too bad, they might have to leave the hatch permanently closed, meaning the docking ports beyond the hatch can’t be used,' says Dr Barber.
Although this would make resupplying the space station more difficult it would ensure that the station can continue functioning.
While this might not be a threat to human life, experts say that this could lead NASA to decommission the station earlier than planned.
Lebanese Media is reporting that Hezbollah has informed the Lebanese Speaker of the House, Nabih Berri, that they agree to the 60-Day Ceasefire Proposal with Israel, which will see the Demilitarization of Southern Lebanon in accordance with U.N. Security Council Resolution 1701.
[IsraelTimes] The White House says in a statement that a leaked draft of the US ceasefire proposal between Israel and Hezbollah published earlier this evening on the Kan public broadcaster “doesn’t reflect the current state of negotiations.”
The proposal aired on Kan envisions a 60-day implementation period, during which time the Lebanese army will deploy along the border and confiscate Hezbollah arms in southern Lebanon.
IDF forces will be out of Lebanon within seven days of the end of hostilities, and will be replaced by the LAF, with UN peacekeepers facilitating the transition. Ultimately, there will be 10,000 LAF troops along the border with Israel.
If it were agreed to, it would just mean more chew toys for the IDF in some short period of time. The Lebanese army is good for parades, as far as I can tell — and even then only if the Hezbollah turbans among the troops are willing.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/31/2024
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#1
Experience teaches that any "peace treaties" with Arabs are not worth the paper they're written on.
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.
...46th president of the U.S. The man who made Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter look competent, if only by comparison....
..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",...
...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...
..the braying voice of Islamic Resistance®,...
...Arabic for 
[JustTheNews] A variety of election irregularities — at least ten of them — have occurred across the country in the weeks leading up to Election Day, as some states have reported record-breaking turnout during early voting. 
[Bee] NEW YORK, NY — The entire cast of the all-female talk show ’The View' was forced to get rabies shots this week after 
[NATIONALREVIEW] The 
...Arabic for 
...an Iranian satrapy until recently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
