Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has reacted to the latest scandal over revelations about Turkish government complicity in weapons shipments to Syrian jihadis: he wants a newspaper editor to spend life behind bars. Can Dundar, the editor of Cumhuriyet, has been charged with “espionage” and “revealing state secrets”. The charges carry a possible life sentence.
In other news, more than 75 people have now been confirmed dead in the Yangtze cruise ship accident in China. Hundreds more are still missing.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to Fjordman, Papa Whiskey, PS, Srdja Trifkovic, 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.
Greece Cannot Accept Deal Terms Proposed by Juncker, Says Deputy Minister
Greece cannot accept a cash-for-reform deal under the terms that European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker was reported to have proposed on Wednesday to Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, the country’s Deputy Shipping Minister said.
Thodoris Dritsas said Athens would not “surrender” to demands by its international creditors in the negotiations.
“What appears to have been discussed and to have been proposed by Mr. Juncker during his meeting with the Greek prime minister is beneath (our) expectations in every way,” he told told Greek TV.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Black Athletes Stereotyped Negatively in Media Compared to White Athletes
COLUMBIA, Mo. — Research has shown that media, such as television and video games, can affect viewers’ thoughts and actions. Now, new research by Cynthia Frisby, an associate professor of strategic communication in the University of Missouri School of Journalism, has revealed racial stereotyping in the way media portray athletes. Frisby found that media stories on African-American athletes focus primarily on criminal actions while stories about white athletes are overwhelmingly positive.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Boston Terror Suspects Plotted to Behead Police Officers, Source Says
The man shot and killed Tuesday by Boston police was plotting with another suspect to behead a cop, a law enforcement source told FoxNews.com
The dead suspect, 26-year-old Usaama Rahim, was under surveillance by the Joint Terrorism Task Force when he was shot at about 7 a.m. near a CVS in the city’s Roslindale neighborhood, when he brandished the blade at police. Later Tuesday, authorities arrested another suspect, David Wright, in connection with the case, police said.
“We believe the intent was to behead a police officer,” one official told The Boston Globe. “We knew the plot had to be stopped. They were planning to take action Tuesday.”
Rahim was shot outside a CVS Pharmacy in Roslindale, Mass. at approximately 7 a.m. Tuesday.
Boston Police Commissioner William Evans told reporters that members of the Joint Terrorism Task Force approached Rahim to question him about “terrorist-related information” they had received when he moved toward officers with the knife.
Evans said officers repeatedly ordered Rahim to drop the knife but he continued to advance. He said task force members fired their guns, hitting Rahim once in the torso and once in the abdomen. Rahim was taken to Brigham and Women’s Hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
[Suicide by cop. Wanted his key to the celestial Playboy Club. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Dabiq: ISIS Could Transport Nuke From Nigeria Into U.S. Through Mexico
By Ralph Sidway
This very real threat was corroborated in March by Gen. John Kelly, commander of U.S. Southern Command (Southcom), who “warned that Islamic terrorist groups such as ISIS could exploit the capabilities and knowledge of Latin American smuggling networks to infiltrate the U.S. through Mexico and possibly bring in weapons of mass destruction.”
by Edwin Mora, Breitbart News, June 3, 2015:
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL), in the latest edition of its propaganda magazine, indicated that it could purchase a nuclear weapon in Pakistan, take it to Nigeria, and then smuggle it into the U.S. through Mexico by using existing trafficking networks in Latin America.
In an op-ed article published in the ninth edition of ISIS’ Dabiq magazine released in late May, the jihadist group claims it could transport a nuclear device in the same way illicit drugs are smuggled into Europe through West Africa, adding that Boko Haram’s presence in Nigeria could facilitate the transaction.
The Nigeria-based Islamic terrorist group, Boko Haram, pledged allegiance to ISIS in March.
In March, Gen. John Kelly, commander of U.S. Southern Command (Southcom), warned that Islamic terrorist groups such as ISIS could exploit the capabilities and knowledge of Latin American smuggling networks to infiltrate the U.S. through Mexico and possibly bring in weapons of mass destruction.
The general, in October 2014, acknowledged that illegal drugs from South America move “through West Africa, up the Maghreb and into Western Europe,” adding that ISIS enemy al Qaeda and its affiliates take “a lot of money to allow it to flow.”
According to the alleged author of the Dabiq op-ed article, kidnapped British photojournalist John Cantlie, ISIS could smuggle a nuke into the U.S. by using the same route and reversing the flow— moving the nuke from West Africa into South America, from where it could be transported into the United States through Mexico.
[This is very scary-sounding, but if ISIS could do this they would do it, not telegraph the punch like this. It should be remembered that Saddam Hussein’s much feared WMD arsenal proved in the end to be nothing but an enormous bluff — and that ISIS is largely run by veterans of Saddam’s security forces. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
How Islam in America Became a Privileged Religion
By Daniel Greenfield
What is Islam? The obvious dictionary definition answer is that it’s a religion, but legally speaking it actually enjoys all of the advantages of race, religion and culture with none of the disadvantages.
Islam is a religion when mandating that employers accommodate the hijab, but when it comes time to bring it into the schools, places that are legally hostile to religion, American students are taught about Islam, visit mosques and even wear burkas and recite Islamic prayers to learn about another culture. Criticism of Islam is denounced as racist even though the one thing that Islam clearly isn’t is a race.
Islamist organizations have figured out how lock in every advantage of race, religion and culture, while expeditiously shifting from one to the other to avoid any of the disadvantages.
The biggest form of Muslim privilege has been to racialize Islam. The racialization of Islam has locked in all the advantages of racial status for a group that has no common race, only a common ideology.
Islam is the only religion that cannot be criticized. No other religion has a term in wide use that treats criticism of it as bigotry. Islamophobia is a unique term because it equates dislike of a religion with racism. Its usage makes it impossible to criticize that religion without being accused of bigotry.
By equating religion with race, Islam is treated not as a particular set of beliefs expressed in behaviors both good and bad, but as an innate trait that like race cannot be criticized without attacking the existence of an entire people. The idea that Islamic violence stems from its beliefs is denounced as racist.
Muslims are treated as a racial collective rather than a group that shares a set of views about the world.
[…]
By combining race, religion and culture, (Islam) replicates the building blocks of its theocracy within our legal and social spaces.
Separately each of these has its advantages and disadvantages. By combining them, Islam gains the advantages of all three, and by moving from one to the other, it escapes all of the disadvantages. The task of its critics is to deracialize Islam, to reduce it to an ideology and to ask what it really believes.
[The four components of opposition to Islam must be: exposure, analysis, criticism, and mockery. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
In Baltimore Schools, Free Meals for All
For the first time in the history of the school lunch program, all children in Baltimore are created equal.
Beginning this week, every student in the city, regardless of income level, is being offered free breakfast and lunch under a federal program that allows school districts to eliminate a decades-old meal-subsidy structure for students in high-poverty schools.
Baltimore is among a handful of districts in Maryland taking advantage of the opportunity that was opened to schools nationwide last year.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
ISIS Exploits Social Media to Make Inroads in U.S.
By Ray Sanchez
Hours before his fatal encounter with anti-terrorism officers, Usaamah Rahim told an associate he was switching from plans to behead a conservative blogger to assaults on the “boys in blue.”
Rahim, who officials believe was radicalized by ISIS, referred to his planned act of jihad against police officers in coded language — “going on vacation,” he said, according to an FBI affidavit.
The 26-year-old security guard’s so-called vacation ended in a hail of bullets Tuesday. FBI and Boston police officers tailing him suspected he was about to launch an attack. An associate, David Wright, 25, was arrested and charged with obstruction.
The investigation into the depth of Rahim’s network and possible overseas connections comes amid concerns by counterterrorism officials about future plots from a growing number of U.S.-based ISIS sympathizers.
Using social media as well as encrypted online communications beyond the reach of law enforcement surveillance, the terror organization is increasingly reaching new sympathizers and encouraging attacks such as the one foiled in Boston, officials said.
“The foreign terrorist now has direct access into the United States like never before,” Michael Steinbach, assistant director of the FBI’s counterterrorism division, told the House Homeland Security Committee this week.
At least one of the men connected to the plot to behead conservative blogger Pamela Geller and kill officers in Massachusetts was being encouraged online by people overseas connected to ISIS, two U.S. officials with knowledge of the investigation said Thursday. The officials, however, cautioned that the exact ties are difficult to know.
[Be it noted that “David Wright” is also known as Dawud Sharif Abdul Khaliq. The MSM dislike identifying jihadi criminals by their Muslim names, lest the Islamophobic hoi polloi get the wrong idea. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Pluto Probe Should Have Clear Sailing Amid Tiny Moons
A NASA spacecraft’s path to Pluto this summer should be relatively smooth and safe, a new and improved portrait of the dwarf planet’s moons suggests.
The New Horizons probe will make the first-ever flyby of Pluto on July 14, cruising within 7,800 miles (12,500 kilometers) of the frigid world’s surface. Last month, New Horizons began hunting for rings, undiscovered moons and other hazards that could potentially trip the spacecraft up in the home stretch of its historic journey.
Mission team members have said they don’t expect to find anything that will pose a serious problem. And now a new study into the characteristics and orbital dynamics of Pluto’s four tiny known moons — Nix, Hydra, Kerberos and Styx — has New Horizons’ handlers feeling even better about their chances. (Pluto’s other known satellite, Charon, is much larger and is considered to comprise half of a Pluto-Charon “binary planet.”)
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Boston Jihadis and the Left’s War on the Police
By Robert Spencer
In Usaama Rahim, the Left’s war on the police and the Islamic State’s war on cartoonists of Muhammad have come together. No surprise: they were always in service of the same goals.
Usaama Rahim died Tuesday morning in Boston after being shot dead by agents of the Joint Terrorism Task Force. The victim’s brother, the prominent moderate imam Ibrahim Rahim, presented the tragic story stoically, with trust in Allah and a request for prayers:
Your prayers are requested:
This morning while at the bus stop in Boston, my youngest brother Usaama Rahim was waiting for the bus to go to his job. He was confronted by three Boston Police officers and subsequently shot in the back three times. He was on was on his cell phone with my dear father during the confrontation needing a witness. His last words to my father who heard the shots were:
I can’t breathe!
While at the hospital, Usaama Rahim died!
From Allah we come, and to Allah we return.
Imam Ibrahim Rahim
“I can’t breathe!” Ring a bell? It certainly did to Leftist and Islamic supremacist activists who saw Usaama Rahim as their next Eric Garner or Michael Brown, another sainted victim they could use to defame police and limit their powers. Islamic supremacist Linda Sarsour complained that by charging that Rahim had been involved in jihad terror plotting, activities “have added a national security component to divide and conquer the movement. At the end of the day, a Black man was shot on a bus stop on his way to work and we should treat this like any other case of police violence. All we want is answers to our questions.”
Zahra Billoo of the Hamas-linked Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) said flatly that the shooting of Rahim “was murder — murder of a black Muslim man.” Her Hamas-linked CAIR colleague Dawud Walid: “I’m not quick to believe the FBI’s narrative about who was supposedly trying to join [ISIS]. I have no reason to believe them in this case. However even if that was true, that doesn’t justify excessive force — the family states that he was shot in the back. Moreover, he was on the phone with his dad as law enforcement approached him then fatally shot him.”
There was just one problem with the tearjerker scenario of an innocent Muslim, a black man, talking on the phone with his beloved father when he was shot in the back by cowardly, racist police, setting him up to echo the now-iconic words of Eric Garner as he struggled for his last breath: it wasn’t true.
[Which should surprise no one, given the pirate Muhammad’s dictum that “War is Deceit.” — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Two Admit Plot to Blow Up Police Station, St. Louis County Prosecutor and Ferguson Police Chief
By Robert Patrick
ST. LOUIS • Two men who met during the Ferguson protests and plotted violence against law enforcement admitted in federal court here Tuesday that they planned to blow up a police station, the top St. Louis County prosecutor and the Ferguson police chief.
Olajuwon Ali Davis, 23, and Brandon Orlando Baldwin, 24, each pleaded guilty of four explosives and gun charges that will carry seven-year prison terms when the men are sentenced Aug. 31.
They met in August in Ferguson, during the protests over the fatal shooting of Michael Brown, 18, by then-Officer Darren Wilson. Davis, a “frequent” protester, and Baldwin started talking about buying guns and organizing protesters to “be like an army” and fight back against police, their plea agreement says.
Federal agents and police tracked them and their calls and texts for weeks, recording some of the conversations. The two discussed using Baldwin, who was then an employee of the Cabela’s store in Hazelwood, to buy guns for felons and others. Baldwin admitted that he did buy three guns, falsifying federal forms by saying that the weapons were for him.
The men also talked about buying bombs. On Oct. 31, Davis “put it out there that he was a terrorist” during a conversation with a confidential informer, his plea says.
Baldwin, speaking to a second informer, said he wanted to build “bombs and blow things up,” his plea says, and “hit them in places where it hurt, hit someone important.”
On Nov. 8, Baldwin told the second informer that they wanted bombs that would divert police attention and others that would be “the last line of defense,” the plea says. Baldwin said they wanted at least 10 bombs with a blast radius of at least five yards.
[Evidently morons, but even morons can be dangerous. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Why Pluto is a Planet, And Eris is Too (Op-Ed)
by Tim DeBenedictis
The International Astronomical Union (IAU) got it wrong. Our solar system has 10 planets.
As NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft glides its way to the cold outer reaches of our solar system to take the first-ever up-close look at Pluto, the time is right to revise the International Astronomical Union (IAU)’s 2006 definition of a planet, which resulted in Pluto’s “demotion” from planet to ambiguous dwarf-planet status.
By the 1,000-km definition, all eight classical planets would remain planets. So would Pluto. And we’d add Eris.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper Says G-7 Will Never Welcome Back Putin
TORONTO — Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper says Russia should never be allowed back in the Group of Seven as long as Vladimir Putin is president.
Harper said in an interview with The Associated Press Thursday that he expects the group won’t ever let Putin back in. He made the remarks ahead of his trip to Ukraine and the Group of Seven meeting in Germany this week.
Harper says Russia has long eroded any basis for belonging to the group of wealthy nations. He also noted that Russia has ramped up long range bomber patrols near North American airspace. The G-7 suspended Russia last year but hasn’t ruled out welcoming him back.
Harper says it would require consensus to “bring Russia back and that consensus will just not happen.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
France: Sarkozy’s ‘Islam Meeting’ Sparks Criticism
Nicolas Sarkozy’s right-wing opposition party held an internal meeting on Thursday on the “question of Islam” in France, boycotted by Muslim groups who warned of “stigmatising” the religion.
The former French president’s right-wing party, recently rebranded “The Republicans”, will debate “the place of religion” in secular France and more specifically “Islam in France.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
How US Students Get a University Degree for Free in Germany
While the cost of college education in the US has reached record highs, Germany has abandoned tuition fees altogether for German and international students alike. An increasing number of Americans are taking advantage and saving tens of thousands of dollars to get their degrees.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Man in Norway Catches Fish Too Big for Boat
A man fishing off Norway’s Lofoten peninsular hooked a halibut so enormous that the only way he could get a photograph was to leap into the water alongside it.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Norway: ‘We Have a Responsibility to Go Back to Utøya’
The leader of the Norwegian Labour Party’s youth league (AUF) has spoken of the group’s “responsibility” to return to Utøya, the site of the brutal gun massacre perpetrated in 2011 by mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik.
“We need to do this. We have a responsibility to continue the history of Utøya, not just as a dark history, but also as a bright history,” Mani Hussaini, the AUF’s new chairman told Norwegian broadcaster TV2.
The AUF’s decision to return to the island this year for their annual summer camp for the first time in four years has been controversial, with some survivors of Breivik’s attack arguing that the wounds are still too raw.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Return of Germanwings Victims’ Remains Delayed
Plans to repatriate the remains of those killed in the crash of Germanwings flight 9525 have been put on hold because of errors on death certificates, angering relatives who had intended to start burying their loved ones next week.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden: Ikea to Spend €1bn on Measures to Fight Global Warming
Swedish furniture giant Ikea has promised to spend €1bn over the next five years on renewable energy and other measures to help fight global warming, according to the Financial Times.
As momentum gathers for companies and charitable organisations to divest any holdings in the world’s top 200 oil and gas producers, Ikea says to the Financial Times that it will spend €500m on wind power and about €100m on solar energy over the next five years. The remainder of the €1bn will go to poorer regions affected by global warming.
“If every business and organisation did what we did, we would flip electricity generation into being renewable-based by 2020 or shortly thereafter,” Steve Howard, Ikea’s chief sustainability officer told the newspaper.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden Set to Pen Deal With Romania on Welfare
Sweden is set to sign a deal with Romania to help the struggling country solve some of its most pressing social issues, including providing aid for Roma beggars on home turf.
Sweden and Romania are expected to sign the new agreement on Friday. The Nordic country has not yet earmarked any funds to the project, which will mainly focus on the education of Roma children, women’s rights and welfare services.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
“It is Permissible for the Mujahid to Enjoy Young Boys in the Absence of Women”
By Raymond Ibrahim
Recently a number of Arabic language websites posted the following picture which is attributed to the official Twitter account of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the Caliph Ibrahim of the Islamic State.
The Arabic writing reads:
“It is permissible for the mujahid [jihadi] to enjoy young boys in the absence of women.”
The purported fatwa then justifies this position by quoting Koran 52:24:
“There will circulate among them [servant] boys [especially] for them, as if they were pearls well-protected.”
A similar verse (76:19) reads: “There will circulate among them young boys made eternal. When you see them, you would think them [as beautiful as] scattered pearls.”
[Creepy photos with this post. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Erdogan Demands Life-Sentence for Cumhuriyet Director
(by Francesco Cerri) (ANSAmed) — Ankara, June 3 — Turkey has entered the final days of high tension toward crucial Turkish elections on Sunday — the first that the ‘sultan’ Recep Tayyip Erdogan could fail to win, as confrontation escalates between the head of state and Can Dundar, the director of opposition newspaper Cumhuriyet.
On Friday, the Cumhuriyet published photos of weapons destined for armed Islamic groups in Syria escorted by the Turkish secret service MIT.
On Monday, Erdogan threatened Dundar, warning that he would “pay a high price” for the scoop with which the Cumhuriyet had caught the government in a lie.
Today the president kept his word. His lawyer filed a criminal complaint against Dundar for “espionage” and “revealing state secrets”, and called for handing the journalist a life-sentence.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
In Turkish Border Region, Syria Policy Dents Ruling Party Support
Levent Hocazade makes no apology for taking part in violent protests against Syrian refugees in this Turkish border province, where an influx of hundreds of thousands fleeing war has heightened competition for jobs and sent rents rocketing.
Gaziantep has long been a bastion of support for Turkey’s AK Party, its small industry and agriculture flourishing over a decade of AKP rule. But four years of war in Syria have changed its demographics and stoked a sense of economic insecurity.
The Islamist-rooted AKP, founded by President Tayyip Erdogan, faces its closest national election on Sunday since it came to power in 2002.
Its Syria policy — supporting mainly Sunni Muslim fighters against the government of President Bashar al-Assad in a war that has killed a quarter of a million people and driven 8 million from their homes — has largely been absent from its campaign. But it is felt keenly here on the frontier.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
On June 3, 2015, the Islamic State (ISIS) in Iraq’s Ninawa (Ninveh) province published photos of a public execution in Mosul of three men convicted of acts of homosexuality.(i) The report, titled “Implementation Of The Punishment Of Those Who Have Committed Acts of Homosexuality” was published on the jihadi forum Shumoukh Al-Islam (Shamikh1.info) and distributed via social media. The three men were blindfolded and dropped head first from the roof of a tall building in front of a large crowd of spectators, including children.
Below are several of the photos.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
ISIS Shows Off US Gear Seized From Iraqis in Fighting Near Fallujah
A new video from ISIS reportedly depicts the terrorist army showing off U.S. military equipment seized from Iraq troops in fierce fighting near Fallujah.
The 10-minute video shows live action from skirmishes in the town of Karmah, just east of Fallujah. The black-clad jihadists are shown using small arms and several rocket-propelled grenades. One scene features an ISIS sniper shooting at Iraqi military positions near the town, and another shows a suicide bomber identified as “Turkistani” being deployed.
But the footage showing the spoils of the fighting could be of deeper concern at the Pentagon. Humvees, cargo trucks, fuel tankers, and U.S.-made MRAPS, the acronym for “Mine-Resistant, Ambush Protected” are among the vehicles flaunted by ISIS. A Department of Defense official declined comment on the video.
The images, gathered by SITE Intelligence Group and reported by Long War Journal, point up the U.S. dilemma in aiding Iraq’s effort to defeat ISIS. While the Obama administration has held firm against sending ground troops, equipment given to outfit the Iraqi military has too often fallen into the hands of ISIS. In addition to giving the terrorist army the world’s best firepower, it makes coalition air strikes more difficult, too.
“ISIS has captured thousands of American-supplied vehicles,” said retired U.S. Army Lt. Col. Ralph Peters, a Fox News contributor. “So both sides travel in the same vehicles and use the same weapons.”
Peters said ISIS gained more than 2,000 Humvees last year when it sent the Iraqi army fleeing and took Iraq’s second-largest city, Mosul.
[This is an echo of what happened in Vietnam, where we lavishly equipped the ARVN only to have it all fall into the hands of the victorious Communists in 1975. — PW]
| — Hat tip: Papa Whiskey | [Return to headlines] |
Saudis Consider Iran Their Top Enemy, Not Israel, Survey Says
An Israeli college has quietly conducted an opinion poll in Saudi Arabia, concluding that the Saudi public is far more concerned about the threats of Iran and the Islamic State group than Israel, and that the vast majority of Saudis support a decade-old peace offer to the Jewish state.
The survey conducted by the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya provides Israelis with a rare glimpse inside Saudi Arabia and may change Israeli perceptions about the desert kingdom. The two countries are longtime foes with no diplomatic relations.
The poll found that 53 percent of Saudis named Iran as their main adversary, while 22 percent said it is the Islamic State group and only 18 percent said Israel. The poll, conducted in conjunction with the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, surveyed 506 Saudis over the phone and had a margin of error of 5 percentage points. It was carried out over the past two weeks, starting in late May.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Terrorist ‘Moron’ Reveals ISIS HQ in Online Selfie, U.S. Air Force Promptly Destroys Compound
A selfie posted online by a member of the Islamic State group just cost the terror organization a headquarters building in Syria.
Air Force Gen. Hawk Carlisle, head of Air Combat Command, said Monday that airmen with 361st Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Group at Hurlburt Field, Florida were able to turn intelligence gleaned from the terrorist’s selfie into a successful bombing run.
“The guys that were working down out of Hurlburt, they’re combing through social media and they see some moron standing at this command. And in some social media, open forum, bragging about the command and control capabilities for Daesh, ISIL. And these guys go: ‘We got an in.’ So they do some work, long story short, about 22 hours later through that very building, three (Joint Direct Attack Munitions) take that entire building out,” the general said, Military.com reported Wednesday.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Ukraine’s Poroshenko Warns of ‘Full-Scale’ Russia Invasion
President Petro Poroshenko has told MPs the military must prepare to defend against a possible “full-scale invasion” from Russia, amid a surge of violence in eastern Ukraine.
Russia has denied that its military is involved in Ukraine, but Mr Poroshenko said 9,000 of its troops were deployed.
Clashes involving tanks took place in two areas west of Donetsk on Wednesday.
There was a “colossal threat” that large-scale fighting would resume, the president told parliament in Kiev.
The outbreak of violence, in the government-held towns of Maryinka and Krasnohorivka, was among the worst in eastern Ukraine since a ceasefire was signed in Minsk in February.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
‘US Geopolitical Ploy: Surround Russia Back Into Depth of Eurasian Landmass’
The US has been driving the Ukrainian crisis from the very beginning, so none of Kiev’s actions will be condemned by the Americans, Srdja Trifkovic, foreign affairs expert told RT.
RT: The spokesman for the Russian president said the escalation could be linked to upcoming international gatherings. He’s obviously referring to the EU summit later this month focusing on extending the sanctions against Russia. What would Kiev gain from this?
Srdja Trifkovic: Quite frankly, we are talking about Kiev as if it were an independent actor, which in reality is not. Kiev’s policy is being set in Washington, and Poroshenko is like a cyclist who has to keep turning the pedals. I think that the immediate international gathering that we are looking at, the G7, will probably not make any tremendous decisions regarding the Ukrainian crisis. But it is indeed very much in the US interest, as well as that of the regime in Kiev, to prepare the ground for the EU summit and to cast Russia as an aggressor.
It’s another thing whether [Angela] Merkel and and [François] Hollande will go along with it because they have every reason to feel rather fed up with Poroshenko’s broken promises and the way in which the Americans have been torpedoing the Minsk II process. The latest example being Poroshenko’s announcement that he would talk to Donbass, but to the Ukrainian Donbass after the elections, which is effectively saying Minsk II is off the table.
RT: Washington has repeatedly accused anti-government forces of the violations while ignoring the reports of those by the Ukrainian side, in effect ignoring reports from the OSCE. Why would that be the case?
ST: Why is it surprising? The same thing kept happening during the wars of Yugoslav succession when whatever the Muslims or the Croats and later the Albanians did was either unreported or justified and the Serbs were blamed for everything. The US has made its political choice in Ukraine. That choice is based on the geopolitical ploy to surround Russia back into the depths of the Eurasian landmass. There is simply nothing that the Ukrainians can or will do that will be condemned by the US. The US is not acting as an honest broker. The US is very much a party to this conflict; it has been driving the Ukrainian crisis from the beginning and it will continue doing so in the future.
RT: The Ukrainian President has been telling his Parliament he plans to ramp up military spending. Is the country in a position to afford this?
ST: He can do so because as long as some money is coming from across the ocean in the form of IMF credit lines he can effectively keep his economy afloat and avoid the nosedive, the utter bankruptcy. I’m rather surprised that some of Ukraine’s creditors in the West have not created havoc over this because after all it effectively means that their money is being used to wage an unnecessary and ultimately losing war. This can’t continue forever. I think that they will try one more time this summer with an offensive and they will get a bloody nose yet again. Only after that at last, after a few hundred or thousand more lives are lost, we will have serious political discussions.
Video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=CfB3ksT9Z8Y
| — Hat tip: Srdja Trifkovic | [Return to headlines] |
Curfew in Indian Kashmir City After Police Shooting Kills 1, Injures 2
SRINAGAR, India — Indian authorities say they have imposed an indefinite curfew in parts of an Indian Kashmir city after clashes with hundreds of Sikh protesters after bullets fired by police kill one person and injure two more.
Police fired at the stone-throwing protesters on Thursday after tear gas and warning shots failed to quell them in Jammu, the winter capital of Indian Kashmir, an officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to reporters.
The Sikhs were protesting the tearing away of posters of slain militant leader Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale by police in Jammu ahead of the anniversary of his death Saturday.
Militant Sikhs waged a guerrilla war in 1980s for an independent homeland in neighboring Punjab state. Many Sikhs live in Indian Kashmir.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
In ISIS, The Taliban Face an Insurgent Threat of Their Own
Throughout the month, fighters claiming allegiance to the Islamic State’s caliph had been attacking veteran Taliban units south and east of Jalalabad, the provincial capital. In one district, Islamic State loyalists have replaced the Taliban as the dominant insurgent power, and elsewhere they have begun making inroads in Taliban territory, one tribal elder, Mohammad Siddiq Mohmand, said in an interview.
On Wednesday, a military spokesman for the Afghan Army corps responsible for the region said that Islamic State fighters had captured and beheaded 10 Taliban who had been fleeing an offensive by the Afghan military. The account of the beheadings, however, has not been confirmed by any other local Nangarhar officials.
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China: Drone to Hunt Down Cheats in ‘World’s Toughest Exam’
A city in the Chinese province of Henan is turning to drone technology in a bid to root out students cheating in exams.
Now’s about the time teenagers across China will be sweating it out as they prepare for what’s become known as “the world’s toughest exam.”
The National College Entrance Exam, more commonly called “the gaokao,” determines access to higher education and is taken annually by up to 10 million students across the country.
The pressure caused by the exam can be enormous, so enormous in fact that some studies have linked the test to student suicides. On top of that, fear of failure has pushed some exam-takers into cheating, a serious issue the authorities appear to have trouble getting on top of, not least because of the increasingly sophisticated methods employed.
Some students, for example, have worn spectacles with tiny cameras that relay images of the question paper to an accomplice outside the exam room. The answers are then fed back to the student via an earpiece.
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China Rescuers Pull Out More Bodies From Cruise Ship Wreck; Over 360 Still Missing
JIANLI, China — Rescuers cut three holes into the overturned hull of a river cruise ship in unsuccessful attempts to find more survivors Thursday, as the death toll in the Yangtze River disaster reached 75. More than 360 people remain missing and are feared dead.
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Godzilla is Officially a Resident in Japan
It looks like Godzilla now has a new home and it’s in Japan! According to the June 3 reports from both the BBC News and Time, Godzilla has received a special residency certificate that now recognizes him as a citizen of the Shinjuku area of Tokyo. The certificate gave the new address of Godzilla, which is Shinjuku-ku, Kabuki-cho, 1-19-1. That’s for those who were wondering were he would be living. Also if you were wondering his date of birth is April 9, 1954.
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Albinos in Tanzania Fear Death as Polls Near
“This is possibly the worst time to be a person with albinism in Tanzania,” says Amir Manento.
In October, citizens will go to the polls to vote in presidential and parliamentary elections.
“Every election period brings with it a new cycle of killings. In between we have smaller elections translating to more abductions, more killings,” said Manento, a retired judge and human rights activist, who for decades has been at the forefront of campaigning for the rights of people living with albinism.
Albino body parts are associated with good luck and, as the country gears up for the elections, the demand for good luck charms goes up. Sacrifices are thought by some to be a sure way of guaranteeing victory in the polls.
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Corrective Rape: The Homophobic Fallout of Post-Apartheid South Africa
South Africa has one of the highest rates of rape in the world — including ‘corrective rape’ — used to ‘cure’ lesbian women of their homosexuality. Lydia Smith reports
South Africa has one of the highest rates of rape in the world. Of the estimated 500,000 rapes that take place every year, only one in nine are reported. For every 25 men brought to trial for rape, 24 will walk free — a poignant reminder of the aggressive masculinity that colours the social and political landscape of South Africa. In a country strongly influenced by traditional cultures and religious groups, corrective rape is a reaction to protect the status quo — women are forced to conform to gender stereotypes or suffer the consequences.
Up to 40 per cent of South African women will be raped in their lifetime according to the South African Institute of Race Relations, but estimates very widely due to underreporting.
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Ghana Petrol Station Inferno Kills Scores in Accra
At least 96 people have died in a fire at a petrol station in Ghana’s capital, Accra, the fire service says.
The fire started as people in the city are trying to cope with two days of heavy rain, which has left many homeless and without power.
The flooding hampered rescue efforts and may have led to the fire, the BBC’s Sammy Darko reports from Accra.
There are fears that the number of dead could rise as the search of the site continues.
It is thought that people were in the petrol station sheltering from the downpours when the fire broke out, our correspondent says.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
How South African Zulu King’s Spending Drove His Purse-Holder to Madness
King Goodwill Zwelithini fired his finance director after he challenged the monarch over his extravagent taxpayer-funded spending on his six wives and 27 children
The former purse-holder for South Africa’s Zulu king has told how the monarch’s endless spending on his six wives, 27 children and six palaces left him feeling he would “die from stress”.
According to media reports, Lucas Buthelezi, the director of King Goodwill Zwelithini’s taxpayer-funded trust, said that “whatever” the powerful royal asked for “he got”.
Spending quickly spiralled out of control when he demanded a £6,000 set of cutlery and a new television for each of his wives because one did not have one.
The 66-year-old king, who inherited the leadership of South Africa’s largest ethnic group in the 1970s and is known for his lavish spending, is also said to have given Mr Buthelezi instructions for a £200,000 wedding to his sixth wife, adding that it should be “big” to coincide with his birthday.
Mr Buthelezi claims he was sacked from managing the 22m rand (£1.1m) trust, part of a total R54m budget allocated to the king by provincial government, because he baulked at his “expensive” requests.
“I was undermined. Every time I pointed out that something should not be coming out of our budget but from the department, or every time I queried non-budgetary items, I would be told to just do it,” he told the Mercury newspaper…
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UN Calls for New Election Timetable in Burundi and Protection of Human Rights During Campaign
The U.N. Security Council is calling for a new timetable for elections in Burundi and urging the government to reinstate private media and protect the right to peaceful assembly so opposition politicians can campaign freely.
A press statement issued Thursday after a closed briefing by Said Djinnit, the U.N. special envoy for Africa’s Great Lakes Region, reiterated the council’s concern at the violence in Burundi, called for those responsible to be held accountable. It urged the disarmament of all armed youth groups allied to political parties.
Burundi has been rocked by protests following the April 25 announcement that the president would seek a third term.
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US Diplomat Urges Congo, UN to Join Forces in Fight Against Rebels in East
KINSHASA, Congo — A top U.S. State Department official says the United Nations and Congo need to work together in the fight against rebels in the country’s troubled east.
In February, the United Nations formally ended support for a Congo military offensive against the FDLR militant group after two Congolese generals linked to human rights violations were picked to lead the operation.
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Luis Fleischman: Massive Demonstrations Against the Venezuelan Government
Thousands of Venezuelans marched on May 30th to protest the deteriorating situation in Venezuela that includes impoverishment, rationing, scarcity, oppression, imprisonment, citizens’ insecurity, mafia style government and repression.
The demonstrations in Venezuelan cities were echoed by marches in many cities in the world including Brazil, the United States, Spain, Switzerland, Chile, Canada, Costa Rica, and other countries and cities.
Venezuelans protested the unjust and unlawful incarceration of political leader Leopoldo Lopez (now holding a hunger strike), former San Cristobal mayor, Daniel Ceballos (also in a hunger strike) and the mayor of Caracas, Antonio Ledezma.
Likewise, demonstrators demanded that a date be established to have parliamentary elections in Venezuela, a step that the government-controlled national electoral council has so far refused to do.
At the same time the deteriorating economic situation has reached levels unknown in the country. Food and medicine are now being meagerly rationed in a country that once was among the most prosperous in Latin America…
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Reps Press Kerry on ‘Alarming’ Violence Surrounding US Consulates in Mexico
A new wave of cartel-fueled violence in Mexico has congressional lawmakers raising bipartisan alarm over the safety of American personnel stationed there — and questioning whether consulates in the country’s most dangerous cities should even remain open.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Italian Police Arrest 44 Over Migrant Centre Corruption
Italian police have arrested forty-four people suspected of being part of a corrupt network of business people and politicians.
Search warrants have been issued against twenty-one other people in Sicily, the centre of the Italy, and the capital Rome.
It follows last year’s uncovering of a system designed to allow a cartel of companies to win contracts to manage migrant centres.
The corrupt operators have taken advantage of the migrant boat crisis in the Mediterranean which leave authorities struggling to deal with tens of thousands of arrivals to Italy.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Migrants Forced to Live ‘Like Animals’ In Abandoned Kos Hotel
They are hoping for safety and a better life, but after crossing the sea from Turkey, asylum seekers on the Greek island of Kos find their hardship is far from over.
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Packed like sardines into a rickety wooden boat, this is the moment Italian sailors found 1,000 migrants desperately trying to flee war-torn Libya.
An Italian navy ship rescued more than 200 children from the boat which was so overcrowded migrants were sat on each other on the top deck, with more crammed into the level below.
The refugees, who were escaping Syria and Eritrea, were found 30 miles off the Libyan coast.
Incredibly, there were so many of them they filled the flight deck of the naval ship Spica despite the boat they had travelled in being a fraction of its size.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
State Senate OKs Health Coverage for Many Immigrants Here Illegally
The state Senate on Tuesday approved a hotly debated measure that would allow many immigrants in the state illegally to sign up for special healthcare programs that would offer the same benefits as Medi-Cal.
The action comes just days after lawmakers significantly scaled back the plan, which originally would have offered state-subsidized Medi-Cal to people in the country without authorization.
State Sen. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) said his proposal provides “what we can realistically achieve now” for the estimated 2 million people in the state illegally.
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Sweden: TV Anchor ‘Sorry’ After Immigrant Kebab Gaffe
A Swedish newsreader has apologized after he referred to immigrants as “kebab technicians” in a rehearsal shoot that went viral in Sweden after it was accidentally beamed out to viewers.
Newsreader Fredrik Ahl sang opera and spoke in funny voices during a taped test run by Swedish public broadcaster SVT’s regional Sörmland’s news programme on Wednesday night.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
The Long Read: A Wave of African Migrants Flee Israel for a Life of Hardship and Hope in South Sudan
“Life in South Sudan is good,” he tells me. “In Israel they didn’t want others (non-Israelis) to succeed but here nobody asks for my papers. I’d like to go back to Israel on holiday and give advice to my fellow Africans there; don’t go to Europe, it’s too dangerous, come here and find a job.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
UN Quota Refugees Had Terror Links: Norway PST
Several refugees sent to Norway under the UN’s quota system turned out to have close links to the terror groups Islamic State (IS) and the al-Nusra Front, Norway’s Police Security Service (PST) has revealed.
According to the service, between five and ten of the 1,000 Syrians chosen to go to Norway by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), were discovered to have links to the one of the two terror groups.
“Unfortunately, there are some who try to exploit and abuse the refugee agency,” Police Superintendent Svein Erik Molstad told Norway’s Dagbladet newspaper. “We have discovered more quota refugees with ties to the al-Nusra front and IS,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |