Claire Bernish at FreeThoughtProject Gulf of Tonkin 2.0? US Using Unconfirmed Attack on Navy Ship to Quietly Start War With Iran & Russia After reportedly coming under fire from missiles launched in Houthi rebel-held territory, the United States officially entered the war in Yemen today by firing back, knocking out strategic radar sites and other targets in the area believed to have fired first.
In response to the U.S. escalation, Iran deployed a fleet of military vessels to the same geostrategically-critical Gulf of Aden waters where American ships have been situated for months guarding the Bab el-Mandeb strait — the narrow passage through which much of the world’s oil is shipped through to the Suez Canal.
While that may be the crux of the narrative presented by the U.S. government and corporate media, far more ominous secondary developments must be considered, and — as has been the case in Syria and the East and South China Seas — everything points back to Russia.
And not in the vein of Russian aggression as the U.S. propaganda machine would have you believe.
Yemen’s Shi’a Houthis — who captured capital city, Sana’a, last year — have long been suspected by Washington to be receiving direct but surreptitious support from the Iranian government, which flatly denies the allegation.
Saudi Arabia has imposed a naval, air, and land blockade on the tiny country — leaving Yemenis one of the most food-insecure and impoverished nations on the planet — and leading to mass starvation. Without a guaranteed influx of supplies — including arms and other military items — haphazardly firing at a Navy ship seems a logical improbability....
Brandon Turbeville at GlobalResearch Only In The World Of American Media Is Syria A Civil War To the vast majority of Americans, the Syrian crisis (as well as the state of affairs in Iraq, Libya, Yemen, etc.) is merely a distant blip on a cluttered radar screen. Competing with issues affecting an individual’s daily life like wages, taxes, and free trade, that small portion of the American population who hasn’t completely zoned out of the political and current-events sphere is increasingly overtaken with the necessities of survival. Those who are able to devote enough time to the Syrian crisis are confronted with an unprecedented onslaught of propaganda demonizing the Syrian government and the Syrian president as “killing his own people,” “brutal,” and “genocidal.” The Syrian people are also victims of the propaganda war as being obsessed with religion, divided, and opposed to their government.
As they are presented by the U.S. media, the Syrian people, like most other people across the world are completely dehumanized. In American media, Syrians are not human. They are numbers. 100 died today. 86 died the day before. Syrians are not mothers or sons. They are not fathers or little children, grandparents. They are blips on a screen and data in a spreadsheet. At least, this is how they are presented to an increasingly hardened American public, a nation that is becoming more and more desensitized to death, destruction, and degradation both at home and abroad.
Having recently concluded a trip to the Middle East, I can safely say that the claims made by Western media are the opposite of the truth.
While my visit centered in Lebanon, we had frequent opportunities to talk with ordinary Syrian citizens either visiting Lebanon or fleeing the ravages of the war in their home country. Indeed, Syrians and Syrian refugees were plentiful in Beirut and many would openly speak about the horrors visited upon them by the West’s proxy war and their trials outside Syria.
What is so important about the fact that these Syrians were being interviewed in Lebanon is the unique benefit of talking with someone not living in their home country because one knows with relative certainty that the person speaking has nothing to lose or gain.......
Waleed Rikab at SyriaComment Abdallah al-Muhaysini came to Syria in 2013 to partake in the uprising against Bashar al-Assad. He presents a unique case of the outsized role a single person can play in the lawless world of the Syrian rebellion. He has positioned himself at the center of radical jihadist politics, fund raising, and legal opinion. Al-Muhaysini hails from the al-Qassim region in Saudi Arabia. Prior to his arrival to Syria, he completed his MA and PhD studies in Islamic Jurisprudence in the Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University in Riyadh, with a dissertation on “The Treatment of Prisoners of War in Islamic Jurisprudence.” A self-professed Salafi jihadist scholar, al-Muhaysini is often seen on the battlefields of northern Syria together with various Islamist factions, prominent among whom are Ahrar al-Sham and Jabhat al-Nusra (JN), in addition to other factions affiliated with the Jaish al-Fateh coalition. He has set up institutions that provide military and financial aid to jihadist groups, and runs a proselytization (Dawah) center (named “The Jihad’s Callers Center“) in Idlib Province.
Al-Mushaysini holds the title General Judge of Jaish al-Fateh. He is highly revered in the jihadi-Salafi landscape (notwithstanding Islamic State adherents), embracing a leading role in the warfare – most recently in the Jabha al-Nusra takeover, together with the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP) of the Abu al-Dhuhur Air Base and in the Jaish al-Fatah battles for control over al-Fuah this month (September 2015). During clashes in the last year, he was documented delivering inflammatory speeches to the troops and bestowing religious blessing upon suicide bombers before embarking on their missions.....
When it comes to hypocrisy, the pro-war Western ‘liberal’ is in a class of his own. While professing opposition to racism, the pro-war liberal is cheerleader for the most dangerous and deadly form of racism in the world today - contemporary US/Western imperialism.
A racism that is scarcely reported, but which has laid waste to entire countries and killed millions - and which now threatens to drag us into potentially catastrophic military confrontation with Russia.
We can see this abhorrent racism on display again in the current debates in elite circles in the West over Syria. It’s taken as a given that ‘We’ i.e., the US and its allies, have a right to declare who is or is not the legitimate government of Syria. We can demand ‘Assad must go’ but of course no Syrian government official can demand one of OUR leaders must go. The very thought of it!
We have the right to impose ‘No Fly Zones’ which of course won’t apply to OUR aircraft - only to THEIRS. We have the right to bomb or illegally invade countries at any time we want to - for whatever fictitious reasons - but if the people of the targeted country dare to fight back, we’ll call them “genocidal” and accuse their leader (and his allies) of war crimes and push for them to be sent to The Hague. Our leaders meanwhile can break international law and kill hundreds of thousands with total impunity.
If you doubt the inherent racism of the current world order, and think I’m overstating the case; then consider what’s been going on at the International Criminal Court (ICC). During its 14 years of existence the only people indicted and tried by the ICC have been Africans..........
Three days ago the USS Mason, an American destroyer patrolling the Red Sea, was apparently fired upon from Yemen. It has gone unquestioned in the Western MSM that the Houthis were behind this attack, despite strong denials from the Houthis themselves.
Yesterday, all thoughts of “reviewing support” put aside, the Americans bombed three “radar sites” that they claim were a threat to their assets in the Red Sea.
Just like that, America is now an active player in the war on Yemen, when before they were simply selling weapons to the Saudis et al.
You might consider it strange that the Houthis, who have not fired on American ships ever before in the nearly 2 years of warfare in Yemen, suddenly decided – just as American support for Saudi Arabia was in question – to launch missiles at an American destroyer.
You might be asking yourself, “Why would the Houthis, who struggle to get any coverage in the Western press at all, let alone sympathetic coverage, launch an attack on America?”
You might consider it strange that the Houthis, already fighting a losing battle against a richer and better equipped enemy, might try and drag America into the war.
It’s not strange. Not in the least. It fits so well with the history of American military entanglements that one might even call it predictable, at this point.....
From WarNewsToday Update for Wednesday, October 12, 2016 Gunman attacks a Shiite shrine in Kabul as worshippers observe Ashura, killing 18. IS in Afghanistan claims responsibility. Separately, an explosion at a Shiite mosque in Balkh kills 14. While the center of Kunduz is now said to be secure, Taliban continue to occupy surrounding areas. This analysis in Der Spiegel discusses the generally deteriorating security situation in the country....
From RT Scores dead and wounded after gunman attacks Shia festival in Kabul At least 14 people have been killed and 36 wounded after a gunman burst into a Shia shrine in the Afghan capital, during the marking of the Ashura festival in what appears to have been a sectarian attack.
The worshipers were densely packed during an evening service at the Karte Sakhe shrine during one of the key weeks in the Shia calendar, when the attack occurred. In a blurry video taken from a distance posted to social media shortly after the incident, a staccato barrage of gunshots is followed by screams. Several unverified photos from the shrine showed the floors running red with blood.......
Ryan Devereaux at AnswerCoalition Protest demands: Close Rikers Island! ...The very idea of a detention center devoted to locking up and terrorizing local youth, men and women who have not even been convicted of a crime is abominable. In a blatant violation of inmates’ basic rights, solitary confinement is used against inmates, even ones who later face no formal charges. Kalief Browder, a teenage inmate subjected to the torture of solitary confinement, took his own life after being released; no formal charges were ever pressed against him.
Daniel Dromm, a City Councilor representing District 25, Jackson Heights and Elmhurst stated, “Rikers Island is a hellhole. No man deserves to live in that hellhole.” Rikers Island is indicative of the United States’ approach to “criminal justice” as a whole: warehouse supposed criminals out of the public eye, throw them into a violent prison environment, punish them for the violence through terrorizing inmates with solitary confinements and other abuses meanwhile doing little to address the root causes of crime.
Whether it’s petty crimes such as shoplifting or drug misuse, the “justice” system seeks nothing but revenge. Instead of allocating roughly $200,000 to detain each inmate at Rikers, communities could use that money for expanding institutions that actually help the community: public schools, jobs and affordable housing to start. As always under capitalism, the government somehow has enough money to detain and terrorize poor people but never enough to make the communities in which they reside genuinely safe and livable....
Furthermore, violent surges of seawater crashed into most of Haiti’s cities, which line the coasts. Even the Dominican Republic, on the eastern side of Hispaniola, well away from the hurricane’s center was so strongly affected by floods and winds that it lost four people.
...For example, the children from a collapsed orphanage are presumed to have died, but no evidence of their deaths has been offered. Such disappearances of children during disasters are often due to https://www.devex.com/news/human-trafficking-prevalent-in-post-typhoon-philippines-82576 human trafficking, and the irresponsible reporters who eagerly repeat these numbers should consider that they might be serving as the unwitting accomplices of criminals....
Afghanistan: 15 years of Invasion and Occupation
From RT ‘Cancer connected with nuclear disasters develops in Yemeni children’ The humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen, where people are dying of famine, lack of medical supplies and chemical weapons, may amount to genocide if the international community doesn’t act, says Kim Sharif of Human Rights for Yemen. Saudi Arabia has blocked a UN request for an independent investigation into alleged crimes committed during the Saudi-led bombing campaign in Yemen. The UN claims the inquiry spearheaded by the Yemeni National Committee is not enough. Yemen is running out of food, fuel and medicine; and the number of malnourished children is skyrocketing. UN figures claim more than half of Yemen's 28 million population is suffering from a lack of food, and vulnerable children end up being the hardest hit.
Up to 400,000 children suffer severe malnutrition leading to a number of diseases.
A study reported by UK’s Guardian newspaper reveals more than a third of all airstrikes hit civilian sites, including hospitals, schools and mosques....
...Sharif went on to say, “people are dying of chemical type of weapons, where children are developing very unusual cancers that are usually connected with a nuclear type holocaust.”
“This is very shocking and so frequent in the northern parts of the Yemen that there is a disproportionate development of rare types of cancers that are usually connected with nuclear types of disasters,” said Sharif.
She insists that an independent investigation into the situation in Yemen and the alleged war crimes committed by the Saudi coalition is necessary........
From TheIntercept “Do Not Resist”:The Police Militarization Documentary Everyone Should See On a sunny afternoon last summer, Craig Atkinson, a New York City-based filmmaker, stood in a front yard in South Carolina surrounded by several heavily armed police officers.
The officers, members of the Richland County Sheriff’s Department tactical team, were descending on a modest one-story house looking for drugs and guns. The team smashed through the windows of the home with iron pikes, then stormed the front door with rifles raised.
Inside, they found a terrified family of four, including an infant. As the family members were pulled outside, Atkinson’s camera captured a scene that plays out with startling regularity in cities and towns across the country, one of many included in his new documentary, “Do Not Resist,” an examination of police militarization in the United States.
The police begin rooting through the trash. “Where the fuck is the weed?” one officer asks, as the team ransacks a car parked in the driveway. “Boy that was sweet,” another says, commenting on the speed of the raid. One officer finds a backpack, which yields a bit of marijuana — it’s not enough to roll a joint, but it’s something.
The officer in charge questions the owner of the backpack, a young African-American man. In a conversation captured on Atkinson’s microphone, the young man, a local community college student, tells the officer he runs a small landscaping business.
Knowing he’s being taken into custody, with his hands cuffed in front of him, he asks the officer for a favor: Can he remove the $876 in his pocket set aside for new lawn-care equipment and give it to one of his employees to go to the hardware store?
Instead of handing the cash to the arrestee’s co-worker, the tactical team seizes the money.....
The last ASEAN country to be studied within the book is Myanmar, which is by far the most susceptible of the entire bunch to Hybrid War. Truth be told, it’s been experiencing some form or another of Hybrid War since its independence in 1948, although this mostly took the form of Unconventional Warfare prior to 1988. From that point on, Color Revolutions were reversely integrated into the destabilization model there and offered as a “solution” to the world’s longest-running civil war, earning them the automatic support of the international (Western) community and lending them false normative “justification” in the eyes of the easily misled global masses.
Myanmar functions as the ideal case study for examining Hybrid War in practice, and it’s more relevant in the current geopolitical climate than ever before. All of the pieces are in place for a violent explosion and the country is rife with asymmetrical risks to its stability. The reason that Myanmar is such a powder keg is because foreign actors have been conspiring against its unity since independence, wanting to exploit one or another peripheral ethnic group for their own particular purposes. The decades-long military government can’t avoid shouldering some of the responsibility for the country’s present woes, as it was unsuccessful in crafting an inclusive and lasting sense of nationhood, though to be fair, the challenge that it was confronted with was immense....
From SuperStation95 Russian Television Tells Citizens NUCLEAR WAR IMMINENT - Find location of nearest Bomb Shelter -- US Base at Diego Garcia so loaded with planes, parking them on roads! Russian television has told its citizens that nuclear war may be "imminent." The terrifying Russian television broadcast explicitly told civilians to find out where their nearest bomb shelter is and repeatedly asked viewers if they were ready for nuclear war.
One apocalyptic broadcast told viewers on Moscow's state-owned TV channel NTV: "If it should one day happen, every one of you should know where the nearest bomb shelter is. It’s best to find out now."
The enraged host, Evgeny Kiselyov, blasted America's "impudent behaviour" and spent two hours warning that a conflict could take "nuclear dimensions".....
......According to information from a government contractor, the US has deployed "More planes than I have ever seen in nine years" to the Military Base at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean. Specifically, this contractor wrote to say:
I rotate thru Diego Garcia every 6 weeks to pull maintenance on uplink equipment as a private contractor.
Something big is going on, the island has more aircraft than anytime in the last 9 years. They have blocked off some access roads and are now parking aircraft on the National Road. Barriers have been set up around the aircraft areas. Temporary barracks and hangers are popping up everywhere. A tent city full of AF and Navy maintenance personal has also been set up.
I have never seen B1s and B2s there at the same time. Actually I have never seen more than 1 there at a time. Now, there are very many.
Security is nuts I had to show my id at least 8 times a day.
My coworker is former AF and said they are like that when nukes are around.....
The US military has refuelled more than 5,700 aircraft involved in the brutal Saudi-led bombing of Yemen https://t.co/6t5taPsM8X
......So why did Truman’s controllers order Japan’s nuclear bombing? As I have grown increasingly aware of the ruthless Talmudic psychopathology of the Powers that Be, I cynically confided to friends, “I think they enjoyed it.” But after discovering David Dionisi’s Atomic Bomb Secrets, we can be much more specific. This well-written, 217-page gem, documented with 496 end-notes, blows the lid off the sordid episode.
A ground-breaking detail I learned from Dionisi is the A-bomb’s role in Korea’s division into North and South. I’ve discussed the artificial justification for this division elsewhere, but Dionisi elaborates that Japanese scientists were developing their own atomic bomb. After initial research in Japan, the project was transferred to the Konan region of northern Korea (then a Japanese protectorate). This area was selected for multiple reasons: availability of uranium, the power the Chosin dams could generate, and (perhaps most importantly) keeping away from American bombers.
Giving the Soviet Union postwar control of North Korea (allegedly its reward for a mere five-days’ participation in the Pacific War) now makes far more sense. Not only was the cabal handing Stalin the plans and materials for the atomic bomb, they were giving him Japan’s installations for making one.
But Dionisi solves much more, especially the mystery of why Nagasaki was targeted.
After Christianity first reached Japan in the 16th century, it faced growing pains, including times of severe persecution, but gradually became established, centered in Nagasaki, which became nicknamed the “Japanese Vatican.” According to Dionisi’s research, in 1945 some 50,000 Nagasaki residents were Christians.
After the Enola Gay dropped the “Little Boy” bomb on Hiroshima on August 6, the plane named Bock’s Car (also written bockscar) carried the “Fat Man” bomb to Japan on August 9. Most of the 12-man crew believed their objective was Kokura, and a secondary target was only to be selected if weather interfered. Dionisi does much to debunk the “poor visibility” claim long used to justify the plane’s rerouting to Nagasaki.
The “Fat Man” bomb from Bock’s Car detonated directly over Urakami Cathedral, the largest cathedral in the entire Orient. At Nagasaki (250,000 residents), 73,844 were killed, 74,909 injured, and more than 120,000 suffered radiation effects...........
Saudis Revealed to the world how savage,brutal, barbaric they are By bombing 3,000 mourners in Sanaa Grand community hall Sat. pic.twitter.com/1ss3IJ1bnx
Asif Aziz at AstuteNews U.S.-Armed Saudi Coalition Bombed Yemen Funeral, Massacring 140, Wounding 525 in “Lake of Blood” Western-backed, Saudi-led coalition airstrikes killed and wounded hundreds of Yemenis at a crowded funeral on Saturday. More than 140 Yemenis were killed and at least 525 were injured, the U.N. said, citing health officials. The casualty figures are likely to increase....
From SciscoMedia BREAKING: Saudi Arabia just bombed a funeral in Yemen, as the UK announces another arms deal On Saturday 8 October, Saudi Arabia allegedly bombed a funeral wake in the Yemeni city of Sanaa, reportedly killing and injuring up to 700 people.
The attack occurred at around 2pm BST, as mourners were gathered for the funeral of the father of Yemen’s Interior Minister Jalal al-Rowaishan. Journalists on the ground also reported that the Mayor of Sanaa, Abdulqader Hilal, was killed.
Matthew Russell Lee at InnerCityPress In Yemen, Ban Ki-moon's Envoy Blamed for Funeral Deaths, UNSC Silent on Saudi UNITED NATIONS, October 9 -- The Saudi led coalition bombed the funeral of the father of Yemen interior minister Jalal al-Roweishan in Sana'a on October 8, the same day the UN Security Council met about airstrikes in Syria.
Inner City Press asked Saudi Arabia's ambassador to the UN Abdallah Yahya A. Al-Mouallimi to confirm it was an Saudi strike and explain it. He said, "I am not aware of it." Vine video here.
Even as the Saudi led Coalition belatedly announced its own "investigation," nothing was heard back from the Saudi Ambassador or Mission. UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, who removed the Saudi coalition from the UN Children and Armed Conflict annex on Yemen, offered what he called his "sincere" condolences.
France, whose foreign minister Jean Marc Ayrault declined to answer Inner City Press' question on October 8 about the Saudi bombing, now says it is "shocked" - without mentioning Saudi Arabia. The Security Council, in which the UK "holds the pen" on Yemen, has yet to say anything.
Now Interior Minister Jalal Rwichan has issued a statement, forwarded to Inner City Press, stating that Ban Ki-moon's envoy Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed was told of a cessation in hostilities for the funeral, that on that basis people went - and were killed. He says not to trust the UN or its envoy anymore. This has been a trend under Ban Ki-moon, in Sri Lanka and elsewhere. We'll have more on this.
After the French resolution failed in the Security Council, its foreign minister Jean Marc Ayrault came to the stakeout. Inner City Press asked him, loudly, if he thinks the Saudi bombardment of Yemen should also be taken up by the Security Council, after an airstrike on a funeral most recently. He did not answer, despite the question being repeated. Vine here. He left.
While Ambassador Matthew Rycroft of the UK, which holds the Council's “pen” on Yemen, also did not answer, Vine here, New Zealand's ambassador when Inner City Press asked if his country also thinks the Saudi-led coalition should stop bombing Yemen said, “I do.” Vine here....
Robert Parry at ConsortiumNews Key Neocon Calls on US to Oust Putin The neoconservative president of the U.S.-taxpayer-funded National Endowment for Democracy [NED] has called for the U.S. government to “summon the will” to engineer the overthrow of Russian President Vladimir Putin, saying that the 10-year-old murder case of a Russian journalist should be the inspiration.
Carl Gershman, who has headed NED since its founding in 1983, doesn’t cite any evidence that Putin was responsible for the death of Anna Politkovskaya but uses a full column in The Washington Post on Friday to create that impression, calling her death “a window to Vladimir Putin, the Kremlin autocrat whom Americans are looking at for the first time.”........
Harrison Koehli at Sott.Net Escalations in the war on Syria: Russia sends in S-300 missile defense system, Syrian Army advances in Aleppo ....We know that the source of most of the atrocity stories in the news are sourced from Western-backed NGOs (e.g., "SOHR" and the White Helmets) with an interest in portraying al-Nusra as the good guys and Russia/Syria as the bad guys. In fact, many of those sources are al-Nusra members themselves, who definitely have such an interest. But they do have a point: civilians are undoubtedly killed and injured in airstrikes targeting militants. Again, this is the cynical but inescapable logic of warfare: civilians get caught in the crossfire, especially in a war zone like Aleppo, which is essentially one large residential area. But here's what gets left unsaid:
Double standards: The U.S. called an emergency UN Security Council over the renewed fighting and airstrikes. They conveniently ignore the fact that they conduct the same type of warfare in Iraq (e.g., Fallujah) and Syria (e.g., Manbij) - besieging a terrorist-held city and saturating it with airstrikes that result in many civilian deaths. The U.S. and its vassals also target hospitals, schools, and residential areas, whether deliberately or not (e.g., Kunduz, Yemen, eastern Ukraine). And, of course, their moderate jihadists do likewise. (see this video report from today).
Hypocrisy: It doesn't bother the U.S. when they're the ones doing it. And it doesn't bother them when their jihadis are the ones doing it. There is no moral outrage for the fact that their jihadis target residential areas, hospitals and schools with hellfire canons, mortars and sniper fire. No moral outrage for the fact that they have publicly aligned with al-Qaeda. No moral outrage for the fact that they are holding civilians hostage and using them as human shields (the very thing that Israel often accuses Hamas of doing, thus justifying civilian casualties).
Omissions: They neglect to mention that the Russians and Syrians have arguably taken every step short of surrender in order to avoid civilian deaths. They held up to their end of the ceasefire agreement for the agreed-upon week, despite constant violations from the rebel side. By and large, Russia has refrained from targeting any residential areas, focusing their airstrikes solely on identifiable command outposts, militant convoys, etc. The Syrians have a longstanding amnesty policy that has been successfully used on countless occasions: militants are free to give up their weapons and reintegrate into Syrian society (if they're actually Syrian - foreigners are to be expelled), or keep their weapons and be moved to a different position on the front, e.g., in Idlib or Hama. Civilians are urged to avoid militants and the areas they use, and have been provided with numerous corridors through which they can travel to western Aleppo, where they are provided with aid and shelter. .....
Craig Murray
From Larouchepac The West Can No Longer Hide the Collapse of the Trans-Atlantic Financial System ....The IMF calls for three policy solutions: more loose money (negative interest rates), more government spending (quantitative easing), and structural reforms (a euphemism for anti-labor policies). Indeed, that is what is already happening across the trans-Atlantic. The Finanacial Times Tuesday acknowledged that "In the final three months of the year, the UK, Japan and Europe are expected to mint a combined $506bn to purchase assets — the largest quarterly sum created since the early days of the US Federal Reserves QE programme in 2009."
Just as the reality of the collapse can not be hidden from the public, so also the only possible solution can and must be brought before the people and the legislators across the U.S. and Europe — putting the current bankrupt system out of its misery in precisely the method implemented by Franklin Roosevelt upon assuming the Presidency in 1933. The immediate restoration of Glass Steagall is the only means to save the commercial banking system of the Western nations. It will mean the demise of most of the Wall Street and London TBTF banks — but the only way to salvage the lives of the real people caught up in that massive bubble is to oversee it's collapse in an orderly, legal fashion, allowing emergency regulators to distinguish between the gamblers and those who were fooled into trusting the criminal institutions with their savings and pensions....
Prof James Petras at GlobalResearch Barbarism in Words and Deeds. Barbarism of U.S. Imperial Wars is Unmatched ‘Barbarians’, to be clear, evoke images of leaders and groups, which abjure all civilized norms and laws. They only respond to armed force. In the present context Power’s charges of barbarism against Russia and Syria was used to justify the US aerial bombardment of a Syrian army outpost, which killed and maimed almost 200 government troops engaged in combating ISIS terrorists and jihadi invaders.
In other words, accusing Syrian soldiers of ‘barbarism’ was Ambassador Power’s cynical way of dehumanizing the young victims of an earlier and deliberate US war crime....
....Over the past decade and a half, the US and its allies have invaded, occupied, killed, wounded and dispossessed over ten million people, in countries from Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon. Military and civilian officials have systematically destroyed entire economies, fostered ethno-religious wars, undermined ancient community and family ties and placed corrupt political puppets in power.
Promoted by the US, torture, arbitrary arrest and incarceration have become the norm creating lawless and chaotic societies, which had once been productive and stable. The shredding of social structures has provokes massive population flight, with millions of desperate refugees fleeing invasions, wars and total society breakdown. The result of these deliberate imperial policy decisions has been emptied cities and neighborhoods, broken families, destroyed lives and futures for many millions of young Arabs and Muslims.
As the human toll mounts and Western Europe is flooded with the results of US aggressive wars, the imperialists have sharpened their shrill rhetoric, labeling all of their adversaries and critics as ‘accomplices in war crimes’, and ‘barbarians’.....
From ZeroHedge Fukushima Radiation Has Contaminated The Entire Pacific Ocean (And It's Going To Get Worse) The nuclear disaster has contaminated the world's largest ocean in only five years and it's still leaking 300 tons of radioactive waste every day. http://www.trueactivist.com/fukushima-radiation-has-contaminated-the-entire-pacific-ocean-and-its-going-to-get-worse/?utm_source=Facebook&utm_medium=AM&utm_content=fukushimaradiationhascontaminatedtheentirepacificoceananditsgoingtogetworse What was the most dangerous nuclear disaster in world history? Most people would say the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in Ukraine, but they’d be wrong. In 2011, an earthquake, believed to be an aftershock of the 2010 earthquake in Chile, created a tsunami that caused a meltdown at the TEPCO nuclear power plant in Fukushima, Japan. Three nuclear reactors melted down and what happened next was the largest release of radiation into the water in the history of the world. Over the next three months, radioactive chemicals, some in even greater quantities than Chernobyl, leaked into the Pacific Ocean. However, the numbers may actually be much higher as Japanese official estimates have been proven by several scientists to be flawed in recent years.
Peter Van Buren at AntiWar Why the Snowden the Movie Matters I’ve reviewed Oliver Stone’s movie Snowden elsewhere, and it’s well worth seeing just as a movie. But of course the issues brought up by Snowden the man, and Snowden the movie, are more complex than fit into two hours.
I had this hit home in a recent discussion with a friend who keeps insisting he has nothing to hide in his emails, phone calls, social media, etc., so why should he care if the NSA looks at all that? Friend, here’s why: NSA surveillance is legal.
True, as was slavery in the U.S., the Holocaust under Nazi Germany, Apartheid in South Africa and so forth. Laws serve higher purposes. They can be manipulated for evil. That’s why we need checks and balances to protect us.
Well, there are checks and balances in the system to protect us.
The king of all checks and balances in this, the Fourth Amendment, has been treated by the government like a used Kleenex.
As for the Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Court (FISA), set up to review government requests for wiretapping, it approved all 1,789 requests submitted to it in 2012. The FBI made 15,229 National Security Letter requests in 2012 on Americans. None of those even require FISA rubber-stamping. And here’s DOJ trying to keep classified a court ruling that says it might have acted unconstitutionally.
The first FISA ruling ever released in full came from Edward Snowden. Before that, no one outside a small circle inside the government had ever seen one.
And you know who represents the “suspect” (i.e., you) in front of the FISA court? No one. You don’t even know they’re reviewing you....
Haid Haid at NOW Did Turkey abandon Aleppo to fight Syrian Kurds? A rumored Turkish-Russian deal would give Ankara a free hand to deal with Kurdish groups in the north in exchange for cutting support to rebels in Syria’s second city ....Sources on the ground also confirmed a recent cutback in military aid to rebel groups in Aleppo. “Any large scale attack by the Syrian regime to capture Aleppo usually leads to an immediate increase in the support we receive from our allies in order to halt the offensive. But it seems that something has changed. Although the regime and Russia are launching the worst attack so far to capture Aleppo, we still have not received any significant support to counter them,” said Ahmed Hussein, a media activist in Aleppo affiliated with Ahrar al-Sham. Commenting on the recent escalation in the city, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan only provided vague statements on the need for foreign powers to “continue our discussions.” Coupled with Turkey’s lack of a response to the targeting of an aid convoy outside Aleppo during the now-dead ceasefire, the government in Ankara has markedly changed its previous belligerent tone toward the actions of the regime and Moscow in the country.
Moreover, a well informed western diplomat based in Beirut, who spoke on condition of anonymity, also confirmed the existence of such a deal. “Different officials allied with the Syrian regime confirmed on several occasions the existence of a trade-off deal with Turkey,” the envoy claimed. “None of them revealed the details of the deal; however, they all mentioned that Turkey gave up on Aleppo in exchange for its operations against the Syrian Kurds along the Turkish border in northern Syria. They also mentioned that Turkey asked for a few months in order to distance itself from some rebel groups that are considered radical.”.......
Part 4 After Chicago police officers Shannon Spalding and Danny Echeverria filed a whistleblower lawsuit, retaliation against them only intensified. Chicago Police Bosses Targeted Cops Who Exposed Corruption In autumn of 2012, the code of silence was very much in the news in Chicago. The trial of the civil suit brought against the city by Karolina Obrycka, the bartender struck and kicked by off-duty Officer Anthony Abbate in 2007, was unfolding before a jury in the federal courtroom of Judge Amy St. Eve.....
Robert Parry at ConsortiumNews Most intelligent Americans – Republicans as well as Democrats – now accept that they were duped into the Iraq War with disastrous consequences, but there is more uncertainty about the war on Libya in 2011 as well as the ongoing proxy war on Syria and the New Cold War showdown with Russia over Ukraine. Today, many Democrats don’t want to admit that they have been manipulated into supporting new imperial adventures against Libya, Syria, Ukraine and Russia by the Obama administration as it pulls some of the same propaganda strings that George W. Bush’s administration did in 2002-2003. et, as happened with Saddam Hussein in Iraq, we have seen a similar hysteria about the evil doings of the newly demonized foreign leaders with the predictable Hitler allusions and vague explanations about how some terrible misdeeds halfway around the world threaten U.S. interests.
Though people mostly remember the false WMD claims about Iraq, much of the case for the invasion was based on protecting “human rights,” spreading “democracy,” and eliminating a supporter of Palestinians who were violently resisting Israeli rule.
The justification for aggression against Iraq was not only to save Americans from the supposed risk of Iraq somehow unleashing poison gas on U.S. cities but to free the Iraqis from a brutal dictator, the argument which explained why Bush’s neocon advisers predicted that Iraqis would shower American troops with rose petals and candies.....
Saudis Revealed to the world how savage,brutal, barbaric they are By bombing 3,000 mourners in Sanaa Grand community hall Sat. pic.twitter.com/1ss3IJ1bnx
Jason Ditz at AntiWar Despite Nobel Peace Prize, Obama’s Presidency Defined by Constant War Obama Not the Peacemaker Americans Were Sold in 2008 Election In his 2008 campaign, Barack Obama was, if not particularly ideologically committed, quickly branded as the comparatively antiwar candidate. It wasn’t a hard case to make, with Sen. John McCain (R – AZ) running an intensely pro-war campaign. But Obama’s dubious antiwar bonafides were quickly embraced internationally, where he was heralded as a peacemaker of historical proportions and, in 2009, awarded the Nobel Peace Prize just nine months into his first term in office. He hadn’t really done anything yet, and the prize was seen as an advanced award for the things he was expected to do.
Coming into his last few months in office, these expectations seem in retrospect incredibly wishful thinking, as Obama’s “peacemaking” efforts have been few and far between, and far overshadowed by the non-stop wars he has championed throughout his presidency....
Rahul Manchanda at VeteransNewsNow The Cowardly BRICS Bank Nations (Except Russia) Except for Russia, who appears to be the only nation with balls enough to stand up to the enemy wreaking havoc on the innocents of the world... It seems that with every single day, both the Mainstream and Alternative Media are reporting more and more innocent men, women, children, and little babies being blown to bits by bombs and artillery, or drowning somewhere off the coast in some remote ocean off of North Africa or Southern Europe on their way to flee from the bombed out desperation and horror of NATO’s carpet bombing of Libya, or from Western Intelligence and Saudi Arabia/Turkey/Israel’s proxy group ISIS, and their collective attacks on Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and the Kurds.
With each and every additional single day of this mindless bloodshed, the world watches and wonders why it is being allowed to continue. Why only Russia it seems is defending these people as best as it can, launching defensive strike after strike to counter the insane violence brought on by the United States, and its terrorist proxies ISIS, NATO, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Israel, who are bombing, droning, and murdering the daylights out of tens of millions of innocents, for often what appears to be simply for gold, oil, heroin production, natural gas, total and utter greed.
For all of their pompous braying and photo ops showing a united BRICS Bank paradigm, with toothy grins from ear to ear of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, showcasing all of their leaders Dilma Rousseff, Vladimir Putin, Narendra Modi, Xi Jinping, and Jacob Zuma, respectively, it appears that the only thing these leaders accomplished was a whole lot of nothing, joining hands and making trips to each others’ nations presumably to boast, talk, and offer even more hot air and lavish praise upon one another.....
From Rudaw Russian team proposes federal system in Syria as ‘only way,’ Kurdish officials say ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - A Russian delegation in Syria has told Kurdish and government representatives that establishing a federal system in the country is the only way to prevent Syria's partition, Kurdish diplomats who attended the meeting told Rudaw.
It also suggested that the country’s official name be changed from the Syrian Arab Republic to the Democratic Republic of Syria, the diplomats said.
"Only federalism can preserve Syria's unity as a country," the leader of the Kurdish Left Party in Syria, Salih Gado, told Rudaw, quoting Russian mediator Colonel Oldvornikov Alexandrovich, who is also the commander of Russian forces in Syria.
"The Russian delegation showed strong support for a federal system in the country and had a road-map to achieve that," said Gado, who represented the Kurdish administration at the September 17 meeting at the Hmeymim air base, south of Afrin city.
"I think it could be a historical achievement if it is realized. The Kurdish movement in Syria has not been able to secure such gains in the past 60 years," Gado said.
Russia has showed strong support for Kurdish inclusion in the Geneva talks over the Syrian conflict in March this year. It insisted that any future solution would require Kurdish participation. Moscow also is one of few European capitals that officially hosts a Syrian Kurdish office.
"The future of Syria is no longer in the hands of the government, the opposition or the Kurds. It is decided by the Russians and Americans," Gado said, believing that Moscow has Washington's blessing in establishing the federal system in Syria.
"The Americans do not want to confront Turkey or the Gulf states over Syria's partition, which is why they have delegated this role to the Russians and shown them the green light," Gado added.....
Steven Chovanec at ConsortiumNews Selective Outrage Over Aleppo Bombing The United States is manipulating humanitarian concern in an effort to protect its proxy militias and its imperial regime-change project in Syria. The mainstream media and intellectual classes are dutifully falling in line, promoting a narrative favoring U.S. military aggression under the cover of “protecting civilians.”
Similar arguments contributed to the invasions of Iraq and Libya, exponentially increasing the massacres, chaos and proliferation of violent extremism within those countries. These “responsibility to protect” or R2P claims are hypocritical, designed to further the interests of conquest and domination and will lead to even more death and destruction in Syria. The United States has no stake in the wellbeing of Syrian civilians, despite the condemnations of Russia’s offensive in Aleppo. This is clearly shown in the fact that the people that the U.S. is supporting are guilty of the same crimes that the U.S. accuses Russia and Syria of: indiscriminate attacks, targeting of civilians, destruction of schools, hospitals, etc.
Furthermore, the offensive in Aleppo is really no different from what the U.S. did in Manbij, a Syrian city northeast of Aleppo where the U.S. is said to have incorporated a “scorched earth policy” while liberating the city from ISIS this year by treating the civilian population “as if they were terrorists or ISIS supporters.”
Arguably the U.S. conduct was even worse, as the U.S. earned the distinction of launching the deadliest single airstrike on civilians out of the entire five-year conflict, massacring at least 73 where no ISIS fighters were present. But the Manbij operation elicited no moral outcry from the media and punditry.....
Thierry Meyssan at RealAgenda The United States are not capable of Honouring their Signature After five years of war in Syria, the masks have come off. The publication of the text of the Russo-US agreement reveals the hidden intentions of the two great powers – Washington wants to cut the «Silk Road», while Moscow wants to destroy the jihadists.
Moreover, the failure of this agreement and the Security Council debates demonstrate the surrealist nature of President Obama’s rhetoric – in five years he has not managed to constitute even a minor group of «moderate» opposition, and therefore is unable to field them, contrary to the text of the agreement.
The failure of the Russo-US agreement of 9 September and the Security Council debates which followed have enabled us to confirm several hypotheses.
The current strategic objective of the United States in Syria is indeed to cut the «Silk Road», which China has been preparing for many years. Placing President Xi Jinping in power in May 2013, China has made the restoration of this historic communication route its main goal. However, since China has become the world’s principal producer, Xi has planned to augment it with a «new Silk Road» which will pass through Siberia and Eastern Europe before joining up with the European Union.....
Washington’s regime change machinery has for the time being succeeded in removing an important link in the alliance of large emerging nations by railroading through a Senate impeachment of the duly elected President, Dilma Rousseff. On August 31 her Vice President Michel Temer was sworn in as President. In his first speech as president, the cynical Temer called for a government of “national salvation,” asking for the trust of the Brazilian people. He indicated plans to reform, and has also signaled his intention to overhaul the pension system and labor laws, and cut public spending, all themes beloved of Wall Street banks, of the International Monetary Fund and their Washington Consensus. Now after less than three weeks at the job, Temer has unveiled plans for wholesale privatization of Brazil’s crown jewels, starting with oil. The planned Wall Street rape of Brazil is about to begin.
It’s important to keep in mind that elected President Rousseff was not convicted or even formally charged with any concrete act of corruption, even though the pro-oligarchy mainstream Brazil media, led by O’Globo Group of the billionaire Roberto Irineu Marinho, ran a media defamation campaign creating the basis to ....
Ten Turkish soldiers and eight civilians were killed on Sunday when suspected Kurdish militants detonated a five-ton truck bomb that ripped through a checkpoint near a military outpost in the country’s southeast, the prime minister said.
Another 27 people, including 11 soldiers, were wounded in the blast which hit the Durak gendarmerie station, 20 km (12 miles) from the town of Semdinli, in one of the most deadly attacks in the region of recent times.
The mountainous Hakkari province, where the attack occurred, lies near the border with Iraq and Iran and is one of the main flashpoint areas in a conflict that has pitted Turkey’s army against the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) for 32 years.....
Tunisa, say "hello" to colonizer UK! Lock up your jewels and antiques or else they will very soon wind up in the UK Museum in London
How the Pentagon paid a British PR firm $500 million for top secret Iraq propaganda The Pentagon gave a controversial UK PR firm over half a billion dollars to run a top secret propaganda programme in Iraq, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism can reveal.
Bell Pottinger’s output included short TV segments made in the style of Arabic news networks and fake insurgent videos which could be used to track the people who watched them, according to a former employee.
The agency’s staff worked alongside high-ranking US military officers in their Baghdad Camp Victory headquarters as the insurgency raged outside.
Bell Pottinger's former chairman Lord Tim Bell confirmed to the Sunday Times, which worked with the Bureau on this story, that his firm had worked on a “covert” military operation “covered by various secrecy agreements.”
Bell Pottinger reported to the Pentagon, the CIA and the National Security Council on its work in Iraq, he said.
Bell, one of Britain’s most successful public relations executives, is credited with honing Margaret Thatcher’s steely image and helping the Conservative party win three elections. The agency he co-founded has had a roster of clients including repressive regimes and Asma al-Assad, the wife of the Syrian president. ....
The mafia family
Paul Joseph Watson at InfoWars Exclusive: Hillary Killed Libya Peace Deal Over Personal Vendetta, Claims Whistleblower Gaddafi agreed to hold free elections, but Clinton's refusal led to ISIS takeover, thousands of deaths, international migrant crisis Hillary Clinton personally nixed a peace deal in Libya that would have led to free elections and prevented the country being seized by ISIS, all because of a personal vendetta she had with Muammar Gaddafi, according to explosive new claims made by a whistleblower who personally oversaw the negotiations....
....According to Dr. Paul. General Clark was so pleased with the outcome of the negotiations that he personally arranged a teleconference with Hillary Clinton on the line to congratulate Dr. Paul on “getting the job done in the face of such danger.”
But there was a problem.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton didn’t want peace. She wanted Muammar Gaddafi dead for her own selfish, spiteful reason – the fact that Gaddafi had favored Barack Obama over her own campaign during the 2008 presidential election cycle.....
Wayne Madsen of StrategicCulture George Soros’s False Flag Factories Global hedge fund tycoon and political provocateur George Soros is leading a war of symbols, namely flags and banners either resurrected or conjured up by his myriad non-profit groups, to stir religious, racial, and ethnic tensions the world over. From the Serbian OTPOR! movement and its clenched-fist symbol adopted by protests groups around the world to the menacing black and white flag of the Islamic State, which first appeared during the Soros-backed «Arab Spring» rebellions, Soros’s «false flag» factories have been running at break-neck production speeds.
Soros and his acolytes saw the importance of symbology in the writings of Gene Sharp of the Albert Einstein Institution in Boston, Massachusetts. Although Sharp’s catechism of how to conduct non-violent resistance and revolution has been likened by some political scientists to Mohandas Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, his concepts on upsetting the political status quo appear to be borrowed more from the likes of Mao Zedong, Karl Marx, and Adolf Hitler.
Among Sharp’s necessary tools to conduct political action are «flags and symbolic colors», «slogans, caricatures, and symbols», and «banners, posters, and displayed communications». The «symbolic colors» have been used by Soros- and Central Intelligence Agency-sponsored «color revolutions» in Ukraine (Orange) and Kyrgyzstan (Pink) and attempted color revolutions in Iran (Green), Kuwait (Blue), and Burma (Saffron).
Using the Sharp template and financing from Soros and the CIA-linked National Endowment for Democracy (NED), Symbols were used in the themed Arab Spring revolutions in Tunisia (Jasmine) and Egypt (Lotus) and attempted revolutions in Georgia (Rose), Lebanon (Cedar), Uzbekistan (Cotton), and Moldova (Grape).
It is now more than obvious that Soros and his minions, known as «Sorosites» – a clever play on «parasites» – in the Balkans, contracted with flag factories to churn out banners of former regimes in the uprisings in Libya and Syria. In Libya, the rebels who rose up against Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi in 2011 brandished factory-fresh, still-creased red-black-green horizontal tricolor with the white crescent and star used by the old Libyan monarchy, the regime that Qaddafi overthrew in 1969.....
Fascinating ... and it finally explains why so many followers of Judaism have the same thirst for blood and gore that is a common factor with followers of the wahhabi cult.
There is a historical “eight hundred pound gorilla” lurking in the background of almost every serious military and diplomatic incident involving Israel, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Greece, Armenia, the Kurds, the Assyrians, and some other players in the Middle East and southeastern Europe. It is a factor that is generally only whispered about at diplomatic receptions, news conferences, and think tank sessions due to the explosiveness and controversial nature of the subject. And it is the secretiveness attached to the subject that has been the reason for so much misunderstanding about the current breakdown in relations between Israel and Turkey, a growing warming of relations between Israel and Saudi Arabia, and increasing enmity between Saudi Arabia and Iran…
Although known to historians and religious experts, the centuries-old political and economic influence of a group known in Turkish as the “Dönmeh” is only beginning to cross the lips of Turks, Arabs, and Israelis who have been reluctant to discuss the presence in Turkey and elsewhere of a sect of Turks descended from a group of Sephardic Jews who were expelled from Spain during the Spanish Inquisition in the 16th and 17th centuries. These Jewish refugees from Spain were welcomed to settle in the Ottoman Empire and over the years they converted to a mystical sect of Islam that eventually mixed Jewish Kabbala and Islamic Sufi semi-mystical beliefs into a sect that eventually championed secularism in post-Ottoman Turkey. It is interesting that “Dönmeh” not only refers to the Jewish “untrustworthy converts” to Islam in Turkey but it is also a derogatory Turkish word for a transvestite, or someone who is claiming to be someone they are not.
The Donmeh sect of Judaism was founded in the 17th century by Rabbi Sabbatai Zevi, a Kabbalist who believed he was the Messiah but was forced to convert to Islam by Sultan Mehmet IV, the Ottoman ruler. Many of the rabbi’s followers, known as Sabbateans, but also “crypto-Jews,” publicly proclaimed their Islamic faith but secretly practiced their hybrid form of Judaism, which was unrecognized by mainstream Jewish rabbinical authorities. Because it was against their beliefs to marry outside their sect, the Dönmeh created a rather secretive sub-societal clan.....
At a conference in Mexico today (Sept. 27), the SpaceX founder and CEO unveiled the company's Interplanetary Transport System (ITS), which will combine the most powerful rocket ever built with a spaceship designed to carry at least 100 people to the Red Planet per flight.
If all goes according to plan, the reusable ITS will help humanity establish a permanent, self-sustaining colony on the Red Planet within the next 50 to 100 years, Musk said at the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara.
"What I really want to do here is to make Mars seem possible — make it seem as though it's something that we could do in our lifetimes, and that you can go," he said............
Paul Joseph Watson at InfoWars State Dept. Threatens Terror Attacks in Russia if Moscow Keeps Fighting ISIS "More Russian lives will be lost, more Russian aircraft will be shot down" In extraordinary comments that have gone virtually unnoticed by the media, U.S. State Department spokesman John Kirby threatened Moscow with terror attacks in Russian cities and even shoot downs of Russian jets if Vladimir Putin continued his fight against ISIS in Syria.
“Extremist groups will continue to exploit the vacuums that are there in Syria to expand their operations, which could include attacks against Russian interests, perhaps even Russian cities. Russia will continue to send troops home in body bags, and will continue to lose resources, perhaps even aircraft,” Kirby told reporters at Wednesday’s press briefing, adding that if the war in Syria continues “more Russian lives will be lost, more Russian aircraft will be shot down.”
While the comments will obviously be presented by the media as Kirby claiming that these will be the consequences of Moscow’s involvement in Syria, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova took the remarks as a thinly veiled threat..... “And those [acts of terrorism] will be perpetrated by ‘moderate’ [Syrian opposition groups]?” Zakharova asked in a Facebook post. “Just the ones that Washington has been unable to separate from Al-Nusra for as long as six months?”
“Don’t you think that such ventriloquism about ‘body bags,’ ‘terrorist attacks in Russian cities’ and ‘loss of aircraft,’ sounds more like a ‘get ’em’ command, rather than a diplomatic comment?” she added.
The Russian government deceived itself with its fantasy belief that Russia and Washington had a common cause in fighting ISIS. The Russian government even went along with the pretense that the various ISIS groups operating under various pen names were “moderate rebels” who could be separated from the extremists, all the while agreeing to cease fighting on successive verges of victory so that Washington could resupply ISIS and prepare to introduce US and NATO forces into the conflict. The Russian government apparently also thought that as a result of the coup against Erdogan, which was said to implicate Washington, Turkey was going to cease supporting ISIS and cooperate with Russia.
Alas, the Russians so fervently, or perhaps I should say feverishly, desired an agreement with Washington that they deceived themselves. If Finian Cunningham’s report is correct, Washington has taken advantage of Russia’s urging that Washington and Turkey join in the attack on ISIS by invading northern Syria under the guise of “fighting ISIS.”
Syria has now been partitioned, and the pretend or fake “moderate rebels” can be built up inside the US/Turkish occupied areas of Syria and the war against Syria kept going for as long as Washington wants. The western presstitutes will report that the Turkish/American forces occupying areas of Syria are not invaders but are attacking ISIS.....
Irfan Husain at InformationClearingHouse The Writing on the Wall for Saudi Arabia THE UK has recently announced an extra 37 million pounds in aid to Yemen, taking the total to 100 million pounds for the year. I wonder if Britain’s international aid secretary, Priti Patel, saw the irony in her announcement: last year, the British government approved sales of 3 billion pounds worth of arms to Saudi Arabia. The kingdom has been using weapons bought from the United States and Britain to pound Yemen, the poorest Arab state in the Middle East, to rubble.
As a result of this relentless, if poorly directed, air campaign, over 10,000 people, mostly civilians, have been killed, with hundreds of thousands wounded and millions displaced. The infrastructure, already woefully inadequate, has been largely destroyed. Incompetent Saudi pilots have blown up schools, hospitals and markets with sickening regularity. One study shows that one out of three bombs dropped has hit civilian targets. Around 330,000 homes have been destroyed, along with some 684 mosques, 630 schools and other educational institutes and 250 health facilities. According to the UN World Food Programme, the population in nearly half of the country’s 22 provinces faces starvation.
It would seem that after more than a year of slaughter and wanton destruction, some people in the West have discovered their conscience, and have begun asking questions about their governments’ complicity in the Saudi-led carnage in which the UAE has been a junior partner. This bombing campaign has been actively supported by the UK and the US, with both supplying intelligence and targeting data. American mid-air refuelling tankers have extended the range and flight time over victims of the coalition air fleet.
A recent move in the US Senate to halt arms supplies to Saudi Arabia was defeated 71 to 27. While the outcome was predictable, the fact that 27 senators voted for the proposal is significant, given the millions the kingdom spends on lobbying and public relations in Washington. Five of the US capitol’s top lobbying and PR firms are on lucrative Saudi contracts. The objective of all this spin is to change the focus of the American perspective from the kingdom’s appalling human rights record to its usefulness as an ally in a troubled Middle East.
"The Syrian Army intercepted a conversation between the Americans and Daesh before the air raid on Deir ez-Zor", Hadiya Khalaf Abbas said as quoted by the Al Mayadeen broadcaster....
From Moon Of Alabama ...Abu al-Ezz, commander, says about Jabhat al-Nusra (al-Qaeda): "We are one part of al-Qaeda. Our principles are: Fighting vice, pureness and security. Our affairs and our way have changed. Israel, for example, is now supporting us, because Israel is at war with Syria and with Hizbullah.
America also changed its opinion about us. Originally "IS" and us were one group. But "IS" was used in the interests of big states like America, for political reasons, and was steered away from our principles. It became clear to us that most of their leaders work with secret security services. We, Jabhat al-Nusra, have our own way. In the past they with us, they were our supporters.
Our aim is the downfall of the dictatorial regime, the tyrannical regime, the regime of the apostate. Our aim is the conduct of conquests, like [the great Arab general] Khaled ibn al-Walid made them. First in the Arab world and then in Europe."
Part 2 - The Interview by Jürgen Todenhöfer with the rebel commander Abu al-Ezz
Jürgen Todenhöfer: How is the relation between you and the United States? Does the U.S. support the rebels?
Abu al-Ezz: Yes, the U.S. support the opposition, but not directly. They support the countries which support us. But we are not yet satisfied with this support. They should support us with highly developed weapons. We have won battles thanks to the "TOW" missiles. We reached a balance with the regime through these missiles. We received the tanks from Libya through Turkey. Also the "BMs" - multiple rocket launchers. The regime excels us only with their fighter jets, missiles and missile launchers. We captured a share of its missile launchers and a large share came from abroad. But it is through the American "TOW" that we have the situation in some regions under control.
To whom did the U.S. hand those missiles before they were brought to you? Were those missiles first given to the Free Syrian Army by the U.S. and from there to you?
No, the missiles were give directly to us. They were delivered to a certain group. When the "road" was closed and we were besieged we had officers here from Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States.
What did those officers do?
Experts! Experts for the use of satellites, missiles, reconnaissance work, thermal surveillance cameras ...
A recording has emerged of a February 1979 meeting of many of the leading U.S. LSD (and other hallucinogens) researchers and promoters at the Beverly Hills home of Oscar Janiger, M.D., a psychiatrist and early LSD researcher. Among those present were the “pioneers” of the early research work with the drug. The host of the meeting, quack (((Dr. Oscar Janiger))), introduced LSD to more than 1,500 people, including artists, famous writers and many of the entertainment industry’s elite.
Others meeting attendees included LSD researcher and “spokesman” (((Sidney Cohen)))), as well as Humphrey Osmond, who so aptly named this powerful class of psycho-active agents when he proposed the term “psychedelic” before the New York Academy of Sciences in 1956. Dr. Osmond was recruited in 1952 by Allen Dulles to play a prominent role in the MKUltra project. He was closely associated with psychiatrist (((Abram Hoffer))), who experimented with patients using psychedelics.....
Stephanie DeSimone, widow, whose husband was killed at the Pentagon offices on 9/11, becomes the first to sue Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are marinated in wahabism, a deadly cult whose members we see headchopping and liver-eating in Syria. Worst of all, the Saudi government is the main cultivator of the cult....so of course, it is the right thing to sue this country for the plague of wahabism-related terrorism, each and every act is traced back to the wahabi doctrine. Come on the rest of you ... what are you waiting for? Satisfied with the $2M Obama says has been given to each of the victims' families? Don't you want to make a statement by filing lawsuits against the country responsible for the death of your loved ones.
Despite warnings from Saudi Arabia of ‘“disastrous consequences” from a United States law allowing 9/11 victims to sue the Kingdom, a 9/11 widow has become the first person to file a lawsuit against KSA.
Stephanie DeSimone was two months pregnant when her husband, Navy Commodore Patrick Dunn, was killed at the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. Only two days after the Congress passed the law, DeSimone filed a lawsuit against Saudi Arabia claiming the Kingdom is partially responsible for her husband’s death.
DeSimone alleged that Saudi Arabia provided material support to al Qaeda for more than a decade, mindful of the terror group’s plan to attack the US.
Impact of 9/11 victims’ families lawsuit against Saudi Arabia
“Absent the support provided by the Kingdom, al Qaeda would not have possessed the capacity to conceive, plan, and execute the September 11 attacks,” the documents read.
According to the lawsuit, the plaintiffs – which include DeSimone’s daughter – suffered “severe and permanent personal injuries” and seek unspecified compensation......
One has to pay for one's sins - sooner than later. By conspiring with foreign powers to do the dirty on its neighbour Syria, Erdogan+gang sided with the dying US Empire, an empire well-known to push unwanted allies under the bus once they have successfully accomplished the Empire's bidding. US/UK/Israel/KSA/France has no more use for Erdogan. The division of Syria is well under way and now it's time to start the division of Turkey, a NATO member, the strongest and mightiest NATO member after the US.
Whether the coup attempt was USA-engineered or Erdogan's ingenious chess move, makes no difference now. Erdogan's Turkey is on the way out. So... let's keep track and see how many years it will take. Just as US+gang smuggled WMDs to the enemies of Syria's Assad, I very much suspect that the same gang must have already laid down the groundwork for similar scenario in Turkey. Wait, watch and see the unfolding of events as time goes by.
The coming civil war in Turkey - some of the apparent evidence of it given below from events that took place in September 2016.
Seven soldiers martyred, 21 injured in SE Turkey operation More than 100 terrorists killed in operation against PKK terrorists in southeastern Hakkari province Seven soldiers were martyred and 21 others injured in an operation against the PKK terrorist organization in Turkey's southeastern Hakkari province on Saturday, the Turkish General Staff announced.
The official statement revised upwards earlier unofficial figures from military sources, who had said three soldiers were martyred and 20 injured in Hakkari's Cukurca district.
The statement added that the injured soldiers were taken to hospital, and more than 100 terrorists were killed in the ongoing operation on Saturday.
Clashes between PKK terrorists and Turkish Armed Forces in Cukurca started at 6.45 a.m. (0345GMT) early Saturday, the military sources said earlier, speaking on condition of anonymity due to restrictions on talking to the media.
Additionally the clashes were reported to be ongoing in the area.....
Turkey now on the offensive against PKK, PM says Turkey has entered a new phase in its counter-terror fight following the July 15 failed coup attempt, and will now be on the offensive, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Sunday, pointing to a number of differences in the measures that will be taken to fight the PKK terrorists.
Speaking during a surprise visit to the 2nd Border Brigade Command in southeastern Çukurca district, Yildirim said that Turkey will target 10-12 PKK positions where the terrorists are mostly situated in.
The prime minister highlighted that Turkey will now be on the offensive, will find and destroy all terrorists....
Turkish police detain 40 over links with Islamic State Turkish counter-terror police detained 40 foreign nationals in raids in Istanbul over their suspected links with Islamic State, Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency reported on Sunday.
Police carried out simultaneous raids to 23 addresses in Istanbul's conservative Fatih district detaining suspects from Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Azerbaijan, Anadolu said.
Some suspects are identified as having gone to the conflict areas inside Syria several times, Anadolu said.....
The soldiers were taking part in the "Euphrates Shield" military operation against the Islamic State (IS) when either a landmine or an improvised explosive device (IED) detonated under their feet.
The two men were rushed to a Turkish hospital across the border, where they were pronounced dead.
The explosion occurred in an area between the cities of Jarabulus and al-Rai, to the north of Aleppo province and near the Syrian border with Turkey.
A total of 10 Turkish soldiers have died since the launch of Operation "Euphrates Shield" on Aug. 24.
The Turkish Armed Forces said Monday in a statement that they had attacked 760 IS-held targets since the start of the land operation, during which 900 square kilometers (347.5 square miles) of territory have been "liberated from terrorists.".....
Blast kills 3 soldiers in southeast Turkey Kurdish militants suspected after roadside explosive hits bus An explosion ripped through a bus carrying military personnel in Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast on Monday, killing three soldiers and wounding eight, hospital and security sources said.
Suspected Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants detonated an explosive device that had been planted in the road, security sources said.
There were no immediate claims of responsibility for the attack on a busy route between the towns of Derik and Kiziltepe in Mardin province, which borders Syria....
