Reader links for May 16 – 2015

This post has all its contents in the comments. For the newest freshest videos and news stories of interest to the Counter-Jihad and the Geopolitics of Islam, please click comments and add to, or read what is posted there.

Some will be integrated into the day’s posts and others not. But this way we can keep a great news flow going without interfering with the conversations about the issues under the various essays and news items in the posts that will be presented throughout the day.

Thank you all for your informative and important contributions.

About Eeyore

Canadian artist and counter-jihad and freedom of speech activist as well as devout Schrödinger's catholic

31 Replies to “Reader links for May 16 – 2015”

  1. U2 Spy Plane, Cockpit View At 70,000 Feet

    This incredible video puts you in the pilot’s seat of a U2 spy plane at 70,000 feet. From takeoff to landing, see what it’s like to be in the cockpit of the plane they nicknamed – Dragon Lady

    (Actually half that and half pilots talking about flying it)

    http://www.chonday.com/Videos/u2planeseve3

  2. Islamic State video -IRAQ – «the battle of Zoba» public beheading of prisonners
    graphic —>(11:07 to the end )

  3. Turkey detains soldiers in ‘Syria arms interception’ case

    Turkish police have detained eight serving members of the army in the latest wave of arrests in a hugely controversial case over the interception last year of an alleged consignment of arms bound for Syria, reports said Saturday.

    Arrest warrants were issued for 10 soldiers, of whom eight had been detained by Friday night, the official Anatolia news agency reported.

    They have been accused of membership of a terrorist group, impeding the work of the government and espionage, it said. They should now appear in court to decide whether to remand them in custody ahead of trial.

    The arrests are the latest in a string of detentions related to the stopping and searching of trucks in the southern provinces of Hatay and Adana near the Syrian border in January 2014 on suspicion of smuggling arms into Syria.

    Documents circulated on the Internet claimed the seized trucks were Turkish National Intelligence Organisation (MIT) vehicles delivering weapons to Syrian Islamist rebels fighting President Bashar al-Assad.

    Turkey has vehemently denied aiding Islamist rebels in Syria, such as the Islamic State (IS) group, although it wants to see Assad toppled.

    The government has imposed a full-blown media blackout, including on social networks, and the investigation is being carried out in the utmost secrecy.

    Earlier this month, Turkey arrested the four prosecutors who had ordered the search of the trucks and they are now in prison ahead of trial.

    Another 19 soldiers were also placed under arrest pending trial in April, Anatolia said.

    Meanwhile, 17 police were arrested as part of the investigation in February and another 11 police back in July 2014.

    Not including the latest arrests, Anatolia said that a total of 47 people were being held in the investigation.

    The Turkish authorities have sought to link the affair to US-based preacher Fethullah Gulen who President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accuses of running a parallel state through supporters in the judiciary and police with the aim of usurping him.

    Supporters of Gulen, who have been pressured by a wave of arrests in the past months, reject the allegations.

    The controversy erupted on January 19, 2014 when Turkish forces stopped trucks bound for Syria suspected to have been loaded with weapons. But they then found MIT personnel were on board.

    http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/130380/World/Region/Turkey-detains-soldiers-in-Syria-arms-interception.aspx

  4. Bill Maher to Ayaan Hirsi Ali: Why Do Liberals ‘Blame the Victim’ When It Comes to Islam?

  5. IS distributes a circulare clarifying Allah’s hodud in a mosque in al- Raqqa City

    SOHR received a copy of a circular distributed by IS in a mosque in the city of al- Raqqa. They said that it explains “ Allah’s rules and hodud” (Hodud are the Islamic punishments carried out against someone who commit a deadly sins). The circular states “Islamic State believes in Allah almighty, who revealed the Quraa, and denies the United Nations which fights Allah, and due to we disbelieve of the rules legislated by human beings we promise Allah almighty to carry out his Sharia (law) on his land among his worshipers even though the Unbelievers may detest (it).

    The circular continues “We clarify Allah’s Hodud for people by mentioning the sin and its punishment as follows:

    The punishment of insulting Allah is the death.
    The punishment of insulting the prophet is the death even though the person repent.
    The punishment of insulting Islam is the death.
    The punishment of adultery is to stone the married person to death and to whip the single person 100 whips and exile for 1 year.
    The punishment of sodomy is to kill both men who do this sin.
    The punishment of thievery is to cut the person’s hand.
    The punishment of drinking alcoholic is the whip of 80 whips.
    The punishment of accusing somebody of adultery is the whip of 80 whips.
    The punishment of spying for the sake of unbelievers is the killing.
    The punishment of apostasy is the death.
    The punishment of banditry is the killing and crucifying if the person kill and take money, if he kill somebody he will be killed in turn, if he take money’s people his right hand and his left leg will be cut and the person who panic people will be exiled.

    “We make people fear of Allah and call them to win Allah’s mercy by obeying his order and keep away from his prohibitions, where the real warfare in doing this. Therefore, the ruler who does not carry out Allah’s Sharia has no goodness. We are not going to tolerate in carrying out this great purpose, where IS has sacrificed hundreds its righteous sons, and it even carry out Allah’s law on its own members like killing some of them”. The circular ended.

    IS executed 38 civilians in the provinces of Deir Ezzor, Aleppo and Homs for “insulting Allah, cooperating with the regime and banditry” as well as it executed 3 members of the regime forces rising the number of civilians and members of the regime forces executed by since the declaration of its alleged “Caliphate” in Syria in 6/28/2014 until 05/15/2015 has risen to 2192.

    The death toll is as follows:

    1397 civilians, including 9 children and 19women. They were executed by beheading, shooting or stoning in the provinces of Deir Ezzor, al- Raqqa, al- Hasakah, Aleppo, Homs and Hama. 930 out of 1362 are from al- Shaitaat tribe in the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor.

    137 fighters of the Nusra Front, rebel and Islamic battalions. IS executed them after arresting them either in clashes between the mentioned battalions and IS or on IS- checkpoint.

    Islamic State also executed 126 of its own members for “exceeding the limits in religion and spying for foreign countries”; most of them executed after arresting them during their attempt to come back home.

    532 officers and soldiers of the regime forces. They were arrested during clashes between IS and the regime forces.

    https://www.syriahr.com/en/2015/05/is-distributes-a-circulare-clarifying-allahs-hodud-in-a-mosque-in-al-raqqa-city/

  6. Turkey: Erdogan condemns Morsi execution sentence and Western ‘posing’

  7. Not how they roll: Pentagon asks media to scrap old footage of ISIS columns

    ISIS may be on the move, but not the way you see on television, claims the Pentagon.

    Footage of the menacing, black-clad terrorist army rolling across the desert in long convoys predates U.S.-led air strikes that have forced the jihadists to travel more discreetly, say senior State Department and Pentagon officials. They have asked television networks to stop using stock footage that makes the terror army seem more mobile – and more formidable – than they say it actually is.

    “One Toyota speeding down the road by itself at night with its headlights off,” would be a more accurate image, said Pentagon spokesman Col. Steven Warren.

    Emily Horne, spokeswoman for retired Gen. John Allen, the State Department’s special envoy leading the international coalition against ISIS, said the footage being used by news networks paints a picture that benefits the terror group, also known as ISIL and Islamic State.

    “We are urging broadcasters to avoid using the familiar B-roll that we’ve all seen before, file footage of ISIL convoys operating in broad daylight, moving in large formations with guns out, looking to wreak havoc,” Horne told Politico. “It’s inaccurate — that’s no longer how ISIL moves.

    A lot of that footage is from last summer before we began tactical strikes.”

    U.S. news media have not been permitted to send embedded reporters into areas of Iraq and Syria where fighting is fiercest, making it nearly impossible to get up-to-date footage of ISIS’ movements. But even if the terrorist army’s mobility is restricted by strikes from above, there is scant evidence that the combination of Iraqi boots on the ground and coalition bombers in the sky is turning the tide against the radical jihadists.

    Iraqi forces backed by U.S. airstrikes took back the city of Tikrit from ISIS in March, and U.S. officials estimate that ISIS has lost as much as a quarter of its territory and as many as 6,000 fighters. Yet on Friday, ISIS militants captured the main government compound in Ramadi, the capital of Iraq’s western Anbar province, forcing Iraqi troops to retreat from the compound and watch from afar as the black flag of ISIS was raised.

    The terrorists also remain in control of the key Iraqi city of Mosul and much of northern Iraq and Syria. The potential capture of Ramadi, a critical city in central Iraq just 70 miles west of Baghdad, would represent a stunning defeat for coalition forces.

    Rick Brennan, a senior political scientist at the RAND Corporation who spent five years as a senior adviser to the U.S. military in Iraq, said the Pentagon has a point, if all it is talking about is ISIS travel methods.

    “Before the summer offensive of 2014, ISIS was moving in large columns which were extremely easy targets to hit,” Brennan told FoxNews.com. “But as a result of the successful airstrikes, they have broken down and are moving as an insurgency under the cover of darkness.”

    Brennan said the terrorist army has now embedded itself in cities and among civilian populations, allowing ISIS to hold onto power with little risk from airstrikes.

    “We have complicated their ability to move,” Brennan said. “On the level of being able to move rapidly and reinforce rapidly, they are no longer able to do that. But their ability to hold terrain has not diminished.”

    According to Central Command, strikes have hit nearly 6,300 targets in Iraq and Syria since the campaign dubbed Operation Inherent Resolve began last Aug. 8. Some 1,500 tanks, Humvees, technical and miscellaneous vehicles were hit from the air between Aug. 8 and March 31, while just 76 were struck between March 31 and May 8, according to the Pentagon.

    Coalition nations conducting airstrikes in Iraq include the U.S. Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Jordan, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Coalition nations conducting airstrikes in Syria include the U.S., Bahrain, Canada, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. The U.S. still handles the vast majority of the strikes in both Iraq, where American planes drop two-thirds of the bombs, and Syria, where the U.S. share is 94 percent.

    http://www.foxnews.com/world/2015/05/15/pentagon-asks-media-to-can-old-footage-isis-columns/

    ————————————————————————————

    In fact Fox NEws should use the more recent footages of IS convoys – they even have Humvees and not only Toyotas :

  8. Boston prosecutor : “- this is not a religious crime – this doesnt reflect “true” Muslim belief..” ( 0:59 on the video —)

  9. Obama: War in Syria will not end before I leave office (DW, May 16, 2015)
    http://www.dw.de/obama-war-in-syria-will-not-end-before-i-leave-office/a-18453235

    “In an interview with Saudi TV, Barack Obama said the war in Syria would not likely end before he leaves office in early 2017. He also affirmed his belief that there would be no “military solution” to the conflict.

    Speaking with Saudi television broadcaster Al-Arabiya on Friday, US President Barack Obama covered a wide range of topics including security cooperation with Gulf allies, Iran and the conflict in Syria. He spoke after a summit with Gulf allies at his Camp David retreat.

    “The situation in Syria is heartbreaking but it’s extremely complex” Obama said.

    When asked if the conflict might be resolved before he ends his second term, Obama said “probably not.”

    “You have a civil war in a country that arises out of longstanding grievances. It was not something that was triggered by the United States and it was not something that could have been stopped by the United States.”

    Obama emphasized that settling the conflict would require the cooperation of Gulf allies and other regional nations such as Turkey, but that “a military solution is not going to be the solution.” The Syrian war has left more than 220,000 people dead….”

  10. Pakistan Officials: US Drone Strike Kills 5 Militants (abcnews, May 16, 2015)
    http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/pakistan-officials-us-drone-strike-kills-militants-31094660

    “Pakistani intelligence officials say missiles fired from a U.S. drone struck a compound in the North Waziristan tribal region near the Afghan border, killing five militants.

    The two officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters, said three of the militants killed Saturday were Uzbeks and the other two were Pakistanis. They say the compound had been used by the Pakistani Taliban.

    U.S. drone strikes have killed several leading militants in rugged areas of Pakistan over the years, but are deeply unpopular in Pakistan because they have also killed civilians.

    Pakistan has been waging a military offensive in North Waziristan for nearly a year, trying to drive out Taliban and other militants who have long enjoyed safe haven in the lawless region.”

  11. UK: Anti-Gitmo protesters demand release of British detainee Shaker Aamer

  12. Myanmar denies responsibility for migrant boat crisis (BBC, May 16, 2015)
    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-32766748

    “Myanmar’s government has said it is not responsible for the migrant boat crisis in south-east Asia, and may not attend an emergency summit on the issue.

    Thousands of migrants from Bangladesh and Myanmar are feared stranded in boats in the Andaman Sea after their crews deserted them.

    Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand have been turning away migrant boats.

    Survivors have described desperate conditions on the boats, with people thrown overboard amid fights for food.

    Rohingya Muslims have been leaving Buddhist-majority Myanmar, also known as Burma, because they are not recognised as citizens and face persecution.

    Many of the Bangladeshis at sea are thought to be economic migrants.

    The BBC’s Jonah Fisher in Bangkok says there are at least five people-smuggling boats, carrying up to 1,000 migrants, moored just off the northern coast of Myanmar near the maritime border with Bangladesh.

    The crackdown on boat people landing in Thailand and Malaysia means the smugglers are reluctant to make the journey but our correspondent says they are refusing to release those on board unless ransoms are paid.

    Thailand is hosting a meeting on 29 May for 15 countries to discuss ways to address the crisis.

    However, Zaw Htay, director of Myanmar’s presidential office, said his leaders would not attend if the word “Rohingya” was used in the invitation, as they did not recognise the term.

    “We are not ignoring the migrant problem, but… we will not accept the allegations by some that Myanmar is the source of the problem,” he told the Associated Press news agency.

    “The problem of the migrant graves is not a Myanmar problem, it’s because of the weakness of human trafficking prevention and the rule of law in Thailand,” he said in a separate interview with AFP….”