Border Fighting Intensifies Between ISIS and Lebanon
By HWAIDA SAAD and RICK GLADSTONE
AUG. 4, 2014
BEIRUT, Lebanon — A deadly confrontation worsened on Monday between Lebanon’s armed forces and Islamist insurgents from Syria who seized the border town of Arsal over the weekend in what appeared to be the most serious spillover of the Syrian civil war into Lebanese territory since the conflict began more than three years ago.
The Lebanese Army said in a statement that its forces were engaged in fierce battles with the Islamists in Arsal, where witnesses reached by telephone, including the deputy mayor, said shelling had hit the town from multiple directions and thousands of residents had fled.
Arsal is also one of the temporary homes for many of the Syrian war refugees who have sought sanctuary in eastern Lebanon, and witnesses said Lebanese Army checkpoints were refusing to let the refugees relocate deeper into the country. Some refugees said they were panicking because they had nowhere to go.
“Some residents here are angry with us — they’re refusing to host any of us thinking that we are behind such fighting, as if we were the ones who welcomed the insurgents,” said a refugee reached by phone, who identified himself only by his first name, Walid. He said at least one refugee encampment of tents had been burned by shelling.
“The situation is miserable,” said Arsal’s deputy mayor, Ahmad Flitti. “Now the shelters are full. Soon we are going to have shortages in drugs, and hospitals here will not be able to receive more wounded.”
The United Nations refugee agency’s Lebanon representative, Ninette Kelley, said in a statement that she had traveled to the Bekaa Valley region near the fighting on Monday and was conferring with Lebanese officials “to determine what additional supplies should be mobilized for civilians in need, including food, water and medicines.”
More than a third of the 1.1 million registered Syrian refugees in Lebanon are in the Bekaa Valley, according to United Nations refugee agency statistics.
The 15-member United Nations Security Council also expressed concern about the Syria war’s spillover into Lebanon. In a statement, the Council said it supported efforts by the Lebanese military and security forces “to counter terrorism and address other security challenges.”
The Lebanese Army statement said its casualties from three days of fighting totaled 14 soldiers killed, 86 wounded and 22 missing, with at least some of them presumed captured by the militants. More than 20 Islamist fighters were also believed to have been killed, but it was impossible to determine their precise casualties.
The Arsal fighting began on Friday when the Lebanese Army arrested Imad Ahmad Jomaa, the commander of a Syrian Islamist rebel group, in Arsal. His disciples, which included brigades affiliated with Al Qaeda and the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, then attacked Lebanese troops, and the insurgents seized control of the town. They have demanded Mr. Jomaa’s release as a condition for any cease-fire.
“Let them release our emir and we are ready to pull out from all over the town,” said one of Mr. Jomaa’s deputies, reached by phone in Arsal, who identified himself as Abu Osama. “Or else we will escalate and expand, and we will ask for more demands.”
Cross-border clashes and shelling from the Syrian side have sometimes disrupted the Syria-Lebanon frontier, but the takeover of a Lebanese town by ISIS members was unprecedented. While the push into Lebanon by ISIS was limited, it reflected the aims of the group, whose fighters see the entire area as their future monolithic Islamic state.
“It’s another front for ISIS and another sign containment of the Syria crisis has failed,” said Andrew J. Tabler, of the Program on Arab Politics at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.
The Lebanese cabinet met in an emergency session on Monday to deal with the Arsal crisis, and Prime Minister Tammam Salam appeared to have ruled out negotiations with the town’s Islamist insurgent occupiers.
“There is no political solution with extremist groups who are manipulating the Arab communities under religious obscurantism and strange titles, seeking to transfer their sick acts into Lebanon,” Mr. Salam said in a televised statement. “Today, the only solution is the withdrawal of the gunmen from Arsal and its surroundings.”
Hwaida Saad reported from Beirut, and Rick Gladstone from New York.
ISIS and Hamas, twins....
ReplyDeleteISRAEL PREFERS al-QAEDA
DeleteIsrael’s Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren told the Jerusalem Post that Israel so wanted Assad out and his Iranian backers weakened, that Israel would accept al-Qaeda operatives taking power in Syria.
“We always wanted Bashar Assad to go, we always preferred the bad guys who weren’t backed by Iran to the bad guys who were backed by Iran.”
Even if the other “bad guys” were affiliated with al-Qaeda.
“We understand that they are pretty bad guys,” Oren said in the interview.
http://www.jpost.com/Syria-Crisis/Oren-Jerusalem-has-wanted-Assad-ousted-since-the-outbreak-of-the-Syrian-civil-war-326328
The Unfolding of Yinon’s “Zionist Plan for the Middle East”: The Crisis in Iraq and the Centrality of the National Interest of Israel
Stephen Sniegoski
Israeli air power was used to to support the force against Assad. What they believed was to be a prelude to a US bombing campaign against Assad. The US supplied arms to the same forces. You don’t hear much about our cute little arms giving forrays into Turkey. No matter, ISIS seems to be able to pickup what they want as they live off the land.
DeleteSpeaking of pickups, check out the Ford F350 at the latter part of the video.
McCain went to Syria to look into their souls, a trick he learned from George OOrah Bush, and recognized freedom fighters when he saw them.
I don’t know if the US is going to get involved with this but the IDF will have their chance if you believe the comment made in the video that one of the countries to be liberated is Palestine.
You obviously have not watched the video.
ReplyDeleteToo little, too late
ReplyDelete(Reuters) - Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered his air force for the first time to back Kurdish forces against Islamic State fighters after the Sunni militants made another dramatic push through the north, state television reported on Monday.
Tens of thousands of people have fled one of the districts seized by Islamic State fighters in the offensive and are now surrounded, the United Nations said on Monday. The Sunni militants often execute people in areas they have captured.
Kurdish peshmerga fighters, who gained experience fighting Saddam Hussein's troops, were regarded as one of the few forces capable of standing up to the Sunni insurgents, who faced almost no opposition from Maliki's U.S.-trained army during their lightning advance through the north in June.
Then on Sunday the Islamic State inflicted a humiliating defeat on the Kurds with a rapid advance through three towns to reach the Mosul Dam, acquiring a fifth oil field to fund its operations along the way.
State television and witnesses said the Islamic State had seized Iraq's biggest dam. Kurdish peshmerga officials said they had pushed militants from the dam area and were in control of it. This could not be immediately confirmed.
Despite predictions from Kurdish commanders that their forces would launch a successful counter-offensive, one senior Kurdish official urged the United States to step in and provide weapons "for the sake of fighting terrorism".
Kurdish commanders whose units came under attack from Islamic State fighters told Reuters they faced overwhelming firepower, were taken by surprise, and that militants had in many cases started shooting from villages where they had formed alliances with residents.
The areas that the Kurds lost were not part of their semi-autonomous region, but had been seized in the north after the fall of Saddam Hussein.
Maliki has been at odds with the Kurds over budgets, oil and land, and tensions deepened after the Islamic State seized control of large swathes of land in the north and west of OPEC member Iraq.
MAX BOOT - COMMENTARY
ReplyDelete“ISIS now controls a volume of resources and territory unmatched in the history of extremist organizations. It possesses the means to threaten its neighbors on multiple fronts, demonstrating a military effectiveness much greater than many observers expected.”
So wrote my Council on Foreign Relations colleague Janine Davidson on July 24. And that was before this weekend’s reports that the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria had routed Kurdish fighters from the town of Sinjar near the Iraq-Syria border–one of the few border posts it did not already control–and that it may have taken control of the Mosul dam, which if blown up could flood much of northern Iraq with a 65-foot wave.
Other reports indicate that ISIS has taken control of a Syrian oil field near Homs. As the Washington Post notes in a very comprehensive round-up of depressing news: “Experts estimate the group is pocketing as much as $3 million per day in oil revenue by selling off resources on black markets in the greater Levant.” Oh and ISIS also just staged an attack in yet another country–Lebanon.
In short, the news is about as bad as it could be. The question that remains is: What is the U.S. doing about it? So far President Obama has dispatched 825 military personnel to Iraq to make a survey of the situation and to conduct some liaison work with the Iraqis in two headquarters. That’s about it, aside from some fiery rhetoric from Washington denouncing ISIS excesses. One wonders if the president is once again assuming that denouncing something is the same thing as doing something about it.
There are no air strikes, no Special Operations raids, no attempts to rally Sunni tribesmen to resist their new overlords. Granted, one should not rush willy-nilly into action before gaining an accurate assessment of the situation and deploying the resources necessary to be successful. That is why, for example, the Bush administration did not start bombing Afghanistan until weeks after the 9/11 attacks. But one fears that this time around the U.S. is not preparing a devastating response–or any meaningful response at all–to the alarming expansion of Islamist terrorist control in Iraq and Syria.
One fears that Washington is busy analyzing while ISIS is altering facts on the ground. And that eventually we will hear about Iraq the same thing we have been hearing about Syria: that the situation is so grim that there is nothing we can do about it. That, of course, becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy–the less we do, the worse the situation gets, and the less likely we are to intervene in any form.
Topics: Iraq, IS
After a decade of doing "something" and spending close to a trillion dollar on the failed effort ....
ReplyDeletePerhaps the "Best" course for the US is to ...
Stay the Course !
The organization is a lineal descendant of the original al Qaeda in Iraq, established shortly after 2003 in the vacuum created by the fall of Saddam.
ReplyDelete(Saddam, the one who kept a lid on these assholes. Of course we hanged him and fired his army.)
Its first leader, the Jordanian Abu Musab al Zarqawi, had trained in the 1990s in al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan, but when he set up shop in Iraq, he largely ignored guidance from the al Qaeda “core” in Pakistan. Instead, he set about exploiting growing sectarian grievances in Iraq, where an Arab Sunni minority had ruled over a Kurdish minority and a much larger Arab Shia majority. Zarqawi believed that the Iraqi state could be destroyed through a civil war, and that, in turn, would allow Sunnis to claim a significant part of the country. There, they could create a true radical Islamist nation that could be a launching pad for a new caliphate, a superstate that would recreate the religious and political unity of the early days of Islam.
Zarqawi came close to achieving his goal of a divided Iraq. But he was killed in an airstrike in 2006, just before U.S. forces enlisted disaffected Sunni tribes to put down the rebellion that was tearing the country apart. Zarqawi’s vision, however, endured. His organization survived and rebuilt itself in Syria, where it took up arms against the Assad regime, which is dominated by the small Alawite sect, a distant cousin of Iran’s “Twelver” Shiism. With significant support from Sunnis who support the overthrow of the Damascus regime, as well as resources gathered through bank robberies and looting on both sides of the Syria-Iraq border, the renamed ISIS, under the leadership of a shadowy figure named Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, has built itself back up into a formidable fighting force.
It is often said that ISIS was too violent for al Qaeda, which is why the core group in effect disavowed the Iraqi affiliate. In fact, what bothered Osama bin Ladin and his successor Ayman al Zawahiri was above all the group’s violence against other Muslims. Al Qaeda has had a deep vein of anti-Shia sentiment since the beginning, but the leadership preferred to focus on targeting the West or what it considered apostate Muslim leaders rather than engage in large-scale intra-Muslim killing. Zarqawi, and now Baghdadi, have shown no such scruples.
Beyond Iraq and Syria, the group’s greatest threat will likely be to Iraq’s Arab neighbors. Already, the group has seized checkpoints on the Jordanian border. The desire to strike at Assad’s allies in Lebanese Hezbollah may have also prompted the group to infiltrate Lebanon: In late June, 17 ISIS members were reportedly arrested in Beirut. And extended operations in Jordan could have a significant effect on regional stability, including on Israel, which has close security ties with Jordan.
ISIS shares with other jihadi groups a visceral hatred for both the United States and Israel. U.S. sources say the group has begun thinking about attacks against American targets, which would yield it tremendous admiration among extremists. From its bases in Syria, the group could also possibly carry out some kind of attack against Israel. Although Israeli border defenses and intelligence capabilities would make this difficult, provocation along these lines might well seem attractive for a group such as ISIS, although it would require resources the group might prefer to use elsewhere.
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Up to now, Israel has largely been spared al Qaeda-related violence at home, although Israeli tourists are sometimes targeted abroad. (Israeli tourists were attacked in Kenya in 2002, and the suspect in the attack on the Jewish Museum in Brussels in June appears to have been trained by Syrian-based extremists.) Much of the reason al Qaeda never got a foothold in the West Bank or Gaza is that Palestinian security forces—whether they cooperate with Israel, as in the West Bank, or not—believe that a catastrophic attack against Israel would ultimately undermine their efforts for independence. Israel, they believe, would take draconian measures to root out extremists, and that would have inevitable unwanted effects on them.
It is unlikely that ISIS or other jihadists operating from Iraq or Syria will soon be able to strike Israel. But the effectively layered defense that Israel has enjoyed thus far will not help against this particular threat. Shrinking the safe haven of Sunnistan and preventing the terrorists within it from carrying out attacks against the United States or other targets is already a high priority for Washington. The need to ensure that they also cannot mount operations against Israel—which would vastly increase the complexity and danger of the situation—adds another element of urgency to a spreading crisis.
Daniel Benjamin is director of the John Sloan Dickey Center for International Understanding at Dartmouth. He served as ambassador-at-large and coordinator for counterterrorism at the U.S. State Department from 2009 to 2012.
ISRAEL PREFERS al-QAEDA
DeleteIsrael’s Ambassador to the United States Michael Oren told the Jerusalem Post
http://www.jpost.com/Syria-Crisis/Oren-Jerusalem-has-wanted-Assad-ousted-since-the-outbreak-of-the-Syrian-civil-war-326328
They have made their bed, now they get to toss restlessly in it.
The Israeli assault against the civilian populations in Palestine can only have helped the popularity of ISIS. Netanyahu, great strategist that he is, just may not have put that into his calculation on possible consequences. He probably assumed, rightly that the US would be forced to do the heavy lifting.
ReplyDeleteThe US is not getting involved, beyond buying Bibi some bullets.
DeleteThere is no clamor for the US to take action, emanating from the people of the US.
There is an election coming up, no action until that is over, fer sur.
Then you have Obama, who is not about to pull the trigger. If he had the desire to do so, he could engage the ISIS with drones. It has not happened, so he has passed on he Afghan model of "Stop Gap" military action.
He is standing down.
Good on him.
.
Israeli LIVES in the hood...
DeleteAmerica doesn't.
And under Obama? Obama SUPPORTED Hamas and the Moslem Brotherhood and trained and funded ISIS....
Israel is holding two pair, in its hand.
DeleteAces & Eights
DeleteThe Dead Man's Hand
BBC DOCUMENTS THE HUMAN COST OF THE ISRAELI KRIEG AGAINST GAZA
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28586190
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDelete
Deleteby Stephen Sniegoski
Mainstream liberal David Ignatius observes in the ultra-establishment Washington Post:
“Let’s look at the reality on the ground in the Middle East: Iraq and Syria are effectively partitioned along sectarian lines; Lebanon and Yemen are close to fracturing; Turkey, Egypt and Saudi Arabia survive intact but as increasingly authoritarian states.
“In the current, chaotic moment, we see two post-imperial systems collapsing at once: The state boundaries drawn by the Versailles Treaty in 1919 to replace the Ottoman Empire can’t hold the fractious peoples together. And a U.S.-led system that kept the region in a rough balance has been shattered by America’s failed intervention in Iraq.
The Washington Post expresses views that all respectable people are allowed, or even expected, to hold, so it is quite significant that this view now has emerged on center stage. Of course, it was not given any attention during the run-up to the US 2003 invasion of Iraq, when it could have served to prevent the chaos that has ensued, though it was mentioned by various Middle East experts, as was discussed in my book, "The Transparent Cabal: The Neoconservative Agenda, War in the Middle East, and the National Interest of Israel".
DeleteAs I brought out in The Transparent Cabal, ignored by the more respectable antiwar crowd as well as the mainstream, a fundamental purpose of the war on Iraq was to ignite the destabilization and fragmentation of Israel’s enemies throughout the Middle East, which has consequently taken place in tandem with a region-wide Sunni—Shiite war.
Moreover, I pointed out that this idea was best articulated, though did not originate, in a lengthy article in Hebrew by Likudnik Oded Yinon in 1982, which Israel Shahak, the perspicacious Israeli dissident, translated in a booklet titled “The Zionist Plan for the Middle East.”
...
DeleteWhile neocons have not openly stated that this Likudnik aim is their goal, though some have alluded to something like this, they have openly stated their support for Israeli policy, which they maintain has the same interests as the US. For example, a letter of April 3, 2002 from the Project for the New American Century to President George W. Bush–signed by such neocon stalwarts as William Kristol, Ken Adelman, Richard Perle, Midge Decter, Robert Kagan, Joshua Muravchik, Daniel Pipes, Norman Podhoretz, and R. James Woolsey–urging the President to attack Iraq, included the following references to Israel:
“Furthermore, Mr. President, we urge you to accelerate plans for removing Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq. . . . It is now common knowledge that Saddam, along with Iran, is a funder and supporter of terrorism against Israel. . . . If we do not move against Saddam Hussein and his regime, the damage our Israeli friends and we have suffered until now may someday appear but a prelude to much greater horrors.”[5]
The letter continued with the assertion:
“Israel’s fight against terrorism is our fight. Israel’s victory is an important part of our victory. For reasons both moral and strategic, we need to stand with Israel in its fight against terrorism.”
It would be hard to believe that the neocons, who were closely tied to the thinking of the Israeli right, have not been aware of this Likudnik strategic destabilization goal. Moreover, an individual who has been referred to as their leading academic guru, Middle East scholar Bernard Lewis, has written on the fragility of the dictatorial regimes of the Middle East.
Lewis echoed Yinon’s analysis of the fragility of the Middle Eastern countries with an article in the September 1992 issue of Foreign Affairs titled “Rethinking the Middle East.” In it, he wrote of a development he referred to as “Lebanonization,” stating that a “possibility, which could even be precipitated by [Islamic] fundamentalism, is what has of late been fashionable to call ‘Lebanonization.’ Most of the states of the Middle East—Egypt is an obvious exception—are of recent and artificial construction and are vulnerable to such a process. If the central power is sufficiently weakened, there is no real civil society to hold the polity together, no real sense of common identity or overriding allegiance to the nation state. The state then disintegrates—as happened in Lebanon—into a chaos of squabbling, feuding, fighting sects, tribes, regions, and parties.”
DeleteSince Lewis— credited with coining the phrase “clash of civilizations”—has been a major advocate of a belligerent stance for the West against the Islamic states, it would appear that he realized that such fragmentation would be the result of his belligerent policy. Lewis was a major proponent of the US attack on Iraq and was an advisor to Dick Cheney, who for years has maintained close connections with the neocon nexus.
Trust in government was destroyed for a generation by Blair and Bush and the Neocon cheerleaders. Whatever happens before this generation is replaced by the next, there will be a great unwillingness to get involved in anothe ME war. Israel will have to fight its own wars in its own neighborhood.
ReplyDeleteThe US is a fickle friend, indeed.
DeleteAsk the Shah of Iran
Israel will have to fight its own wars in its own neighborhood.
DeleteYep, as it has done for 66 years.
ARTIFICIAL STUPIDITY
ReplyDeleteIs thinking now obsolete?
Thomas Sowell defends Matt Drudge in face of Geraldo's barbs
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution in Stanford, Calif. He is the author of 28 books, including "Dismantling America" and "Basic Economics: A Common Sense Guide to the Economy."
Some have said that we are living in a post-industrial era, while others have said that we are living in a post-racial era. But growing evidence suggests that we are living in a post-thinking era.
Many people in Europe and the Western Hemisphere are staging angry protests against Israel’s military action in Gaza. One of the talking points against Israel is that far more Palestinian civilians have been killed by Israeli military attacks than the number of Israeli civilians killed by the Hamas rocket attacks on Israel that started this latest military conflict.
Are these protesters aware that vastly more German civilians were killed by American bombers attacking Nazi Germany during World War II than American civilians killed in the United States by Hitler’s forces?
Talk-show host Geraldo Rivera says that there is no way Israel is winning the battle for world opinion. But Israel is trying to win the battle for survival, while surrounded by enemies. Might that not be more important?
Has any other country, in any other war, been expected to keep the enemy’s civilian casualties no higher than its own civilian casualties? The idea that Israel should do so did not originate among the masses but among the educated intelligentsia.
In an age when scientists are creating artificial intelligence, too many of our educational institutions seem to be creating artificial stupidity.
It is much the same story in our domestic controversies. We have gotten so intimidated by political correctness that our major media outlets dare not call people who immigrate to this country illegally “illegal immigrants.”
DeleteGeraldo Rivera has denounced the Drudge Report for carrying news stories that show some of the negative consequences and dangers from allowing vast numbers of youngsters to enter the country illegally and be spread across the country by the Obama administration.
Some of these youngsters are already known to be carrying lice and suffering from disease. Since there have been no thorough medical examinations of most of them, we have no way of knowing whether, or how many, are carrying deadly diseases that will spread to American children when these unexamined young immigrants enter schools across the country.
The attack against Matt Drudge has been in the classic tradition of demagogues. It turns questions of fact into questions of motive. Geraldo accuses Drudge of trying to start a “civil war.”
Back when masses of immigrants from Europe were entering this country, those with dangerous diseases were turned back from Ellis Island. Nobody thought they had a legal or a moral “right” to be in America or that it was mean or racist not to want our children to catch their diseases.
Even on the less contentious issue of minimum wage laws, there are the same unthinking reactions.
Although liberals are usually gung ho for increasing the minimum wage, there was a sympathetic front-page story in the July 29 San Francisco Chronicle about the plight of a local nonprofit organization that will not be able to serve as many low-income minority youths if it has to pay a higher minimum wage. They are seeking some kind of exemption.
Does it not occur to these people that the very same thing happens when a minimum wage increase applies to profit-based employers? They, too, tend to hire fewer inexperienced young people when there is a minimum wage law.
This is not breaking news. This is what has been happening for generations in the United States and in other countries around the world.
One of the few countries without a minimum wage law is Switzerland, where the unemployment rate has been consistently less than 4 percent for years. Back in 2003, The Economist magazine reported that “Switzerland’s unemployment neared a five-year high of 3.9 percent in February.” The most recent issue shows the Swiss unemployment rate back to a more normal 3.2 percent.
Does anyone think that having minimum wage laws and high youth unemployment is better? In fact, does anyone think at all these days?
Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2014/08/is-thinking-now-obsolete/#SfBtJcV9OXi672MZ.99
Switzerland has a government-mandated minimum wage, and no worker in Switzerland can be paid less then this mandatory minimum rate of pay. Employers in Switzerland who fail to pay the Minimum Wage may be subject to punishment by Switzerland's government.
DeleteWhat is the Switzerland Minimum Wage?
Switzerland's Minimum Wage is the lowest amount a worker can be legally paid for his work. Most countries have a nation-wide minimum wage that all workers must be paid.
While Switzerland has no official minimum wage, a majority of the voluntary collective bargaining agreements contain clauses on minimum compensation, ranging from 2,200 to 4,200 francs per month for unskilled workers and from 2,800 to 5,300 francs per month for skilled employees. Switzerland's minimum wage was last changed in N/A
2200 to 4200 Francs is approx. $2,400.00 to $4,600.00.
You see, almost everyone in Switzerland belongs to a union.
DeleteDon't you ever get tired of letting these right-wing hacks make a fool of you?
DeleteWhat is "Occupation"Mon Aug 04, 10:16:00 PM EDT
ReplyDeleteISIS and Hamas, twins.....
.........................................
Joined at the hip and head.........freaks
Good post about ISIS, Deuce.
ReplyDeleteMr. Insha'Allah there is going to have a tougher time taking Baghdad.
ReplyDeleteWish I had his F-350 Ford Pickup though.
I'd take the overhead lights off, put on a camper, and go fishing with my niece.
Obama could have stopped all this. Took the troops out too soon. May have been a great move though, breaking up Iraq.
DeleteIf Kurdistan survives.
Deuce ☂Mon Aug 04, 10:55:00 PM EDT
ReplyDeleteThe Israeli assault against the civilian populations in Palestine can only have helped the popularity of ISIS. Netanyahu, great strategist that he is, just may not have put that into his calculation on possible consequences. He probably assumed, rightly that the US would be forced to do the heavy lifting.
the civilians of "palestine" have supported terror against Israel for 66 years.
nothing new here except the name of the group...
Aaaaha !
DeleteNetanyahu is responsible for the rise of ISIS.
Why didn't I think of that?
I didn't hear Mr. Insha-Allah mention Bibi, though.
Ungrateful son bitch, Mr. Insha-Allah.
Delete;)
I think ISIS was on the rise long before these recent events in Gaza.
Delete
Deletethe civilians of “palestine” have supported terror against Israel for 66 years.
Of course they have. Your team is the oppressor. Your team is the occupier. The people that were tending their olive groves for a millenium are not stupid. They wake to find their previous foreign lords, the British, think it a good idea to flood their turf with boat loads of more European intruders.
They are not stupid to buy the patently ridiculous concept that these people are returning because their holy wizards claim they were there 2000 years ago, or 3000 or as many more thousands you like to support the infantile and absurd claim that the olive groves and pastures belong to another wave of European occupation forced upon them.
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteAs long as Deuce, Hamas and others think that Israel has no right to be the Jewish state and be in the middle east? You will have war.
DeleteThe arabs? occupy 899/900th of the middle east. What right do they have to the numerous nations they now occupy?
The have that right because they "are". No more, no less, their claim to mohammed and their wizards and historic claims are shit. Their "right" to statehood is the same as all folks across the planet.
Israel is a nation state and as defined by it's citizens, a nation state for the Jewish people.
Like it or not? The arab nation states have said they are the nation states of islamic peoples, no jews allowed.
Deal with it.
Interesting what you do or do not delete.....
DeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
DeleteIsrael - Founded by Terrorists and Sustained by Terrorism
DeleteJews and Muslims lived as neighbors for over 1,600 years, until the Europeon Ashkenazi invaded Arabia.
The Ashkenazi upset the apple cart and want to blame the apple vendor for the mess.
the Talmud teaches that
Delete"unnatural intercourse does not cause a woman to be forbidden to marry a High Priest,"
since then "you will find no woman eligible … ."... from the Talmud book of Yebamoth, Folios 59a-59b)
Rulings of the "sages" follow:
"A woman who had intercourse with a beast is eligible to marry a priest — even a High Priest."
Unless specifically warned in advance and the act seen by two witnesses, she is acceptable also. If she had intercourse with a dog while sweeping the floor, she is likewise reckoned to be pure, and suitable. For,
"The result of such intercourse being regarded as a mere wound, and the opinion that does not regard an accidentally injured hymen as a disqualification does not regard such as intercourse either."
http://www.come-and-hear.com/dilling/chapt05.html
It is in your Book, "O"rdure.
DeleteThe ebola virus attacks the immune system shutting down its ability to make antibodies. This new serum seems to be working really well.
ReplyDeleteThey put ebola virus in mice and succeeded in getting an immune response there. They took the mice anti-bodies and made it into a serum.
The hopeful report is that the doctor from Africa who was just brought to the United States -- his condition began to improve in about half an hour after being given the serum.
With ebola there is sometimes a reported phemomenon of improvement in the untreated right before things get really bad.
Hopefully it is not this that is occurring in the doctor.
He will be isolated for some weeks, but his condition is said to be dramatically improved.
Democracy at its finest -
ReplyDeleteDORSET, Minn. (AP) — A 5-year-old boy's run as mayor is over in a tiny tourist town in northern Minnesota.
Robert "Bobby" Tufts lost his bid for a third consecutive term as mayor of Dorset on Sunday. Eric Mueller, a 16-year-old from Mendota Heights, Minnesota, won when his name was drawn from the ballot box during the annual Taste of Dorset festival.
Bobby was only 3 when he was first elected mayor in 2013. Dorset, about 150 miles northwest of Minneapolis, has no formal city government and a population ranging from nine to 28.
"It was fun, but it's time to pass on the vote," Bobby told The Associated Press by telephone Monday. Then he suggested his little brother get a shot at some point: "I'm gonna let James do it. He's 2."
People can vote as many times as they like in the "election" — for $1 a vote — at ballot boxes in stores around town. The proceeds go toward organizing the festival.
Bobby said he was proud of his efforts to raise money for the Ronald McDonald House Charities of the Red River Valley in Fargo, North Dakota, One of his other major acts was to declare ice cream top of the food pyramid.
His mother, Emma Tufts, said family members joked about having Bobby and James build up a political resume to prepare for a presidential run in 2048. But she said she's happy that Bobby will get a break. Now, for example, he can catch candy at parades rather than be the one throwing it.
"He really enjoyed being a kid in some festivals, not having to perform," she said.
Eric, the new mayor, said he came up with the idea to run after he ate five fried ice creams at one sitting. He'll be a high school junior this fall.
<<<>>>Hamas is an organization devoted to ending Jewish history. This is what so many Jews understand, and what so many non-Jews don’t. The novelist Amos Oz, who has led Israel’s left-wing peace camp for decades, said in an interview last week that he doesn’t see a prospect for compromise between Israel and Hamas. “I have been a man of compromise all my life,” Oz said. “But even a man of compromise cannot approach Hamas and say: ‘Maybe we meet halfway and Israel only exists on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.’”…
ReplyDeleteIn 2011, the former Hamas minister of culture, Atallah Abu al-Subh, said that “the Jews are the most despicable and contemptible nation to crawl upon the face of the Earth, because they have displayed hostility to Allah. Allah will kill the Jews in the hell of the world to come, just like they killed the believers in the hell of this world.” Just last week, a top Hamas official, Osama Hamdan, accused Jews of using Christian blood to make matzo. This is not a group, in other words, that is seeking the sort of peace that Amos Oz—or, for that matter, the Palestinian Authority president, Mahmoud Abbas—is seeking. People wonder why Israelis have such a visceral reaction to Hamas. The answer is easy. Israel is a small country, and most of its citizens know someone who was murdered by Hamas in its extended suicide-bombing campaigns; and most people also understand that if Hamas had its way, it would kill them as well.<<<>>>
from Hot Air Quotes of the Day
http://hotair.com/archives/2014/08/04/quotes-of-the-day-1811/
***
G'nite
Cheers !
Another crock of shit from Robert Peterson.
DeleteHamas is dedicated to the liberation of Palestine from the Colonial Zionists forces from Europe.
DeleteThat the founders of the Zionist colony knew it was a colony and described it as such, a historical fact.
The Palestine Jewish Colonization Association, commonly known by its Hebrew acronym PICA (Hebrew: פיק"א), was established in 1924 and played a major role in supporting the Yishuv in Palestine until its disbandment in 1957.
The Jewish Colonization Association (ICA) was founded by Bavarian philanthropist Baron Maurice de Hirsch in 1891 to help Jews from Russia and Romania to settle in Argentina. The Baron died in 1896 and thereafter the ICA began to assist the Palestinian colonies.
In 1899 Edmond James de Rothschild transferred title to his colonies in Palestine plus fifteen million francs to the ICA, which was reorganised as the Palestine Jewish Colonization Association in 1924, under the direction of Edmond's son James Armand de Rothschild
AnonymousTue Aug 05, 08:07:00 AM EDT
DeleteAnother crock of shit from Robert Peterson.
Hamas is dedicated to the liberation of Palestine from the Colonial Zionists forces from Europe.
Hey dumb ass, why aint you deleting the rat posts that out you know who...
While Robert Peterson posted on Sun Jul 13, 02:44:00 PM EDT
DeleteThe Robert chose a poor moniker not the fault of anyone else, but himself
AnonymousMon Aug 04, 09:17:00 AM EDT
DeleteNo, he does not focus upon what others post.
His postings are errors, he has to be held to the same standard he holds others.
He chose the avatar.
He can beg forgiveness, make apologies, as always.
Or you can shut down the blog.
Those have been the options, they remain the options
Deuce allows the rat/jack hawkins/anon to say practically anything he wishes...
DeleteOne standard for Me and none for thee....
deuce, quick, pull that shirt down your bias is showing...
It takes two to make a fight, in your case three. You and Bob could stop it by not responding.
DeleteIn your case, your hyperbole is unsurpassed:
DeleteYour bias is showing.
Death to the Jews is your slogan, own it.
You are like three foolish adolescents
A female journalist heard about a very old Jewish man who had been going to the Western Wall to pray, twice a day, every day, for a long, long time.
ReplyDeleteSo she went to check it out. She went to the Western Wall and there he was, walking slowly up to the holy site.
She watched him pray and after about 45 minutes, when he turned to leave, using a cane and moving very slowly, she approached him for an interview.
"Pardon me, sir, what's your name?"
"Morris Feinberg," he replied.
"Sir, how long have you been coming to the Western Wall and praying?"
"For about 60 years."
"60 years! That's amazing! What do you pray for?"
"I pray for peace between the Christians, Jews and the Muslims."
"I pray for all the wars and all the hatred to stop."
"I pray for all our children to grow up safely as responsible adults and to love their fellow man."
"I pray that politicians tell us the truth and put the interests of the people ahead of their own interests."
"How do you feel after doing this for 60 years?"
"Like I'm talking to a fucking wall"
ReplyDeleteMurphy, a furniture dealer from Dublin, decided to expand the line of furniture in his store, so he decided to go to Paris
to see what he could find.
After arriving in Paris , he visited with some manufacturers and selected a line that he thought would sell well back home. To celebrate the new acquisition, he decided to visit a small bistro and have a glass of wine.
As he sat enjoying his wine, he noticed that the small place was quite crowded, and that the other chair at his table was the only vacant seat in the house.
Before long, a very beautiful young Parisian girl came to his table,
asked him something in French (which Murphy could not understand), so he motioned to the vacant chair and invited her to sit down.
He tried to speak to her in English, but she did not speak his language. After a couple of minutes of trying to communicate with her, he took a napkin and drew a picture of a wine glass
and showed it to her. She nodded, so he ordered a glass of wine for her.
After sitting together at the table for a while, he took another napkin, and drew a picture of a plate with food on it,
and she nodded. They left the bistro and found a quiet cafe that featured a small group playing romantic music.
They ordered dinner, after which he took another napkin and drew a picture of a couple dancing.
She nodded, and they got up to dance. They danced until the cafe closed and the band was packing up.
Back at their table, the young lady took a napkin and drew a picture of a four-poster bed.
To this day, Murphy has no idea how she figured out he was in the furniture business
Hamas launches "revenge" barrage of rockets into Israel before cease-fire, rocket hits home of Palestinian family .
ReplyDeleteMinutes before a Gaza ceasefire took hold at 8 a.m. on Tuesday, Hamas launched a salvo of long-range rockets into Israel, calling them revenge for Israel's "massacres". Sirens went off as far north as Jerusalem's outlying areas such as Ma'ale Adumim. There was no word of casualties.
One rocket hit a house near the Palestinian West Bank town of Bethlehem, police said and residents said.
Minutes after the attack, police rushed to the scene and a large crowd gathered outside the house.
Owner of the house, Elias Jubran said his house sustained damage to the roof and to the living room.
"We were at home asleep, when we heard a loud explosion that shook all the houses, three floors and my brothers' houses on the other side, the windows and other things broke," Jubran said.
He said no one was hurt.
DARN....
It's always a good day when a Hamas rocket hits a Palestinian home, school or mosque. After all 13% of ALL rockets and mortars actually land inside of "palestinian" controlled lands....
DeleteThose rockets are not really much of an existential threat, are they?
DeleteYou make that point so well, "O"rdure.
13% of the Israel casualties caused by the rockets, why that would be nil, wouldn't it.
DeleteSo to blame the Hamas rockets for substantial numbers of Palestinian casualties, not very realistic.
Again, "O"rdure, your point is well made.
Anonymous,
DeleteLove your new avatar....
Criminal, one eye, pirate, outlaw, murderer...
Fits you to a tee....
Glad you approve, "O"rdure.
DeleteQuirkMon Aug 04, 10:40:00 AM EDT
ReplyDeleteGive it up Deuce. The rat is infantile, never quite got past the anal stage. He still takes pleasure in throwing shit around.
LOL
.
.
DeleteAnd yet you took time to log in to say that...
DeleteLOL
tick tock, the hourglass of your worthless life falls thru the hole, like sand thru an hourglass....
There go the days of your life.
DeleteMy own, rather limited, political goals are being met.
As rufus linked to the other day, the majority of US residents want to cut the funding to Israel.
That is the goal, ay by day we are getting closer to achieving it.
The rest ...
That's Entertainment !
The majority?
DeleteThe majority of Americans think that Dancing with the Stars is important…
LOL
vi·tu·per·a·tive
ReplyDeletevəˈt(y)o͞opəˌrātiv,vī-,-p(ə)rətiv/Submit
adjective
bitter and abusive.
"the criticism soon turned into a vituperative attack"
Now that's a new word I didn't know...
Let's use it in a sentence.
DeleteOne day, after abusing horses and dogs, the fellow with the avatar called "jack hawkins" came home to find no wife, child or even a pet animal to spit on.. He flew into a rage, went to the local whore house where he was turned down for services requested and flew into a vituperative rant and rage that the local Sheriff had to be called. Once again returning the man, whose avatar is called "jack hawkins", to his regular and well used cell for a few days, waiting sentencing.
Yep, calling someone by the moniker they chose for themselves, that should be considered "bitter and abusive".
DeleteI'll buy into that, you betcha.
Not
Yeah I think that works...
DeleteDid the "anonymous" pirate get his depends in a knot?
DeleteBetter go change your underoos... Mr Pirate...
LOL
So sorry "Depends"
DeleteBut, "O"rdure, it is pure fiction, and as such rolls off my back like water off a duck.
DeleteWhile what is posted about Israel, is true and factual.
And that is all that matters.
Focus on Jack Hawkins, it will advance your cause, greatly.
Stay the Course !
Focus on Jack Hawkins, it will advance your cause, greatly.
Deleteno focus on the fiction of "jack hawkins"
But since you invested so much time in promoting your so called "book", if anyone ever stumbles on it?
then googles the name?
it will be connect to the vile posts you post here...
LOL
Stay the Course.
Vile, quoting the Talmud is vile?
DeleteWhat you talking about, "O"rdure?
Using the moniker chosen by the contributor is vile?
You have lost your mind.
The only one who see vile bile, is you and you have to read between the lines to fabricate it.
AnonymousTue Aug 05, 09:21:00 AM EDT
ReplyDeleteYep, calling someone by the moniker they chose for themselves, that should be considered "bitter and abusive".
I'll buy into that, you betcha.
Not
Yep it fits... a pirate avatar, for the name "anonymous"
A nothing person behind the mask...
A nobody.
A bitter old man, sitting in his Depends typing at a keyboard posting all sorts of nonsense from Jew hating websites...
Laughable.
Pathetic.
Tragic? Maybe...
But no one cares...
LOL
Really, NO ONE cares...
Then why are you on the ubject?
DeleteObviously YOU care.
And that is the point, don't you know.
Jack Hawkins - About 3,920,000 results (0.22 seconds)
John Edward Hawkins, CBE was an English actor who worked on stage and in film from the 1930s until the 1970s. Wikipedia
Born: September 14, 1910, Wood Green, United Kingdom
Died: July 18, 1973, Chelsea, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, United Kingdom
Buried: Golders Green Crematorium, London, United Kingdom
Spouse: Doreen Lawrence (m. 1947–1973), Jessica Tandy (m. 1932–1940)
Children: Susan Hawkins, Andrew Hawkins, Nicholas Hawkins, Caroline Hawkins
Har dee har har
Some day the so called man behind the "rat" will be dead, buried in a grave somewhere in AZ....
ReplyDeleteand no one will care...
LOL
Doe this mean were not friends?
DeleteDoes
DeleteLook at all the movies Jack Hawkins was in ...
ReplyDeleteBirds of Prey (1930)
The Lodger (1932)
The Good Companions (1933)
The Lost Chord (1933)
I Lived with You (1933)
The Jewel (1933)
A Shot in the Dark (1933)
Autumn Crocus (1934)
Lorna Doone (1934)
Death at Broadcasting House (1934)
Peg of Old Drury (1935)
Beauty and the Barge (1937)
The Frog (1937)
Who Goes Next? (1938)
A Royal Divorce (1938)
Murder Will Out (1939)
The Flying Squad (1940)
The Next of Kin (1942)
The Fallen Idol (1948)
Bonnie Prince Charlie (1948)
The Small Back Room (1949)
The Elusive Pimpernel (1950)
State Secret (1950)
The Black Rose (1950)
No Highway in the Sky (1951)
The Adventurers (1951)
Home at Seven (1952)
Angels One Five (1952)
Mandy (1952)
The Planter's Wife (1952)
The Cruel Sea (1953)
Malta Story (1953)
Twice Upon a Time (1953)
The Intruder (1953)
The Seekers (1954)
Front Page Story (1954)
Land of the Pharaohs (1955)
The Prisoner (1955)
Touch and Go (1955)
The Long Arm (1956)
Fortune Is a Woman (1957)
Man in the Sky (1957)
The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
The Two-Headed Spy (1958)
Gideon's Day (USA title: Gideon of Scotland Yard) (1958)
Ben-Hur (1959)
The League of Gentlemen (1960)
Two Loves (1961)
Lafayette (1961)
Five Finger Exercise (1962)
Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
Rampage (1963)
Zulu (1964)
Guns at Batasi (1964)
The Third Secret (1964)
Lord Jim (1965)
Masquerade (1965)
Judith (1966)
Danger Grows Wild (1966)
Shalako (1968)
Stalked (short) (1968)
Great Catherine (1968)
Oh! What a Lovely War (1969)
Monte Carlo or Bust (1969)
Waterloo (1970)
Jane Eyre (1970)
The Beloved (1970)
The Adventures of Gerard (1970)
Twinky (1970)
When Eight Bells Toll (1971)
Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)
Kidnapped (1971)
Young Winston (1972)
The Last Lion (1972)
Escape to the Sun (1972)
Theatre of Blood (1973)
Tales That Witness Madness (1973)
Yes, let's all focus on Jack Hawkins - that will surely advance "O"rdure's cause of a Zionist state in Palestine.
Delete.
DeleteYes, let's all focus on Jack Hawkins
Its hard for some to not focus on you, rat. Whereas in days long past, you would present something new or offer an interesting observation, now you merely offer the same continuous loop of scurrilous hate-speech drawn from obscure and outre sources. You are like tinnitus, a background drone, bothersome and annoying, something people try to ignore but which on occasion sometimes forces its way into your consciousness. As with tinnitus, some are affected more than others.
But what can you say about tinnitus? It's there, its aggravating, but it simply a condition rather than a disease, merely a symptom of some deeper malady.
.
I must say I have taken to regularly scrolling the continuous loop spewing forth from the man. Odd, but interesting, to watch a person devolve into....I don't know - is it dementia? Could be.
Delete.
Delete:-)
I kind of agree with you, Ash (well maybe not the dementia part) but don't take what I write too seriously. While everything I said about rat is pretty much spot on, IMO, I enjoy it when someone gives me an opportunity to opine as rat did today. It's not so much the words as the music; although in rereading my post I see I should had spent more time in order to clean it up and allow for better flow.
Frankly, other than Deuce's post on our soldier's death in Afghanistan, there wasn't much more to comment on today.
.
yah, I'm still waiting for Bob to get WiO to explain to him Israel's "cutting the grass" meme.
DeleteAsh are you that ignorant you cannot understand the idea of "cutting the grass"?
DeleteIt's simple really… It is called kicking the islamic nazis in the nuts…. Make them have to reinvest billions, time and of course thousands of little Palestinians slave labor kids…
Now If I was king for a day?
I would, as bob said, spray Roundup….
Or better yet? Deport every Hamas member to Canada to date your daughter...
After all the warnings and all the clichés about a war that would “spill” over Syria’s border, the savage fighters of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s Sunni Muslim “caliphate” have at last arrived in Lebanon.
ReplyDeleteSo far, the Lebanese army has lost 13 of its soldiers in a costly battle with fighters to retake the north-eastern town of Arsal – on the Syrian border –
The world’s attention, of course, has been concentrated on the slaughter in Gaza. In the Middle East, tragedy must come one day at a time.
In Arsal, the fighters – from el-Nusra, whose own members are already joining those of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s caliphate – adopted their usual practice of seizing large buildings in the centre of the town (in this case, the technical college, a hospital and a mosque) and clinging to them in the hope that their opponents would disintegrate. The Lebanese army, which has twice defeated fighters inside Lebanon in the past 15 years, claimed to have retaken the college, but the statements from both the Lebanese commander and Prime Minister may be taken as accurate: that the takeover of Arsal had been planned long in advance and is part of a far strategy.
For more than a year, the Lebanese army has tried vainly to close the frontier east of Arsal, and a Syrian army victory over fighters in Yabroud on the other side of the border earlier this year suggested that insurgents might leave Arsal lest they be cut off.
While McCain, The US Army and the IDF under Netanyahu’s command, were assisting the ”rebels” aligned against Syria (ISIS). The Iranians recognized ISIS under any of its names.
ReplyDeleteTwo battalions of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) are reported to be operating in Iraq to combat the offensive campaign being waged by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) against the Iraqi government. In late June, a spokesman for ISIS announced that it was shortening its name to the Islamic State and would rule its territory as a Sunni Muslim caliphate overseen by its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The Islamic State, an al-Qaeda offshoot, has seized much of northern Iraq since June.
An August 3 report from Reuters quoted from Basij Press, a news site affiliated with the Basij militia that is overseen by the Revolutionary Guards, about the death of IRGC Colonel Kamal Shirkhani, who was killed in a mortar attack by Islamic State militants “while carrying out his mission to defend” a revered Shiite shrine in the city of Samarra, Iraq.
“When the Islamic State reached Shi’ite areas in Iraq, the Revolutionary Guards had forces there who fought them,” Mohsen Sazegara, identified as a founding member of the Revolutionary Guards now living in the United States, was quoted as saying by Reuters. “A number of them were killed,” he said.
Reuters observed that Shirkhani’s death in Iraq was an indication that Iran has committed “boots on the ground” to defend Iraqi territory from being overrun by Islamic State militants. The report also noted that Iraqi security forces have “largely dissolved” as fighters for the Islamic State advance on Baghdad, indicating that the government is barely capable of defending Iraq.
The Reuters report also cited a high-level Iraqi security official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to speak to the media, as saying that Iran has now mobilized up to 20,000 Iraqi militiamen from groups it funded and trained. Those same militiamen had attacked U.S. troops during our nation’s long occupation of Iraq following the removal of Saddam Hussein.
We reported back on June 11 that during the battle to capture Mosul, despite the fact that Iraqi security forces outnumbered ISIS fighters by more than 15 to one, the government troops suffered what a BBC reporter described as “a dramatic collapse of morale.”
This apparent military meltdown prompted a harsh statement by Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on June 11, when he said, “The commanders who retreated and wavered must be punished.”
{...}
ReplyDelete{...}
After the ISIS seized control of Mosul, it was reported that 150,000 people immediately fled the city. ISIS then issued an edict expelling the remaining Christians who, fearing for their safety, failed to attend a meeting to discuss their future status. ISIS authorities have destroyed Christian and Jewish religious artifacts such as the cross from St. Ephrem’s Cathedral, the tombs of Jonah and Seth, and a statue of the Mary, the mother of Jesus.
David Curry, president/CEO of Open Doors USA, recently condemned the Islamic State’s anti-Christian actions.
“The persecution and treatment of Christians in Mosul is unprecedented in modern times,” said Curry. “This latest forced exodus of Christians further shows why Western governments and the people in the West need to cry out in support for religious freedom in the Middle East and elsewhere. If this does not move us concerning the near extinction of Christianity in the Middle East, it’s likely nothing else can.”
According to Open Doors, the Islamic State gave Christians an ultimatum over the weekend of July 19-20: 1) Stay and convert to Islam; 2) Pay Islamic tax (which is too much for most families to pay); 3) Leave Mosul taking nothing but their clothes. Christians who stayed would be executed.
An earlier Reuters report on July 14 noted that as the Iraqi army became decimated by desertions in June during battles that including the fall of Mosul, al-Maliki’s Shiite-led government has relied heavily on Shiite militias and volunteers who, in some areas, equal the numbers of regular soldiers.
The media frequently cast the fighting in Iraq as a rivalry between Shiites and Sunnis, with ISIS being made up of militant Sunnis and the Iraqi government — an ally of Shiite ruled Iran — being dominated by Shiites. However, such religious-based descriptions are an oversimplification. There have been Sunni rulers in the Middle East who have been moderate and anything but fanatical when it came to religion, such as Saddam Hussein, King Abdullah II of Jordan, and Egypt’s Anwar El Sadat. All of these rulers were tolerant toward Christians and other religious minorities living in their countries. In contrast, the strongly anti-Western revolutionaries who took control of Iran in 1979 established an official Shia Islamic government that tolerated little religious nonconformity.
There are several ironies apparent in the current battle raging in Iraq. Among them is that the United States, after repeatedly condemning Iran for years because of the nation’s nuclear fuel enrichment program that much of the West alleges is part of a nuclear weapons program, now finds itself on the same side as Iran in the fight against the ISIS militants. A report from Iraqi News back on January 19 quoted a White House statement that Vice President Joe Biden had phoned Premier al-Maliki, during which “Biden and Maliki discussed the U.S. support for Iraq in its battle against the ISIL terrorists.”
Another irony is that the ISIS militants are allied with the rebel coalition fighting against the Assad regime in Syria — a coalition that has received U.S. support. President Obama expressed hope in a news conference to “mobilize the international community to support” installing a new regime in Syria.
Senator Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who was obviously aware of the connection between the anti-Assad rebels and the al-Qaeda-linked ISIS, made a statement on May 21, 2013, directed at his colleagues, nearly all of whom voted to send arms to Syrian rebels: “This is an important moment. You will be funding, today, the allies of al-Qaeda.”
About the only thing that is certain about U.S. policy in the Middle East, particularly with regard to Iraq, is that is has been consistently inconsistent, and has rarely served U.S. interests.
About the only thing that is certain about U.S. policy in the Middle East, particularly with regard to Iraq, is that is has been consistently inconsistent, and has rarely served U.S. interests.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/asia/item/18852-irans-revolutionary-guards-fighting-isis-in-iraq
DeleteKABUL, Afghanistan — A United States Army major general was killed on Tuesday by an Afghan soldier, shot at close range at a military training academy on the outskirts of Kabul, an official of the American-led coalition and Afghan media reported Tuesday. The officer was the highest-ranking member of the American military to die in hostilities in the Afghanistan war.
ReplyDelete.
DeleteTroops are still dying,
13 years after we invaded, 6 years after Obama promised to get the troops out, the longest war in US history with troops promised to remain for two more years, about 11 years since we first defeated the Taliban and helped spread the war into Pakistan, 10 years after we helped install what has been called the most corrupt government in the world, about 9 years since we have seen the resurgence of the Taliban, about seven years since our actions helped the local economy by doubling the poppy crop, 3 years since we got Obama not in Afghanistan but in Pakistan, 4000 US soldiers and contractors dead, not to mention the other deaths and destruction we have left in our wake.
We sure showed them.
.
Looks like they got a US General today...
Delete... and of course Jennifer Rubin is concerned that Iran may want the “bomb”. After watching the IDF in Gaza, it sounds like a fairly responsible wish.
ReplyDeleteSo Iran's seeking a nuke to murder all Jews is a fair price for 600 dead palestinians in a war where Hamas used them as human shields?
DeleteYour bias is showing.
Death to the Jews is your slogan, own it.
I am going to put up a post on the wealth destruction placed on the people Of Gaza by the inotdinately barbaric assault on the civil population by Israel. Man up and quit trying to use the fact of your being a Jew as a shield. That is weak.
DeletePlease read the article and view the density map in the article by Alan M. Dershowitz that I posted below.
DeleteHamas is responsible for the vast majority of 'civilian' casualties in Gaza.
You simply do not wish to see the truth.
Deuce ☂Tue Aug 05, 01:55:00 PM EDT
DeleteI am going to put up a post on the wealth destruction placed on the people Of Gaza by the inotdinately barbaric assault on the civil population by Israel. Man up and quit trying to use the fact of your being a Jew as a shield. That is weak.
make sure you put up the cost the Jewish state of what it SPENDS protecting it's self from the savages you defend daily….
I bet you'd find that the "folks" of gaza "wealth" was MOSTLY donated and not earned…
LOL
"wealth destruction" now that's funny…
As for manning up about the jew thing?
DeleteThe REASON the arab savages try to MURDER us is BECAUSE we are JEWS…
man up yourself and be honest…
read the Hamas charter…
It wants to murder JEWS…..
rat is confabulating again, ruining a decent thread about ISIS.
ReplyDeleteThis being so, I'm gonna go do some stuff.
Cheers !
Service industries such as builders and retailers grew in July at the fastest pace since December 2005, signaling the U.S. economy was hitting its stride entering the second half of 2014.
ReplyDeleteThe Institute for Supply Management’s non-manufacturing index increased to 58.7, exceeding the highest estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists, from the prior month’s 56, the Tempe, Arizona-based group’s report showed today. Readings greater than 50 indicate expansion. The median estimate in the Bloomberg survey called for 56.5.
Prospects for the world’s largest economy are improving as the group’s orders index reached an almost nine-year high, reflecting broad-based gains. Combined with another report showing factory bookings are also jumping, the pickup in demand raises the odds the job market will extend its recent progress.
“We’re seeing numbers that we haven’t seen since well before the financial crisis and recession, and they seem to be more sustained,” said Terry Sheehan, an economist at Stone & McCarthy Research Associates in Princeton, New Jersey, whose ISM index projection of 57 was among the highest in the Bloomberg survey. The strengthening is “pretty much across the board for business activity, new orders and employment.”
Other services figures from abroad today were . . . . . . . . .
Surging ISMs
The economy still sucks, but it IS getting a little bit better.
DeleteNow, if we could just get a little help from the "Crazy Chorus."
The empty spaces in Gaza
ReplyDeleteby Alan M. Dershowitz
August 5, 2014 at 3:00 pm
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4580/gaza-population-density
How many times have you heard on television or read in the media that the Gaza Strip is "the most densely populated area in the world"? Repeating this statement, however, does not make it true. There are dense parts of Gaza, especially Gaza City, Beit Hanoun and Khan Younis, but there are far less dense areas in Gaza between these cities. Just look at Google Earth, or this population density map.
The fact that these sparsely populated areas exist in the Gaza Strip raise several important moral questions: First, why don't the media show the relatively open areas of the Gaza Strip? Why do they only show the densely populated cities? There are several possible reasons. There is no fighting going on in the sparsely populated areas, so showing them would be boring. But that's precisely the point—to show areas from which Hamas could be firing rockets and building tunnels but has chosen not to. Or perhaps the reason the media doesn't show these areas is that Hamas won't let them. That too would be a story worth reporting.
Second, why doesn't Hamas use sparsely populated areas from which to launch its rockets and build its tunnels? Were it to do so, Palestinian civilian casualties would decrease dramatically, but the casualty rate among Hamas terrorists would increase dramatically.
That is precisely why Hamas selects the most densely populated areas from which to fire and dig. The difference between Israel and Hamas is that Israel uses its soldiers to protect its civilians, whereas Hamas uses its civilians to protect its terrorists. That is why most of Israeli casualties have been soldiers and most of Hamas' casualties have been civilians. The other reason is that Israel builds shelters for its civilians, whereas Hamas builds shelters only for its terrorists, intending that most of the casualties be among its civilian shields.
The law is clear: using civilians as human shields—which the Hamas battle manual mandates—is an absolute war crime. There are no exceptions or matters of degree, especially when there are alternatives. On the other hand, shooting at legitimate military targets, such as rockets and terror tunnels is permitted, unless the number of anticipated civilian casualties is disproportionate to the military importance of the target. This is a matter of degree and judgment, often difficult to calculate in the fog of war. The law is also clear that when a criminal takes a hostage and uses that hostage as a shield from behind whom to fire at civilians or police, and if the police fire back and kill the hostage, it is the criminal and not the policeman who is guilty of murder. So too with Hamas: when it uses human shields and the Israeli military fires back and kills some of the shields, it is Hamas who is responsible for their deaths.
DeleteThe third moral question is why does the United Nations try to shelter Palestinian civilians right in the middle of the areas from which Hamas is firing? Hamas has decided not to use the less densely populated areas for rocket firing and tunnel digging. For that reason, the United Nations should use these sparsely populated areas as places of refuge. Since the Gaza Strip is relatively small, it would not be difficult to move civilians to these safer areas. They should declare these areas battle free and build temporary shelters—tents if necessary—as places of asylum for the residents of the crowded cities. It should prevent any Hamas fighters, any rockets and any tunnel builders from entering into these sanctuaries. In that way, Hamas would be denied the use of human shields and Israel would have no reason to fire its weapons anywhere near these United Nations sanctuaries. The net result would be a considerable saving of lives.
But instead the UN is playing right into the hands of Hamas, by sheltering civilians right next to Hamas fighters, Hamas weapons and Hamas tunnels. Then the United Nations and the international community accuses Israel of doing precisely what Hamas intended Israel to do: namely fire at its terrorists and kill United Nations protected civilians in the process. It's a cynical game being played by Hamas, but it wouldn't succeed without the complicity of UN agencies.
The only way to assure that Hamas' strategy of using human shields to maximize civilian casualties is not repeated over and over again is for the international community, and especially the United Nations, not to encourage and facilitate it, as it currently does. International law must be enforced against Hamas for its double war crime: using civilian human shields to fire at civilian Israeli targets. If this tactic were to be brought to a halt, then Israel would have no need to respond in self-defense. Applying the laws of war to Israel alone will do no good, because any country faced with rockets and tunnels targeting its civilians will fight back. When the fighters and tunnel builders hide behind human shields, there will inevitably be civilian casualties—unintended by Israel, intended by Hamas—regardless of how careful the defenders are. Israel has tried its hardest to minimize civilian casualties. Hamas has tried its hardest to maximize civilian casualties. Now the United Nations and the international community must try their hardest to become part of the solution rather than part of the problem.
Alan Dershowitz's latest book is "Taking the Stand: My Life in the Law".
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/4580/gaza-population-density
The situation is very clear to those with eyes who wish to see:
DeleteHamas is responsible for the vast majority of 'civilian' casualties.
Deuce should remember this fun adventure in his city of brotherly love…
Deleteof course, why would I know about this????
And these folks were not shooting rockets off……
MOVE or the MOVE Organization is a Philadelphia-based black liberation group founded by John Africa. MOVE was described by CNN as "a loose-knit, mostly black group whose members all adopted the surname Africa, advocated a 'back-to-nature' lifestyle and preached against technology".[1] The group lived communally and frequently engaged in public demonstrations related to issues they deemed important.
Since their founding in 1972, MOVE has been in frequent conflict with the Philadelphia Police Department. A major incident occurred in 1978, when the police raided their Powelton Village home. This raid resulted in the imprisonment of nine group members, now known as the "MOVE 9."[2] After this, the group relocated farther west to a house at 6221 Osage Avenue.
In 1985 the group made national news when police dropped a bomb on the Osage house from a helicopter in an attempt to end an armed standoff. The explosion and ensuing fire killed 11 people, including five children and the group's leader, John Africa. Only two occupants survived—Ramona, an adult, and Birdie, a child. In addition, approximately 60 other (non MOVE-affiliated) homes were destroyed as the entire block burned.[3]
Yep one standard for the jews of israel and no standards for anyone else….
can't wait til we get another "move" in philadelphia…
i bet those philie cops will offer terms, assistance and of course free coffee and pizza to the "freedom fighters"….
:)
DeletePhilly seems to have every kind of goof ball in the world, no kidding.
DeleteIt's one of those 'places in between' the vast empty spaces that I love so well that my wife and I always avoid on our trips.
We take a 'density map' with us and head for empty spots. :)
DeleteYeah it was quite the sight…. a few crazy black folks with rifles, hold up in a row house…. not loving rockets or rgb's at the cops… just being assholes…..
DeleteThey didn't bomb pizza parlors or tunnel under the homes to try to kidnap little italian kids…
Nope just crazy black folks..
and the police BURNED TO THE GROUND an entire BLOCK of ROW HOUSES…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eHpRjxk7N4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOU5fqRU6Kg
Just go to youtube and search for "philadelphia Move"
LOL
THAT HOW AMERICA DOES IT…..
Sounds effective.
DeleteNo fucking around, that's for sure.
So you are comparing the IDF to the Phila Police? eWhat is your point? The IDF is better, worse, more competent at killing or worse? The comparison could not be more idiotic. The cops didn't bomb Philadelphia Electric or hahneman hospital or a half a dozen high schools.
DeleteBut Deuce, be honest, if the MOVE organization had used the basement of those building to store rockets and machine guns and had lobed 3000 rockets at Upper Marion? If they had used those schools to hide tunnels to South Phila where they would POP up and kidnap little Italian kids eating water ice? If those blacks had stabbed, shot, snipered and murdered for years and years?????
DeleteThose "cops" would have bombed and destroyed every location under the sun.
Idiotic?
baloney.
Hamas is a group of islamic NAZIS who publicly call for the death of every Jew on the planet, not to mention the destruction of Israel. It has invested BILLIONS to murder Jews.
It's only mantra is "Kill the Jews"
If the Blacks in America every were 1/100,000 as radical? Every single one would be HUNG from a tree, every black church? burned to the ground, every water pipe and electric line cut off to every black "hood"..
You know it and I know it….
You just refuse to be an HONEST man.
What would HAMAS DO if they could…. Ask yourself that…..
The answer? MURDER EVERY JEW…
What does Israel want? To be LEFT alone and not murdered….
But your side cannot LIVE with Israel being left alone, it seeks it's destruction.
So it means WAR…
AND your side? Uses it's kids to protect it's missiles….
My side? Uses missiles to protect our kids….
Want peace? Want Gaza to thrive??????
Tell your pals, the Hamas, to stop plotting, investing and waging war on Israel and Jews….
But they will not…
They cannot..
It's in their nature
Well said.
DeleteAs a direct result of the Obama Economy, The Tiny House Movement is growing by leaps and bounds.
ReplyDeleteIf you can't afford a 2,000 sq ft tract home, maybe you can make do with 100-400 sq ft.
You can make the mortgage payments on these with monthly Obama Money.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2716297/Have-house-travel-Inside-Tiny-House-Movement-growing-number-Americans-rejecting-traditional-idea-home-living-simpler-cheaper-lives-result.html