Reader’s submitted news items for July 29 – 2015

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About Eeyore

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

55 Replies to “Reader’s submitted news items for July 29 – 2015”

  1. All Roads Lead to Syria
    THE NUCLEAR DEAL FALLOUT

    The United States got down on its knees last week to kiss the frog on the lips and sign the nuclear deal with Iran; the frog, however, does not show much sign of turning into a prince. It is early days, but the Iranian nuclear deal seems not to have changed very much on the ground. Instead of a handsome prince professing undying love, we have the same old ayatollah croaking dismally that U.S. policies were diametrically opposed to those of Iran, in a speech punctuated by chants of “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.” The top Revolutionary Guards commander came out in opposition to the heavily caveated provisions which grant access to Iran’s secret military sites, saying that the deal crossed “red lines.” “We will never accept it.”
    […]
    What does the deal with Iran really mean? Did we take the nuclear issue off the table, sort of, in order to clear the decks for a tougher regional strategy to counter Iran’s rush for hegemony across the Middle East? Or is the nuclear deal just the first act in a longer drama of retreat, retrenchment, and accommodation as the U.S. hands the keys of the Persian Gulf to our new Shi’a friends?

    This is the debate now raging in the foreign policy establishment and the halls of Congress. The appeasers, sorry, the accommodationists argue that if we are too tough on Iran now, they will walk away from the nuclear deal, and the United States will be face to face with the stark choice that the Obama Administration has worked so hard to avoid: accept an Iranian bomb, or bomb Iran. The frog won’t turn into a prince if the kiss isn’t sincere.
    […]
    The nuclear deal, whose full ramifications are only slowly coming into view, appears to be replete with mechanisms by which Iran could walk away from it without incurring the price of a snap-back of international sanctions or an interruption of the money rolling in. That makes an aggressive, anti-Assad, anti-IRGC policy a risky bet. But unless Washington confronts Iran’s regional ambitions on the ground, the nuclear deal could do more to destabilize the Middle East than it will to calm things down.
    And so the Administration has come not, as it may have thought, to a happy ending in the Middle East in the arms of a handsome prince. In order to save the agreement that President Obama hopes will be his historical legacy, his administration may yet have to play hardball with a frog.

    http://www.the-american-interest.com/2015/07/24/all-roads-lead-to-syria/

    • If Obama can manage it he will kick the can of what to do about Iran far enough down the road to let the next President deal with it, Of course Iran has plans of their own and may decide to ;make a major move before Obama is out of office so any response by the US will be muted at the worst and blocked at the best.

        • Probably, be sure to read the article on one of todays threads about ISIS trying to start Armageddon, looks like they and Iran have the same goal in mind.

    • It will make it easier for Iran to get nukes, the scary part is the hidden clauses and the side deals.

      • Right now Israel is within range of the Iranian missiles but they can’t reach the US, they can smuggle a tactile nuke over the southern border or mount one on scud put both on a freighter and pull a low trajectory pop shot from a couple of hundred miles out. Eeyore the latter possibility may be why Canada is buying the Iron Dome radar.

        • Canada is so big you could detonate a nuke between Toronto and Edmonton and only seismographers would suspect a thing. That includes if you took Grand Prairie right off the map. Although then its possible a few people in Thunder Bay might suspect something a month or so later. So its hard to see how Iron dome could work with 3500 miles of coast and millions of sq. miles of nothing.

          • Granted, however even the scuds have enough accuracy to hit a big city from 200 miles, with a nuke you don’t have to have tack driving accuracy, near is close enough to destroy the target. Spending 2 years about 5 miles from United States Army Headquarters in Europe during the height of the Cold War gives you a big incentive to learn about nukes and how to survive them. Our chosen method was to try and put the mountain between us and the explosion show it would stop the blast front, over pressure wave and thermal bloom.

          • The idea of knocking the warheads off course so they detonate in empty areas is part of the rational of missile defense.

  2. This article by Leon Wieseltier simply demolishes the amateurs running the administration.

    The Iran Deal and the Rut of History
    […]
    But what is the alternative? This is the question that is supposed to silence all objections. It is, for a start, a demagogic question. This agreement was designed to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. If it does not prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons—and it seems uncontroversial to suggest that it does not guarantee such an outcome—then it does not solve the problem that it was designed to solve.

    And if it does not solve the problem that it was designed to solve, then it is itself not an alternative, is it? The status is still quo. Or should we prefer the sweetness of illusion to the nastiness of reality? For as long as Iran does not agree to retire its infrastructure so that the manufacture of a nuclear weapon becomes not improbable but impossible, the United States will not have transformed the reality that worries it. We will only have mitigated it and prettified it. We will have found relief from the crisis, but not a resolution of it.

  3. The Iran Delusion? A Primer for the Perplexed

    The chattering class has spent months bickering about whether or not the United States should sign on to a nuclear deal with Iran, and everyone from the French and the Israelis to the Saudis has weighed in with “no” votes. Hardly anyone aside from the Saudis, however, seems to recognize that the Iranian government’s ultimate goal is regional hegemony and that its nuclear weapons program is simply a means to that end.

    The Middle East has five hot spots—or “shatter zones,” as Robert D. Kaplan called them in his landmark book, The Revenge of Geography—which are more prone to conflict than others, where borders are either unstable or porous, where central governments have a hard time keeping everything wired together, and where instability is endemic or chronic.
    […]
    What do these shatter zones have in common? The Iranian government backs militias and terrorist armies in all of them. As Kaplan writes, “The instability Iran will cause will not come from its implosion, but from a strong, internally coherent nation that explodes outward from a natural geographic platform to shatter the region around it.”

    That’s why Iran is a problem for American foreign policy makers in the first place; and that’s why trading sanctions relief for an international weapons inspection regime will have no effect on any of it whatsoever.

    http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/article/iran-delusion-primer-perplexed

    • “Guide for the Perplexed” is the title of Maimonides’ best known book. The title of this article is supposed to make you smirk, if you’re into that sort of thing.

  4. Malik Ishaq: Pakistan Sunni militant chief killed by police (BBC, July 29, 2015)
    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-33699133

    “Pakistani police say they have shot dead Malik Ishaq, the leader of banned Sunni militant group Lashkar-e-Jhangvi. Ishaq, who had been detained last week, was in a police convoy in Punjab province when supporters opened fire in an attempt to free him, said police.

    They said Ishaq was killed in a gun fight along with his two sons and 11 militants in Muzaffargarh district. Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) has been behind some of the most violent attacks on Shia Muslims in recent years.

    Punjab Home Minister Shuja Khanzada confirmed the news to AFP news agency, while a doctor at Muzaffargarh District Hospital said 14 bodies had been received there. Six police officers were also reported injured but correspondents say the extent of their injuries is unclear. The exact circumstances of the killing remain unclear.

    Ishaq, his two sons and other alleged members of LeJ were taken into custody by the Counter Terrorism Department several days ago in connection with eight recent sectarian killings. Late on Tuesday they were being led to Shahwala, on the outskirts of Muzaffargarh city, “where they (prisoners) said they had hidden a cache of arms and ammo”, police said.

    Police claim the group was attacked by 10 or 12 armed men in an attempt to free the prisoners. All of them were killed in the ensuing gunfight, they said.

    Ishaq was in police custody for more than 13 years on over 70 charges of sectarian killings. He walked free in December 2014 after a decision by Lahore High Court. LeJ was banned in Pakistan in 2001 and designated a terrorist group by the US in 2003. It has claimed the killings of hundreds of mainly Shia civilians in Pakistan.”

  5. Denmark
    Copenhagen gunman ‘stars’ in Isis recruit ad

    Omar El-Hussein, the gunman who killed two civilians and wounded six police officers in the Copenhagen shootings in February this year, has now appeared in Isis recruitment material, according to Berlingske.

    http://www.thelocal.dk/20150729/copenhagen-gunman-used-in-isis-ad

    Germany
    13-year-old boy detained for trying to join Isis

    A young teen from Munich was detained near the Turkish border with Syria on Friday as he was trying to join the radical Islamist group Isis.

    http://www.thelocal.de/20150729/13-year-old-from-munich-tries-to-join-isis

  6. Fox&Friends reporting Mullah Omar died two years ago from tuberculosis as picked up from a Pakistani paper by USAToday .

    Later in a repeat discussion of that report, F&F added…(advise to take any hypertension Rx before continuing)…the Bengazi5/Bergdahl exchange (—Mohammad Fazl, Abdul Haq Wasiq, Mullah Norullah Nori, Khairullah Khairkhwa, Mohammed Nabi)…were Mullah Omar’s top men and one is likely to replace his command.
    This suggests that Obama was aware of the mullah’s demise and negotiated/cooperated in releasing Mullah Omar’s men to fill the void.

  7. $ 5.4 billion sale of Patriot missiles to Saudi Arabia

    WASHINGTON, Jul 29, 2015 – The State Department has made a determination approving a possible Foreign Military Sale to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia for Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) Missiles and associated equipment, parts and logistical support for an estimated cost of $5.4 billion. The Defense Security Cooperation Agency delivered the required certification notifying Congress of this possible sale on July 28, 2015.

    The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has requested a possible sale of six hundred (600) Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) Cost Reduction Initiative (CRI) Missiles with containers, eight (8) PAC-3 CRI Test Missiles for fly-to-buy. Also included are PAC-3 Telemetry Kits, PAC-3 Guidance Enhanced Missile (GEM) Flight Test Target/Patriot as a Target (PAAT) missiles, Fire Solution Computers, Launcher Modification Kits, PAC-3 Missile Round Trainers, PAC-3 Slings, Patriot Automated Logistics System (PALS) Kits, Shorting Plugs, spare and repair parts, lot validation and range support, support equipment, repair and return, publications and technical documentation, personnel training and training equipment, Quality Assurance Team, U.S. Government and contractor technical and logistics support services, and other related elements of logistics and program support. The estimated total cost is $5.4 billion.
    *****************************************************************
    The proposed sale will contribute to the foreign policy and national security of the United States by helping to improve the security of a partner which has been, and continues to be, an important force for political stability and economic progress in the Middle East.
    *****************************************************************
    The proposed sale will modernize and replenish Saudi Arabia’s current Patriot missile stockpile, which is becoming obsolete and difficult to sustain due to age and limited availability of repair parts. The purchase of the PAC-3 missiles will support current and future defense missions and promote stability within the region. Saudi Arabia, which already has Patriot missiles in its inventory, will have no difficulty absorbing these additional missiles into its armed forces.

    The proposed sale will not alter the basic military balance in the region.

    The principal contractors will be Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control in Dallas, Texas; and Raytheon Corporation in Tewksbury, Massachusetts. Although offsets are requested, they are unknown at this time and will be determined during negotiations between Saudi Arabia and the contractor.

    Implementation of this sale will require approximately thirty (30) U.S. Government and forty (40) contractor representatives to travel to Saudi Arabia for up to sixty (60) months for equipment de-processing, fielding, system checkout, training, and technical logistics support.

    There will be no adverse impact on U.S. defense readiness as a result of this proposed sale.

    This notice of a potential sale is required by law and does not mean the sale has been concluded.

    http://www.dsca.mil/major-arms-sales/kingdom-saudi-arabia-ksa-patriot-advanced-capability-3-pac-3-missiles-and-support

  8. DAILY MAIL – Computer geek who bought enough ricin to kill 1,400 people on the dark web after being inspired by Breaking Bad hid vials of the powder in battery compartment of a toy car

    Father-of-two Mohammed Ali found guilty of trying to buy chemical weapon
    The computer geek had ordered enough poison ricin to kill 1,400 people
    Claimed he was inspired by a storyline in hit American show Breaking Bad
    Package arrived from black market site Dark Web hidden within a toy car

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3178696/Father-tried-buy-ricin-kill-1-400-people-GUILTY-attempting-acquire-chemical-weapon.html

  9. Authorities in western New York say they’ve arrested a man who attempted to support the Islamic State group. They say Arafat Nagi pledged support to the organization, purchased military gear and traveled twice to Turkey to join

  10. Hollande invites Iran’s Rouhani to visit France: ISNA

    French President Francois Hollande has invited his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani to visit France in November, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius was quoted as saying by Iran’s ISNA agency during a visit to Tehran on Wednesday.

    “I am carrying a letter of invitation from Francois Hollande, the president of my country, to Hassan Rouhani, president of Iran, to visit France in November,” Fabius was quoted as saying by ISNA.

    Fabius was speaking after a meeting with his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif and was due to meet Rouhani later on Wednesday.

    http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/8/136462/World/Region/Hollande-invites-Irans-Rouhani-to-visit-France-ISN.aspx

        • With the Iranian gov’t due to get 150 Billion unlocked it appears to me that the Europeans are slobbering all over them to get a piece of the action.

          • Follow the money, given the way the Iranians kill people the politicians will probably carry through on the deal one they have the money.

          • It isn’t just the Europeans, there are a lot of American firms that would love to get a toe hold in the Iranian markets.

    • China needs cash badly and Edogan wants weapons possibly chemical weapons that can’t be traced to him, he also wants protection in case the next US President has been eating his Wheaties and feels he has to do something about the betrayals.

    • Court bars anti-abortion group from releasing new videos

      LOS ANGELES

      A temporary restraining order has been issued preventing an anti-abortion group from releasing any video of leaders of a California company that provides fetal tissue to researchers. The group is the same one that previously released three covertly shot videos of a Planned Parenthood leader discussing the sale of aborted fetuses for research.

      The Los Angeles Superior Court order issued Tuesday prohibits the Center for Medical Progress from releasing any video of three high-ranking StemExpress officials taken at a restaurant in May. It appears to be the first legal action prohibiting the release of a video from the organization.

      The Center for Medical Progress has released three surreptitiously recorded videos to date that have riled anti-abortion activists. The Senate is expected to vote before its August recess on a Republican effort to bar federal aid to Planned Parenthood in the aftermath of the videos’ release.

      In a statement Wednesday, center leader David Daleiden said StemExpress was using “meritless litigation” to cover up an “illegal baby parts trade.”

      “The Center for Medical Progress follows all applicable laws in the course of our investigative journalism work,” he said.

      StemExpress is a Placerville-based company started in 2010 that provides human tissue, blood and other specimens to researchers. Planned Parenthood is one of the company’s providers of fetal tissue.

      A company spokesman said StemExpress is “grateful its rights have been vindicated in a court of law.”

      In the first video released by the Center for Medical Progress, Dr. Deborah Nucatola, Planned Parenthood’s senior director of medical services, describes techniques for obtaining fetal body parts for researchers to activists posing as potential buyers from a human biologics company over lunch. When asked about partnering with Planned Parenthood directly rather than through its affiliates, Nucatola mentioned StemExpress as one company that had approached them.

      In another previously released video, a woman identified as a former StemExpress phlebotomist describes drawing blood and dissecting dead fetuses.

      “I thought I was going to be just drawing blood, not procuring tissue from aborted fetuses,” the employee, Holly O’Donnell, said.

      Planned Parenthood’s affiliates in fewer than five states provide fetal tissue for researchers, according to the organization. The Center for Medical Progress accuses the group of illegally making a profit from that.

      Planned Parenthood has said it only receives reimbursements for costs of providing tissue donated by women and that it has done nothing wrong.

      The temporary restraining order issued Tuesday will remain in place until a hearing on Aug. 19.

      http://www.sacbee.com/news/nation-world/article29471548.html

        • The restraining order just gives more publicity to the videos and the pro life position, eventually the videos will be made public but until then the appeals hearings are going to keep reminding the public about the videos. science and the Roe effect has been changing the public attitude towards abortion.

          Roe effect: The pro abortion keep aborting a percentage of their kids, this lets the pro life groups become a much larger portion of the population and turn public opinion to the point where abortions will once again be illegal.

  11. This is ging to hurt them also

    Satanic Cult Pledges Funds to Support Abortion Rights

    Satanic Cult Pledges Funds to Support Abortion Rights

  12. Calais migrant crisis: France sends extra police to Channel Tunnel (BBC, July 29, 2015)
    http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-33709244

    “France is to send extra police officers to Calais, as migrants say they will keep trying to reach the UK despite the deaths of nine people since June.

    Migrants told the BBC going in groups of up to 400 gave them the best chance of getting into the Channel Tunnel.

    Motorists using the tunnel’s rail shuttle have seen delays in both the UK and France, while disruption to freight traffic is set to last all week.

    The home secretary said new fencing was urgently being installed in Calais….”

  13. Anti-Boko Haram force ‘to cross borders to fight’ (BBC, July 29, 2015)
    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-33702738

    “Multinational troops fighting Boko Haram in West Africa will be able to pursue the militants across borders, Nigeria’s presidential spokesman says. Garba Shehu told the BBC this was there was now trust between those contributing troops since the election of President Muhammadu Buhari in May. He was speaking ahead of the Nigerian leader’s visit to Cameroon. A boosted force with 8,700 troops from Cameroon, Chad, Niger and Nigeria is to become fully operational next month….”

  14. Kurd leader attacks Turkey’s ‘safe zone’ plan for Syria (BBC, July 29, 2015)
    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33698659

    “A “safe zone” Turkey and the US are creating in Syria is an attempt by Ankara to stop Kurds from forming their own territory, the leader of Turkey’s pro-Kurdish party has told the BBC.

    HDP chairman Selahattin Demirtas said Turkey’s operation against Islamic State militants across the border was a cover to target PKK Kurdish rebels.

    He urged both Turkey and the PKK to return to the peace process.

    Ankara earlier said PKK attacks on Turkey made peace attempts impossible.

    There has been a recent series of clashes between Turkish forces and the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party).

    Turkey has also been hit by attacks by IS-linked militants – including one that left 32 dead in the border town of Suruc last week.

    Turkey considers both the PKK and IS terrorist organisations.

    Turkish planes struck PKK sites in northern Iraq overnight Tuesday into Wednesday, in what Reuters said was the heaviest such assault since last Friday.

    There were no immediate reports of casualties.

    Separately, the US has confirmed it was holding talks with Ankara about their joint military campaign against the IS in Syria.

    State Department spokesman John Kirby said “more coalition effort and energy” would now be focused on the border area.

    But he rejected suggestions that the US had sanctioned Turkey’s air strike on Kurdish forces in northern Iraq.

    Over the past week, analysts say, Turkey has turned its approach to the US-led coalition against IS on its head.

    Previously a reluctant partner, it is now flying combat missions and making its airbases available to US jets.”

  15. 18 of American trained-equiped Syrian moderates arrested by Nusra Front after entering Syria today

    #BringBackOurRebels Part 2: Al-Qaeda Arrests 18 U.S.-Trained Rebels On Their First Day in Syria
    These “vetted moderate” rebels have cost the U.S. $4M per fighter thus far.

    On Monday, I reported here at PJ Media that the first 50 graduates of Obama’s U.S.-trained “vetted moderate” Syrian rebel army had left Turkey for Syria two weeks ago — and haven’t been heard from since.

    But today comes a new report that a fresh class of U.S.-trained recruits were arrested today upon entering Syria.

    18 of American trained-equiped Syrian moderates arrested by Nusra Front after entering Syria today – Turkish http://t.co/EWrz7LHhFX

    — ilhan tanir (@WashingtonPoint) July 29, 2015

    Syrian Turkmen Colonel Hasan, member of #US train & equip program & field commander Jasim, detained by Al-Nusra Front: Local – @HasanSari7

    — Conflict News (@rConflictNews) July 29, 2015

    Tanir links to this Turkish Sputnik News report that says Jabhat al-Nusra, Al-Qaeda’s official affiliate in Syria, arrested the 18 U.S.-trained members of Obama’s “vetted moderate” rebel army for being American agents.

    This is just the latest embarrassing episode for Obama’s $500 million anti-ISIS army approved by congressional Republicans back in September.

    Despite having spent half of those funds already, Defense Secretary Ashton Carter revealed to Congress earlier this month that only 60 fighters had been trained so far. This amounts to $4 million per fighter.

    We know from the McClatchy report earlier this week that 50 members of that first class are MIA. Now 18 members of the next class are in the custody of al-Qaeda.

    Anyone want to talk about a JV team?

    http://pjmedia.com/tatler/2015/07/29/bringbackourrebels-part-2-al-qaeda-arrests-18-u-s-trained-rebels-on-their-first-day-in-syria/

  16. REBEL MEDIA – Thousands will die as Obama continues to throw our allies to the wolves in Kurdistan

  17. DAILY MAIL – Britain’s borders trampled underfoot: Calls to send in the army as hundreds of migrants storm fences around Calais Channel Tunnel entrance for THIRD night running – desperate to clamber on trains bound for Kent, whatever the cost

    Demands growing for Britain to send in Army to help with Calais chaos as migrants continue to besiege Calais
    For the third night running, migrants tried to storm the Channel Tunnel where French authorities have ‘lost control’
    It comes after a Sudanese man was killed in the chaos early on Wednesday morning after being crushed by a truck
    Senior Tory MP Andrew Percy said: ‘It is time we considered more radical options, including the use of the Army’

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3179285/As-Cameron-preaches-abroad-slave-labour-migrants-besiege-Tunnel-join-black-economy-MPs-demand-Calais-Send-Army.html