Martin Sellner of the Austrian Identitaires and Brittany Pettibone, his American girlfriend, were detained upon entry into the UK and will be deported. Mr. Sellner and Ms. Pettibone came to Britain to interview Tommy Robinson, which is now a deportable crime, unlike, say, supporting ISIS terrorists or calling publicly for the murder of Jews and Christians.
In other news, several hundred migrants were rescued in the Mediterranean by NGO ships and the Libyan coast guard.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to C. Cantoni, Charles Low, Dean, KS, Reader from Chicago, SS, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.
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Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.
4 Killed in California Veterans Home
(CNN) — A gunman and three female hostages were found dead at a military veterans home in Northern California on Friday evening, officials said, a grim end to a standoff that lasted nearly eight hours.
Shortly before 6 p.m., officers stormed into the room where the gunman had held the hostages at the Veterans Home of California in Yountville, said Chris Childs with the California Highway Patrol.
They found the gunman and the three hostages dead, he said. The coroner’s office identified the victims as Christine Loeber, 48; Jennifer Golick, 42; and Jennifer Gonzales, 29.
“This is a tragic piece of news, one that we were really hoping we wouldn’t have to come before the public to give,” Childs said.
Before officers entered the room, hostage negotiators spent hours trying to contact the gunman, who was a former client at The Pathway Home. Authorities identified him as Albert Wong, 36, of Sacramento.
Wong was a client of The Pathway Home, a nonprofit that helps veterans who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder and operates a rehabilitation center on Yountville property. He left the program two weeks ago, according to state Sen. Bill Dodd…
| — Hat tip: Dean | [Return to headlines] |
Monteith: Trump is Playing a Blinder Against Sucker Juncker on EU Trade
The stench of hypocrisy and the reek of duplicity remain alive and well with the EU and its camp followers. A trade war beckons between the European Union and the United States but there can only be one guilty party, one side responsible, and to the EU Customs Union and its willing cheerleaders in the BBC that has to be the United States in general and President Trump in particular, despite evidence to the contrary.
In a flagrant attempt to paint President Trump as the international bad guy the EU Commission’s President Jean-Claude Juncker talks tough by announcing how his Customs Union will raise tariffs on particular U.S. goods — while intentionally ignoring how EU tariffs already punish US imports. The BBC, unable to resist a pitch that demonises President Trump, swallows the EU narrative whole and encourages the British Prime Minister to take the EU’s side.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
No Exemptions on U.S. Steel Tariffs So Far for EU, Japan; Australia Appears Set for Reprieve
The European Union has threatened retaliatory measures if they are not exempted from U.S. steel tariffs, while Japan has warned of the dangers of tit-for-tat measures. U.S. President Donald Trump has already granted Canada and Mexico temporary exemptions to the tariffs, with Australia appearing set to join that list.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Foreign-Funded Extremists Attempt to Kill Canadian Pipelines
On Friday’s show, I reported on leaked battle plans by American extremists group 350.org to organize lawbreakers to oppose the construction of Canadian oil pipelines.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Man Charged With Five Assaults After Woman Says She Was Kicked on Rideau Street
An Ottawa woman is warning others to be vigilant after she was allegedly kicked by a complete stranger — who then recorded her shock on his phone — in an unprovoked attack Tuesday on Rideau Street.
Police confirmed they’ve charged Mustafa Khoshnaw of Ottawa, 26, with five counts of assault after they investigated a string of complaints from people walking on Rideau.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Wikileaks founder Julian Assange lashed out at the UK government over Twitter on Friday after Britain’s official UN account (UK Mission to the United Nations) tweeted “A free and independent media fulfils a vital role in holding the powerful to account and giving a voice to the powerless,” with a link to a puff piece waxing eloquent over the UK’s commitment to free speech.
Assange — apparently not included in the UK’s definition of “free and independent media” (facing arrest and detention should he leave the Embassy), fired off a stunning reply — claiming that the UK’s has spent roughly twice as much spying on him as it has on their entire international human rights program.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Austrian Steel Maker Rethinks US Investments After President Trump Imposes Tariffs
Austrian steel firm Voestalpine said on Friday it would reconsider its investments in the United States in light of President Donald Trump imposing tariffs on steel and aluminium imports.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
Conservative Activists Martin Sellner and Brittany Pettibone Detained in UK for Political Beliefs
Austrian activist Martin Sellner of Génération Identitaire and his girlfriend, American author and YouTuber Brittany Pettibone, have been detained by airport police in England for nearly three days.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
EU Has ‘One Year Left’ — This Election May Destroy Merkel and Macron’s Superstate Agenda
Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron only have a year to save their vision of the European Union, according to a German political correspondent, who said the EU will continue to struggle this year.
Mrs Merkel only recently completed a long-awaited deal to form another grand coalition with the Social Democrats, and is set to begin a fourth term as Chancellor next week.
Nina Haase, a correspondent for DW, said the threat posed by Brexit, Donald Trump’s trade war and the Italian election are dwarfed by the potential risk of next year’s European elections.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Former Polish Minister Says More EU Countries Will Vote Out if Brexit is a Success
Prominent Polish politician Radoslaw Sikorski said the results of the Italian and German elections prove there is a huge anti-EU movement and the success of Brexit could lead to more countries voting to leave the EU.
Mr Sikorski, the former minister of national defence in Poland, was asked whether other EU countries will follow the same path as Britain if Brexit is a success.
He told students at the University of Greenwich: “Sure. I mean, we’ve just got a result in Italy where right-wing anti-EU parties have the majority of the vote.
“In Germany, an anti-EU party is gaining ground. You know, we assume that the centre will hold in Germany.”
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Poland: Total Collapse for Pro-EU Opposition as Support for Patriotic Conservative Govt Surges
Survey data shows Poland’s patriotic, conservative government enjoying a huge lead in the polls, with the europhile opposition trailing by 30 points.
Warsaw-based pollster CBOS found backing for the ‘centrist’ Civic Platform (PO) — the party of current European Council head Donald Tusk, which headed the previous government in Poland — has fallen to just 14 per cent.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Steve Bannon Tells Far-Right French Nationalists ‘History is on Our Side’
Former White House strategist Steve Bannon delivered a speech Saturday in France that breathed new life into the far-right National Front Party, the motto for which is “France First.”
“Let them call you racist,” the former head of Breitbart News told Marine Le Pen’s nationalist supporters at a party gathering in Lille, France. “Let them call you xenophobes. Let them call you nativists. Wear it as a badge of honor.”
“The globalists have no answers to freedom,” he said. “You’re part of a worldwide movement bigger than France. History is on our side.”
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Turkey Committing War Crimes Against Kurds, SDF Argues to UN, ICC
The Syrian Democratic Forces appealed to multiple international bodies with images of their mutilated soldiers in arguing that Turkey is committing war crimes in northern Syria.
Soldiers from the SDF — the coalition of Kurds, Assyrians, Arabs, and other ethnic minorities that captured Raqqa from ISIS — have been responding to Afrin to fight with the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and defend civilians from Turkey’s onslaught, which began in January.
The UN Security Council demanded a ceasefire two weeks ago for all parties, including President Bashar al-Assad bombing Ghouta, and met today to discuss everyone ignoring the ceasefire. “UNSC, damn your resolution. What is the meaning of a decision that has not been implemented? You are deceiving humanity, you are cheating,” President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said at a Tuesday meeting of his Islamist AKP party…
| — Hat tip: KS | [Return to headlines] |
Friday Humor: Dozens of Nations That Interfered in 2016 Elections Annoyed Russia Got All Credit
Via The Onion,
Complaining that U.S. investigations into foreign interference in the election have gotten almost everything wrong, officials from dozens of countries around the world expressed irritation Friday that all of the credit for meddling in the 2016 presidential race was going to Russia.
[Comment: For those who do not knows what The Onion is, it is a news satire organization.]
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Tajik Cities at Risk of an ‘Islamist Explosion’
The extremists recruited by the Islamic State tend to be young people between 18 and 30. The loss of familial ties and clerical influence has been filled by online indoctrination. Government policies against extremism have proven counterproductive.
Dushanbe (AsiaNews) — An “Islamist explosion” in Tajikistan’s cities is increasingly likely, writes Paul Goble in a piece published on Tuesday by the Jamestown Foundation.
According to the researcher, the main centres of the “Islamist revival of the last 30 years” are the cities, not poor rural areas.
This is due to the “communication revolution” and the “loss of familial ties” of young people moving from rural villages to fast-growing cities.
If this was true in Iran and the countries hit by the Arab Spring, and “it is even more so now in Central Asia” — “nowhere more than in Tajikistan, the most Islamic, and one can also say Islamist, country in that region.”
In the big cities of the former Soviet Republic and in some Tajik diasporas in Russian cities like Moscow, Salafists and Wahhabis, known for their radical interpretations of Islam, have made huge inroads.
This has been a source of concern for Tajik authorities, whose countermeasures, like closing down 2,000 unofficial mosques in 2017, have so far proved counterproductive.
Two Tajikistani experts, Khokim Mukhabbatov and Mavdzhigul Ibadullayeva of the ‘Muslims Against Narcotics, Extremism, Force and Terrorism’ say that Salafism and Wahhabism attract young men between the ages of 18 and 30 who left their villages for the cities or for work in Russia.
Their religious worldview was “formed not by imams and mullahs in their villages but by Internet sites that appealed to them as Muslims rather than as villagers or Tajiks.” From this, it was only a short step from there for them to become recruits for the Islamic State.
Tajik authorities have hesitated between incentives and suppression, between making concessions — like amnesties and reaching out to Salafist backers in Qatar and Saudi Arabia — and cracking down hard.
“Neither approach has worked, the two experts say. The first has been taken by the Salafists as an indication of [. . .] the weakness of the Tajikistani government. And the second has created an ever-larger group of people either in prison or listed as extremists who have no reason to support the government and every reason to join with others in opposing it or even seeking its overthrow.”
What is more, Salafists and Wahhabis have a “real advantage” over the government. They know how to use modern technology to reach out and organise their followers.
Thus, they are able to benefit from the fruits of modernity remaining faithful to Tajik traditions, and at the same time reject the Russian language and the country’s pre-Islamic history.
| — Hat tip: C. Cantoni | [Return to headlines] |
The gang has a reputation for violent crime in New Zealand, and its members have been kicked out of Western Australia as they attempt to grow their influence in Perth.
| — Hat tip: SS | [Return to headlines] |
Anti-Migration Northerners Put Faith in Italy’s League
In the picturesque northern city of Varese, nestled in Italy’s rich Lombardy region, voters turned en masse to the anti-immigration League party in the general election, convinced that only nationalists would put their interests first.
“With the League in power, I won’t have to deal with people coming here from abroad who are willing to earn less than me to do the same job,” said Davide Quadri, a 25-year-old law student as he celebrated the League’s win at the party’s local headquarters.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
German City Builds Brand New Apartments for Refugees Only
The first group of refugees have entered their new homes in the German town of Bielefeld. Thirteen apartments were built especially for those who are in the asylum process. The project combines new apartments with social support and its goal is to encourage integration of the refugees.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Hundreds of Migrants Picked Up Between Libya and Italy
ABOARD AQUARIUS RESCUE SHIP (Reuters) — International charity ships and Libya’s coastguard and picked up several hundred migrants on Saturday as smugglers trying to take advantage of calm seas launched a flurry of boats towards Italy.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Social Media Purges of Conservatives and Christians Spark Outcry
With social-media giants becoming increasingly hostile to anyone who disagrees with statist and globalist ideology, a growing chorus of voices is sounding the alarm. Christians, conservatives, libertarians, patriots, and more have all been purged from key platforms. On Capitol Hill and across America, outrage over the politically motivated “censorship” is escalating. Now, with lawsuits flying and calls for regulation getting louder, a number of legal issues confront the Internet behemoths — Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Google, and more — that could see dramatic changes in the years ahead.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
If Mustafa Khoshnaw “of Ottawa”, were still Mustafa Khoshnaw of wherever he’s actually from, five people wouldn’t have been assaulted, five people wouldn’t now be nervous and wary when they walk down a street, five people wouldn’t have had their future quality of future life substantially degraded.
But hey, you five! Wake up! You’re just collateral damage. Canadians rise up! Stop this while you can. Get to the ballot box.
What about habeas corpus for the detained tourists in the UK. What possible reason could they have?
Are you serious? they were going to meet the ‘extremist’ Tommy Robinson and could upset ‘community cohesion’.
Which in this context is essentially the fear of authorities in the UK of Muslim mobs and threats of menace.
‘Community’ never seems to apply to British ‘communities’, some of whom have endured more provocations from Muslims, than any Muslim ‘community’ on earth could or would tolerate.
It is quite obvious that Muslim authoritarian community, wherever they migrate to or have any influence or whenever they have any sort of real or unreal power, would never allow any sort of opposition.
Russian security services say they have prevented an attack planned by a terrorist cell. An improvised explosive device and a hand grenade were found in a car during an operation in the western Saratov region.
https://www.rt.com/news/420984-terrorist-attack-foiled-russia/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxoj3Xc58_E
MORE than 1.5 million animal lovers have demanded harsher penalties for two men who hacked off a dog’s ears and posted the images to social media.
https://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/930155/animal-cruelty-petition-dog-ears-cut-off-turkey-isparta
– The criminals escaped jail? Why?
– Oh, then they must be muslims and the so=called tin judges cowards.
– Do you mean muslims criminals do not go to jail in the west, as muslims do not go to jail in muslim majority countries when they kill a non muslims. No one dare to jail them.
I can imagine a world without Muslims, but I do not represent it without dogs.
I just suggested to the Italian party “La Lega” that they should rebrand as “Lega Patriottica Italiana” (Italian Patriotic League — we all know that English is written from right to left) or “Lega degli Italiani” (League of Italians). It makes sense as evolution, from Lega Lombarda to Lega Nord to Lega degli Italiani or (my favorite) Lega Patriottica Italiana. This time, when their affairs are going very well, is the time to rebrand. It does the minimum possible damage, and have to explain nothing to anybody. It widens the appeal. It can be presented as the natural evolution of the species.
“The European Union has threatened retaliatory measures if they are not exempted from U.S. steel tariffs, while Japan has warned of the dangers of tit-for-tat measures.”
What some hyperventilating commentators don’t seem to realize, is Trump’s “plan” to impose steel and aluminium tariffs is a brilliant piece of negotiation. It’s an opening gambit, after which he can offer concessions in exchange for something else. Europe’s response, tit for tat tarrifs on Harley Davidsons, Bourbon and orange juice, was a weak one, as if these export items were the powerhouse of the US economy. Trump is trying to improve the US terms of trade and is showing his experience in arm twisting business deals with this latest flutter. Concessions will be made by certain countries and the tariff threat will be quietly forgotten. Job done.