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Showing posts with label kuwait. Show all posts
Showing posts with label kuwait. Show all posts

Wednesday, January 8, 2020

Some of my tweets from Jan 1, 2020 to Jan 8, 2020




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Monday, November 26, 2018

"America, Come Home" ... says an anti-war activist, but to no avail


Quite an eye-opener ... especially to those of us who opened our eyes to the dirty world of politics after 9/11.  While reading his article, let us also wish Justin Raimondo is quick and full recovery.
 

America, Come Home

Justin is recuperating from cancer treatment and under the weather for the next few days. However, we are able to offer some of his “best of” words here – the following columns are remarkably prescient, and, indeed, might have been written – why – yesterday! We at Antiwar.com have been monitoring the world and reporting since before 9/11/ 2001 – since before some of our readers were even born! So, here, we invite you to take a scary ride on the Justin Raimondo Way-Back Machine.

This morning’s [March 27, 2001] New York Times has yet another story about the developing split within the Bush administration over foreign policy, with the partisans of Donald Rumsfeld, unreconstructed cold warrior, versus Colin Powell’s (relatively) noninterventionist State Department. As is usual with the arbiter of the conventional wisdom, the Times defined the two camps in terms of “ideological conservatives” versus “moderates,” with the former allied with Rumsfeld and the latter partial to Powell. But in the post-cold war world, these categories make no sense at all: with the Soviet Union a fading nightmare, and America’s status as the last superpower left standing, the cold war paradigm simply does not apply. There is nothing inherently “conservative” in a policy of perpetual war for perpetual peace: indeed, it seems like the sort of wild-eyed radicalism that energized the Napoleonic foreign policy of the French Revolution – the very antithesis of conservatism – and hardly a force for stability and the preservation of traditional values. But the Times has a natural predilection for mischaracterizing conservatives, for reasons too obvious to state, and, in any case, the right is very divided on foreign policy. Some, like Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz, his neoconservative Svengali, seek to impose an American hegemony on the world, or most of it, and take great pride in a stubborn unilaterialism – even if it means a probable failure to reach their ostensible objectives (containing Saddam Hussein, avoiding all-out war in the Balkans, reducing the threat of a nuclear war, etc.). These ideologues are usually tagged with the term “neoconservative” as if to acknowledge, at least on some level, that this dogma of radical interventionism represents a revision – I would contend a complete reversal – of the original. But, as much as they would like to believe it, the neocons are not the whole show.

A DISSENTING MAJORITY
Others on the right have dissented from this would-be orthodoxy. The collapse of communism, the end of the cold war, and the troubling rise of threatening trends on the home front have all soured grassroots conservatives on the alleged necessity for the US to intervene on a global scale. Pat Buchanan’s critique of Western hubris has garnered considerable support on the right, even if his recent race for the White House did not, as conservatives wake up to the startling and darkly disturbing insight that the enemy is not in any foreign capital, but right here at home. These rightists, faced with the choice of bombing either Baghdad or Washington D.C., would more than likely choose the latter. Llewellyn H. Rockwell, the president of the Mises Institute; Donald J. Devine and David Keene, of the American Conservative Union; and of course the indefatigable scholars over at the Cato Institute, that bastion of libertarianism in the Beltway – all have proffered important critiques of the cold warrior-neoconservative stance, and their views more faithfully reflect the opinions of grassroots activists than the Beltway conservative ‘generals’ intent on re-fighting the cold war.

‘WORLD HEGEMONY’ OR BUST
The Kosovo war was a watershed for many grassroots conservatives: for the first time they began to see the actions of their government as not merely mistaken, but evil. They also began to see, with a new clarity, the domestic uses of our interventionist foreign policy, as Clinton bombed an aspirin factory in the Sudan to get Monica off the front pages. This revulsion at the policies of the most interventionist President since Teddy Roosevelt began to translate, after a while, into a broad criticism of interventionism in general............

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Sunday, November 12, 2017

Corbett talks to Sharmine Narwani on the Mid East fiascos produced and directed by the usual chaos creators


This is a "must watch" analysis on the goings on in the Middle East.






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Friday, August 4, 2017

A couple of items on the ongoing saga between Qatar and other wahhabi nations


It doesn't take long to shift sides in times of war.  Anything can happen at any time. Today's allies can become tomorrow's deadly enemies.  One has to only look back at WWII or even further to see how mercurial most alliances between countries can become at a moment's notice.


From DailyStar
Qatar launches wide-ranging WTO complaint against trade boycott
Qatar filed a wide-ranging legal complaint at the World Trade Organization on Monday to challenge a trade boycott by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and United Arab Emirates, Qatar's WTO representative Ali Alwaleed al-Thani told Reuters.

By formally "requesting consultations" with the three countries, the first step in a trade dispute, Qatar triggered a 60 day deadline for them to settle the complaint or face litigation at the WTO and potential retaliatory trade sanctions....

From DailyStar
Deep pockets and a five-year lead time are keeping Qatar’s dream
 of hosting football’s 2022 World Cup from turning into a boycott-battered nightmare.

A four-nation embargo led by Saudi Arabia has cut off Qatar construction materials it was counting on to build at least eight stadiums, lay dozens of miles of rail work and erect a brand new city before the world’s most-watched sporting event. But as the diplomatic and commercial boycott approaches its third month, the gas-rich nation says it is casting further abroad and laying out more cash than planned to replace suppliers that live next door.

Malaysian steel is replacing Saudi. Oman will provide materials originally ordered from the UAE, they say. China is stepping into the breach with dozens of products, and even Qatar is suddenly erecting facilities to build bleachers. Some suppliers from boycotting nations are rerouting shipments through Omani ports.

“For every challenge that we face, there are solutions that keep popping up,” Hassan al-Thawadi, secretary-general of the Qatar World Cup Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy, said in an interview in Doha. “We are working with our contractors to make sure we actually deliver long-term supply chain solutions and alternatives.” Neither he nor analysts ventured estimates for the cost overruns........
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Saturday, July 1, 2017

The Qatar crisis: Origins and Consequences


This is one way of looking at it.  There are countless others on which we will never really get a firm grip cuz it's tough to understand how cavemen minds are wired.


Posted by MariaS at 15:58 0 comments
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Sunday, January 15, 2017

Some News, Views and Opinions from the Alternative Media ... week ending Sunday January 15


Peter Korzun at GlobalResearch
Poland Will Do it for Us? Poland Acquires First Strike Capability to Pose Threat to Russia

It should be noted that quite often the most interesting arms contracts escape media attention. That’s how it was in 2016. Signing a multi-billion-dollar military aid package between the United States and Israel and the subsequent White House approval for long-awaited fighter sales to the Middle East hit the radar screen.

In late September, the US approved the sales of Boeing fighters worth a total of around $7 billion to Kuwait and Qatar. First mooted around two years ago, the deals had been held up by the US government due to Israeli concerns and in order to smooth the way for nuclear talks with Iran.

The same month, a $38-billion Israeli arms package over the next 10 years – the largest of its kind ever – was finalized and signed.

The news about those contacts was a real scoop hitting the headlines of all mainstream media outlets. In late November, the State Department approved another transaction- the acquisition of 70 AGM-158B JASSM-ER (extended range) missiles for Poland. The deal undeservedly failed to attract much attention. In fact, it matters much and changes a lot.

The prospects for the acquisition of the extended range version were discussed as far back as 2014. The US obviously procrastinated due to political considerations. The decision to make the deal go through makes Poland the first state outside the United States to acquire the JASSM-ER.

In 2014, Poland signed a contract to procure the JASSM AGM-158A version for its F-16C/D jets. The stealth missile is designed to destroy ground targets at distances 370+km (230 mi). As of 2014, the JASSM had also entered service in Australia and Finland.

The 370 km is a great range for the purpose of self-defense. But Poland badly wanted strategic conventional first strike capability. With the JASSM-ER deal reached, its dream has come true. Using a more efficient engine and larger fuel volume in an airframe with the .....




Charles Hugh-Smith at ZeroHedge (Plenty of informative graphs)
Dear Self-Proclaimed "Progressives"... You're As Evil As The Neocon-Neoliberal Empire You've Enabled

Submitted by Charles Hugh-Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

Sorry, pal, you're evil. Self-righteous indignation counts for nothing in the strict accounting of real progressivism.

Dear Self-Proclaimed "Progressive": I love you, man, but it has become necessary to intervene in your self-destruction. Your ideological blinders and apologies for the Establishment's Neocon-Neoliberal Empire are not just destroying your credibility, they're destroying the nation and everywhere the Empire intervenes....

...You embraced the Corporate Media's absurd "fake news" witch-hunt, when the biggest purveyors of fake news/Imperial Propaganda are the "liberal" media you unhesitatingly believe with all your heart because it reinforces your sense of moral superiority. Never mind that the mainstream "liberal" media is owned by corporations that are in bed with the Establishment and the Empire.

You were silent when your "progressive" president engaged in a global Murder, Inc., and your former secretary of state bragged "we came, we saw, he died."Your  sputtering excuses for Imperial over-reach, extra-judicial murder and the destruction and displacement of entire populations is a travesty of a mockery of a sham of real Progressivism.....




Ben Norton at Alternet
U.S.-backed Saudi War in Yemen Fuels 'Largest Food Security Emergency in the World'

U.S.-backed bombing has killed thousands of Yemenis and pushed millions to the brink of famine.
A prominent famine monitor created by the U.S. government has acknowledged that the U.S.-backed war in Yemen has fueled the "largest food security emergency in the world." And acording to its analysis, the catastrophic situation only continues to get worse.

Since March 2015, the U.S. has supported a Saudi-led coalition that has bombed Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East. With tens of billions of dollars worth of American and British weapons, more than 1,000 refueling sorties by U.S. planes and intelligence and guidance from the American and British militaries, Saudi Arabia has carried out thousands of airstrikes, at least one-third of which have struck civilian sites.

The Western-backed, Saudi-led coalition has also intentionally targeted food production and the agricultural sector in its bombing campaign in Yemen, in what a leading expert has described as a "scorched-earth strategy."....

Lizzie Phelan on Israel's attack on Syria's military airport


Brandon Turbeville at ActivistPost
Grand Mufti of Syria dismantles religious crisis lie
While most Americans are force fed propaganda and misinformation about virtually every country outside their own borders (including the country in which they live) Syria has been a particular target of the corporate press. In fact, so much propaganda and lies have been spread regarding Syria and the crisis unfolding there that the average person glued to Fake News outlets like CNN, FOX, and MSNBC could scarcely recite one fact about the country correctly.

One such propaganda narrative is the lie that the Syrian crisis is sectarian in nature and that the country was plagued by religious tension and division before the war began. Neither of these claims were the case and, five years into the NATO imperialist war effort, Syrians are as united as they have ever been.

Americans under the false impression of Syria and Syrians as well as religion in Syria might be surprised to hear from the religious leaders of the country who have denounced the violence and who have expressed nothing but compassion, understanding, and unity with Muslims, Christians, Jews and those of all other faiths....

From SyrianNews
Top Opposition Figure Nawaf al-Bashir Repents and Returns to Syria

Sheikh Nawaf al-Bashir, the highest figure in the western fabricated opposition in Syria, the chief of Baggara Tribe in northeast Syria, returned to Damascus and declared his loyalty to the Syrian people, the Syrian leadership and praised the Syrian Arab Army and put himself under the command of the Syrian president Dr. Bashar Al-Assad.

With 1.2 million tribesmen and women in his Der Ezzor base, he left them behind and joined the ranks of makeshift opposition individuals convinced by Qatari officials that the days of the ‘regime’ are numbered and if they defect now they’ll reserve a place for them in the future Syria. Some were bribed with tens of millions of dollars, others were seduced with leading post-Assad posts, and the vast majority who couldn’t be bought or deceived were intimidated, only few fell for any of those.....

From RT
Venezuelan court overrides opposition parliament’s ‘impeachment’ of President Maduro

 Venezuela’s Supreme Court has annulled parliament’s resolution aimed at ousting President Nicolas Maduro. The Court ordered them to stop the “political trial” against the president, since it is not within its constitutional authority.

In a statement issued Monday, the high court reaffirmed its position previously expressed in ruling number 948 of the Constitutional Chamber dated November 15, 2016, in which it ordered the country’s parliament to “refrain from continuing the procedure of declaring ‘political responsibility’ against the president of the Republic,” as cited by AFP.

It also ordered the legislature to refrain from making decisions that are outside its legislative authority.....




Robert David Steele at GlobalResearch
The Soft Coup Collapses – CIA Bluffing, Russia Did Not Hack, Blackmail Revealed – What Next?

CIA was bluffing, produced no evidence – Russians did not “hack” the election. Is this the beginning of the end of the Deep State in the USA? Can Trump clean house & wage peace?....

....Below is my formal evaluation of the five deep failures by the US IC in this report – it is a political report lacking in professional merit.

01 The report fails to provide evidence against the Russian state. The report assumes, against all publicly known information, that Guccifer, a Romanian taxi driver with a track record of success despite antiquated equipment, was a controlled asset of the Russian state. The report, in a most unprofessional, clearly partisan political manner, does not mention any of the many credible sources clearly stating that insiders did the leaking.

In UPDATE 17 of my 30 December 2016 post I list and link to 29 different individuals – including Barack Obama as saying the Russians did not hack the election. When Obama said this (in November 2016) he was not aware that the Deep State planned to persist with the narrative in an attempt to overthrow the Electoral College with false testimony – the equivalent in the USA of jury tampering, a very serious offense. They might have succeeded, had many of us not spoken up and reinforced the common sense of the majority of electors, who ultimately realized there was no evidence being presented.

02 The report is completely lacking in responsible context, which is to say, it deliberately represents Russia as the only state engaged in cyber-espionage and information operations (IO) intended to influence the outcome of the US election. The report is devoid of much needed attention to the far greater covert operations of Israel, inclusive of collaborative operations with Facebook and Google that censored critical commentary and manipulated search results so that searches for Clinton + Crime become Clinton + Love and searches for Trump became Trump + Hitler.  Eric Schmidt and Marc Zuckerberg have much to answer for, as do the Rothchilds – particularly Lynn Rothschild – as well as George Soros and other Jewish influencers including those who stole vast sums from Russia. The report naturally fails to observe that the National Security Agency (NSA) has been spying on (and to some extent blackmailing) many if not all Members of the US Congress as well as President Barack Obama, while CIA has been actively spying on selected Members and selected computers, an activity for which Director John Brennan was censured in September 2014.

03 There is no discussion whatever .....

From AgaKhanMuseum, Toronto
A Pearl in the Desert: Palmyra’s Multicultural Society

Thursday, January 26, 1 pm
Free with Museum Admission
Join archaeologist and Ancient Middle East specialist Clemens Reichel in an illustrated journey through the magnificent architecture and rich multicultural history of Palmyra....


Pam Martens and Russ Martens at WallStreetOnParade
Here’s How Goldman Sachs Became the Overlord of the Trump Administration

During his political campaign, Donald Trump repeatedly railed against Wall Street with a specific focus on Goldman Sachs. .....
...How did a candidate who repeatedly demonized Goldman Sachs as the poster child for a corrupt establishment that owned Washington end up with Goldman Sachs’ progeny filling every post that even tangentially has the odor of money or global finance? One answer is family ties; another may be something darker.

Trump’s non-stop nominations and appointments of Goldman Sachs alumni have left his supporters stunned. Trump nominated Steven Mnuchin, a 17-year veteran of Goldman Sachs to be his Treasury Secretary. Stephen Bannon, another former Goldman Sachs banker, was named by Trump as his Chief Strategist in the White House. The sitting President of Goldman Sachs, Gary Cohn, has been named by Trump as Director of the National Economic Council, which, according to its website, coordinates “policy-making for domestic and international economic issues.”  Last week, in a move that stunned even Wall Street, Trump nominated a Goldman Sachs outside lawyer, Jay Clayton of Sullivan & Cromwell, to serve as Wall Street’s top cop as Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. Adding to the slap in the face to Trump’s working class supporters, Clayton’s wife currently works as a Vice President at Goldman Sachs.

But the Goldman Sachs’ ties don’t stop there.

When Alexander Blankfein, .....




Nick Turse at TomDispatch
Tomgram: Nick Turse, Special Ops, Shadow Wars, and the Golden Age of the Gray Zone 

Don’t think the fad for “draining the swamp” began on the campaign trail with Donald Trump.  It didn’t, although the “swamp” to be drained in the days after the 9/11 attacks wasn’t in Washington; it was a global one.  Of course, that’s ancient history, more than 15 years old.  Who even remembers that moment, though we still live with its fallout -- with the hundreds of thousands dead and the millions of refugees, with Islamophobia and ISIS, with President-elect Trump, retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, and so much more?

In the never-ending wake of one of the most disastrous wars in American history, the 2003 invasion and occupation of Iraq, it’s hard to imagine any world but the one we have, which makes it easy to forget what the top officials of the Bush administration thought they would accomplish with their “Global War on Terror.”  Who remembers now just how quickly and enthusiastically they leapt into the project of draining that global swamp of terror groups (while taking out the Taliban and then “decapitating” the Iraqi regime of Saddam Hussein)?  Their grandiose goal: an American imperium in the Greater Middle East (and later assumedly a global Pax Americana). They were, in other words, geopolitical dreamers of the first order.

Barely a week after 9/11, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was already swearing that the global campaign to come would "drain the swamp they live in."  Only a week later, at a NATO meeting, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz insisted that, "while we'll try to find every snake in the swamp, the essence of the strategy is draining the swamp [itself]."  By the following June, in a commencement address at West Point, President George W. Bush would speak proudly of his administration’s desire to drain that swamp of “terror cells” in a staggering “60 or more countries.”

Like Washington for Donald Trump, it proved .....

George Galloway on Israeli spy in UK



From MidEastOnline
Thousands mark Jesus baptism at historic Jordan site

Thousands of Catholic Christians attend special mass at the Jordan River, in annual pilgrimage to the site where many believe Jesus was baptised.
AMMAN - Thousands of Catholic Christians attended a special mass Friday on the Jordanian side of the Jordan River in an annual pilgrimage to the site where many believe Jesus was baptised.

Before the ceremony started, dozens of priests walked to the river and filled jugs with water as scouts played traditional music.

The priests were led by Archbishop Pierbattista Pizzaballa, apostolic administrator of the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem.

More than 4,000 pilgrims packed the "church of the baptism", west of the Jordanian capital Amman and near the Dead Sea, a photographer said.

During the ceremony the priests dipped their fingers in the water they drew from the Jordan River and used it to bless the congregation, emulating the baptism of Jesus....

Real News Network talks to Rania Khalek


From MoonOfAlabama
The Deep State Versus Donald Trump - New Smears And The Ukrainian Connection

UPDATED (3x) (at end of original)

As remarked on January 6:

    When Hillary Clinton was defeated in the U.S. presidential election the relevant powers launched a campaign to delegitimize the President elect Donald Trump.

    The ultimate aim of the cabal is to kick him out of office and have a reliable replacement, like the Vice-President elect Pence, take over. Should that not be possible it is hoped that the delegitimization will make it impossible for Trump to change major policy trajectories especially in foreign policy. A main issue here is the reorientation of the U.S. military complex and its NATO proxies from the war of terror towards a direct confrontation with main powers like Russia and China.

The deep state campaign against Trump opened new grounds today with the publication of completely fake and thereby unverifiable anonymous assertions which include the smear that Trump had some fun in a Moscow hotel and that Russian secret services is using that to manipulate him.

Like many smears against Trump via proxies of the Clinton presidential campaign these new ones seem to origin from Ukraine related sources and Ukrainian "nationalist" (aka fascist) putsch supporters.

The new assertions about Trump come in 35 pages of "reports" by an anonymous (claimed) former British intelligence operator working for a private U.S. company with dates ranging from June 20 2016 to December 13 2016. They say that Russia has some tapes of Trump watching sex games in 2013, they claim that Trump campaign officials coordinated the Clinton campaign leaks with Russia and that the Russian President Putin was highly involved in all of this.

Here is how the claimed former intelligence operator typically describes his sources in these "reports":.............


George Galloway on Trump and Russia


F William Engdahl at Journal Neo
Is Trump the Back Door Man for Henry A. Kissinger & Co?

The term Back Door Man has several connotations. In the original blues song written by Willie Dixon, it refers to a man having an affair with a married woman, using the back door to flee before the husband comes home. During the Gerald Ford Presidency, Back Door Man was applied to Dick Cheney as Ford’s White House Chief of Staff and his “skills” at getting what he wanted through opaque means. More and more as Cabinet choices are named, it looks like the entire Trump Presidency project is emerging as Henry A. Kissinger’s “Back Door Man,” in the Cheney meaning of the term.

Long forgotten is Trump’s campaign rhetoric about draining the swamp. In October during his campaign candidate Trump issued a press release stating, “Decades of special interest dealing must come to an end. We have to break the cycle of corruption…It is time to drain the swamp in Washington, D.C…That is why I am proposing a package of ethics reforms to make our government honest once again.”

So far, the President-elect has already named more billionaires to cabinet and other top posts than any other president in US history–Betsy DeVos of the AmWay fortune as Education Secretary, Wilbur Ross as Commerce Secretary, Linda McMahon as Small Business Administrator, and Vincent Viola, as Army Secretary. That’s not including Trump himself as a putative billionaire.

Then in terms of the vested special interests of Wall Street, Goldman Sachs has a huge power in the new Administration. Goldman Sachs partner Steven Mnuchin is Trump’s nominee for US Treasury Secretary. Goldman Sachs President Gary Cohn will be his top White House Economic Adviser. Anthony Scaramucci, Presidential Transition Team Executive Committee member, is a former Goldman Sachs banker as well as Steve Bannon, Trump’s chief strategist and Senior Counselor.

We add to that assemblage no fewer than four US military generals representing the most corrupt military industrial complex in world history: as Secretary of Defense retired General James “Mad Dog” Mattis, Board member since retiring of major defense contractor General Dynamics; retired Lt. General Mike Flynn, with his own consulting firm, as his National Security Adviser and retired General John F. Kelly as Secretary of Homeland Security.

Add to this collection the naming of Rex Tillerson the CEO of ExxonMobil, the largest oil multinational of the United States, as Secretary of State; the ex-Governor of Texas, America’s largest oil producing state, Rick Perry, as Secretary of Energy, along with pro-shale energy Oklahoma Attorney General, Scott Pruitt to be head of the Environmental Protection Agency, and certain dramatic economic policy flips begin to emerge compared with the previous hapless Presidency.....




Gareth Porter at ConsortiumNews
Pushing for a Lucrative New Cold War

The New Cold War promises untold riches for the Military-Industrial Complex, causing hawks inside the Obama administration to push for more hostilities with Russia, as in a Syrian case study dissected by Gareth Porter for Truthdig...

Airstrikes by the United States and its allies against two Syrian army positions Sept. 17 killed at least 62 Syrian troops and wounded dozens more. The attack was quickly treated as a non-story by the U.S. news media; U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) claimed the strikes were carried out in the mistaken belief that Islamic State forces were being targeted, and the story disappeared....

On Snowden


Dr Ron Paul
Will Obama’s ‘Good War’ in Afghanistan Continue? 

Last week, as the mainstream media continued to obsess over the CIA’s evidence-free claim that the Russians hacked the presidential election, President Obama quietly sent 300 US Marines back into Afghanistan’s Helmand Province. This is the first time in three years that the US military has been sent into that conflict zone, and it represents a final failure of Obama’s Afghanistan policy. The outgoing president promised that by the end of his second term, the US military would only be present in small numbers and only on embassy duty. But more than 8,000 US troops will remain in Afghanistan as he leaves office.

When President Obama was first elected he swore that he would end the US presence in Iraq (the “bad” war) and increase US presence in Afghanistan (the “good” war). He ended up increasing troops to both wars, while the situation in each country continued to deteriorate.

Why are the Marines needed in the Helmand Province? Because although the foolish and counterproductive 15-year US war in Afghanistan was long ago lost, Washington cannot face this fact. Last year the Taliban controlled 20 percent of the province. This year they control 85 percent of the province. So billions more must be spent and many more lives will be lost.

Will these 300 Marines somehow achieve what the 2011 peak of 100,000 US soldiers was not able to achieve? Will this last push “win” the war? Hardly! The more the president orders military action in Iraq and Afghanistan, the worse it gets. In 2016, for example, President Obama dropped 1,337 bombs on Afghanistan, a 40 percent increase from 2015. According to the United Nations, in 2016 there were 2,562 conflict-related civilian deaths and 5,835 injuries. And the Taliban continues to score victories over the Afghan puppet government.

The interventionists in Washington continue to run our foreign policy regardless of who is elected. They push for wars, they push for regime change, then they push for billions to reconstruct the bombed-out countries. ........

Ron Paul
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Tuesday, October 11, 2016

On the USA/UK supplied WMDs to KSA which resulted in the bombing of a funeral parlour killing and wounding close to a 1000 Yemeni mourners and those who came to their rescue




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.

At least 155 people died with local reports putting the number of casualties at around 700; the Yemeni government initially confirmed more than 500. The Yemeni division of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) said they had treated over 400 people at local hospitals.....


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....
Posted by MariaS at 17:23 0 comments
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Thursday, May 26, 2016

As the MSM is deaf and blind, the cries of Yemenis are only heard on Twitter


This is the most under-reported war of total and utter misery wrought on innocent Yeminis and the reason it is hardly spoken about, leave alone any "jounalist" writing about it, is BECAUSE the USA and UK are both making tonnes of $s from selling cluster bombs and other weapons of mass destruction to the Saudis+gang coalition.

This is our world of today.  Yet, there are multitudes of the sheeple who still insist the West is helping to bring "democracy" to the people their bombs are shattering into pieces. The doublespeak is beyond what you read about in Orwell's "1984"

















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Monday, October 19, 2015

The callousness and heartlessness of the western MSM in ignoring the ongoing genocide in Yemen ...


is beyond vomit-inducing.  The genocide is being committed by the coalition of  KSA and other Sunni  govt governing states of Qatar, UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, Sudan and if rumors are to be believed, Pakistan is also involved. This coalition is operating under the good graces of the American war machine - make no mistake about that.  The silence of the North American media as well as the largely silent European media  should be enough to tell you that the US influence on the media is dark and dangerous and does not bode well for the ordinary mortals of this world of ours.
Latest news (see vid at bottom) seem to indicate that the Houthis have started targeting areas deep into Saudi Arabia.  I take that as a good sign.

Samuel Oakford writing at ViceNews:
'All We Could Find Were Body Parts': America's Role in Yemen's Civilian Carnage

On the morning of September 28, two families gathered in the southwestern Yemeni village of Wahija for the wedding of a young couple.

Dozens of women were inside a large wooden structure owned by the family of the groom, Merssal Mosaibas, helping to prepare for the festivities. A few male relatives and guests, both men and boys, were outside.

At about 9:30am, the familiar roar of Saudi-led coalition jets was heard overhead. Some people fled as the planes approached, fearing an attack, but many women and children remained inside. Bombs started falling shortly after 10am, the first striking near where the men had gathered. The structure, held up by tree branches and covered with a tarp, was obliterated minutes later. Mosaibas was nearby, but survived the attack; his bride, Hanen Makhrama, had not arrived yet from her nearby village.

The women and children inside the structure, however, were killed.

Wedding guest Shadi Taha told VICE News over the phone that the attack turned what had been a scene of joy and celebration into one of horror. Body parts were scattered all over, tree branches flecked with pieces of skin.
"There were only small, small pieces," he recalled. "People were small, small pieces of meat.".........................


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Wednesday, September 9, 2015

USA's cavemen ally KSA's war on the poorest nation in the Middle East


Almost all the weapons, including the cluster bombs used by Saudi Arabia and the Sunni nations bombing their "brothers" in Yemen are made in the USA and in the countries of USA's bosom pals.  Why is the Western media largely silent about the ongoing death and destruction in Yemen? That's the burning question asked in the vid below.



Iona Craig writing at TheIntercept
Yemen’s Hidden War:    How the Saudi-Led Coalition Is Killing Civilians
IN THE ISLAMIC CONCEPT of qadar, your divine destiny is inescapable. If you try to cheat death it will find you. For two women on a dusty road in mid-June on the southwest corner of the Arabian Peninsula, their repeated attempts to dodge fate ended in tragic failure.

Leaving the war zone of Yemen’s southern port city of Aden on June 10, the women headed north in a Toyota Cressida driven by a male relative. The pair were escaping the violence that had already turned entire streets in Aden to rubble, left hundreds dead and thousands of civilians under siege, struggling to find food, water and medical care....

.......In March, the Saudis — aided by U.S. and British weapons and intelligence — began a bombing campaign in an attempt to push back the Houthis, who they see as a proxy for Iran. Since then, from the northern province of Saada to the capital Sanaa, from the central cities of Taiz and Ibb to the narrow streets at the heart of Aden, scores of airstrikes have hit densely populated areas, factories, schools, civilian infrastructure and even a camp for displaced people.

From visiting some 20 sites of airstrikes and interviews with more than a dozen witnesses, survivors and relatives of those killed in eight of these strikes in southern Yemen, this reporter discovered evidence of a pattern of Saudi-coalition airstrikes that show indiscriminate bombing of civilians and rescuers, adding further weight to claims made by human rights organizations that some Saudi-led strikes may amount to war crimes and raising vital questions over the U.S. and Britain’s role in Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen..........
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Monday, August 3, 2015

World War 3 news and updates ... Aug 3


The countries in it, either in major or minor roles:
USA, UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Lebanon, Libya, Mali, Jordan, UAE, Qatar,Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Iraq, Israel, Syria, Turkey, Kurdistan, Yemen, Nigeria,France with (Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Chad ) Germany, Italy, Czech Republic,Albania, Estonia, Hungary, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, Switzerland, Austria, Japan,Republic of Korea, Ireland, Spain, Slovakia, Norway, The Netherlands, Luxembourg,Bulgaria, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Novorussia, Ukraine, Russia, Chechnya, Somalia, Iran, India, South Korea, North Korea, Central African Republic, Kenya, Tunisia, ThePhilippines, Egypt, Albania, Serbia, China, Sudan, South Sudan, Bukina Faso, Palestine,Georgia, Chad, Spain, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Indonesia, Nepal, Congo, Uganda, Romania,Mexico, Gambia, Haiti, Cameroon, Chad, Algeria, Venezuela, Thailand, Argentina, Vietnam,Myanmar, Georgia, Burundi, Senegal, Macedonia, Armenia, Dominican Republic

From Reuters
Turkey joined the   fight against Islamic State, but not for the reasons you think
After months of wavering, Turkey agreed on July 23 to partner with the United States in launching joint air strikes against Islamic State militants in Syria and Iraq. However, soon after pounding Islamic State positions in Syria, Ankara quickly turned its attention to strike at the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Iraq, whose Syrian wing, the People’s Protection Units (YPG) is a key U.S. ally against Islamic State.
The decision to strike against the PKK was made with the aim of advancing Turkey’s governing AK Party’s political position ahead of early parliamentary elections. But it will be a pyrrhic victory: Syria’s problems will continue to spill over Turkey’s borders, making a solution to the conflict ever more elusive.......

From Time
These 5 Stats Explain    Turkey’s War on ISIS—and the Kurds
Turkey enters the battle against ISIS, but it's real target seems to be the Kurds
On the heels of a major suicide bombing in the border town of Suruç a couple weeks ago, Turkey has officially joined the war against ISIS—though it’s not clear what it actually aims to achieve. Turkey and its leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan were riding high just a few years ago, with a strong economy and a growing international profile. Now the country’s economy is tumbling, and its politics are fragmenting. These 5 facts explain Turkey’s various motivations for going to war. Be warned—they’re complicated.
1. A Faltering Economy
Until recently, Turkey was an emerging market darling. In 2010, its economy was growing at a robust 9.2 percent. But by 2013, GDP growth had fallen to 4.1 percent. The slowdown has continued, and growth for 2015 is now forecast at 3.1 percent, which may actually be a generous estimate. Unemployment in the country has reached 11 percent, the highest rate in 5 years.
It’s not clear that joining the fight ...........

From AlJazeera  (interactive map at link)
A close look at the most Major Kurdish factions
 influential Kurdish groups in the Middle East spread over Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran.

 From Forbes
Instead Of Fighting   ISIS, Erdogan Pushes Turkey Toward Chaos And Despotism
In Turkey, an ISIS suicide bomb kills 30 and wounds many more in the Kurdish area town of Suruc. The Kurdish insurgent terrorists, the PKK, then start killing Turkish policemen and soldiers while ISIS attacks a Turkish military border post. Peace demonstrations ensue in some cities which police put down with the, by now, familiar methods of severity against civilians. Ankara and Washington reach an agreement allowing the US to use its bases inside Turkey against ISIS in Iraq and Syria. Erdogan’s spokesmen announce that Turkey’s air force has conducted raids against both PKK and ISIS targets across the border. Turkish authorities arrest some 900 people nationwide, mostly Kurds, for allegedly belonging to terror networks. Turkish tanks shell Kurdish villages in Syrian borderlands near Kobani. Meanwhile, news leaks that the US has solid evidence of Turkish collusion with ISIS in months past. Let us pause here and dispel some of the fog.
First, let us remember that Turkey conducted a national election on June 7 and still hasn’t formed a government. All these decisions in a time of crisis are being taken by somebody. Someone’s running the country. We’ll get to the full implications later but initiatives are being taken, ......



From ZeroHedge
Obama Authorizes "Defensive"   Airstrikes Against Assad Regime In Syria
On Friday, we checked in on the Pentagon’s ongoing effort to recruit, vet, and train ambitious "freedom fighters" to join the battle against ISIS in Syria.

It goes without saying that covert US efforts to aid the multifarious groups vying for control of the country have met with disastrous consequences so far, but if there’s anything Washington is particularly adept at, it’s making bad foreign policy outcomes worse, which is why we weren’t at all surprised to learn that the commander of the Pentagon's new Syrian "force" was captured, along with his deputy, by al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra last week near the border with Turkey.
The NY Times called the kidnapping "perhaps [the] most embarrassing setback yet," for Washington’s ragtag contingent of volunteer militiamen and indeed, the fact that the Pentagon had hoped to field a "force" of 3,000 men by the end of the year but has so far only managed to train 54 speaks to the futility of the entire effort.
Or perhaps not. It all depends on what the real aim behind the program was in the first place. If the goal was to field a fierce band of well-trained warriors to rout Islamic State, then things aren’t going so well. If, however, the idea was simply to give the US an excuse to get directly involved in facilitating the swift demise of Bashar al-Assad now that his forces have been largely decimated by a three-front war, well it’s mission accomplished, because as WSJ reports, President Obama has now authorized US airstrikes against Assad’s army in the event they interfere with America’s very serious 50 solider effort to combat ISIS. Here’s more:...........

From RT
Taking sides in Syrian civil war?   Obama authorizes airstrikes ‘to defend’ US-trained rebels
The US president has reportedly authorized the Air Force to protect Syrian rebels trained by Washington to fight against Islamic State by bombing any force attacking them, including Syrian regular troops.
Thus the US may become involved in the Syrian civil war on the rebel side.
The change was first reported by US officials speaking on condition of anonymity with the Wall Street Journal Sunday. The first airstrikes to protect American trainees in Syria have already taken place on Friday, July 31, when the US Air Force bombed unidentified militants who attacked the compound of the US-trained rebels..............

From BBC
....Capt Davis said the US  would provide defensive fire support to the NSF "no matter whom they came up against".
Many will see this as "mission creep" as the administration of President Barack Obama has always insisted that the battle inside Syria is against IS alone, the BBC's Gary O'Donoghue at the Pentagon reports.......

.
From AlMonitor
Attacks on Chinese escalate in Turkey
On July 1, news broke that a group of five men attacked a Chinese restaurant named Happy China with sticks and stones in the center of Istanbul. The attackers were heard to say, “We do not want a Chinese restaurant here, get out of our town!” The owner, Cihan Yavuz, said in a TV interview, “We are all Turks here; our chef is a Uighur Turk. We serve Muslim East Asian tourists and rarely ever have Chinese customers. We do not serve alcohol. We never received any warnings of an attack. But I see it may not be possible for us to earn a living here.”
On July 4, in the western city of Balikesir, a group protested against China for persecuting Uighur Turks and hung an effigy of late Chinese leader Mao Zedong.
On the same day, a group of ultranationalists attacked a Korean tourist they assumed was Chinese in the popular Istanbul tourist district of Sultanahmet.
To add insult to injury, Devlet Bahceli, chairman of the Nationalist Action Party (MHP), gave an interview to popular journalist Ahmet Hakan on July 8 about the attacks. Bahceli said, “Our nationalist youth is sensitive to injustices in China. They should have the freedom to exercise their democratic rights. These are young kids. They may have been provoked. Plus, how are you going to differentiate between Korean and Chinese? They both have slanted eyes. Does it really matter?” His racist and ignorant statement caused an uproar in the Turkish and international media.

From Reuters
Nusra Front attacks Western-backed rebels   in northern Syria
The al Qaeda-linked Nusra Front attacked Western-backed rebels in northern Syria on Friday, rebel groups and an organization monitoring the war said, escalating tension between rival insurgents near the Turkish border....
.....Opposition sources say that one of the rebel groups targeted in Nusra's overnight attack, Division 30, has been a participant in the newly launched U.S.-led program to train and equip insurgents to fight Islamic State.
Division 30 says Nusra fighters abducted its leader and several other members earlier this week. The Pentagon has said however that no members of the "New Syrian Force" had been captured or detained..........



From BBC
Ukraine court backs self-rule plan for conflict zone
Ukraine's highest court has approved constitutional changes that would allow limited self-rule to the rebel-held eastern areas of Donetsk and Luhansk.
The changes are part of a peace deal aimed at ending fighting between Ukrainian forces and pro-Russia rebels.
But many MPs oppose autonomy for the east and the decision must be voted through parliament.
Meanwhile, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has released $1.7bn (£1.08bn) in aid to Ukraine.
The payment is part of a bailout aimed at stabilising Ukraine's struggling economy. The country is also trying to reach a deal with its main creditors on restructuring its debts.........

Here's a prediction which is super easy to make. As the Nordic countries are fast becoming fiercely anti-immigrant, especially immigrants and refugees from the Middle East and Africa, give them a  few years and some of them will break away from the EU and will put in place new immigration laws instead of taking orders from Brussels or they will force Brussels to respect their own new laws on immigration.
From Guardian
Why are anti-immigration parties so strong in the Nordic states?
The Danish People’s  party’s success in the election continues a trend of rising support for rightwing parties across Finland, Denmark, Sweden and Norway.....
.....Most crucially, attitudes to immigration have become significantly more negative in Sweden and Denmark. According to the Eurobarometer, a record number of people now see immigration as one of the two most important issues facing these countries. In Finland, the share has declined after spiking between 2007 and 2010 (support for the Finns follows a similar pattern), and immigration is now seen as less pressing than the economic situation and unemployment (the country was in recession for most of last year, and growth is still flat).......

From NYTimes
  Abductions Hurt  U.S. Bid to Train Anti-ISIS Rebels in Syria
A Pentagon program to train moderate Syrian insurgents to fight the Islamic State has been vexed by problems of recruitment, screening, dismissals and desertions that have left only a tiny band of fighters ready to do battle.
Those fighters — 54 in all — suffered perhaps their most embarrassing setback yet on Thursday. One of their leaders, a Syrian Army defector who recruited them, was abducted in Syria near the Turkish border, along with his deputy who commands the trainees. They were seized not by the Islamic State but by its rival the Nusra Front, an affiliate of Al Qaeda that is another Islamist extremist byproduct of the four-year-old Syrian civil war........
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2015/Aug-01/309278-syrian-rebel-group-leaves-their-hq-after-clash-with-al-qaeda.ashx US-backed rebel group flees north Syria HQ after clash with Nusra
Clashes between members of al-Qaida's branch in Syria and a rebel faction in the country's north believed to have been trained by the U.S. government have stopped after the rebels left their headquarters, activists said Saturday.
The fighting came a few days after the U.S. and Turkey announced the outlines of a deal to help rebels push ISIS back from a strip of territory it controls along the Syrian-Turkish border, replacing it with more moderate rebels backed by Washington and Ankara.
Rami Abdurrahman, who heads the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said members of the Division 30 faction fled to a nearby area controlled by a Syrian Kurdish militia. Abu al-Hassan Marea, a Syrian activist who is currently in Turkey near the Syrian border, confirmed Saturday that Division 30 fighters have withdrawn from their headquarters.
Abdurrahman and Marea said Division 30 had less than 60 fighters and that on Friday alone the group lost five fighters and 18 others were wounded.......




From AlMonitor
...Perhaps the strongest criticism   came from Reformist Ghanoun newspaper in an article by Saman Saberian, “Hamas: Bank account in Tehran, stronghold in Riyadh.” Saberian wrote that Hamas’ turn to Saudi Arabia cannot be viewed as merely seeking Saudi funding and help because in the latest war, “The Saudis helped Tel Aviv the most and the only support they gave to Gaza was coffins for the martyrs.”
The article touched on a rumor circulating in the Iranian media that Meshaal would send fighters for Saudi Arabia's war in Yemen. Saudi Arabia is three months into a bombing campaign of Ansar Allah forces, which it claims are backed by Iran. The multi-sided war has been a humanitarian catastrophe in Yemen. Saberian acknowledged that no one has confirmed the rumor of an agreement between the Saudis and Hamas, but Iranian reports citing anonymous Saudi sources have said that Saudi Arabia has requested special Hamas forces trained in the same military tactics as the Lebanese group Hezbollah to combat Yemen’s Ansar Allah. Whether the rumor is psychological warfare or not, it reveals how tense the region and how heated the rivalries have become.

From PressTV
Russia willing for joint Iran in fight against ISIL 
Russia has voiced interest to team up with Iran to fight the Takfiri ISIL terrorists operating in the Middle East region.
“We can develop anti-terror cooperation with Iran, first of all, in the Middle East region,” Ilya Rogachev, the director of Department of New Challenges and Threats Issues of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said on Monday.
“The notorious international terrorist organization as Islamic State (ISIL) can be and has to be the object of our cooperation with Iran,” the Russian official said.

From Guardian
Turkey sends in jets as Syria’s agony spills over    every border
Turkish air strikes in Syria last week signalled a new phase in a conflict that has left its bloody mark on every country in the region. But will the Turks now agree to US demands to cease all clandestine dealings with Islamic State?
When US special forces raided the compound of an Islamic State leader in eastern Syria in May, they made sure not to tell the neighbours.
The target of that raid, the first of its kind since US jets returned to the skies over Iraq last August, was an Isis official responsible for oil smuggling, named Abu Sayyaf. He was almost unheard of outside the upper echelons of the terror group, but he was well known to Turkey. From mid-2013, the Tunisian fighter had been responsible for smuggling oil from Syria’s eastern fields, which the group had by then commandeered. Black market oil quickly became the main driver of Isis revenues – and Turkish buyers were its main clients.
As a result, the oil trade between the jihadis and the Turks was held up as evidence of an alliance between the two. It led to protests from Washington and Europe – both already wary of Turkey’s 900-mile border with Syria being used as a gateway by would-be jihadis from around the world..........




From AlJazeera
Turkish warplanes   have bombed military positions of Turkey's Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in neighbouring Iraq, a spokesman for the PKK has said.
The air raids came just hours after Turkish warplanes pounded Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) positions in Syria on Friday morning, marking a significant shift in Ankara's position on how to deal with armed groups in Syria and Iraq.
"At around 11:00pm (20:00 GMT) tonight, Turkish warplanes started bombing our positions near the border, accompanied by heavy artillery shelling," PKK spokesman Bakhtiar Dogan told the AFP news agency.....

From Reuters
Turkish warplanes pounded    Islamic State targets in Syria for the first time on Friday, with President Tayyip Erdogan promising more decisive action against both the jihadists and Kurdish militants.
Hours after the initial attacks, fighter jets were launched in a second round against Islamic State, while others targeted militants camps of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in northern Iraq, according to local media.
Reuters was unable to confirm the second round of strikes. An attack against PKK camps in Iraq would likely mark a major blow to Turkey's already stalled peace process with the Kurds.

Friday's operations followed a telephone conversation between Erdogan and U.S. President Barack Obama on Wednesday, and were accompanied by police raids across Turkey to detain hundreds of suspected militants, including from Kurdish groups.
Ankara said it had approved the use of its air bases by U.S. and coalition aircraft to mount strikes against Islamic State, marking a major change in policy that has long been a sore point for Washington.........




From ConsortiumNews
Mideast Alliances Shift Again   
July 31, 2015
Like shifting desert sands, the volatile Middle East is going through a new, though subtle, realignment of adversaries and allies, with Turkey’s political tensions shaking up one area while Saudi Arabia makes moves of its own, as recounted by ex-CIA analyst Paul R. Pillar.
By Paul R. Pillar
Some recent policy decisions by Middle Eastern governments have the potential to shake up regional alignments, or what are widely perceived to be alignments. In the near term this will have little to do with the Iran nuclear agreement, despite the attention the agreement is getting at the moment. That accord will not lead to realignments as great as its opponents fear, and its larger impact on regional diplomacy will be gradual and only slightly apparent in the near term.
The agreement by the Turkish government to cooperate more actively than previously with the United States in combating the so-called Islamic State or ISIS in northern Syria represents a more immediate shaking up..........

From Time
Egypt Is Struggling to Cope With Its ISIS    Insurgency
A rocket attack on a warship was just the latest in a series of escalating attacks on Egyptian forces in Sinai
They have attacked on land and at sea, killing dozens of soldiers. They have assassinated a senior official in daylight and attempted to seize a small Sinai town.
The insurgents control no significant area of land, but they are far from being defeated. A season of deadly attacks by insurgents in Egypt — including those backed by the Islamic State in Iraq and Greater Syria group (ISIS) — underscores an escalating insurgency that the Egyptian state is struggling to suppress.
The surge in violence began in late June when Egypt’s chief prosecutor was killed in a car bombing in daylight in an upscale Cairo neighborhood. Two days later, the ISIS-affiliated militants launched a massive assault on military positions in north Sinai, attempting to seize control of a small chunk of territory in Egypt. At least 17 Egyptian soldiers died, although some reports placed the death toll much higher........

From TodayNigeria
Suspected Boko Haram   chief recruiter arrested in Chad
Suspected Boko Haram recruiter Bana Fanaye, also known as Mahamat Moustapha, has been arrested by the authorities in Chad.
Fanaye, who is said to be the mastermind of Boko Haram operations in Chad and northern Cameroon, was arrested on Friday afternoon, with assorted weapons, as well as cell phone SIM cards for various countries, including Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger.
The suspect is said to be the brain behind most Boko Haram operations including arms purchases in Chad and northern Cameroon.
Multiple media reports quoted Chadian officials as saying that Fanaye is in charge of recruiting Boko Haram terrorists, arms purchases and planning of terrorism targets and operations in Chad and northern Cameroon.
It was his arrest that helped security forces locate and kill other Boko Haram members housed in an area called Diguel Diguessou in the 8th district, tchadinfos.com reported.......

From Reuters
Chad says killed 117 Boko Haram fighters   in two-week campaign
N'DJAMENA Chad said on Thursday its forces had killed 117 Boko Haram insurgents during a two-week military campaign aimed at clearing islands on Lake Chad used by the militants as hideouts and bases to launch attacks.
Chad has deployed thousands of soldiers alongside troops from neighbors Nigeria, Cameroon and Niger to tackle the militant group whose six-year insurgency has killed thousands.
"We killed 117 Boko Haram fighters during the two-week operation. We lost two men and several wounded," Colonel Azem Bermandoa, spokesman for the Chadian army, said.
"We destroyed their boats and seized various weapons during the operation," he said........



From Xinhuanet
News Analysis: Yemeni crisis   mirrors regional unrest in Middle East
CAIRO, July 25 (Xinhua) -- The ongoing crisis in conflict-stricken Yemen is reflection of a regional unrest in the Middle East, especially after the forces of fleeing President Abd-Rabbo Mansour Hadi seized strategic southern city of Aden against Shiite Houthi fighters, said Egyptian experts.
Yemen has become more like a battlefield for regional and even international powers that seek more influence in the Middle East region through the ongoing conflict hitting the country, including the United States, Saudi Arabia and Iran.
U.S. INTERESTS
"Yemen has always been a place of interest for the United States, and former U.S. President Clinton said openly that Yemen is a matter of a national security for the United States," said Gehad Auda, professor of international relations at Helwan University.
The professor told Xinhua that Yemen is highly located due to its control of Bab al-Mandeb Strait that connects between the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden as well as between the continents of Asia and Africa, "therefore it is a very critical area geopolitically and geostrategically."
Being responsible for guaranteeing the security of its Gulf allies, the United States must have helped with the seizure of Yemen at the hands of pro-Hadi forces to reassure Saudi Arabia and other Gulf partners about their national security, according to the expert.

SAUDI ARABIA VS IRAN
Unhappy with the recently-reached nuclear deal between Iran and six world powers led by the United States, Sunni Saudi Arabia is obviously concerned about greater influence of Shiite Iran in the region and about Iranian attempts to turn Yemen into a Shiite state, given that the Iran-backed Houthi fighters are Shiites.
Although the deal is expected to strengthen Iran's influence in the region, experts believe that it will take a few years until Iranian regional expansion can be strongly felt after the deal. ......

From RT
Saudi-led coalition airstrikes kill over 120 in Yemen,   humanitarian truce announced
Saudi-led coalition airstrikes killed over 120 civilians and left 150 injured after a fierce attack on Friday in the southwestern Yemeni province of Taiz. The coalition has announced a five-day humanitarian truce starting on Sunday night.
Local sources told AP that most of the houses in the area were in ruins and a fire later broke out in the port city of Mokha, on the Red Sea coast of Yemen. They said that most of the corpses found there, including children, women and elderly people, had been completely immolated in the flames. One resident, Ahmed Mohammed al-Mouzay, who took part in rescue operations, reportedly said that most of his neighbors had died. A security official told AP that it was impossible to take the injured to the provincial capital due to the roads being blocked by the ongoing violence.......

Vid below is not for the faint of heart.  See for yourselves how many civilians are dying at the hands of Saudi + coalition + USA/UK/Russia weapons


From English IRIB
Bombing kills 14, injures 47  in northeast Nigeria
At least 14 people have been killed and 47 others wounded in a bomb attack at a busy market in northeastern Nigeria, the latest in a string of deadly attacks in the violence-hit country.
According to witnesses and hospital sources, the blast occurred on Sunday at 0850 GMT in the Nigerian town of Damaturu, the capital of Yobe State.
Market trader Garba Abdullahi said the attack took place when a female assailant blew her explosives “at the... entrance of the market where commuters were arriving.”.......

From AlManar
Saudi Defense Minister Threatens  to Occupy Kuwait
Saudi Defense Minister Mohammad bin Salman threatened to launch war on Kuwait after differences between the two Persian Gulf Arab states escalated over Khafji oilfield.
"Mohammad bin Salman threatened that his country would attack and occupy Kuwait, claiming that not only Khafji oilfield but also entire Kuwait is part of the Saudi territories based on historical documents," Middle-East Panorama quoted on Sunday intelligence sources of the Persian Gulf Arab littoral states as saying.
Kuwait has complained that the continued shut down of Khafji oilfield it shares with Saudi Arabia will incur huge losses Riyadh must compensate for in the future.
Kuwaiti Oil Minister Ali Al Omair in a letter to his Saudi counterpart Ali Al Naimi urged him "to take adequate measures to resume production at Khafji...........
From ArabNews
Kuwait imposes limited   control on entry of Saudis
The security agencies of Kuwait have imposed a limited control over entry of Saudis into their country, said an online newspaper.
This is being done to tighten security measures at various entry points of the country following the terror attack on June 26 at Imam Sadiq Mosque, which left 25 people dead and over 200 injured.
Brig. Gen. Adil Al-Hashshash, director general of public relations and security media, told the newspaper that the number of those who were barred from entering Kuwait was very small and they had some security issues.
He said the ban had come as a result of “precautionary actions and required measures due to the situation in the region... and that the situation should not be open as in the past.” ...........


From Reuters
Suicide bomber, clashes kill 12 Libyan soldiers    in Benghazi
Nine Libyan soldiers were killed in the eastern city of Benghazi on Tuesday by a suicide bomber and in ensuing clashes between troops and Islamist fighters, medics and military sources said.
Forces loyal to Libya's internationally recognized government have been fighting Islamist groups in the country's second-largest city since last year, part of a wider struggle since Muammar Gaddafi was overthrown and killed in 2011.
A suicide bomber rammed a car laden with explosives into a group of soldiers during a street battle in the city center near Benghazi's Mediterranean port, killing three soldiers and wounding eleven, medics said.
Shortly afterwards, Islamist fighters blamed by the army for the suicide bombing attacked troops loyal to the official government in the same area. Six more soldiers were killed and 10 wounded in the fighting, medics said.........

BBC subtle and stealth report trying to make way for UK and additional warmongers from EU to return to Libya.  Read between the lines.


From PRI
"The roads are   targeted. Cars are often hit," says British Dr. Natalie Roberts. "Every few hundred meters you see another burned out vehicle; every bridge on the road has been bombed out".
Roberts, who is in Yemen with Doctors Without Borders, has worked in conflict zones before. But she says Yemen's war zone is unlike anything she has seen elsewhere. "What's really surprising to me here is that I've never seen so few [aid workers and journalists] on the ground. Syria, when i was there, was counted as the most dangerous conflict in the world — but Yemen? I just haven't met anyone."
Yemen is the poorest country in the Arab world, and has been politically unstable since the Arab Spring. But civilian casualties really began to increase in March this year, when a Saudi Arabian-led coalition began bombing towns and villages to try to defeat a rebel force known as the Houthis.
More than 80 percent of Yemen's 25 million people are now in need some form of aid, and the United Nations has warned the coalition that indiscriminate bombing of populated areas is against international law......

From Jadaliyya
In late March 2015,  a coalition of states led by Saudi Arabia initiated a military campaign against Yemen consisting of intensive air raids, the arming of local allies and a de facto naval and air blockade of the country. Initially termed Operation Decisive Storm but since renamed Operation Restore Hope, it continues to this day. Riyadh identified the recent territorial gains of Yemen’s Houthi movement, and the ouster of President Abd-Rabbu Mansur Hadi and his government, as the reasons for its campaign and pledged that both would be swiftly rolled back. Four months later neither objective appears to be in reach, nor is a negotiated end to this conflict in sight.  As part of a series of Quick Thoughts with International Crisis Group Middle East analysts, Jadaliyya asked April Longley Alley, Crisis Group Senior Analyst for the Arabian Peninsula, to shed light on the causes and course of this war.]
Jadaliyya (J): Who exactly are the Houthis, why have they apparently aligned with their former nemesis Ali Abdullah Saleh, and is their domination of Yemen in your view sustainable?
April Longley Alley (ALA): The Houthis are an armed group that has its roots in a movement for Zaydi cultural and religious revivalism in north Yemen. (Zaydism is a branch of Shia Islam distinct from the Twelver Shiism prevalent in Iran, Iraq, Bahrain and Lebanon). They have a strong militia component, but view themselves as a political and social movement against corruption and Western imperialism. Their primarily base of support is in the northern Zaydi highlands and especially in the Saada governorate bordering Saudi Arabia.
During and after the 2011 uprising against former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, the movement expanded rapidly, forming alliances with disgruntled tribesmen in the north, left-leaning activists and even some southern separatists. As the Yemeni transition collapsed, they took advantage of.........

From WashingtonTimes
Bitter feud between Turkey, Egypt undercuts U.S. hopes for Middle East
Two of America’s linchpin allies in the Middle East are bitterly feuding, complicating the Obama administration’s hopes of confronting Sunni Salafists and containing the ambitions of Shiite Iran.
Egypt is accusing Turkey of working with the Islamic State on the Sinai Peninsula, a new low in the already poor relations between the two regional powers.......

From Ahram:
Regional   manoeuvres: A Hamas visit to Riyadh leaves Egypt, Iran wondering
A visit to Riyadh by the head of Hamas left consternation among some parties and questions among some observers. What did Saudi Arabia aim to achieve, asks Ahmed Eleiba
The visit by Hamas Politburo Chief Khaled Meshaal to Saudi Arabia and his meeting with King Salman Bin Abdel-Aziz raised the issue of how the kingdom has opened up to the group under King Salman’s reign. The visit is part of a series of meetings with other Muslim Brotherhood leaders, including Yemeni Muslim Brotherhood leaders and key figures in the Yemeni Reform Party (Al-Islah), Abdel-Meguid Al-Zindani and Salman Al-Ouda.
Senior sources close to Hamas, however, stated there were problems between the kingdom and Hamas that delayed the visit by two months, but that the Muslim Brotherhood general guide in Jordan, Hamam Said, visited Saudi Arabia two weeks ahead of Meshaal’s trip.
Said was invited by Saudi Minister of Religious Endowments Saleh Bin Abdel-Aziz Al-Sheikh and talks resolved most outstanding issues between the two sides. Saudi Arabia Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir at a joint press conference with his Egyptian counterpart Sameh Shukri on Thursday, said "there was no political visit by Hamas to the kingdom", trivialising the significance of Hamas visit, saying it was only a religious pilgrimage and Riyadh's position on the Palestinian Islamist movement remains unchanged..........
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