Reader’s links for Aug. 26 – 2016

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In order to preserve the flow of conversation about various posted items, and also in order to make it easier for visitors to find the list of related links being shared by other readers, regulars and interested parties in one place, each day a post is automatically created at a minute past midnight ET.

This way, under the various posts of the day, conversation can take place without as much ‘noise’ on the various links and articles and ideas in the main posts and all the news links being submitted can be seen under these auto-posts by clicking on the comments-link right below these ones.

Thank you all for those that take the effort to assist this site in keeping the public informed. Below, typically people can find the latest enemy propaganda, news items of related materials from multiple countries and languages, op-eds from many excellent sites who write on our topics, geopolitics and immigration issues and so on.

About Eeyore

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

81 Replies to “Reader’s links for Aug. 26 – 2016”

  1. The issue of wearing a burqa is contrary to all civilization.

    It is not the freedom of the individual.

    It is a cultural straightjacket.

    That is the difference.

    The collectivist stranglehold.

      • Of course government and the society tells women (and men) what to wear. You can not wear bikini swim suit to work, you can not walk naked in the malls in Canada or in Europe, you can not walk topless to the court of law. So why French (or anyone) can not ban burkini which in reality is a sharia-compliant swimsuit?

      • “Top French court overturns Burkini ban saying ‘you can’t tell women what to wear’ ”

        Two standards for women on the beach:
        French: Nothing less than a bikini.
        Islam: Nothing less than a burkini.

        So the Top French judges lied about them not telling women what to wear, or most likely were minded not to remember and cannot see the danger staring them right in the face.

        The burkini, a totally Western invention, is a political weapon. No self respecting Muslim would ever allow his four wives to wear a figure-hugging outfit in public. Period.

        To lie on the beach for a pallywood photo shoot was to say, “today we show you how to be modest; tomorrow, if you have not accepted the peace of Islam we kill you without compunction.” This is Islam occupying the beach-space.

        Exactly the way Muhammadism is always conducted before every tribe and nation: submit to Muhammad’s revealed Allah or die at the hand of his Jihad gang.

        Therefore this issue had nothing about the removing womens’ rights.

        Socialists: positively selected to their seats for being blind to the right side of their faces.

  2. Suicide truck bomb blamed on PKK kills 11 police in Turkey

    A suicide truck bombing at a police headquarters in Turkey’s largely Kurdish southeast killed at least 11 and wounded dozens on Friday, two days after Turkey launched an incursion against Islamic State and Kurdish militia fighters in Syria.

    Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said there was no doubt that the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy, was responsible for the attack in Sirnak province, which borders Syria and Iraq.

    The provincial governor’s office said 11 police officers were killed and 78 people, three of them civilians, wounded. There was no immediate claim of responsibility.

    Large plumes of smoke billowed from the blast site in Cizre, footage on CNN Turk showed. The broadcaster said a dozen ambulances and two helicopters had been sent to the scene.

    Photographs broadcast by private channel NTV showed a large three-storey building reduced to its concrete shell, with no walls or windows, and surrounded by grey rubble.

    http://www.reuters.com/article/us-turkey-blast-southeast-idUSKCN1110BO

  3. Anti-Islam lawmaker Wilders calls for ban on Muslim migrants

    THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Anti-Islam Dutch lawmaker Geert Wilders, whose Freedom Party has led opinion polls in the Netherlands for months, has published a one-page election manifesto calling for a ban on all asylum seekers and migrants from Islamic nations, and for the country to leave the European Union.

    Hammering home themes that have made him one of this nation’s most popular and divisive politicians, Wilders also calls for banning the Quran and closing all mosques and Islamic schools.

    Wilders’ manifesto was the first published by a major political party ahead of elections for the lower house of Dutch parliament which are due by March 15 next year.

    His hard-line positions on Islam and the EU will likely make it difficult for him to form a majority coalition if he wins the election.

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/anti-islam-lawmaker-wilders-calls-ban-muslim-migrants-101010532.html

  4. Austrian illegal drug trade flourishes in 2015: report

    The illegal drug trade in Austria appears to have increased significantly in 2015, a new report from the Federal Criminal Police Office (BK) revealed on Wednesday.

    The report showed the amount of confiscated drugs for the year was with street value of nearly 28 million euros (about 31.6 million U.S. dollars), up from 18 million euros in 2014.

    This included a 90 kg increase in the amount of cocaine that was seized.

    The most popular drug on the streets, however, remained marijuana.

    A further 172 new chemical substances were also reportedly seized by authorities.

    There were also 2,657 more drug-related offences for the year, taking the total to just under 33,000, the highest in a decade.

    About half of all dealers arrested were said to have foreign backgrounds. Those of Serbian and Nigerian origin were more prominently active in Vienna, while Afghan nationals were found to be dealing in the towns of Styria, and Moroccans in Tyrol.

    http://www.china.org.cn/world/Off_the_Wire/2016-08/25/content_39160190.htm

    Österreich: Menge an sichergestellten Drogen stark gestiegen

    Im Vorjahr wurden in Österreich knapp 33.000 Anzeigen nach dem Suchtmittelgesetz (SMG) erstattet. Das ist die höchste Zahl seit zehn Jahren. Gegenüber dem Jahr 2014 gab es einen Anstieg von 8,8 Prozent und in absoluten Zahlen ein Plus von 2.657 Anzeigen. Ebenso ist die Menge an sichergestellten Drogen im Vergleich zum Jahr davor stark gewachsen.

    Der Suchtmittelbericht für das Jahr 2015 wurde am Mittwochnachmittag auf der Homepage des Bundeskriminalamts (BK) veröffentlicht. Darin werden die von der Polizei gemeldeten Daten über die bekannt gewordenen gerichtlich strafbaren Handlungen nach dem SMG veröffentlicht.[…]

    http://www.salzburg24.at/menge-an-sichergestellten-drogen-stark-gestiegen-2/4864699

    • Polizei durchsuchte Asylheim nach Drogen

      Es konnten bei der Überprüfung jedoch keinerlei Suchtmittel gefunden werden.

      Über Aufforderung der zuständigen Staatsanwaltschaft Korneuburg ist am Dienstag eine Asylunterkunft im Bezirk Bruck an der Leitha kontrolliert worden. Der Fokus lag u.a. auf Suchtmitteln, nachdem es laut der NÖ Polizei in der Vergangenheit wiederholt zu Weitergaben von Drogen an Verbraucher gekommen sein soll. Gefunden wurde nichts dergleichen, die Verdächtigen wurden einvernommen.
      Waffe sichergestellt

      Sichergestellt wurde ein waffenähnlicher Gegenstand in Form eines Schwerts asiatischer Herkunft. Eingesetzt waren Kräfte des Bezirkspolizeikommandos, Bedienstete der Einsatzeinheit Niederösterreich und Polizeidiensthundeführer. Die Überprüfung der Asylwerber erfolgte in Anwesenheit von Vertretern der Einrichtung.

      http://www.oe24.at/oesterreich/chronik/Polizei-durchsuchte-Asylheim-nach-Drogen/248688503

    • Mehr Drogen in Österreich, Marokkaner beherrschen Szene in Tirol

      In Tirol wird die Drogenszene zu zwei Dritteln von Marokkanern dominiert. Im Jahr 2015 befanden sich die Anzeigen in Österreich bezüglich Drogendelikten auf dem Höhepunkt der letzten zehn Jahre. Der Schwarzmarktwert erhöhte sich durch die gestiegene Menge gegenüber dem Jahr davor um zehn Millionen Euro.

      Wien, Innsbruck – Marokkanische Staatsangehörige haben die Drogenszene in Tirol – speziell in Innsbruck – fest im Griff. Verglichen mit den restlichen Bundesländern stammen knapp zwei Drittel der verdächtigen Dealer aus dem Staat im Nordwesten Afrikas. Das geht aus dem Suchtmittelbericht für das Jahr 2015 hervor, der am Mittwochnachmittag auf der Homepage des Bundeskriminalamts (BK) veröffentlicht wurde. Darin werden die von der Polizei gemeldeten Daten über die bekannt gewordenen gerichtlich strafbaren Handlungen nach dem SMG veröffentlicht. Demnach dealen deutsche Staatsbürger zumeist in Tirol, Salzburg und Oberösterreich.[…]

      http://www.tt.com/panorama/verbrechen/11933673-91/mehr-drogen-in-%C3%B6sterreich-marokkaner-beherrschen-szene-in-tirol.csp

    • This is normal when massive numbers of ethnic groups migrate to new countries they tend to take over the organized crime in the new nation. The seperation of nationality in different cities is also to be expected, the “refugees” will trust their neighbors from the home country more then those from other nations.

      • Usually the new organized criminal groups are more ruthless than the native groups. Old organized groups have more connections to the native population and by being ruthless they can lose more than they would gain. New criminal groups have to be more ruthless to gain territory. Also they usually come from the countries where life means less than in the countries they come to.

  5. Hungary to build a second ‘massive’ wall to keep out migrants heading from Turkey

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3759620/Hungary-build-stronger-anti-migrant-fence-Orban-says.html#ixzz4IRYvOFRq
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

    Hungary will build a new, ‘more massive’ fence on its southern borders to defend against a possible surge in the number of migrants, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said on Friday.

    Orban, who earlier said migrants were ‘poison’, said on state radio that there may soon be a ‘greater need for security’ and the fortified barrier would be able to stop ‘several hundreds of thousands of people’ at the same time, if needed. He did not say when construction could start.

    Orban said the surge could take place if, for example, Turkey allows the millions of refugees living there to leave for Western Europe.

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3759620/Hungary-build-stronger-anti-migrant-fence-Orban-says.html#ixzz4IRZ69OAz
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

  6. Shots Fired in Persian Gulf; Iran Warns Encroaching U.S. Ships Will be ‘Severely Punished’
    By Patrick Goodenough | August 26, 2016 | 4:10 AM EDT

    (CNSNews.com) – Iran’s defense minister vowed Thursday that any U.S. or other warships that enter Iranian waters would be “severely punished,” as the Pentagon confirmed that a U.S. patrol vessel had fired warning shots after being approached by an Iranian attack boat in an “unsafe” manner.

    “It is a natural and routine program of the border patrol to do surveillance in the southern waters and to collect intelligence on foreign ships’ operations,” the Mehr news agency quoted Defense Minister Hossein Dehghan as telling reporters in Isfahan.

    http://cnsnews.com/news/article/patrick-goodenough/shots-fired-persian-gulf-iran-warns-encroaching-us-ships-will-be

  7. DAILY MAIL Were France burkini photos STAGED? A Muslim woman on a beach with no towel, no book, or parasol… and then forced to remove swimwear by police … fresh claims pictures may be SET UP

    Images show police in Nice ordering a woman to take her clothes off
    The 34-year-old woman said ‘racist’ officers wanted to humiliate her
    French political figures and media suggest incident could have been staged to ‘divide France’
    But Nice officials and photo agency who published picture deny any set up
    French court this week upheld ‘burkini ban’ – ruling it could cause offence
    Judges said the ban was ‘necessary, appropriate and proportionate’
    But campaigners say the burkini ban is ‘exactly what ISIS wants’

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3758402/Were-France-burkini-photos-STAGED-Muslim-woman-beach-no-towel-no-book-parasol-forced-remove-swimwear-police-fresh-claims-pictures-SET-UP.html

    • P GELLER – Burkini Jihad Hoaxer: How Muslims staged the French Burkini Arrest

      The now infamous “burkini” incident was a total set-up.

      Burkinis on Nice beaches have been banned. It’s the law. Boom. So why would this Muslima show up in a burkini and make sure to have the moment photographed (of course) when the cops show up. So that the poor oppressed Muslims looks like a victim. Agitprop and vile manipulation.

      She knows it’s against the law now. So why go? it’s a set-up for that sympathy shot. And the enemedia lapped up this staged incident like a dying man in the desert.

      The pictures — sold worldwide by an agency — are not credited. They are, however, professionally shot.The photographer was there long before the incident.

      This Muslim and her photo goon squad’s disregard for the hundreds of victims of brutal Islamic attacks in Nice, Paris, Toulouse, Brussels, makes her as vicious and treacherous as the jihadis themselves. Attacking an attempt to counter the jihad threat is sedition.

      File this under al Dura, Pallywood, the Syrian boy on the beach and the rest of the fiction as news enemedia churns out daily. .

      I have been meaning to write up the ruse and hadn’t gotten to it. This column does a fine job of exposing the burkini hoaxer.

      “‘CITIZENS SUPPORT BEACH BAN’ Provocative French writer says ‘If you’re upset by burkini cop image, you’ve have been sucked in by Islamist propaganda,”[…]

      http://pamelageller.com/2016/08/burkini-jihad-hoaxer-how-muslims-staged-the-french-burkini-arrest.html/

  8. Turkey signals no quick end to Syria incursion as truck bomb kills 11

    ISTANBUL/KARKAMIS, Turkey (Reuters) – Turkish forces will remain in Syria for as long as it takes to cleanse the border of Islamic State and other militants, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Friday, after a truck bombing by Kurdish insurgents killed at least 11 police officers.

    The suicide bombing at a police headquarters in a province bordering Syria and Iraq came two days after Turkey launched its first major military incursion into Syria, an operation meant to drive Islamic State out of the border area and stop Kurdish militias from seizing ground in their wake.

    Turkey, a NATO member and part of the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, has seen a series of deadly bombings this year blamed on the radical Islamists. But it also fears Kurdish militias in Syria will seize a swathe of border territory and embolden Kurdish insurgents on its own soil.

    President Tayyip Erdogan said the bombing in Sirnak province would increase Turkey’s determination as it fights terrorist groups at home and abroad. Yildirim said there was no doubt the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency for Kurdish autonomy, was responsible.

    “From the beginning we have been defending Turkey’s territorial integrity. We are also defending Syria’s territorial integrity. The aim of these terrorist organization is … to form a state in these countries… They will never succeed,” Yildirim told a news conference in Istanbul.

    “We will continue our operations (in Syria) until we fully guarantee security of life and property for our citizens and the security of our border. We will continue until Daesh (Islamic State) and other terrorist elements are taken out.”

    http://www.oann.com/turkey-signals-no-quick-end-to-syria-incursion-as-truck-bomb-kills-11/

    • There is a lot in the article so click over and read the rest.

      Remember the Turkish incursion was designed to prevent the Kurds from gaining control over more territory. The question is also as how long will the Turks remain in Syria, Erdogan wants them to remain there permanently, remember he wants a new Ottoman Empire with himself as the Caliph.

  9. French court suspends ‘burkini’ ban (BBC, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://bbc.in/2bSIOrM

    “French court suspends controversial “burkini ban” in coastal town of Villeneuve-Loubet
    This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly. Please refresh the page for the fullest version…”

    • France: le Conseil d’Etat suspend l’interdiction du burkini

      Le Conseil d’Etat français a suspendu vendredi un arrêté dit “antiburkini” interdisant aux baigneurs portant des vêtements religieux l’accès aux plages de Villeneuve-Loubet (Alpes-Maritimes). Des maires invoquaient des risques de troubles à l’ordre public.

      La plus haute juridiction administrative avait été saisie en urgence par la Ligue des droits de l’homme (LDH) et le Collectif contre l’islamophobie en France (CCIF), pour qui ce type d’arrêté, pris dans plusieurs dizaines de villes balnéaires depuis fin juillet, est “liberticide”.

      “A Villeneuve-Loubet, aucun élément ne permet de retenir que des risques de trouble à l’ordre public aient résulté de la tenue adoptée en vue de la baignade par certaines personnes”, peut-on lire dans un communiqué du Conseil d’Etat. “En l’absence de tels risques, le maire ne pouvait prendre une mesure interdisant l’accès à la plage et la baignade.”

      A l’audience jeudi, l’avocat de Villeneuve-Loubet, François Pinatel, avait assuré que les burkinis y étaient devenus “pléthoriques” avant le 5 août, quand l’arrêté a été pris, et contribuaient à crisper le climat “dans une région fortement éprouvée par les attentats”.

      La polémique sur le burkini exacerbe les tensions en France et divise le gouvernement, où deux ministres ont pris leurs distances avec la multiplication des arrêtés d’interdiction, soutenus par le premier ministre Manuel Valls. Sans trancher le débat, le président François Hollande a indirectement évoqué la question jeudi, en appelant tous les citoyens à “se conformer aux règles”, sans “provocation ni stigmatisation”.

      http://www.romandie.com/news/France-le-Conseil-dEtat-suspend-linterdiction-du-burkini/731597.rom

    • The mayor of Sisco in northern Corsica says he won’t lift his ban on the burkini despite a ruling by France’s top administrative court regarding a similar ban in another town.

      Ange-Pierre Vivoni had banned the burkini after an Aug. 13 clash on a beach in Sisco.

      He told BFM-TV Friday: “Here the tension is very, very, very strong and I won’t withdraw it.”

      http://www.omaha.com/news/world/the-latest-sisco-mayor-says-he-won-t-lift-burkini/article_61ee0347-1e9f-5beb-82fb-c6d0ae17ac6e.html

    • Several French mayors stick to burkini ban despite court ruling

      Several mayors in southeast France on Friday said they would maintain their bans on the Islamic burkini swimsuit despite a ruling by France’s highest administrative court to suspend the measures.

      Town hall authorities in Nice said the mayor would continue to fine women wearing burkinis while the mayor of nearby Frejus, David Rachline, told AFP that “the Frejus order is still valid.”

      http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/2/9/241747/World/International/Several-French-mayors-stick-to-burkini-ban-despite.aspx

      • They are daring the Federal government to arrest them, things are about to fall apart in France.

  10. New Syrian rebel advance against IS may take months, commander says

    BEIRUT (Reuters) – Syrian rebels, who this week seized a strategic town from Islamic State, aim to move westward in the next phase of their Turkey-backed operation, an advance that could take weeks or months to complete, a rebel commander said.

    Colonel Ahmad Osman, head of the Sultan Murad group, also told Reuters the rebels did not wish to fight Kurdish forces that have advanced in northern Syria as part of a separate campaign against IS, but would do so if necessary.

    Sultan Murad is one of the main Syrian rebel groups taking part in the operation that on Wednesday drove IS from the border town of Jarablus with help from Turkish special forces, warplanes and tanks.

    The operation aims to expel IS from its last foothold at the Syrian-Turkish border, but also to prevent any further gains by the Kurdish YPG militia whose growing influence in Syria has alarmed Turkey as it battles its own Kurdish insurgency.

    Osman, speaking to Reuters from Jarablus, said the priority was now to advance some 70 km (40 miles) westward to Marea, a town where rebels have long had a frontline with IS.

    “We want to cleanse this area before moving south,” Osman said. Failing to do so would leave the rebels at risk of IS counter attack, he said. “The priority is from Jarablus in the direction of al-Rai, reaching Marea.”

    http://www.oann.com/new-syrian-rebel-advance-against-is-may-take-months-commander-says/

  11. CANADA – Guidebook for teachers aims to prevent youth from becoming prey for violent extremists

    16-page manual deals with Islamophobia, ‘Trump effect’

    A unique back-to-school guide offers tips on how to help Muslim students and refugee children hurt by world conflicts and “the Trump effect,” so they don’t end up isolated and recruited by violent extremists on the Internet.

    Helping Students Deal with Trauma Related to Geopolitical Violence & Islamophobia: A Guide for Educators is being released today in Ottawa by the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Islamic Social Services Association (ISSA) and the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM).

    The 16-page guide (which is being made available online in English and French) is especially timely, with Syrian refugees settling in at school this fall and the American election on the horizon, says Amira Elghawaby, NCCM communications director.

    “We’ve experienced an increased demand for information on how students are being impacted by issues around Islamophobia and how educators can support newly arrived Syrian refugees,” she said. “There’s clearly a gap and this is what this guide is trying to do: put some basic resources out there and get them thinking. Sometimes, they aren’t aware, like what is the Trump effect on our students.”

    Presidential candidate Donald Trump’s call to ban Muslims from entering the U.S. has stoked Islamophobia rhetoric, says the guide, which includes an Associated Press report on the impact it has had on American Muslim children.

    “It has an impact on youth, and children don’t have the capacity to process that and shake it off,” said Winnipeg-based ISSA president Shahina Siddiqui.

    “We know the American election will have impacts here in Canada,” Elghawaby said in Ottawa. “We want to make sure educators are attuned to how it impacts the students they’re caring for.”

    Syrian refugees who recently arrived in Canada will likely be confronted with Islamophobia in some form. “Many refugees are settled in, and now the real work begins,” Elghawaby said.

    When Muslim students face Islamophobia, they often find themselves under attack and on the defensive, the guide says. They may feel they have to stay silent or apologize for terrorists acting in the name of their faith to prove their loyalty to Canada, it says.

    The booklet aims to help teachers and guidance counsellors understand the impact of hate, war, trauma and terrorism so they can support students dealing with fear, grief, and confusion, Siddiqui said.

    “It is critical schools provide safe spaces for youth” and help them build confidence in their identity as Canadian Muslims, Siddiqui says in the guide’s preface. If they’re not supported and take hateful messages to heart, they’re more likely to act out in unhealthy ways, turning to drugs, alcohol or the Internet, where they’re targets for violent extremist recruiters, she said.

    In an interview Wednesday, Siddiqui wondered if Aaron Driver (an Islamic State supporter who was killed Aug. 10 by police in Ontario while reportedly en route to committing a terrorist act) had received the emotional help he needed in school to deal with the grief over his mother’s death.

    The guidebook aims to help children long before they’re isolated and turn to violent extremism, she said.

    “It’s meant to reach children at the preventative and healing stage (and) to help teachers understand what they’re dealing with,” said Siddiqui.

    “Many of them don’t have the knowledge base or understanding,” she said, adding two examples: at a Manitoba school, a girl’s hijab (head scarf) was pulled off by a teaching assistant; at another school, a student who complained about course material having an anti-Muslim bias was told she couldn’t graduate unless she completed the assignment.

    “Do we want a society that’s cohesive and harmonious or one that’s about the ‘othering’ of a whole group of people?” Siddiqui said. “Unless it is stopped, it will escalate. Hate escalates and violence escalates when it is not responded to.”

    http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/local/guidebook-for-teachers-aims-to-prevent-youth-from-becoming-violent-extremists-391230291.html

  12. ‘We’re not a MIGRANT WAITING ROOM’ Austria blasts Merkel and demands ‘deportation summit’ (express, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/704186/We-re-not-MIGRANT-WAITING-ROOM-Austria-blasts-Merkel-demands-deportation-summit

    “AUSTRIA is not Germany’s “waiting room”, the country’s defence minister has said, in the latest attack on Angela Merkel’s immigration policy.

    Hans Peter Doskizil claims the beleaguered German chancellor’s “welcoming” stance on refugees fleeing the Middle East is creating a new “attraction factor” for those hoping to relocate to Europe.

    Mrs Merkel’s open door policy was persuading thousands of migrants to try and cross Austria in the belief they will be welcomed in Germany, he said.

    But he accused EU superpowers of “burying their head in the sand” and called for a “summit on deportation”.

    In an interview with Austria’s Krone newspaper, Mr Doskozil said: “It is a mystery to me why the right lessons have not been learned from the events of 2015.”

    As many as 1.5 million refugees entered Germany last year, carried in on a wave of euphoria by residents holding “Refugees Welcome” banners as the they arrived in the country.

    But the public mood has shifted drastically since then, after events such as the mass sex attacks in Cologne on New Year’s Eve and a Syrian migrant blowing himself up at a music festival near Ansbach.

    Optimism has been replaced by suspicion and anger, with regular reports of arson attacks on refugee shelters and a new wave of Neo-Nazism spreading across the nation…

    Mr Doskozil added: “The ‘we can do it’ policy is irresponsible.

    “It is not a policy, if Europe stays here in agony and sticks its head in the sand.”

    The defence minister also dismissed the planned readmission agreement with Turkey, which would see the country take back immigrants in exchange for €3bn (£2.5bn) in aid, visa-free European travel for Turks and accelerated talks over EU membership.

    Referring to the bungled miitary coup to overthrow President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Mr Doskozil said: “The Turkish government is no longer to be taken seriously by the recent events, events and interventions yet. From a visa liberalization with Turkey we are far away, because Turkey is far from European standards.””

  13. USN fires warning shots as Iranian harassment ramps up

    Additional reporting today on maritime encounters with Iranian patrol boats indicates that the severity of the incidents really is increasing – along with their frequency.

    A number of sites have picked up on the reporting Thursday that a U.S. Navy patrol ship in the Gulf had to fire warning shots at Iranian boats on Wednesday, 24 August. But each of the other incidents just this week — four so far — is of concern in its own right. Things are starting to spiral.

    In the warning-shots situation, USS Squall, a Cyclone class “PC” or coastal patrol ship – smaller than a frigate – had to fire shots from the deck-mounted .50-cal machine gun, to ward off Iranian patrol boats that approached to within 200 yards of her sister ship, USS Tempest. The two PCs were operating in the northern Persian Gulf, and had actually been harassed by the Iranians in a separate incident earlier on Wednesday.

    Said U.S. Fifth Fleet/NAVCENT spokesman Commander Bill Urban:

    http://libertyunyielding.com/2016/08/25/usn-fires-warning-shots-iranian-harassment-problem-ramps/

    Richard: Be sure and read the full article for a professional intelligence analysis if what is happening. She makes the point that there are two main reasons for Iran doing this, 1) They want to start a fight, 2) They are trying to extort more money from the US. Either way things are at a point where they can spiral out of control and a major shooting war start.

    One thing that she doesn’t bring 0ut is that several years back Iran and North Korea were whipsawing us between the mideast and Korea with one creating a big stir to draw the worlds attention while the other did something. Don’t forget to look at Korea and China to see if something else is going on over there. The reports that North Korea was starting to build nukes again and that they might be getting ready to test one spring to mind.

  14. From a Russian point of view:
    U.S. Invades Syria, And Warns Russia

    On Monday, August 22nd, the United States government — which demands the overthrow of the internationally-recognized-as-legal government of Syria — officially announced that America’s military forces in Syria will continue to occupy Syrian land, no matter what the Syrian government says, and will shoot down any Syrian planes that fly over U.S. forces there and that attack them.
    […]
    This means that the U.S. government will not allow the Syrian government to expel or otherwise eliminate U.S. forces in Syria. The Syrian government never invited U.S. forces into Syria, but the U.S. now officially dares the Syrian government to assert its sovereignty over the areas where America’s troops are located.
    […]
    [T]he U.S. not only is at war against the legitimate government of Syria, but…the U.S. government will also be at war against Russia if Russian forces (which the Syrian government did invite into Syria) defends Syrian forces from attacks in Syria by U.S. forces — forces that are illegally there.

    These U.S. forces number only 300, of whom 250 were sent to Syria on April 24th to serve as advisors to other illegal military forces in Syria.

    The vast majority of the illegal military forces in Syria are jihadists who had been hired by the Saudi government and the Qatari government, and supplied with U.S. weapons, to overthrow the Syrian government. Most of the other illegal forces in Syria are Kurdish forces, supported by the U.S. government to break Syria apart so as to create a separate Kurdish state in the majority-Kurdish far north-eastern tip of Syria.

    The primary U.S. goal in Syria is to overthrow the Syrian government, which is led by the Baath Party, Syria’s secular Party. Many Arabs insist upon Sharia, or Islamic law, but Syria’s Arabs are an exception; the Baath Party is and has always been supported by the majority of the Syrian people, including by most of Syria’s Arabs. Most Syrians are strongly opposed to Sharia law. Syria is the most secular nation in the Middle East.
    […]
    The Syrian government, from now on, is in the uncomfortable position of having invaders on its territory, and of being warned that one of them — the U.S. — will be fully at war against Syria if Syria tries to expel them.

    Russia too is now under warning from the United States, that, if Russia, an ally of Syria, takes any action to expel or kill any of the U.S. invaders in Syria, then the U.S. will also be at war against Russia.

    The U.S. government is now also daring the Russian government. Perhaps the U.S. strategy here is to force Russia’s President, Vladimir Putin, either to back down, and abandon its Syrian ally, or else to launch a nuclear strike against the United States. If Putin backs down, that would greatly diminish his support from the Russian people, which is above 80% in all polls, including Western-sponsored ones. Perhaps this is the strategy of U.S. President Barack Obama, to drive Vladimir Putin out of office — something that might occur if the U.S. drives Bashar al-Assad out of office.

    As Seymour Hersh reported, on 7 January 2016, “the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) and the Joint Chiefs of Staff, then [in the summer of 2013] led by General Martin Dempsey, forecast that the fall of the Assad regime would lead to chaos and, potentially, to Syria’s takeover by jihadi extremists, much as was then happening in Libya,” and so Dempsey quit, and Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, director of the DIA between 2012 and 2014, was fired over the matter. “The DIA’s reporting, he [Flynn] said, ‘got enormous pushback’ from the Obama administration. ‘I felt that they did not want to hear the truth.’”

    Flynn is now a foreign-affairs advisor to the Republican Presidential candidate, Donald Trump, who is being criticized by the Democratic Presidential candidate, for being soft on Russia and insufficiently devoted to the U.S. goal of overthrowing Assad.

    http://russia-insider.com/en/politics/us-invades-syria-and-warns-russia/ri16082

    h/t Israpundit

    • Oh boy, Putin is raising the stakes he is laying the ground work to force Obama to publicly back down and remove our forces from Syria. If/when he succeeds this will have a minimum of 4 advantages for him maybe 5 and there are probably some I haven’t thought of 1) massive political capital in Russia, 2) massive political capital in the Middle East while reducing US influence in the Middle East. 3) Reducing the faith our allies around the world have in the US (not that Obama hasn’t already destroyed this trust) 4) emboldening China and North Korea. 5) If this is done in the next 75 days it will create turmoil in the US Presidential Election (not that we need foreign help in creating chaos during this election season).

    • The main reason Turkey moved in was to stop the Kurds from gaining more territory, after they pacify the area that was their initial goal they will find some excuse to move on the Kurds and try to destroy their fighters. This will spread to include the Yazdie and Christian militias in that region. Erodgan wants to be Caliph which means no independent Islamic nations and no armed infidels unless they are working for the Caliph.

  15. EXCLUSIVE: Bill Clinton bombed Saddam to distract from the Monica Lewinsky scandal – what Huma Abedin’s Muslim journal claimed about her boss’s husband (dailymail, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://dailym.ai/2bSUXND

    “An article in the Muslim journal where Huma Abedin was assistant editor claimed Bill Clinton bombed Saddam Hussein to deflect from his Monica Lewinsky affair.

    The claim made made in an article published in the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, where Abedin was a member of the editorial board – the group of people who decide what is published in the academic journal.

    It is the latest bombshell to emerge from the archives of the journal, whose editor-in-chief is Abedin’s mother, Saleha Mahmood Abedin, an academic in Saudi Arabia…”

  16. Russia: Massive training drills continue ahead of Caucasus 2016 exercises

    Footage shows service personnel hooking up a satellite as well as checking radio, telephone and message lines. The video also captures a Sukhoi Su-34 fighter being checked and prepared for a reconnaissance flight, as well as a column of armoured vehicles driving along an undisclosed street at night.

    • That looked more like a ground link in a microwave network rather then a Sat link. Wish we had had trucks like that when i was serving, we had to raise the tower and antenna by hand. When you are young it takes a lot less time then people think.

  17. Humiliation on the High Seas
    The Obama administration isn’t taking Iran’s threat to the U.S. Navy seriously.

    Iran is harassing American naval warships in the Persian Gulf while Washington still entertains the idea that Iran can be a friend of America.

    Top Iranian political and military leaders proclaim their total hatred of the United States.

    The attack on the USS Nitze on Tuesday was a test of an Iranian tactic called the “swarming boat” attack to destroy U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf: a number of fast boats equipped with missiles and torpedoes attack enemy ships from multiple angles to damage or destroy them as quickly as possible.

    Fast patrol boats are hard to hit. They are built mostly of fiberglass, so they are not so easy to locate with radar. In addition, the defensive weapons on board most U.S. naval ships are inadequate.

    The old Mark 45 five-inch guns fire too slowly and are linked to aged fire control and radars that probably won’t pick up the patrol boats until they are in range to fire their missiles.

    http://www.usnews.com/opinion/articles/2016-08-25/stop-allowing-iran-to-humiliate-america-on-the-high-seas?src=usn_tw

    • What they are talking about is the old MTB (British term) or PT (US term) from WWII. The boats are useful but not as useful as the designers wanted. they are more useful for patrolling and calling in larger ships or attacking cargo vessels. I am not sure what the US is using for that purpose right now.

    • In WWII they discovered that 50 cal machine guns and 20mm rapid fire cannons were the best way to take out the boats. Britain used steam powered grenade launchers on merchant vessels that doubled as both surface weapon on the fast boars and as an antiaircrft weapon. When not under attack ships often engaged in semi friendly fights by firing raw potatoes at the other ships in the convoys,

  18. Spilling Blood in War on ISIS, Kurds Pay Heavy Price for U.S.-Turkey Ties

    One day after the U.S. threatened to withdraw its support, Kurdish forces withdrew from Manbij, Syria, one of the Islamic State’s most important strongholds, which had been taken by Kurdish forces under cover of American air support in a battle that won them accolades for their important victory.

    An official in the Kurdish administration in Iraq told Ha’aretz that the American threat “conveys a frustrating and dangerous message not only to the Kurds in Syria but to the entire Kurdish people, who are spilling blood in the war against ISIS and were relying on the U.S. government to stand by them.”

    The U.S. is preparing assaults on ISIS in Mosul, Iraq, and Raqqah, in Syria. On both fronts, its plans depend on massive cooperation on the part of Kurdish forces. We will see how the Kurds operate after the slap in the face they received this week.

    Over the past year, Russia has become an ally of the Kurds in Syria. Last week Moscow initiated a cease-fire between the Syrian regime and the Kurds in the Hasakah region in northeastern Syria. Ostensibly this was merely a local accord, but its special importance is that it strengthened the standing of Russia, which – unlike the U.S. – can establish a cease-fire, create areas of quiet, and translate its aerial assaults into achievements on the ground.

    http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/turkey/.premium-1.738779

  19. Norway Builds a Fence

    Countries that were once noted for their hospitality to refugees are becoming polarized. Norway is putting up a steel fence at a remote Arctic border post with Russia after 5,500 migrants mainly from Syria crossed into Norway last year, reflecting a wide shift in public attitudes.

    The only really effective way to deal with refugee problems is to deal with their causes. As Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Yemen slide into anarchy, a wave of desperate refugees and migrants sets off for the security and prosperity of Europe. If the West can’t or won’t help locals stabilize these countries, the refugee flow will inevitably reach a level at which even the most liberal politicians can no longer keep the doors open.

    http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/08/25/norway-builds-a-fence/

  20. Book review of Jay Solomon’s The Iran Wars, on why Obama [yech, poo] didn’t even lend moral support to the Green Revolution against the monster-Ayatollah’s in 2009.

    Why Obama Let Iran’s Green Revolution Fail

    President Obama wasn’t just reluctant to show solidarity [with Iranian protestors] in 2009, he feared the demonstrations would sabotage his secret outreach to Iran. . . . Behind the scenes, Obama overruled advisers who wanted to do what America had done at similar transitions from dictatorship to democracy, and signal America’s support. Solomon reports that Obama ordered the CIA to sever contacts it had with the Green movement’s supporters. . . .

    It’s worth contrasting Obama’s response with how the U.S. has reacted to other democratic uprisings. The State Department, for example, ran a program in 2000 through the U.S. embassy in Hungary to train Serbian activists in nonviolent resistance against their dictator, Slobodan Milosevic. Milosevic, [like the ayatollahs], accused his opposition of being pawns of the U.S. government. But in the end his people forced the dictator from power. . . . Even the Obama administration provided diplomatic and moral support for popular uprisings in Egypt in 2011 and Ukraine in 2014.

    Iran, though, is a very different story. Obama from the beginning of his presidency tried to turn the country’s ruling clerics from foes to friends. It was an obsession. And . . . it’s striking the lengths to which Obama went to make good on his word. As Solomon reports, Obama ended U.S. programs to document Iranian human-rights abuses. . . .

    His quest to engage the mullahs seems to have influenced Obama’s decision-making on other issues, too. When he walked away from his red line against Syria’s use of chemical weapons in 2013, Solomon reports, both U.S. and Iranian officials had told him that nuclear negotiations would be halted if he intervened against Bashar al-Assad.

    https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-08-24/why-obama-let-iran-s-green-revolution-fail

    • Depraved new ISIS video shows child executioners gunning down Kurds

      A stomach-turning new video released Friday by ISIS shows the depraved terrorist army’s so-called “cubs” executing five Kurdish fighters, as well as a twisted montage of mass murder in the name of Allah.

      The 9-minute video was posted online by ISIS leaders in its stronghold of Raqqa, Syria, under the title, “The Nations [are] Uniting Against You.” It was first reported by Middle East Media Research Institute, which tracks terrorist groups’ communication throughout the region.

      “What lies between me and you are days that make young men turn old,” warns one child identified as Abu Al-Baraa Al-Tunisi, as he and the others point handguns skyward. “The war against you has not started yet and the U.S., France, the U.K., Germany, and neither humans nor Jinn devils will avail you. Prepare you coffins, dig your graves, and await a fate similar to that of these men.”

      With that, the children, who appear to be as young as 10 years old, shout “Allah Akbar,” lower their guns and shoot the kneeling men in the backs of their heads

      With that, the children, who appear to be as young as 10 years old, shout “Allah Akbar,” lower their guns and shoot the kneeling men in the backs of their heads.

      The other children are identified as Yousouf Al-Ozbaki, Abu Fuad Al-Kurdi, Abu Ishaq Al-Masri and Abu Abdalla Al-Britani, whose name indicates he is British.

      ISIS has released several videos showing its enemies’ executions, including some by children. But Friday’s video was believed to be the first showing a mass execution carried out by multiple children, who are known as the “cubs” of the black-clad jihadist group.

      “ISIS wants to you to know that their children will continue their jihad, and that killing current fighters isn’t much of a net gain if their many offspring will replace them,” said Ryan Mauro, a national security analyst with Clarion Project, which tracks the international terrorist threat. “For ISIS, this is a show of strength; that even their little kids are capable of violent devotion beyond what their enemies’ adults can muster.”

      The video begins with masked fighters beheading and shooting five men accused of being members of Sahawat militias. One of the fighters delivers a message to the Sahawat calling on them to repent before ISIS finds them.

      “Allah’s willing,” he said “we will cut off your heads and purify the earth of your filth,” the fighter states.

      The video intersperses scenes of kiling with depictions of destruction across ISIS’ caliphate and civilians who purportedly were killed in allied airstrikes.

      The group also levels threats at President Obama and Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.

      The video ends with an ISIS fighter threatening Shia Muslims, who have historically been at odds with the Sunnis who include ISIS.

      “Today, we kill your sons here, and tomorrow [we will kill them] in Qardaha, Tartus and Lattakia, Allah’s willing,” before he and three other fighters execute four men accused of being Syrian soldiers.

      http://www.foxnews.com/world/2016/08/26/depraved-new-isis-video-shows-child-executioners-gunning-down-kurds.html

  21. AUSTRALIA – Home Hill stabbing: Police request accused murderer Smail Ayad stay away from court

    The Frenchman accused of killing one British tourist and leaving another clinging for life in a shocking backpacker hostel stabbing did not appear in Townsville court after police requested he stay away.

    Smail Ayad, 29, is accused of the stabbing murder of 21-year-old Mia Ayliffe-Chung and the attempted murder of “hero” fellow Brit Thomas Jackson, who remained in intensive care after his father flew across the world to see him on Thursday night.

    After allegedly attacking officers on two separate occasions, police cited public safety concerns in not bringing the accused into the Townsville Magistrates Court in person to face charges of murder, attempted murder and assaulting police.

    He was expected to appear via video link but was not beamed into the court on Friday morning.

    “It was the police that requested that he not be brought up and I’ve taken instructions that don’t resist that,” Legal Aid solicitor Helen Armitage said.*

    She asked for an eight-week adjournment to allow police to complete an unspecified application and prepare a brief of evidence.

    The matter was delayed for most of Friday morning as a French lawyer was organised to speak to Mr Ayad and only lasted a matter of minutes when it was eventually heard.

    Directly after the hearing, the court was closed for police to make an unspecified application to Magistrate Richard Lehmann.

    Ms Armitage didn’t comment as she left court.

    It’s further alleged Mr Ayad tried to kill Grant Scholz, the 46-year-old manager of the north Queensland backpacker hostel at the centre of the shocking alleged attack.
    English woman Mia Ayliffe-Chung, who had been working as a waitress at the Gold Coast, had been in Townsville less than …
    English woman Mia Ayliffe-Chung, who had been working as a waitress at the Gold Coast, had been in Townsville less than two weeks before she was killed. Photo: Facebook

    Mr Scholz, whose efforts to calm the situation were also described as courageous, escaped without life-threatening injuries and was released from hospital on Wednesday.

    Mr Ayad allegedly turned the knife on and killed the family dog before injuring several police officers as body-worn camera footage captured him shouting “Allahu Akbar” on his arrest.

    The Frenchman, in Australia since March, was himself taken to hospital for injuries suffered in the attack.

    Police said he leapt from the balcony of the Home Hill Backpackers, about 100 kilometres south of Townsville, and landed on his back.

    He allegedly lashed out at police again while being moved from hospital to the watchhouse, with one officer bitten on the leg.

    It took half a dozen officers using capsicum spray and a Taser to restrain him, police said, charging him with 12 counts of serious assault police, including by biting or spitting.

    The Australian Federal Police was called in to help investigate whether Mr Ayad had any links to extremism but police had not found any evidence of radicalisation.

    Mr Ayad will not be required to appear when the matter is heard again in a committal mention on October 28.

    http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/queensland/home-hill-stabbing-accused-backpacker-murderer-smail-ayad-does-not-front-court-20160826-gr1qu8.html

  22. Merkel’s party mate wants to get rid of all Karl Marx streets (thelocal, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://www.thelocal.de/20160826/merkels-party-mate-wants-to-get-rid-of-karl-marx-streets

    “Hundreds of streets are named after the founder of communism, but this conservative politician wants to give Marx the boot.

    Some 550 streets, alleys and plazas in former communist East Germany bear the name of of the Communist Manifesto philosopher, according to Die Welt.

    But the Economic Council of the CDU (Christian Democratic Union) believes it’s about time the country moved away from its Cold War past, as Bild first reported.

    “More than a quarter of a century after the political and economic bankruptcy of the GDR [East Germany], it is time to part ways with communism’s replacement of saints in the streets,” general secretary for the CDU economic council Wolfgang Steiger told The Local in a statement on Thursday.

    “I do not understand why some places today still have main streets named after him.”

    The economic council is an organization of business professionals that works closely with the CDU party to represent the interests of entrepreneurs in economic policies.

    Steiger went on to say that Marx and colleague Friedrich Engels “did nothing good with their ideology”…”

  23. 6 reasons why Berlin is now known as ‘the failed city’ (thelocal, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://www.thelocal.de/20160826/6-reasons-why-berlin-has-earned-its-label-of-a-failed-capital-city

    “With state elections around the corner, The Local looks at the poor side of Germany’s “poor but sexy” capital city.

    Since its reunification in 1990, Berlin has developed into a thriving, cosmopolitan centre.

    Dubbed “poor but sexy” by its former mayor, it has attracted creative types like moths to a flame with its low rents and exploding startup scene.

    Tourists flock to this grungy vibe too, with nearly six million visiting in the first six months of this year alone.

    But the reality is that the city is struggling with poverty, unemployment, poor infrastructure, a floundering education system, debt, the refugee crisis and crime.

    Its chronic problems led national newspaper Die Welt to label it a “failed state” in 2014. Here are a few reasons why Berlin has earned this uncomfortable moniker.

    1. Six years behind schedule, the airport still hasn’t been opened.

    Berlin is hardly unique in Germany when it comes to embarrassing mega projects. Anyone acquainted with Stuttgart’s underground central station or Hamburg’s new concert hall knows that cliches about German efficiency hold little water.

    But there is something spectacular about how Berlin has failed to open the Berlin-Brandenburg airport. Its launch has been postponed repeatedly since 2011 due to planning failures and amid corruption accusations. Few people believe the city’s claim that it will open next year.

    Upon his resignation in 2014, former mayor Klaus Wowereit described the fiasco as the biggest failure of his 13-year term in office.

    The original projected costs of the airport have more than doubled. By 2017, some estimate the taxpayer will have forked out over €5 billion for it.

    To pick just the most recent of years of negative headlines, this week a former senior employee admitted to taking €150,000 in bribes from a subcontractor.

    2. In comparison to Germany as a whole, Berlin is swimming in debt.

    While debt is increasing in other Bundesländer – with Hamburg’s debt rising from €26 billion in 2014 to €26.7 billion in 2015 – it is decreasing in Berlin, with the capital’s debt dropping from €59.8 billion in 2014 to €59.2 billion in 2015.

    Despite this, Berlin’s debt still overshadows that of other states, towering above Bavaria’s €36.9 billion.

    While capitals are often the economic power houses of their respective countries, Berlin is heavily reliant on the rest of the Bundesrepublik. In fact, it is the only European capital which is a drain on its country’s overall economy, a study by the Cologne Institute for Economic Research demonstrated.

    Germany has a system of fiscal equalisation which tries to eliminate financial inequalities between states. Berlin is the largest recipient of payments, receiving over €3.6 million last year. By contrast, Bavaria is the biggest contributor to the scheme, providing over €5.4 million.

    3. Berlin is struggling to provide adequate care for refugees.

    At the height of the refugee crisis last year, 500 asylum seekers were arriving daily at the capital’s main registration centre, known as LaGeSo, but only 200 could be given an appointment on a given day, an employee told the Berliner Zeitung last December.

    “Our leadership is completely overwhelmed”, the employee said.

    “The files we’ve put on hold are mounting up in boxes. We store them in several rooms. There is no system to it, which is why we have come up with a job called ‘the seeker’ – someone whose only task is to find the necessary file,” said another.

    Refugees have queued outside LaGeSo in temperatures as high as nearly 40C and as low as -8C in recent years.

    Antje Kapek, leader of the Green Party in Berlin, talking to the city parliament in June described the situation as “disgraceful”.

    4. Berlin’s crime rate is higher than in all the other German states.

    In 2015, Berlin experienced the highest crime rate of all the Bundesländer, according to the Federal Interior Ministry’s crime statistics.

    The capital reported 16,414 cases per 100,000 people, above Hamburg’s 13,839, Bremen’s 13,784, Saxony’s 8,893, and the national average of 7,797.

    Berlin’s overall crime rate increased by 4.9 percent between 2014 and 2015.

    During this period, while murder and manslaughter decreased by 14.5 percent and robbery fell by 5.1 percent, shop theft increased by 14 percent, bag theft rose by 25.8 percent and basement break-ins increased by 34.6 percent, police crime statistics for the capital showed.

    5. Unemployment and poverty are very real issues.

    In 2015, the capital had the second-highest unemployment rate of all the German states, with 10.7 percent of the working-age population jobless, while the overall national rate was 6.4 percent. In Hamburg the rate was 7.4 percent of Hamburgers and in Bavaria it was 3.6 percent.

    While only 4.3 percent of people in Baden-Württemberg and 3.6 percent of people in Bavaria receive Hartz IV welfare benefits, 16.4 percent of Berliners receive this funding.

    But not only that: 20 percent of Berliners are classified as “in danger of poverty” (receiving less than 60 percent of the median national income for private households), compared to Bavaria’s 11.5 percent and Baden-Württemberg’s 11.4 percent.

    A Berlin branch of the Catholic welfare organisation Caritas e.V. reported that between 2014 and 2015, the number of treatments given to homeless people and people without insurance increased by a third at their local treatment centre.

    And those who aren’t sleeping on the streets of the capital still earn less than people in many other German states.

    In 2014, the disposable income in private households per inhabitant was €18,594 in Berlin, in comparison to Bavaria’s €23,080 and Hamburg’s €23,596.

    6. The capital has the worst education system in the Bundesrepublik.

    One of the reasons behind the city’s plight may just be its poor education system.

    Berlin’s education system trailed in last place in the Bildungsmonitor 2016, an analysis by the Cologne Institute for Economic Research for the think tank New Social Market Economy Foundation.

    Saxony and Thuringia took the top spots in the survey.

    In 2014, the dropout rate in Berlin schools was 8.1 percent compared to the national average of 5.5 percent, and 39.7 percent of students did not complete their vocational training compared to the national average of 27.7 percent, the survey demonstrates.”

  24. Vast majority of Germans in favour of burqa ban: poll (thelocal, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://www.thelocal.de/20160826/vast-majority-of-germans-in-favour-of-burqa-ban-poll

    “A survey found that the vast majority of respondents were in favour of Germany passing a ban on the full-body veil sometimes worn by Muslim women.

    The “Deutschland Trend” poll for broadcaster ARD surveyed more than 1,000 people between Tuesday and Wednesday and asked what they thought about the proposal for Germany to ban full-body veils worn by Muslim women.

    A little more than half (51 percent) of respondents said that they approved of having a general ban on burqas or niqabs in public, while about one-third were for a partial ban in public places like schools or public offices.

    That means that in total, 81 percent were in favour of some form of ban on the burqa.

    Meanwhile, 15 percent said they objected to a burqa ban as a matter of principle.

    The German government is currently considering a restriction on burqas as part of measures to combat terrorism. Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière last week proposed a partial ban in public offices, schools, in court or other such places where showing one’s face “is necessary for our society’s coexistence”.

    Chancellor Angela Merkel also criticized the apparel last week…”

  25. Danish city’s proposed burqa ban fails (thelocal, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://www.thelocal.dk/20160826/danish-citys-proposed-burqa-ban-fails

    “A proposal to bar public workers in Faxe Municipality from wearing burqas and niqabs on the job failed to pass on Thursday night.

    City council members in the southern Zealand municipality were deadlocked 12-12 on the proposal, which was set forth by Jonas Kristinsson, a member of the national ruling party Venstre.

    The tie vote meant that the proposal was scrapped, much to the relief of Faxe’s mayor, Knud Erik Hansen.

    “It [the ban] is unnecessary. It sends the wrong signal and I’m not even sure we could even [legally] do it,” he told broadcaster TV2.

    Despite being against the ban, Hansen said he’s not a fan of the face-covering garments worn by some Muslim women.

    “Children in daycare institutions and schools, and people who receive in-home help shouldn’t encounter people who cover themselves up. But on the other hand, there are jobs within the municipality that don’t entail contact with the problem, and that’s where [the ban] could be a problem,” he said…”

    • One Czech politician – not a Muslima, but pro migrant – has bought herself a burkini and started parading around in it. She needs it ‘for health reasons’.

      With politicians like these….

  26. Expert says smuggling is as high as last year in Austria (thelocal, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://www.thelocal.at/20160826/experts-say-smuggling-is-as-high-as-last-year-in-austria

    “The gruesome discovery of 71 dead migrants in a truck in Austria last August shocked Europe and led countries to open their borders to a massive influx of people fleeing war and poverty, mainly from the Middle East.

    But a year on, the mood in Europe has changed. Razor-wire fences have gone up, borders are firmly shut again, and the European Union has struck a controversial deal with Turkey to keep migrants from reaching Greece — the main entry point into the bloc, along with Italy.

    While the measures have led to a sharp drop in arrivals, experts warn the crisis is far from over.

    “In absolute terms, the number of people hoping to find asylum in Europe via one route or another is even higher than a year ago as a result of growing conflicts,” Gerald Tatzgern, the head of Austria’s anti-human trafficking force, told AFP.

    “We can’t exclude that such a catastrophe won’t happen again,” he said, in reference to the grisly discovery made on August 27, 2015, near the town of Parndorf…”

  27. US aid to Pakistan shrinks amid mounting frustration over militants (tribune, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://tribune.com.pk/story/1170280/us-aid-pakistan-shrinks-amid-mounting-frustration-militants/

    “WASHINGTON, DC: Pakistan’s continued support for resurgent militant groups hostile to the United States, coupled with warming US military and business relations with India, is sharply diminishing Islamabad’s strategic importance as an ally to Washington, US military, diplomatic, and intelligence officials and outside experts said.

    The United States has cut both military and economic aid to Pakistan sharply in recent years, reflecting mounting frustration among a growing number of officials with the nuclear-armed country’s support for the Taliban in neighboring Afghanistan. That frustration has dogged US-Pakistan ties for more than a decade, but has spiked anew as the militant Islamic group has advanced in parts of Afghanistan that US and allied forces once helped to secure, US officials and analysts say.

    “We’re seeing a very definitive and very sharp reorienting of US policy in South Asia away from Afghanistan-Pakistan and more towards India,” said Michael Kugelman, a South Asia expert with the Woodrow Wilson Center, a Washington think-tank. The US relationship with Pakistan has long been a transactional one marked by mutual mistrust, marriages of convenience, and mood swings.

    The long-standing US frustration with Pakistan’s refusal to stop supporting the Taliban, especially within the US military and intelligence community, is now overriding President Barack Obama’s administration’s desire to avoid renewed military involvement in Afghanistan, as well as concerns that China could capitalise on fraying ties between Washington and Islamabad, the US officials said. Obama announced last month he would keep US troop levels in Afghanistan at 8,400 through the end of his administration, shelving plans to cut the force in half by year end…”

  28. Bomb disposal squad deployed in central England after arrests (gulfnews, Aug 26, 2016)
    http://gulfnews.com/news/europe/uk/bomb-disposal-squad-deployed-in-central-england-after-arrests-1.1885900

    “LONDON: An army bomb disposal team was deployed to an area in Birmingham, central England, on Friday after police arrested five men on suspicion of preparing acts of terrorism.

    The West Midlands police force said as a result of one of the arrests, an army bomb disposal team had been called in as a precautionary measure to the Lee Bank area of Birmingham.

    The Fire Brigade said it had been assisting the police with the operation.

    Police said two men, aged 32 and 37, were arrested in the Stoke area of Staffordshire while three others, aged 18, 24 and 28 were arrested in Birmingham, Britain’s second-biggest city.

    “Police are searching a number of properties in the Stoke and Birmingham areas as part of the investigation; these searches are ongoing,” they said in a statement.

    “The arrests were intelligence-led and part of an ongoing investigation.” Britain is on its second-highest alert level of “severe”, meaning an attack is considered highly likely.”

  29. Clinton Foundation to Use Chelsea for Influence Laundering

    The Clinton Foundation ran a trial balloon of various potential commitments in case Hillary Clinton wins. Then it popped most of them.

    One of the basic commitments was Chelsea Clinton leaving the Clinton Foundation. Instead Chelsea will stay. And that turns the Clinton Foundation into a blatant influence peddling arm of a potential Clinton White House. The obvious reason to keep Chelsea there is to keep the same game going that Hillary back at the State Department. Except that Chelsea would have even more access to her mother, and therefore donors to the White House, than Huma Abedin would.

    Hillary Clinton has become so arrogant that her people are making it clear that the Clinton Foundation corruption will continue.

    http://www.frontpagemag.com/point/263973/clinton-foundation-use-chelsea-influence-daniel-greenfield

    • US: Clinton calendars won’t be released until after election

      WASHINGTON (AP) — Seven months after a federal judge ordered the State Department to begin releasing monthly batches of the detailed daily schedules showing meetings by Hillary Clinton during her time as secretary of state, the government told The Associated Press it won’t finish the job before Election Day.

      The department has so far released about half of the schedules. Its lawyers said in a phone conference with the AP’s lawyers that the department now expects to release the last of the detailed schedules around Dec. 30, weeks before the next president is inaugurated.

      The AP’s lawyers late Friday formally asked the State Department to hasten that effort so that the department could provide all Clinton’s minute-by-minute schedules by Oct. 15. The agency did not immediately respond.

      The schedules drew new attention this week after the AP analyzed the ones released so far. The news agency found that more than half the people outside the government who met or spoke by telephone with Clinton while she was secretary of state had given money – either personally or through companies or groups – to the Clinton Foundation. The AP’s analysis focused on people with private interests and excluded her meetings or calls with U.S. federal employees or foreign government representatives.

      The AP’s reporting was based on official calendars covering Clinton’s entire term plus the more-detailed daily schedules covering roughly half her time as secretary of state. The AP first asked for Clinton’s calendars in 2010 and again in 2013. It then sued the State Department in federal court to obtain the detailed schedules, and the department so far has provided about half of them under court order.

      Clinton has said the AP’s analysis was flawed because it did not account fully for all meetings and phone calls during her entire term as secretary. She also said the analysis should have included meetings with federal employees and foreign diplomats. The AP said it focused on her meetings with outsiders because those were more discretionary, as Clinton would normally meet with federal officials and foreign officials as part of her job.

      Clinton said she met with people outside government regardless of whether they gave money or charitable commitments to her family’s charity.

      “These are people I would be proud to meet with, as any secretary of state would have been proud to meet with, to hear about their work and their insights,” Clinton said this week on CNN.

      With the foundation drawing continued attention, Clinton promised Friday to put in place additional safeguards to prevent conflicts of interest with the charity should she win the White House.

      The foundation issue, along with continued focus on her use of a private email server, has dogged Clinton politically throughout the week, drawing strong criticism from opponent Donald Trump.

      Former President Bill Clinton said last week that if she is elected president, the foundation will no longer accept foreign or corporate donations.

      The State Department is now estimating there are about 2,700 pages of schedules left. Under its process, it is reviewing and censoring them page-by-page to remove personal details such as private phone numbers or email addresses. In some cases it has censored names of people who met privately with Clinton or the subjects they discussed.

      A State Department spokeswoman, Elizabeth Trudeau, declined to discuss the ongoing case and noted the agency is struggling with thousands of public records requests.

      In court, the AP in December had asked U.S. District Judge Richard Leon to order the State Department to produce specific percentages of the remaining schedules every 30 days under a formula so that all would be released before the presidential primary elections were complete.

      Instead, because the State Department said it did not know how many pages were left, Leon ordered it in January to release at least 600 pages of schedules every 30 days. Each 600-page group covers about three months of Clinton’s tenure.

      Under the present rate, a government attorney working on behalf of the State Department notified the AP’s lawyers, it will take about four and one-half months – or until Dec. 30 – to release all the remaining schedules through the end of Clinton’s term, in February 2013. The government’s notice late Thursday was the first time the State Department has provided the AP with a measure of how many pages were remaining and when it expected to complete the job.

      It was unclear whether the judge will reconsider his earlier decision and order faster results. In the AP’s lawsuit over other Clinton-related files, Leon has said it would be “ridiculous” to allow the State Department to delay until even weeks before the election. He also cited “mounting frustration that this is a project where the State Department may be running out the clock.”

      http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_CAMPAIGN_2016_CLINTON_FOUNDATION?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2016-08-26-19-32-28

  30. 180 Muslims from Canada Operating as Terrorists Abroad

    Just think how many more there can be once Justin brings all the Syrian migrants he can find to Canada.

    An estimated 180 individuals with ties to Canada left the country and were believed to be involved in terrorist activity at the end of 2015, Canadian government says.

    Canada’s public safety department said another 60 people had returned to Canada after allegedly participating in extremist activity abroad. The figures were contained in the government’s 2016 Public Report on the Terrorist Threat to Canada, which was published online Thursday, and match those provided by the head of the Canadian Security Intelligence Service during an appearance before a Senate committee earlier this year.

    So what is Canada doing about this? Exactly what you would expect. And that means that we have to think about security risks from north of the border. It wouldn’t be the first time.

    We’ve had a number of Islamic terror plots in the US that used Canada as a vector, including the LAX and VIA plots. With a left-wing government, the threat is more real than ever.

    http://www.frontpagemag.com/point/263974/180-muslims-canada-operating-terrorists-abroad-daniel-greenfield

  31. Trump and the American Dream
    Stopping the “fundamental transformation” of the U.S.

    According to most polls taken since last month’s party conventions, Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton enjoys an insurmountable lead over Republican nominee Donald Trump. Consequently, a number of commentators on both sides of the partisan divide have declared the race over. Clinton, they say, has won.

    There are several problems with this conclusion.

    First of all, the “official campaign,” won’t begin until September 26, when Clinton and Trump face off in their first presidential debate. Clinton is not a stellar debater and Trump, a seasoned entertainer, excels in these formats.

    Second, recent polls indicate that Trump is closing the gap. Whereas until this past week Clinton enjoyed a 6-8 point lead in the polls, in two polls taken this week, her lead had contracted to a mere 1-3 points.

    Third, it is quite possible that Clinton’s problems have only begun. Her peak popularity may be behind her. Since her nomination, barely a day has passed without another stunning exposé of apparently corrupt behavior on the part of Clinton and her closest advisers. This week’s AP report that half of Clinton’s non-official visitors during her tenure as secretary of state were donors to the Clinton Foundation was merely the latest blow.

    The continuous drip of corruption stories will have a corrosive effect on Clinton’s support levels. If the revelations to come are as damaging as many have claimed, their impact on Clinton’s candidacy may be fatal.

    In light of Clinton’s weaknesses, Trump’s main hurdle to winning the election may very well lie with the NeverTrump movement. That movement encompasses much of the Republican establishment – that is, the political class of centrist elected officials, opinion-shapers, former officials and ideologues. Its members have vowed not to vote for Trump even if it means that Clinton wins the White House. The fact that so many prominent Republican voices continue to oppose Trump even after he has been nominated hurts his ability to build support among swing voters.

    http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/263969/trump-and-american-dream-caroline-glick

  32. Extremist Islam in Canada
    A shocking new report reveals what is being taught in mosques and schools inside the country.
    August 26, 2016
    Lloyd Billingsley

    Leading Canadian politicians have been proclaiming that, despite what former prime minister Stephen Harper contended, Islamic extremism is rare or nonexistent in Canada’s mosques, and that to believe otherwise is racist or Islamophobic. On the other hand, an investigation by two experts finds that in some Canadian mosques and school libraries, extremist Islamic literature is the only brand available.

    That is the contention of “The Lovers of Death”? Islamist Extremism in Our Mosques, Schools and Libraries, a recent study by Thomas Quiggin, formerly an intelligence analyst with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) and the Privy Council Office. Quiggin is also a court-qualified expert on the structure of jihadist terrorism. Co-author Saied Shoaaib, a journalist originally from Egypt, has written extensively on Islamic extremism in the Middle East and in Canada.

    “It is not the presence of extremist literature in the mosque libraries that is worrisome,” the new report contends. “The problem is that there was nothing but extremist literature in the mosque libraries.”

    Examples include In the Shade of the Qur’an and Milestones by Sayyid Qutb, an author al-Qaida leaders found inspirational, as Lawrence Wright noted in The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11. Quiggin and Shoaaib also found prevalent the complete works of Muhammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab, the founder of Wahhabism, perhaps the most extremist form of Islam, heavily promoted by Saudi Arabia.

    http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/263958/extremist-islam-canada-lloyd-billingsley

  33. Beyond Belief: Obama Seeks Illegal Immigration Assistance Of Latin American Countries As Aliens Flood Into The U.S.
    The wolves helping to guard the hen house?

    On August 24, 2016 Reuters published an astonishing headline, “U.S. seeks Latin American help amid rise in Asian, African migrants.”

    This is the sort of headline that might be expected on April First — for the April Fool’s edition of the news. Unfortunately, this is not a bogus headline, but it most certainly is a bogus tactic crafted by the Obama administration.

    The borders of the United States are America’s first line of defense and last line of defense against international terrorist organizations and transnational gangs. However, whenever our government or members of such volunteer organizations as the Minutemen have attempted to stanch the flow of illegal aliens and contraband from Mexico into the United States, the government of Mexico has reacted swiftly and derisively.

    Yet Obama is now reportedly seeking assistance from the government of Mexico and has, in the past, sought assistance from Panama and other Latin American countries.

    What you need to consider as you read the Reuters account is that the Tri-Border Region of Brazil harbors terror training camps and that members of Hezbollah, Hamas and likely al-Qaeda and ISIS are present in that lawless and dangerous region of the country.

    http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/263966/beyond-belief-obama-seeks-illegal-immigration-michael-cutler

  34. Syria Brutality Enabled by Anti-Israel Double Standards
    Hundreds of thousands of victims of the Syrian conflict, but the international community still focuses on Israel.

    Syria’s civil war claimed 470,000 lives since it started in March 2011, the Syrian Centre for Policy Research announced in February. That’s an average of about 262 deaths per day and 7,860 per month. The carnage has continued unabated, so, applying the same death rate nearly 200 days after the February estimate, the death toll is over 520,000.

    Such numbers are staggering, even by Middle East standards. However, the violence has become so routine that it only occasionally captures global attention, usually when a particularly poignant moment of human suffering is documented. The most recent example is Omran Daqneesh, a 5-year old Syrian boy who was filmed shell-shocked, bloody, and covered in dust after the airstrike bombing of his Aleppo apartment block.

    The tragic image of Omran caused outrage around the world, as did the image of Aylan Kurdi, the drowned Syrian boy whose body washed up last September on a beach in Turkey. Yet Omran’s plight demonstrates that, nearly a year after the last child victim of Syrian horrors captured global sympathy, nothing has changed.

    If anything, the violence in this multi-party proxy war seems to be getting worse. Since Aylan Kurdi’s drowning, Russia began blitz-bombing Syria in support of the Assad regime. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) estimates that nine months of Russian airstrikes have killed 3,089 civilians – a toll that is greater, by some estimates, than the number of civilians killed by the Islamic State. By contrast, Syrian civilian deaths caused by U.S. airstrikes are probably in the hundreds (over roughly twice as much time, since U.S. airstrikes began in the summer of 2015).

    http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/263954/syria-brutality-enabled-anti-israel-double-noah-beck

  35. French Children Play ‘Silence Reigns’ To Prepare for Terrorism
    French children as young as three are being taught to keep silent to stay safe in the event of a terrorist attack.

    Beginning in September, every school in France will organize three counter-terrorism drills per year, as part of the government’s new security measures.

    The drills will focus on different safety measures depending on the location and scenario of the simulation. At least one drill of the three will focus on a scenario in which the terrorists enter the building.

    Children aged 13-14 will learn basic life-saving techniques, while young children will be taught how to keep silent in a game called “le roi silence (silence reigns).”

    Additionally, France is calling up 3,000 reserve gendarmes to protect schools and other educational establishments. Mobile patrols will monitor entrances and exits.

    An extra €50 ($56.4) million is being allocated to local authorities for school protection.

    http://www.clarionproject.org/news/french-children-play-%E2%80%98silence-reigns%E2%80%99-prepare-terrorism

  36. Iran Threatens US Ships With Missiles: What Gives?
    Ratcheting up the rhetoric (read: humiliation), Iran announced that all US ships in the Strait of Hormuz are now within target range

    American’s reasoning that the nuclear deal with Iran and the freeing up of billions of dollars of frozen Iranian money previously denied to them through international sanctions would bring the Islamic Republic into the “family of nations” is naïve at best and extremely dangerous at worst.

    Ratcheting up the rhetoric (read: humiliation), the Islamic Republic of Iran announced at the beginning of the week that they have made significant advances in their surface-to-surface missile technology, making all U.S. ships in the Strait of Hormuz, within target range.

    “We have greatly increased the range of our marine cruise missiles and currently possess missiles with a range of 200 kilometers which are anti-ship and anti-surface,” said Iranian defense minister Brig. Gen. Hossein Dehqan. “We have succeeded in changing the strategic systems of cruise missiles and increasing the power of their engines and ranges.”

    https://www.clarionproject.org/analysis/iran-threatens-us-ships-missiles-what-gives

    • Click through and read the entire article, it says what most of the regular readers know but it is still important, especially the part that Iran considers agreements as simply a step towards getting what Iran wants. And that the pushing in the Gulf is Iran trying to achieve dominance over the US.

  37. (Another must read article)

    Turkey, China, Join Syrian Civil War
    Turkey has sent tanks into Syria to hammer Islamic State positions, exactly 500 years to the day after Ottoman Sultan Selim I invaded Syria

    Turkish jets launched a series of airstrikes at the Islamic State-held town of Jarabulus yesterday, followed up by a tank invasion.

    “(Wednesday’s operation) started in the north of Syria against terror groups which constantly threaten our country, like (ISIS) and the [Kurdish] PYD” President Erdogan stated, unequivocally demonstrating that the action was aimed as much as fighting the Kurds as the Islamic State.

    “The Turks never cared about Jarablus until the Kurds wanted to get there,” an unnamed US Official told CNN.

    Turkey views the Kurds and their push for autonomy as a mortal threat.

    Kurdish forces recently took Manjib and were advancing on Jarablus.

    But now forces loyal to the Free Syrian Army, which is backed by Turkey, have reportedly taken Jarablus.

    U.S. officials said, “We’ve been in communication with the Turks about the operation” and described it as “very significant.”

    The operation is dubbed “Euphrates Shield.”

    The date chosen for the operation, August 24, is of historical significance, because it marks exactly 500 years to the day since Ottoman Sultan Selim I won the decisive Battle of Marj Dabiq, leading to the Ottoman conquest of Syria and much of the rest of the Middle East.

    https://www.clarionproject.org/analysis/turkey-china-join-syrian-civil-war

    • Edogan is showing his Imperial dreams and goals with the pick of the 24th to invade Syria, this will hurt the west in the long run.

      In the Short run the interesting thing is China coming in on the side of Assad and Iran, according to Elliot Friedland this is because China wants to reopen the ancient Silk Road to have a land route for trade from China and Europe. This will lower the transportation costs for the goods traveling both ways, and it will remove the threat of the pirates currently running riot in the South China Sea. I will have to think on this to see what other advantages this gives China.