Reader’s Links for Aug. 7, 2020

Each day at just after midnight Eastern, a post like this one is created for contributors and readers of this site to upload news links and video links on the issues that concern this site. Most notably, Islam and its effects on Classical Civilization, and various forms of leftism from Soviet era communism, to postmodernism and all the flavours of galloping statism and totalitarianism such as Nazism and Fascism which are increasingly snuffing out the classical liberalism which created our near, miraculous civilization the West has been building since the time of Socrates.

This document was written around the time this site was created, for those who wish to understand what this site is about. And while our understanding of the world and events has grown since then, the basic ideas remain sound and true to the purpose.

So please post all links, thoughts and ideas that you feel will benefit the readers of this site to the comments under this post each day. And thank you all for your contributions.

This is the new Samizdat. We must use it while we can.

About Eeyore

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

66 Replies to “Reader’s Links for Aug. 7, 2020”

  1. “Pastor John MacArthur appears on Fox News ~ WE WILL OPEN ~ on Tucker Carlson ~ July 28, 2020” The Saint – July 28, 2020

  2. Male in juvenile detention facility forced to take estrogen: Lawyer joins Tucker

  3. Purpose
    We are building a database of people who have been “canceled”.

    Our purpose is to better understand cancel culture itself as a phenomenon. How does it manifest? How is it evolving? How does it affect societal norms around free speech that enable democracy to function and flourish? By consolidating as many well-sourced data points as possible, we hope to give researchers and others the tools to explore and draw their own conclusions.

    What does it mean to be canceled?

    http://www.canceledpeople.com/about

  4. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) intelligence officials are targeting activists it considers “antifa” and attempting to tie them to a foreign power, according to a DHS intelligence report obtained exclusively by The Nation.

    The intelligence report, titled “The Syrian Conflict and its Nexus to the U.S.-based Antifascist Movement,” mentions several Americans, including a left-wing podcast host who traveled to Syria to fight ISIS. The report includes a readout of these individuals’ personal information, including their Social Security numbers, home addresses, and social media accounts, much of the data generated by DHS’s Tactical Terrorism Response Teams. As the intelligence report states, “ANTIFA is being analyzed under the 2019 DHS Strategic Framework for Countering Terrorism (CT) and Targeted Violence.”

    https://www.thenation.com/article/society/dhs-antifa-syria/

    • Give them 2.000 usd today and 2.000 usd tomorrow…Day after ask them to return 5.000 usd.

  5. Semiogogue, a very under rated YouTube/Bitchute Channel
    Very entertaining.

    COMING ATTRACTIONS – It’s That Time of Year! – CHAINSMOKE SERIES

  6. Nigerian lesbian refugee attacked with boiling water, now has 2nd degree burns all over right side of body. The attack was by a straight Nigerian refugee, who was aiming for the lesbian’s partner and her 18 month yo son. The victim is now banned from entering the shelter, and thus from visiting her partner.

    Tweet, with photo (graphic):
    https://twitter.com/HartvNL/status/1291388808412504066

    Article in Dutch, comes with video:
    https://www.hartvannederland.nl/nieuws/2020/lesbische-vrouw-kokend-water-azc/

    25% of gay refugees in dutch shelters is confronted with homophobic violence.

  7. India, Pakistan Engage in Heavy Mortar Firefight Along LoC in Jammu and Kashmir’s Kupwara – Video (sputniknews, Aug 7, 2020)
    https://sputniknews.com/india/202008071080091740-india-pakistan-engage-in-heavy-mortar-firefight-along-loc-in-jammu-and-kashmirs-kupwara—video–/

    “India and Pakistan continue to violate ceasefire along the Line of Control in their ongoing Kashmir conflict. In June, New Delhi accused Islamabad of violating the ceasefire over 2,000 times this year, while the latter blamed India for engaging in cross-border firefights 957 times during the same period.

    Three civilians have sustained injuries in heavy mortar shelling between Indian and Pakistani forces along the Line of Control (LoC) in Kupwara, a town in Jammu and Kashmir, on Friday morning.

    According to India, ?Pakistan resorted to an unprovoked ceasefire violation on Thursday along the LoC in Mendhar and Balakote sectors. The Indian Army said that it retaliated as it saw fit.

    India and Pakistan keep accusing each other of violating the ceasefire in Jammu and Kashmir. This year, several civilians and army personnel have lost their lives in cross-border exchanges of fire between the two countries.”

  8. Erdogan Says Turkey Has Restarted Gas Drilling Operations in Eastern Mediterranean (sputniknews, Aug 7, 2020)
    https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/202008071080093526-erdogan-says-turkey-has-restarted-drilling-operations-in-eastern-mediterranean/

    “Ankara temporarily halted its gas drilling for gas in an area of the eastern Mediterranean which Greece and Cyprus consider to be their territorial waters late last month, giving rise to hopes that the disagreement could be resolved through talks.

    Turkey has resumed gas drilling operations in the Eastern Mediterranean, with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accusing Greece of failing to keep its promises to halt exploration operations in the region on Friday.

    “We have resumed the drilling activity. We have sent the Barbaros Hayrettin [ship] to the area,” Erdogan said, speaking to reporters following prayers at the Hagia Sophia mosque complex, his remarks cited by AFP.
    The announcement comes a day after Ankara and the Turkish-backed Libyan government in Tripoli declared that that the recently signed Egyptian-Greek agreement on the delimitation of maritime jurisdictions in the Eastern Mediterranean was “null and void,” and supposedly “violated” and ignored the continental shelf claims made by both Turkey and the Government of National Accord.

    Egypt and Greece signed an agreement on Thursday designating large swathes of an oil and gas-rich portion of the eastern Mediterranean as an exclusive economic zone. Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias praised the deal, stressing that it “respects all concepts of international law and the Law of the Sea and good neighbourly relations, and contributes to security and stability in the region.”

    Cairo, which has an ongoing dispute with Ankara in Libya, where the two nations are supporting rival factions vying for control of the country in an ongoing civil war, joined Greece in condemning a 2019 Turkish-Libyan maritime delimitation agreement which claimed oil and gas-rich portions of the Eastern Mediterranean to belong to them, describing the agreement as “illegal.”

    Greece has a similar dispute with Turkey over Turkish gas exploration activities off the coast of Cyprus, and another maritime delimitation dispute with Ankara in the Aegean Sea.

    DETAILS TO FOLLOW”

  9. Who didn’t see this one coming…
    https://pjmedia.com/columns/raymond-ibrahim/2020/08/06/hagia-sophia-and-cathedral-of-cordoba-the-jihad-factor-n760513
    Hagia Sophia and Cathedral of Córdoba: The Jihad Factor
    BY RAYMOND IBRAHIM AUG 06, 2020 3:52 PM EST

    What’s ours is ours; and what’s yours is ours, as well. This is one of the primary messages coming from Muslims following the recent decision to transform the Hagia Sophia museum—which was originally built, and for a millennium functioned, as a Christian cathedral—into a trophy mosque again.

    The recent, deliberate display of the symbols of conquest further underscored the sense of Islamic triumphalism:

    The first day of prayer since the Hagia Sophia’s change in status was last Friday [July 24]. Thousands gathered under dark drapes covering the once glittering mosaics depicting Christ and the Virgin Mary. The top imam of the country, Ali Erbas, carried a sword while delivering his sermon from the tall minbar. When questioned about this he said: “This is a tradition in mosques that are the symbol of conquest.” Outside thousands more gathered chanting anti-Greek slogans. Commemorative coins were made in celebration of the event.

    Rather than (or at least pretending to) reject this emphasis on the jihadist nature of their religion, emboldened Muslims around the world are calling for the “return” of other structures.

    “At the very least,” Sheikh Sultan bin Muhammad al-Qasimi, one of the rulers of the United Arab Emirates, said days after Turkey’s Islamic annexation of Hagia Sophia, “we demand the return of Córdoba Mosque [currently the Cathedral of Córdoba in Spain], which was granted to the church, as this is a gift which doesn’t belong to those [Christians] who don’t deserve it.”

    Similarly, in response to Pope Francis’s immensely succinct if not timid reflection concerning the Hagia Sophia’s transformation into a mosque— “I think of Hagia Sophia, and I am very saddened”—

    Turkish historian, Mehmet Özdemir, retorted in an interview that Pope Francis “should also feel sad for the mosques converted to churches during Al Andalus.” Another Turkish historian, Lütfi Seyban, reiterated the same point, stating an injustice is being perpetrated against the world’s Muslims for not being allowed to pray in what was once the Grand Mosque of Córdoba, which is now serving as the Catholic Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption.

    The message is clear: If the Hagia Sophia, which everyone knows was built and served as a cathedral for a thousand years can, without challenge, be transformed into a mosque—with sword waving imams to boot—surely the Cathedral of Córdoba, formerly the Grand Mosque, should be returned to a mosque.

    But was it, in fact, originally built as a mosque, as so many claim, or was it, too, originally a conquered church?

    In a recent Catholic World Report interview devoted to this question, Darío Fernández-Morera, an associate professor at Northwestern University, and author of The Myth of the Andalusian Paradise, provides much evidence to support the conclusion that “not only was the [Grand] mosque built on a Christian site, but it was also built using materials from the sixth century Christian building destroyed by Muslims in the ninth century.”

    The interview is worth reading in its entirety, as it gives lots of detailed information on Islam’s historic treatment of churches:

    [W]henever Muslim chronicles mention Christian churches in Spain, it is only to gloat over their destruction or their conversion to mosques. But turning Christian churches into mosques has been standard practice during the Muslim conquests. For example, the famous Umayyad mosque of Damascus was built with materials from the great Greek basilica of Saint John the Baptist, which stood on the site and which was demolished by the Arab conquerors….

    The origins of the Grand Mosque are no different:

    [The] Christian basilica of Saint Vincent of Córdoba [erected in the sixth century] was demolished by celebrated Umayyad ruler Abd-al-Rahman I (731-788), whose statues adorn several places in today’s Spain. With its materials he had the Mosque of Córdoba built on the [same] site.

    The fact that the Grand Mosque was, like so many other mosques, originally a Christian church—and returned to being one during the Reconquista—should put to rest any Muslim claims to the site of Córdoba. Thanks, however, to what should by now be a very familiar reason, this is not the case. Fernández-Morera continues:

    Not surprisingly, the archaeological and documentary evidence [validating the view that the Grand Mosque was originally the St. Vincent basilica] is rejected by archaeologists commissioned by the left-wing municipal government of Córdoba, by an archaeologist from the Spanish Centro Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas, and by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), who do not want to admit anything that might undermine the Muslim claim to the Cathedral of Córdoba. They are on the same ideological side of those academics who deny the existence of a Reconquest. Nothing can be allowed to undermine Islam.…

    It’s important to keep in mind that not only has the unchallenged conversion of the Hagia Sophia into a mosque emboldened calls to transform the Cathedral of Córdoba into a mosque again; but this latter demand is meant to exonerate Turkey’s recent Islamic takeover. Consider Turkish scholar Khalid Yacinen’s logic on this symbiotic relationship:

    When Spain expelled Muslims in the inquisition, it changed the Grand Mosque of Córdoba into a cathedral, where Muslims are forbidden to pray to this day … Turkey [on the other hand] has ruled to allow [Muslim] people to carry out prayers in Hagia Sophia. That hardly compares to getting arrested in the Grand Mosque of Córdoba for saying something in Arabic or converting it into a cathedral.

    As Fernández-Morera observes, however,

    A true analogy with the history of the Cathedral of Córdoba would be to turn the site of Hagia Sofia and the building back into what it was before the Muslim conquest, namely a Christian site with one of the greatest churches ever built—the Basilica of Hagia Sofia, Holy Wisdom.

    In other words, the only real connection between the two buildings in Spain and Constantinople is that they were both conquered by Muslims and transformed—or in the case of St. Vincent’s, cannibalized and regurgitated—into mosques. While one, the Hagia Sophia, was recently turned into a mosque, thereby signifying the triumph of Islam over “infidels,” the other remains a cathedral—and this is apparently intolerable, not just for Muslims but the Left, which thrives on denying and rewriting history.

    • Then let’s shave the gilded pimple off the Temple Mount, purge Crusaders’ detritus, and make ready for _Moshiach_.

  10. Elites are Running Scared as German Citizens Congregate in Berlin

  11. Imam Who Headed ‘Peace’ Association Deported from Italy for Radicalism (breitbart, Aug 7, 2020)
    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/08/07/imam-who-headed-peace-association-deported-italy-radicalism/

    “Italy has expelled three radical Islamic extremists deemed to be security risks, including an Egyptian imam who headed an Islamic cultural association in the province of Venice.

    The Egyptian imam headed the Islamic association La Pace — “Peace” — and is said to have subscribed to Salafism, a radical Islamic sect followed by many terrorist groups across the globe.

    The Italian Interior Ministry released a statement on the imam’s deportation, saying according to Il Gazzettino: “He has been in contact with people, including in other European states, gravitating to Islamist circles and dedicated to criminal conduct. He openly expressed his extremist thinking during an oration held at the Salafist ‘al-Nur’ mosque in Berlin.”

    The al-Nur mosque has been known for hosting imams with radical views in the past, including in 2015 when Imam Sheikh Abdel Moez al-Eila called for women to be confined to their husband’s homes and claimed a wife is forbidden from refusing to sleep with her husband.

    The second extremist deported was a Tunisian who had become radicalised by an Algerian preacher who had been expelled in 2018. The migrant had evaded arrest in 2017 but was later found in Switzerland in October of last year…”

  12. China citizens angry; Shred trucks seen at China consulate in NY; US to purge ‘untrusted’ China apps

  13. Vietnam arrests hundreds of Chinese nationals who fled from their country in search of food

  14. ndian Hindus have reclaimed the temple of Lord Rama; Can the Christian World reclaim Hagia Sophia?

  15. “Peter Hitchens: I think Boris Johnson is enjoying this power of decree far too much” talkRADIO – August 3, 2020

  16. Trump effectively bans TikTok, WeChat; US sanctions HK officials; 1.8 mil jobs added in July | NTD

  17. Kerala Air India Plane Crash Updates: Pilot Dead, Several Injured At Calicut Aiport

  18. Air India Express Crash At Karipur Airport: Dubai – Calicut Flight Crashes After Shooting Off Runway

  19. China’s Netizens Mock Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Through Satirical Skit | China | Epoch News

  20. NYC Breakdown Shows Why Trump’s Economy Was STRONG, Dem Governors Can’t Compete

  21. Swedish Police Officer: Gang Members Who Shot Child Are Victims Too (breitbart, Aug 7, 2020)
    https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/08/07/swedish-police-officer-gang-members-shot-12-year-old-also-victims/

    “A Swedish police officer has claimed that the gang members who shot dead a 12-year-old girl caught in their crossfire last weekend are also victims.

    Martin Lazar, a police officer in the municipality of Botkyrka where the deadly shooting took place last weekend, said that he felt the incident was a failure of all parts of Swedish society.

    “Many people now want to focus on the visible part of the iceberg – actions from people who lack empathy and morality. But these individuals are in fact victims,” he claimed in an opinion article for Swedish newspaper Expressen.

    “They lacked the right conditions from day one of life, as violence was closer at hand than anything else. These people usually lack an honest relationship with their parents and have little or no community in their families,” he argued.

    Many criminal gangs, particularly in the Stockholm region, are led by migration-background individuals, according to a report from Expressen released earlier this year.

    On Monday, two migrant gangs came to blows in Borås, with at least one or more of the estimated 20 individuals armed with knives. Four people were injured and treated at a local hospital as a result of the brawl. It was believed to have been between one gang composed of Arabs and another gang composed of Somalians and Eritreans.

    Police press spokesman Peter Adlersson commented on the incident, saying: “Some of them had received knife wounds. One had a cut to the face, another to their back.”

    Gang warfare, which often involves shootings and bombings in Sweden, remains a major problem. Gang crime has not shown any signs of slowing down so far this year, despite the Wuhan virus pandemic…”

      • I am building a deck—the freaks of the world have helped me to drive the nails in in 5 smashes. Such crap, Martin Lazar is also a victim – his mother obviously dropped him on his head. It never ends, nobody knows the trouble I’ve seen. At what point does EVERYBODY grow up?

  22. China’s Genocide Machine in Xinjiang

    by Lawrence A. Franklin
    August 7, 2020 at 5:00 am

    The Chinese Communist Party’s chairman, Xi Jinping, and his colleagues on the ruling Politburo, have, it seems, decided on the final solution for China’s ethnic Uyghur Muslims. All who have seen the internet drone footage in Xinjiang of hundreds of blindfolded, male prisoners, sitting in silence, hands tied behind their back while ringed by Gestapo-like guards must shudder at the similarity in China of masses of prisoners being marched off to concentration camps.

    Crimes against humanity that meet the UN definition of genocide are being inflicted by Chinese troops on their Turkic Uyghur minority in the so-called Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region. Charges include torture, forced sterilization and hair shaved from inmates and made into commercial products. Last month, US Customs seized 13 tons of human hair and other “beauty products” worth approximately $800,000 “from Uighurs in camps.”

    The most detailed description of the brutalities visited upon the Uyghurs by Han Chinese thugs was revealed by U.S.-based lawyer and Uyghur activist Nury Turkel, who claimed that Uyghur detainees in China have had fingernails pulled out, were subjected to electric shocks, and were sexually assaulted.

    https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16306/china-genocide-xinjiang

  23. Seth Frantzman:
    How will Hezbollah react to this week’s massive blast in Beirut?

    THIS WEEK, the massive explosion represents another possibility for Hezbollah. While it may initially get some criticism and heat for the explosion, because it also maintains dangerous stockpiles of weapons all over Lebanon, it will find a way to leverage this to its benefit. Hezbollah wants China, Russia and Iran to help rebuild Lebanon. Turkey and Qatar are also rebuilding the country, but Hezbollah has amicable relations with Doha.

    Now Hezbollah may have to wait some time before making its moves clear. This is because it can’t raise its head too much and appear to gloat over the destruction. It will instead try to send volunteers to help and portray itself as the responsible party. It will try to shift blame to Israel and the US. While others are distracted with solidarity for Beirut, Hezbollah will increase its stranglehold elsewhere. This has always been the Hezbollah model. It may increase trafficking in weapons from Syria and construct new bases.

    Israel would be reticent to carry out any actions in Lebanon amid tensions with Hezbollah, because Israel will not want to be seen as harming Lebanon more. This means the explosion becomes a perfect smokescreen and solidarity shield for Hezbollah. For average Lebanese, it is yet another disaster in a long series of disasters.

    While Hezbollah will pretend to be patriotic, it will work behind the scenes to corrupt everything that comes into Lebanon in the next year.

    https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/how-will-hezbollah-react-to-this-weeks-massive-blast-in-beirut-637777

  24. This is why Waleed Aly is an absolute disgrace
    The Project last night opened with the horrific Beirut blast that has so far killed over 135 people and injured thousands, its decimated the city.

    Waleed Aly began by swiping at Trump for calling it an attack.

    The only problem is Trump never said that he said it looked like an attack, which it did.

    A few minutes later, Waleed put the question to their guest, not a politician, security or geopolitical expert––a photographer.

    Their photographer guest blamed Israel.

    When Trump said it looked like an attack, he was wrong, but when a photographer claims it was an attack and more specifically by Israel, that’s okay. No need to question the Jew-hating narrative.

    That is Waleed and The Project for you.

    • Omri’s comment on this:
      Omri Ceren @omriceren
      ·9h
      The Chinese Communist Party seems institutionally incapable of conducting intl affairs except through ham-fisted, tone deaf bullying. Sooner or later – and it’ll be sooner – they’re going to learn other countries also get to make choices and pursue their interests.

    • Gordon G. Chang
      China Threatens a Bold Grab for Japanese Territory This Month. Who’s Next? | Opinion

      On Tuesday, Japanese Defense Minister Taro Kono at a press conference announced the Self-Defense Force, essentially Japan’s military, would work with the country’s Coast Guard in protecting the Senkaku Islands. His comments were in response to increased Chinese provocations around those uninhabited features.

      Why are these eight rocks in the East China Sea of any concern? They could trigger history’s next great conflict, perhaps as early as this month.…

      Over time, Beijing has been sending larger vessels to the islands. Because of persistent efforts to control the surrounding seas, some expect China to soon declare “administrative control” over the Senkakus.

      The situation is now so serious that the United States is openly concerned. .… The islands are, according to several U.S. statements, covered by Article 5 of the U.S.-Japan mutual defense treaty.

      Tokyo has every reason to invoke the treaty to demand American help to defend the outcroppings. Japan, after all, is nothing more than an archipelago, so the loss of islands would set a grievous precedent.

      Moreover, Beijing has made it clear it wants more than just these eight islets, so Japan has to take a stand somewhere. Ominously, China, for more than a decade, has been eyeing the entire Ryukyu chain, pushing the notion that these strategic islands belong to China.

      It’s clear why Japan would want America’s help, but is it in America’s interest to extend it? To put this another way, why should the U.S. go to war with China over the Senkakus?

      …For more than a century, American policymakers have drawn the U.S. western defense perimeter off the coast of East Asia, and Japan is the “cornerstone” ally in that defense line. Washington believes, correctly, that it is better to face an Asian aggressor over there than near Hawaii or off the coast of California.

      That defense perimeter is now in danger from an aggressive China. Unfortunately, accommodation with Beijing is not possible, something especially evident from America’s failure to protect Scarborough Shoal, a feature that was thought to be part of another American treaty ally, the Philippines.…

      To avoid confrontation with a militant Beijing, the Obama administration did nothing to enforce the agreement. What the White House did, by doing nothing, was empower the most belligerent elements in the Chinese political system by showing everybody else that aggression in fact worked.…

      https://www.newsweek.com/china-senkoku-islands-japan-threat-1523610

  25. Trump effectively bans TikTok, WeChat; US sanctions HK officials; 1.8 mil jobs added in July | NTD

  26. Chicago Mayor Lightfoot blames Pro Gun States & AR-15s for Gun Violence Spiking in Chicago

  27. Nearly 20 Civilians Killed at Market in Eastern Burkina Faso (sputniknews, Aug 7, 2020)
    https://sputniknews.com/africa/202008071080097617-nearly-20-civilians-killed-at-market-in-eastern-burkina-faso/

    “Gunmen in Burkina Faso’s Est region have opened fire at a cattle market and killed 20 civilians, the regional governor said in a statement on Friday that was carried by domestic media outlets.

    “Provisionally, 20 people were killed and many more were injured”, regional governor Colonel Saidou Sanou said in a written statement, which was published by the Le Faso news portal.
    The incident reportedly took place near the village of Namoungou, in the province of Gnagna.

    In March, more than forty people were killed in attacks on two villages in the Barga department in Burkina Faso’s Nord region.

    Burkina Faso has been struggling to contain an armed insurgency linked to Daesh*, since 2016. Hundreds of civilians have been killed during the ongoing conflict.

    *Daesh is a terrorist group banned in Russia and many other countries.”

  28. Residents Unable to Buy Food Protest, Then Are Suppressed by Police | CCP Virus | Epoch News

  29. Almost 150 Extrajudicial Killings by Malian, Burkinabe Troops: UN
    https://www.thedefensepost.com/2020/08/07/extrajudicial-killings-malian-burkinabe-troops/

    “Almost 150 people were extrajudicially killed by Malian and Burkinabe security forces in Mali between April and June, the UN said Thursday.

    A 2012 revolt in northern Mali has since spread to the center of the poor Sahel country, as well as to Burkina Faso and Niger despite the presence of thousands of French and UN troops.

    The Mali-based United Nations mission, MINUSMA, reported “an increase in serious human rights violations attributable to the Malian security forces,” which it held responsible for 94 such killings over the three-month period.

    The quarterly report also found 50 extrajudicial killings in late May by Burkina Faso troops in the village of Boulkessi, and settlements close to the nation’s Mali border.

    The UN report said the army targeted numerous terrorist elements in central Mali, as well as sometimes conducting “reprisal operations against civilian populations,” accused of supporting jihadists.

    Malian authorities have said they will investigate to find those responsible.

    MINUSMA also voiced concern at the number of military operations carried out with local Dozo militiamen. These traditional hunters have previously been accused of carrying out illicit operations.

    Central Mali saw a surge in violence from 2015, when the Islamic preacher Amadou Kouffa founded the Katiba Macina militia, recruiting widely from the Fulani community.

    Jihadist groups in Mali were found to be responsible for 43 murders, 25 kidnappings, and attacks on schools and humanitarian spaces between April and June, according to the UN report.”

  30. Tony Badran @AcrossTheBay
    · 6h
    Looks like Macron roped in the Trump admin to subsidize the Lebanese cartel’s expenditures for the foreseeable future. Lebanon policy was always a liability; an insanity left over from the Obama years, backed by DoD, directly at odds with maximum pressure.

    Macron roped in the Trump admin with the Hariri nonsense in KSA, which he then followed up with a donor conference to float his buddy and the Hezbollah-led cartel. He’s doing it again. And DoD/DoS is following suit like last time.

    Meanwhile, France is the force blocking the EU-wide designation of Hezbollah; is the force blocking a change to the UNIFIL mission preferring the pro-Hezbollah status quo; and is literally financially invested in offshore energy in Lebanon.

    The US, meanwhile, is doubling down on that most clever and meaningful of policies: wasting US taxpayer money on a fictitious clown force called the LAF, in a fictitious “state.” All in all, heck of a job, DoD and DoS.

    https://twitter.com/AcrossTheBay/status/1291774585357164544

  31. US senators push to block drone sales to Saudi Arabia, UAE
    https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/us-uae-saudi-arabia-senators-drone-sales

    “A bipartisan group of US senators introduced legislation on Thursday that would block the sale of drones to countries that are not close allies of Washington, mentioning Saudi Arabia in particular.

    The legislation comes in response to a recent decision by the Trump administration to bypass a decades-old Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) and sell large armed drones to foreign militaries.

    Countries that can now purchase the advanced drones include Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, which have used US-made weapons in the deadly war in Yemen.

    Both Republican and Democratic senators criticised Trump’s decision, saying it could cause a dangerous increase in the spread of missile technology and encourage other countries to undermine arms agreements.

    “If we allow Trump to start selling drones, we set a dangerous precedent that allows and encourages other countries to sell missile technology and advanced drones to our adversaries,” Senator Chris Murphy, who introduced the bill, said in a statement…”

  32. UN experts call for sanctions ‘bringing suffering and death’ to be lifted
    https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/suffering-and-death-humanitarian-sanction-exemptions-fail-protect-most-vulnerable-un-experts

    “A group of UN experts has called for unilateral sanctions to be lifted on countries including Iran and Yemen, adding that humanitarian exemptions “are not working”, with people failing to receive life-saving treatments and coronavirus protection.

    In a statement on Friday, the group said sanctions were “bringing suffering and death” to people in countries including Iran, Sudan, Syria, Yemen, Venezuela, and Cuba.

    “Sanctions should be lifted – or at a minimum eased – so people can get basics like soap and disinfectants to stay healthy, and so that hospitals can get ventilators and other equipment to keep people alive,” said Alena Douhan, UN special rapporteur on the negative impact of unilateral coercive measures on the enjoyment of human rights.

    Douhan said nothing had improved since she called for the lifting of all unilateral sanctions preventing states from adequately fighting the Covid-19 pandemic back in April.

    The International Red Cross, Red Crescent Societies and several US lawmakers made a similar appeal at the start of the pandemic, but the calls have been widely ignored.

    “Sanctions that were imposed in the name of delivering human rights are in fact killing people and depriving them of fundamental rights, including the rights to health, to food and to life itself,” said Douhan and other UN experts, without calling any particular sanctioning country out by name…”

  33. US looking into claims of China-Saudi ‘nuclear bomb’ developments
    https://english.alaraby.co.uk/english/news/2020/8/6/us-looking-into-claims-of-china-saudi-nuclear-bomb-developments

    “US intelligence is looking into claims that China is assisting Saudi Arabia on the recent secretive expansion of the kingdom’s nuclear programme, which could pave the way towards the development of nuclear weapons.

    Reports emerged this week that Chinese entities were assisting Saudi Arabia on its path towards producing nuclear fuel. Experts say this could ultimately be diverted into a covert military nuclear programme in the future.

    US intelligence analysed suspect collaboration between the two countries at an undeclared site in central Arabia, close to a solar-panel production area.

    It is one of a number of recent constructions in the kingdom that have alarmed nuclear experts, including a site for the processing of yellowcake in the northwest of Saudi Arabia – a further step towards the development of nuclear fuel.

    While President Donald Trump has sought to work on Saudi Arabia’s civilian nuclear programme, the recent reports have been a cause for alarm, The New York Times reported…”

  34. Iraq to import electricity from Turkey to tackle deficit
    https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200807-iraq-to-import-electricity-from-turkey-to-tackle-deficit/

    “The Iraqi Ministry of Electricity yesterday announced its intention to import 200 megawatts of electricity from Turkey to address the severe power shortage it is facing, Anadolu reported.

    A ministry spokesman, Ahmed Al-Abadi, told the news agency that after obtaining the approval of Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi, the ministry began negotiations with Turkey to import 200 megawatts of electricity through the Mosul Dam Station, in the north of the country.

    Al-Abadi explained that the imported electricity will cover the northern provinces’ power needs, noting that the two sides are discussing technical matters and other issues related to the electrical connection between them…”

  35. Iraq clears ports of ‘hazardous materials’ following Beirut blast
    https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200807-iraq-clears-ports-of-hazardous-materials-following-beirut-blast/

    “Iraq will create an inventory of all “hazardous materials” at its ports and airports as a precautionary measure, after a warehouse filled with ammonium nitrate fertiliser exploded in the Lebanese capital Beirut this week killing hundreds and damaging more than half the city.

    The head of Iraq’s Border Ports Authority, Omar Adnan Al-Waeli, was quoted by local media as saying that he had received approval from Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kadhimi “to form an urgent committee to clear out all the country’s ports from hazardous inventory that have been accumulated at the border ports.”

    Al-Waeli added that the objective was to “avoid any repetition of what happened in Lebanon in Iraq,” pointing out that he was tasked to complete the work “in 72 hours”…”

  36. Egypt, Greece sign maritime demarcation deal
    http://english.ahram.org.eg/NewsContent/1/64/376084/Egypt/Politics-/Egypt,-Greece-sign-maritime-demarcation-deal.aspx

    “Egypt and Greece have signed a maritime demarcation deal establishing an exclusive economic zone between the two countries, Egypt’s Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said in a joint televised press conference on Thursday.

    Shoukry received his Greek counterpart Nikos Dendias in Cairo earlier on Thursday to discuss means to strengthen bilateral relations and coordination between the two countries in the East Mediterranean region.

    Shoukry said at the conference that the provisions of the deal are in line with international law and the United Nations Convention On The Law Of The Sea.

    The deal targets tapping into the capabilities available in the Eastern Mediterranean region, he added.

    “The deal permits Egypt and Greece to go ahead with maximising benefits from riches available in the exclusive economic zones of both countries, particularly the promising gas and oil reserves,” he stressed.

    Shoukry pointed out the new agreement paves the way for more regional cooperation between the Egyptian and Greek sides in the field of energy, given the membership of the two countries in the Eastern Mediterranean Gas Forum.

    The forum’s members include Egypt, Cyprus, Greece, Italy, Israel, Jordan, and Palestine. The forum was established in January 2019 to “create a regional gas market, optimise resource development, cut the cost of infrastructure, offer competitive prices, and improve trade ties,” Egypt’s petroleum ministry earlier said.

    Shoukry added that “the friendly relationship between Egypt and Greece is a key pillar to preserving the security and stability of the Eastern Mediterranean and countering the threats stemming from irresponsible policies that support extremism and terrorism.”

    Greece and Italy earlier signed an agreement on maritime boundaries on 9 June, establishing an exclusive economic zone between the two countries and resolving longstanding issues over fishing rights in the Ionian Sea.

    The recently-signed agreement has paved the road for the Greek-Egyptian agreement and how both countries would gain from signing the agreement for an Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ).

    ‘Historical deal’

    Dendias said the deal is “historical” and that it materialised following long rounds of negotiations, adding that the agreement ensures cooperation between both countries.

    The process of negotiating exclusive economic zones (EEZ) between Egypt and Greece was launched over three years ago during a visit by President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi to Athens, where he and then Greek prime minister Alexi Tsipras agreed that to help each country benefit from the possible resources of its national waters an agreement needed to be signed.

    According to Nikoaos Garilidis, the Greek ambassador to Cairo, over 13 rounds of negotiations have been held between Cairo and Athens over the past three years.

    The Egyptian-Greek deal was inked in accordance with the law of the sea and respects all neighbouring relations.

    “The deal is the exact opposite of any other illegitimate thing like what was signed between Turkey and Tripoli. That deal was baseless,” he added.

    In November 2019, Turkey and the Prime Minister of the Government of National Accord (GNA) Fayez Al-Sarraj inked a memorandum of understanding on maritime boundaries in the Mediterranean Sea.

    Turkish claims

    In response to the Egypt-Greece maritime demarcation deal, Turkey claims it falls in the area of Turkey’s continental shelf, Turkey’s foreign ministry said on Thursday.

    Reuters reported the ministry as saying that Turkey considers the agreement null and void and that the deal also violated Libya’s maritime rights.

    Knotty background

    Egypt, a close ally to Greece and Cyprus, has had strained relations with Turkey since the 2013 ouster of Egypt’s late Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, a close ally of Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan’s government.

    Relations further deteriorated recently over Turkey’s intervention in Libya and a signalled military intervention by Egypt in the war-torn country.

    What escalated the tension was the 2019 memorandum of understanding on maritime boundaries in the Mediterranean Sea signed between Turkey and Libya’s GNA.

    Five countries including Egypt, Greece, and Cyprus called on the United Nations not to register the maritime boundaries deal, describing it as “illegal”, particularly after the Speaker of the Libyan House of Representatives Aguila Saleh, in his letter to the UN, rejected the agreement.

    As a result of the “illegal” agreement, a seismic survey carried out by Turkey from 21 July to 2 August which Egypt said represented a “violation and an attack on sovereign rights” and further escalated tensions between the two countries.

    In a statement by the Egyptian foreign ministry on 2 August, foreign ministry spokesman Ahmed Hafez said that Egypt objects to the Turkish seismic survey, saying it overlaps with Egypt’s exclusive economic zone.

    Hafez said the encroachment violates the UN convention on the Law of the Sea and international law. The statement added that Egypt does not recognise the outcomes or implications that may entail from Turkey’s activity in the area of overlap.

    The Turkish move has, moreover, stirred a dispute with Greece and Cyprus over drilling rights in the Mediterranean, with Athens stressing it will do “whatever is necessary” to defend its sovereign rights in response to Ankara’s planned move.”