Italian police placed twelve migrants under house arrest after an inmates’ revolt at an refugee center in Sicily. The revolting migrants were angry because they hadn’t received their daily pocket money since the beginning of July.
In other news, a reported 130 vehicles were torched in Paris during the night after July 14, Bastille Day.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to Fjordman, Gaia, Insubria, JD, RL, Srdja Trifkovic, Upananda Brahmachari, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.
Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.
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.
EU Commission Proposes ‘Difficult’ €7bn Loan for Greece
The European Commission Wednesday proposed giving Greece a €7bn bridge loan to cover its July financing needs using the European Financial Stability Mechanism. “This is not an easy option,” said vice-president Dombrovskis, referring to the fact that it is an EU-wide fund and non-euro states have raised “serious concerns”.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
French, German Ministers Plan Iran Visits After Nuclear Deal
Europe is mulling its return to Iran after a nuclear deal paved the way to reopen trade ties. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has said he will visit Tehran, following in his German counterpart’s tracks.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
There were furious scenes in the Greek parliament today as politicians ripped up papers outlining the terms of the country’s €86 billion bailout deal and threw them at Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras.
Politicians gathered in Athens this afternoon to debate the draconian reforms Tsipras agreed to implement during crunch overnight talks with eurozone leaders earlier this week.
The harsh austerity measures Greece would have to put in place to release the bailout fund have been widely condemned, with even the International Monetary Fund branding them unfair.
As a midnight deadline looms for Greek MPs to vote on whether to accept the controversial plans, it now looks increasingly likely that Tsipras’ own hard left Syriza party will reject them, after more than half of the party’s members slammed the deal, branding it ‘humiliating’ and ‘destructive’.
Earlier Tsipras revealed that even he does not believe in the tough bailout deal offered by eurozone leaders but said he only agreed to implement it in order to save the near-insolvent country, adding that he has no intention of resigning over the matter.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Global Bankruptcy, Sustainable Development, and Propaganda
The indoctrination into the global citizenship will be facilitated by our Department of Education agenda of “cradle to government-approved career.”
Ever so caring for the fate of humanity, Pope Francis’ duties have now extended from world climatologist, population control, and critic of free market economics, to expert on global bankruptcy. He said, “The goods of the Earth are meant for everyone, and however much someone may parade his property, it has a social mortgage.”
The Catholic principle of “social mortgage” is the idea that the public has a “legitimate and necessary claim on private wealth and property.”
We are so lucky that we have such a capable Pope who not only tends to the souls of his flock but also to the pockets of the rich and of the downtrodden who are in serious need of wealth redistribution and social justice.
If we allow countries to go bankrupt, we are definitely a heartless bunch. Just giving them foreign aid and technical expertise to build their own prosperous economy is no longer enough. In the meantime, Christians are being killed and persecuted around the globe by their Muslim brethren, but I digress.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Greece Debt Crisis: Tsipras Facing Eurozone Deal Revolt
Greek MPs are debating tough economic measures they must approve by the end of the day in order for an €86bn eurozone bailout deal to go ahead.
The new legislation includes tax rises and an increase in the retirement age.
PM Alexis Tsipras has said he does not believe in the deal, but has urged MPs to agree to the measures.
The vote is expected to pass with opposition help, despite a revolt from some hardliners in the ruling left-wing Syriza party.
Pro-European opposition parties have pledged to vote for the measures.
Hardliners in the ruling left-wing Syriza party are likely to vote against, and the junior coalition party has offered only limited support.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Greece Had Only Three Allies in Bailout Negotiations
Italy’s finance minister Pier Carlo Padoan told Il Sole 24 Ore that only Italy, France and Cyprus supported a compromise deal with Greece. He noted that many countries fell in behind Germany, and that “only we, the French and little Cyprus were for a compromise.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
It Starts Today: “A Financial Collapse is Imminent Within This Six Month Time Period”
Over the last six years Michael Snyder of The Economic Collapse Blog has published over one-thousand research papers, articles and reports detailing the financial, economic and monetary crises sweeping the world. While he has often urged his readers to prepare for calamity, he has never issued a specific date or time-frame for the trigger that would send the whole system into a tailspin.
Until now.
In his latest must-watch interview with Future Money Trends, Snyder sets the record straight and explains why he recently issued his first and only “Red Alert” to readers warning of an impending, far-reaching event that will touch ever corner of the globe.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Riot Police Fire Tear Gas at Greek Demonstrators
Rioters hurled petrol bombs at police who responded with tear gas during an anti-austerity demonstration outside parliament Wednesday, as Greek lawmakers began debating contentious measures needed to start negotiations on a new bailout and avoid financial collapse.
Groups of youths among the more than 12,000 demonstrators smashed storefronts and set at least one vehicle alight during the hourlong clashes. It was the first significant violence since the left-wing Syriza government came to power in January promising to repeal bailout austerity. Police said at least 50 people were detained.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
50 billion euros in Greece, 70 billion euros in Ireland, 40 billion euros in Spain — one Euro-country after another is forced to support its banks with huge sums of money in order to equalize the losses incurred by money worldwide from bad loans. But where do the billions go anyway? Who are the beneficiaries? With this simple question the award-winning business journalist and nonfiction author Harald Schumann travels across Europe and gets surprising answers.
The rescued are not in the poorer Euro states — unlike commonly believed — but mainly in Germany and France. A large part of the money ends up with the creditors of the banks that want to be saved or must be saved.
And although these investors have obviously made bad investments, they are — against all logic of the free market economy — protected at the expense of the general public against any losses. Why? Who gets the money? Actually, simple questions, but that regard the core of European identity. Maybe the most passionate film on the banking crisis.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
US Treasury Chief to Meet Draghi, Schaeuble, Sapin
US treasury secretary Jack Lew is to meet ECB chief Mario Draghi on Wednesday and then German finance minister Wolfgang Schäuble in Berlin and France’s Michel Sapin in Paris on Thursday to discuss Greece. He will discuss “the path forward for Greece within the eurozone”, said his office.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
8th Grade Test From 1912 Shows How Far American Education Has Been Dumbed Down; Can You Take it?
A Kentucky 8th grade exam from 1912 was donated to the Bullitt County history museum. The questions feature the fundamental foundation of education that we seem to have lost due to the dumbing down of the American education system.
Now with the common core epidemic we can see our youth transformed by a cookie cut education system and a near total loss of critical and independent thinking. If you can not read the fine print or zoom in, then here are some examples of 8th grade level testing in 1912.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Bernie Sanders is a Communist and an Ignoramus
Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has been getting away for years with describing himself as a socialist, when in reality he is an outright America-hating communist.
This belief in communism is reflected in the Sanders platform. Even a brief glance reveals his plan to be hopelessly utopian and insane. It will extinguish freedom and shutter businesses and cause widespread suffering especially among the poor people he claims to want to help. It is a program for exporting the best and the brightest to places that appreciate them.
But identifying Sanders as a communist can be a risky proposition in modern-day America. The Left so dominates American culture that the word communist itself has become jarring, not because communism is bad but instead because leftists believe communism is good.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
In a brazen act of medical tyranny, California recently became the first state in the U.S. where lawmakers removed religious exemptions to those opposing vaccines for their children. The bill now signed into law, SB277, faces legal hurdles in court next.
Now, legislators in California want to pass the “first US adult vaccine mandate with NO personal exemptions and CRIMINAL penalties for failure to comply.” SB 792, would eliminate an adult’s right to exempt themselves from one, some, or all vaccines, a risk-laden medical procedure.
Will California soon become a medical police state?
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Dem Judge Orders Psych Counseling for D’Souza
At a hearing Monday in Manhattan in which he ruled filmmaker Dinesh D’Souza must continue community service for four more years, U.S. District Judge Richard M. Berman said he considers D’Souza’s violation of federal campaign-finance laws to be evidence of a psychological problem and ordered further counseling.
D’Souza’s defense counsel Benjamin Brafman provided evidence to the court that the psychiatrist D’Souza was ordered to see found no indication of depression or reason for medication. In addition, the psychologist D’Souza subsequently consulted provided a written statement concluding there was no need to continue the consultation, because D’Souza was psychologically normal and well adjusted.
But Judge Berman, who was appointed by Bill Clinton, disagreed, effectively overruling the judgment of the two licensed psychological counselors the U.S. probation department had approved as part of D’Souza’s criminal sentence.
“I only insisted on psychological counseling as part of Mr. D’Souza’s sentence because I wanted to be helpful,” the judge explained. “I am requiring Mr. D’Souza to see a new psychological counselor and to continue the weekly psychological consultation not as part of his punishment or to be retributive.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
How Obama and Democrats are sabotaging our military from within, America’s national security will be held hostage to the welfare state
A devastating report by the Heritage Foundation reveals yet another arena where the Obama administration, with the blessings of the Democrat Party, is fundamentally transforming the United States of America. “The U.S. military may be weaker than you think,” the report states. “All but one branch of America’s military and nuclear forces are currently operating at ‘marginal’ strength levels.”
The Heritage Foundation’s conclusions are strikingly at odds with the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review, which maintains the U.S. can still fight two major conflicts simultaneously. Yet that same report highlights the reality that beginning in FY2012 the Department of Defense began absorbing the “significant impacts” of the $487 billion, ten-year spending cut instituted by the Budget Control Act of 2011 (BCA). “Sequestration” was the bit where Republicans abided drastic cuts in military spending in exchange for cuts in discretionary spending—even Democrats managed to keep budget-busting programs such as Social Security and Medicaid largely exempt. The BCA also included the requirement that the military cut its budget by $50 billion on an annual basis. The Bipartisan Budget Act of 2013 provided a temporary respite from sequestration, but barring any actions by Congress, “annual sequestration cuts are set to resume in FY2016,” the report warns.
Thus, Heritage maintains the military’s two-front capability is rapidly becoming a pipe dream. After taking a detailed look at the military’s units and weapons on a region by region basis, they conclude that the “current U.S. military force is adequate to meeting the demands of a single major regional conflict while also attending to various presence and engagement activities. Clearly, this is what the military is doing now and has done for the past two decades, but it would be very hard-pressed to do more and certainly would be ill-equipped to handle two, near-simultaneous major regional contingencies.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Ever Wonder Which Words Will Flag You as a Terrorist?
By now, we all know that the NSA is spying on us. They read our emails, our texts, our Facebook posts, passwords, and they even listen to our phone calls. They record every thought we utter and every website we visit onto massive databases, and use sophisticated algorithms to predict our actions. But how exactly do they decide which of our thoughts are threatening, and which ones are harmless? Which words have the potential to flag us as terrorists? The answer may surprise you.
A Slovenian artist by the name of Emile Kozole has compiled a few of the words that international agencies use to identify terrorists. It’s a growing list that may include upwards of 40,000 words. He in turn used these words to create a font that crosses out everything you type that might be flagged by the NSA. He has since dubbed this, “Project Seen.” You can try out his font for yourself at projectseen.com, where you can also download it for your own personal use. You’d be shocked by some of the mundane words that can have you placed on some government watchlist.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Family Threatened at Gunpoint for Waving Confederate Flag
A family was threatened at gunpoint for waving the Confederate flag on their own private property in another illustration of how controversy surrounding the flag is only driving more animosity.
The incident occurred on Monday night in Moseley, Virginia while the family was expressing their First Amendment right by waving the flag in their own driveway next to a busy highway. A man driving an SUV pulled into the driveway, took out his gun, chambered a round, pointed it at the family and started yelling.
“He slammed on the brakes and when he got right beside me, he pulled out a gun, chambered a round and told me my cause wasn’t worth anything now,” Mark Wilson told CBS 6. “He got out of the car and took three steps towards me and the gun was maybe six inches off my head.”
Wilson said he was concerned that the gunman would shoot his children. 46-year-old James Baker was later arrested by police for brandishing a weapon. Baker dubiously claimed that the family had threatened his life.
“This is a busy highway and he is in a vehicle going 70 miles per hour, how are we threatening him by walking across?” said Wilson, who called for Baker to be sent to jail.
“The police went and investigated it and they let him go, he admitted everything and they just let him go,” added Wilson.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Freedom or the Slaughterhouse? The American Police State From A to Z
Despite the best efforts of some to sound the alarm, the nation is being locked down into a militarized, mechanized, hypersensitive, legalistic, self-righteous, goose-stepping antithesis of every principle upon which this nation was founded.
All the while, the nation’s citizens seem content to buy into a carefully constructed, benevolent vision of life in America that bears little resemblance to the gritty, pain-etched reality that plagues those unfortunate enough to not belong to the rarefied elite. For those whose minds have been short-circuited into believing the candy-coated propaganda peddled by the politicians, here is an A-to-Z, back-to-the-basics primer of what life in the United States of America is really all about.
A is for the AMERICAN POLICE STATE. As I point out in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, a police state “is characterized by bureaucracy, secrecy, perpetual wars, a nation of suspects, militarization, surveillance, widespread police presence, and a citizenry with little recourse against police actions.”
B is for our battered BILL OF RIGHTS. In the cop culture that is America today, where you can be kicked, punched, tasered, shot, intimidated, harassed, stripped, searched, brutalized, terrorized, wrongfully arrested, and even killed by a police officer, and that officer is rarely held accountable for violating your rights, the Bill of Rights doesn’t amount to much.
C is for CIVIL ASSET FORFEITURE. The latest governmental scheme to deprive Americans of their liberties—namely, the right to property—is being carried out under the guise of civil asset forfeiture, a government practice wherein government agents (usually the police) seize private property they “suspect” may be connected to criminal activity. Then, whether or not any crime is actually proven to have taken place, the government keeps the citizen’s property.
D is for DRONES. It is estimated that at least 30,000 drones will be airborne in American airspace by 2020, part of an $80 billion industry. Although some drones will be used for benevolent purposes, many will also be equipped with lasers, tasers and scanning devices, among other weapons.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
NASA Releases First Pluto Flyby Images
NASA has released the first images taken during New Horizons’ historic flyby of dwarf planet Pluto.
New Horizons principal investigator Alan Stern compared the range to the Rocky Mountains, adding that they provide clues about Pluto’s geology. “The steep topography means that the bedrock that made these mountains must be of H20, water ice,” he said. “We can be really sure that the water is there in great abundance.”
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
New Horizons: Spacecraft Survives Pluto Encounter
A signal received from the New Horizons spacecraft shows that it survived its historic encounter with Pluto.
Data in its first call home since Tuesday’s flyby suggest the spacecraft experienced no upsets as it hurtled past the icy world at 14km/s (31,000mph).
The signal came through a giant dish in Madrid, Spain — part of a Nasa network of communications antennas.
The message took four hours 25 minutes to traverse 4.7 billion km of space.
The first high-resolution pictures from the flyby should be downlinked later on Wednesday.
James Christy, who discovered Pluto’s moon Charon, joined relatives of Clyde Tombaugh, who discovered the dwarf planet itself in 1930, at mission control to witness receipt of the signal.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
New Horizons: Images Reveal Ice Mountains on Pluto
Pluto has mountains made of ice that are as high as those in the Rockies, images from the New Horizons probe reveal.
They also show signs of geological activity on Pluto and its moon Charon.
Mission scientist John Spencer told journalists that the first close-up image of Pluto’s surface showed a terrain that had been resurfaced by some geological process — such as volcanism — within the last 100 million years.
“We have not found a single impact crater on this image. This means it must be a very young surface,” he said.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Pluto Unveiled: NASA Photos Reveal Ice Mountains and Active Moon
After 85 years as a mystery, the surface of Pluto is finally coming into focus, with a new NASA photo revealing towering ice mountains rising from its surprisingly youthful face.
NASA today unveiled the first close-up photos of Pluto and two of its five moons as seen by the New Horizons spacecraft, which buzzed the dwarf planet Tuesday (July 14) during a historic flyby. One photo revealed a mountain range rising 11,000 feet (3,500 meters) into Pluto’s sky, along with a surface just 100 million years old at the most.
Another image captured evidence of recent geological activity on Charon, Pluto’s largest moon. Yet another photo revealed the first good look at Hydra, one of Pluto’s four smaller satellites.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Report: Planned Parenthood Doctor Admits to Selling Aborted Baby Body Parts
[WARNING: Disturbing Content.]
A disturbing hidden camera video out of Los Angeles features a Planned Parenthood clinician discussing the practice of selling the body parts of aborted babies in blatant violation of federal law.
In the video, part one of a 3-part documentary series from The Center for Medical Progress, Planned Parenthood Senior Director Dr. Deborah Nucatola explains to a male and female couple over lunch how the procedure goes down and which human organs are most popular.
“I’d say a lot of people want liver,” Dr. Nucatola says. “And for that reason, most providers will do this case under ultrasound guidance, so they’ll know where they’re putting their forceps. The kind of rate-limiting step of the procedure is calvarium. Calvarium—the head—is basically the biggest part.”
Dr. Nucatola nonchalantly describes that the “calvarium” fetches the highest price, and that prices for body parts generally range from $30 to $100, all while eating a salad.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
The Confederate Flag Needs to be Raised, Not Lowered
Ladies and gentlemen, I submit that what we see happening in the United States today is an apt illustration of why the Confederate flag was raised in the first place. What we see materializing before our very eyes is tyranny: tyranny over the freedom of expression, tyranny over the freedom of association, tyranny over the freedom of speech, and tyranny over the freedom of conscience.
In 1864, Confederate General Patrick Cleburne warned his fellow southerners of the historical consequences should the South lose their war for independence. He was truly a prophet. He said if the South lost, “It means that the history of this heroic struggle will be written by the enemy. That our youth will be trained by Northern school teachers; will learn from Northern school books their version of the war; will be impressed by all of the influences of History and Education to regard our gallant dead as traitors and our maimed veterans as fit subjects for derision.” No truer words were ever spoken.
History revisionists flooded America’s public schools with Northern propaganda about the people who attempted to secede from the United States, characterizing them as racists, extremists, radicals, hatemongers, traitors, etc. You know, the same way that people in our federal government and news media attempt to characterize Christians, patriots, war veterans, constitutionalists, et al. today.
Folks, please understand that the only people in 1861 who believed that states did NOT have the right to secede were Abraham Lincoln and his radical Republicans. To say that southern states did not have the right to secede from the United States is to say that the thirteen colonies did not have the right to secede from Great Britain. One cannot be right and the other wrong. If one is right, both are right. How can we celebrate our Declaration of Independence in 1776 and then turn around and condemn the Declaration of Independence of the Confederacy in 1861? Talk about hypocrisy!…
People say that Lincoln freed the slaves. Lincoln did NOT free a single slave. But what he did do was enslave free men. His so-called Emancipation Proclamation had NO AUTHORITY in the southern states, as they had separated into another country. Imagine a President today signing a proclamation to free folks in, say, China or Saudi Arabia. He would be laughed out of Washington. Lincoln had no authority over the Confederate States of America, and he knew it.
Do you not find it interesting that Lincoln’s proclamation did NOT free a single slave in the United States, the country in which he DID have authority? That’s right. The Emancipation Proclamation deliberately ignored slavery in the North. Do you not realize that when Lincoln signed his proclamation, there were over 300,000 slaveholders who were fighting in the Union army? Check it out.
[…]
Think, folks: why would the southern states secede from the Union over slavery when President Abraham Lincoln had offered an amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing the PRESERVATION of slavery? That makes no sense. If the issue was predominantly slavery, all the South needed to do was to go along with Lincoln, and his proposed 13th Amendment would have permanently preserved slavery among the southern (and northern) states. Does that sound like a body of people who were willing to lose hundreds of thousands of men on the battlefield over saving slavery? What nonsense!
The problem was Lincoln wanted the southern states to pay the Union a 40% tariff on their exports. The South considered this outrageous and refused to pay. By the time hostilities broke out in 1861, the South was paying up to, and perhaps exceeding, 70% of the nation’s taxes. Before the war, the South was very prosperous and productive. And Washington, D.C., kept raising the taxes and tariffs on them. You know, the way Washington, D.C., keeps raising the taxes on prosperous American citizens today.
This is much the same story of the way the colonies refused to pay the demanded tariffs of the British Crown — albeit the tariffs of the Crown were MUCH lower than those demanded by Lincoln. Lincoln’s proposed 13th Amendment was an attempt to entice the South into paying the tariffs by being willing to permanently ensconce the institution of slavery into the Constitution. AND THE SOUTH SAID NO!
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
New close-up images of a region near Pluto’s equator reveal a giant surprise: a range of youthful mountains rising as high as 11,000 feet (3,500 meters) above the surface of the icy body.
The mountains likely formed no more than 100 million years ago — mere youngsters relative to the 4.56-billion-year age of the solar system — and may still be in the process of building, says Geology, Geophysics and Imaging (GGI) team leader Jeff Moore of NASA’s Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California. That suggests the close-up region, which covers less than one percent of Pluto’s surface, may still be geologically active today.
Moore and his colleagues base the youthful age estimate on the lack of craters in this scene. Like the rest of Pluto, this region would presumably have been pummeled by space debris for billions of years and would have once been heavily cratered — unless recent activity had given the region a facelift, erasing those pockmarks.
“This is one of the youngest surfaces we’ve ever seen in the solar system,” says Moore.
Unlike the icy moons of giant planets, Pluto cannot be heated by gravitational interactions with a much larger planetary body. Some other process must be generating the mountainous landscape.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
130 Cars Burnt in Paris Overnight
From Le Figaro:
In the Parisian region alone nearly 130 cars burned. A sad record for this eve of July 14 that has become, along with New Year’s Eve, a traditional rendezvous for thugs and police. These figures are especially disturbing because they are considerably higher than the national daily average: about 80 cars are burnt every day in France, half of them in the Parisian region.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
‘Accountant of Auschwitz’, 94, Convicted of 300,000 Counts of Accessory to Murder
LUENEBURG, Germany — A 94-year-old former SS sergeant who served at the Auschwitz death camp was convicted Wednesday on 300,000 counts of accessory to murder and sentenced to four years in prison.
Oskar Groening testified during his trial at the state court in Lueneburg, in northern Germany, that he guarded prisoners’ baggage after they arrived at Auschwitz and collected money stolen from them. Prosecutors said that amounted to helping the death camp function.
Presiding Judge Franz Kompisch said Groening had decided to be part of the Nazis’ machinery of death.
Groening sat expressionless as the verdict was read and listened attentively for more than an hour and a half as the judge detailed the ruling, occasionally sipping from a bottle of water. He then walked out of the courtroom without talking to reporters.
The charges against Groening related to a period between May and July 1944 when hundreds of thousands of Jews from Hungary were brought to the Auschwitz-Birkenau complex in Nazi-occupied Poland. Most were immediately gassed to death.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
France Says Terror Plot Against Military Bases Foiled
France’s interior minister says authorities have foiled a plot by four would-be extremists to attack military bases.
Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Wednesday that four suspects aged between 16 and 23 were arrested Monday at four separate locations around France.
Cazeneuve said the group’s leader had been under surveillance after his online activities raised investigators’ suspicions.
The minister said authorities break up similar plots every week in France, where more than 300 people have been implicated in jihadi activities since 2012.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Muslim Screaming “Allahu Akbar” Holds Knife to Tourist’s Neck at Rome’s Colosseum
Hundreds of horrified visitors to the Italian landmark looked on as the attacker held a kitchen knife to the neck of a 26-year-old woman and yelled ‘Allah is great’ and ‘It is God that sends me’.
The man held Chiara Frisco hostage for several minutes as he yelled religious fanaticism at the crowd with police powerless to act.
One witness said: ‘It seemed like a scene from ISIS.
‘He made the girl get down on her knees like you see in the terrorists’ videos, while he held a knife to her throat.
‘The only thing missing was the orange jumpsuit.’
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Paco, Spanish Fighter Against ‘ISIS Fascists’
21-year-old a sniper with Kurds in Iraq, arrested in Madrid
(by Francesco Cerri) (ANSAmed) — MADRID, JULY 14 — He was inspired by the ‘international brigades’ of foreign volunteers who travelled to Spain during the civil war to defend democracy and fight against the fascism of future dictator Francisco Franco.
And one day, at the beginning of the year, after reading about the atrocities committed by the men fighting on behalf of ‘caliph’ al Baghdadi against Yazidi civilians in Iraq, of beheaded civilians and the women raped and sold as sexual slaves, he boarded a plane to join Kurdish militias in Iraq. For six months, he was a sniper. He killed ISIS ‘beheaders’.
From a hill of Sinjar, the holy mountain of the Yazidis, he shot at enemy positions — especially at night. “You look into the telescopic rifle sight and shoot once, twice and then there is one less of them”, he said.
When he returned to Madrid last week with another Spanish volunteer he was arrested for taking part, unauthorized, in a war abroad — as if he had enrolled with ISIS terrorists instead of fighting them in the name of freedom and human rights, the holiest values in the west.
He was released almost immediately as he awaits trial. “I don’t understand, I am not a terrorist, they are the terrorists”, he told El Mundo. Paco, who prefers not to reveal his second name to the public, — “one of them could arrive here while I am here on the street and kill me” — spoke about the atrocities he saw and of the many companions he lost to ISIS ‘fascists”.
The man said he saw jihadists capture a group of Kurdish youth: “they shot them in the legs and then closed them up.
They screamed for hours and bled to death”.
Paco used to read history at the University of Madrid. He was a militant in a communist group, apparently a shy and calm young man. He read Marx, Lenin and Harry Potter, all books he said he brought with him to Iraq and which he kept reading in between battles. Then he read about the International Brigades of 1936-39.
“Those men had nothing to do with us, they didn’t ask for anything back and came from France, England, the US to fight against the fascists. There was a lot of generous romanticism, a lot of truth, values that are not abundant today”. In Iraq, he thought about his dear ones, his parents, siblings, girlfriend, during difficult times. “I told her I was going to fight the jihadists just a few hours before leaving. She left me”, he said.
At times, tension, fear and desperation took over. “Looking above a wall could be like a Russian roulette”.
He said how once a young Kurd with whom he had shared difficult experiences told him: “It’s over Paco”.
Shortly afterwards, while on patrol, the young man separated from the group and walked straight into a minefield: “He exploded”.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Despite the nature and severity of the attack, which French investigations have conceded was deliberate and with a delicious turn of French understatement “malicious”, yesterday’s explosions at the Berre L’Etang refinery in second city Marseilles failed to make the front page of a single English-language newspaper this morning. The explosions took place on Tuesday morning and set alight two enormous petrochemical tanks which stood half a kilometre apart, immediately ruling out the possibility of blaming an industrial accident.
A third device exploded on another tank but failed to set it alight, reports Le Parisien. One of the tanks contained highly-refined naphtha, and took 50 fire engines most of the day to put out, burning away “thousands of cubic meters of oil”, although thankfully there were no injuries.
French authorities now say they have recovered remains of an electronic detonator, proving criminal intent, and holes cut in the fence around the tanks suggest the explosions were not an inside job. It has also not gone unnoticed that the site of the attack is only 12 miles away from a major theft last week of explosives from a French army depot…
| — Hat tip: Gaia | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Batman, 5, Saved a Baby Trapped in a Scorching Car After Mother is Locked Out
Zavi Ahmed came to the rescue after police were unable to free the trapped child from the Volkswagen Beetle at a Tesco car park in Uckfield, East Sussex, despite smashing the rear window.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK: Brave Woman Who Dares to Shatter a Toxic Taboo
British Pakistanis are THIRTEEN times more likely to have disabled children because of marriage among relatives
A study of the Bradford region found that 37 per cent of babies of Pakistani origin had parents who were first cousins.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Srebrenica, Twenty Years Later
by Srdja Trifkovic
“Truth and reason are eternal,” Thomas Jefferson wrote to Rev. Samuel Knox in 1810. “They have prevailed. And they will eternally prevail…” Jefferson was wrong. As the current media pack coverage of the 20th anniversary of the “Srebrenica massacre” indicates, his belief that “error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left to combat it” was somewhat naive.
It is noteworthy that “Srebrenica” in the mainstream media discourse is no longer a geographic location that needs to be preceded by a noun (“the massacre in…”). It has been developed into a stand-alone term that denotes horror, on par with “Auschwitz,” “Katyn,” or “Hiroshima.” In reality, unlike those very real horrors, it is a postmodern myth based on a distortion of facts and their willful omission.
In a Jeffersonian paradigm, two decades later we would have a reasonable, factually based debate on what happened in and around Srebrenica in July 1995, how and why; but the very term “debate” is rejected by an elite class in the West that treats “Srebrenica” as a metaphysical concept. Its luminaries deny as a matter of principle that there is anything to debate. They claim that eight thousand prisoners were executed in cold blood and that a UN-established judicial forum of unquestioned authority has found it to constitute “genocide.”
As it happens, many authoritative and reasonable people with no ethnic, religious or personal axe to grind in the Balkan quagmire disagree. They have spoken and written as if a Jeffersonian debate existed, only to be dismissed as “genocide deniers.”…
| — Hat tip: Srdja Trifkovic | [Return to headlines] |
France Provides Jordan With $250 Million Loans
To be used in water and energy projects
(ANSAmed) — AMMAN, JULY 14: France has agreed to provide Jordan with $265 million soft loan for development projects in water and energy, French diplomats said today.
A total of $67 of the loan will be utilized for water projects, including $43 million in Wadi al Arab water convenience project from Wadi al Arab in Irbid.
An additional sum of $55 million will be invested in energy projects to improve electricity power station in south of the kingdom, said French ambassador Carolina Dumas.
The ambassador said the French government has approved the loan and will be channeled to the kingdom coffers in the near future, adding that cooperation with Jordan will be enhanced including projects in the port city of Aqaba.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Iran Nuclear Deal Tends to Next Islamic World War.
Iran nuclear deal most dangerous for world as to corner India and Israel in the war against Islamic Terrorism. Rest of the world is put under the threat of Islamic World War.
Upananda Brahmachari | HENB | New Delhi | July 16, 2015:: The world is now divided in two sectors between the points of the notorious deal aimed at reining in Iran’s nuclear program worth $100 billion vetted by US and the world peace.
On Tuesday, U.S. President Barack Obama’s foreign policy, appears set to reshape relations between Iran and the US, with its effects likely to ripple across the volatile Middle East. In Vienna, Obama bowed down to Islamic Republic of Iran, the most powerful Shia regimen in this world.
The dormant gene in Barack ‘Hossian’ Obama evoked a pulse in him to mislead the world peace process and obviously the war against Islamic terror with a probability of the cracking down the IS and Sunni terrorism through a Shia nuclear warfare.
The blunder of Obama will affect the humanity immensely in forth as the US promoted the Islamic terrorism, whether it is Shia or Sunni. Unfortunately, the Homo sapiens know it well, how the big world powers have originated and empowered the Islamic terrorism only to capture the zonal powers in the different parts of this world. The notorious Iran nuclear deal is nothing but the repetition of history.
Describing the Iran deal as dangerous for the world, Israel envoy to India Daniel Carmon said on Wednesday that India was aware of Israel’s concerns over the agreement and that he apprehends that Iran nuclear deal is most dangerous for world as to corner India and Israel in the war against Islamic Terrorism. Ambassador Carmon told TOI how for many years India and Israel have been sharing values, challenges and interests, including in the global war against terror and and that he was sure Israel’s strong partnership with India was going to continue.
The Sunni power Saudi Arabia, another important factor for India in the region to control the Islamic outfits in the Indian subcontinent, too has been particularly opposed to the controversial Iranian nuclear deal…
| — Hat tip: Upananda Brahmachari | [Return to headlines] |
Iran Deal Exposes Obama’s Fairyland Views
President Obama stepped onto the national stage early Tuesday morning to announce a deal with Iran to stop that country’s development of nuclear capabilities — and by stop, of course, what he really meant was delay.
Among his self-congratulatory back-pats: The part where he said the accord “demonstrates that American diplomacy can bring about real and immediate change.”
Congratulations, Mr. President. Once again, you’ve exposed the depth of your Land of Oz-like thinking. Believing in the power of the tongue to control terrorists, state sponsors of terror and all-around enemies of Israel and the West is not only sheer hubris — it’s borderline madman.
What part of the ayatollah’s mid-negotiations “Death to America” chants did you not hear?
Listeners of the early morning speech he delivered while staring directly and nearly unblinkingly into the lens of the camera — a la the “look ‘em in the eye’ approach — had to know the deal was bad for America when he assuredd: “Today, because America negotiated from a position of strength and principle”
But did anybody ever think that — ever?
Just look at these headlines:
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
West to Teach Iran How to Block Israeli Nuclear Sabotage
More disturbing details surface in Iran deal: Europe and US to train Iran to ‘protect against and respond to sabotage’ at nuclear sites.
By Ari Yashar
Disturbing details of the Iran nuclear deal signed Tuesday continue to come to light, revealing why critics are more concerned than ever.
One particularly interesting detail: Tucked away near the very end of the deal’s massive text is a section entitled “Nuclear Safety, Safeguards and Security,” which stipulates that the West will train Iran to thwart sabotage against its nuclear facilities.
According to text, Iran will learn how to secure its controversial and covert nuclear program from all threats thanks to training by the “E3/EU+3,” another designation for the P5+1 countries consisting of the US, UK, France, Germany, Russia and China, as well as the EU.
The section seemingly begins benignly enough, with a clause saying that “E3/EU+3 parties, and possibly other states, as appropriate, are prepared to cooperate with Iran to establish a Nuclear Safety Centre in Iran, engage in workshops and training events in Iran.”
But then things take a turn, with the same world powers obligating to “co-operation in the form of training courses and workshops to strengthen Iran’s ability to prevent, protect and respond to nuclear security threats to nuclear facilities and systems as well as to enable effective and sustainable nuclear security and physical protection systems.”
Leaving no doubts about the intentions, the text then promises “co-operation through training and workshops to strengthen Iran’s ability to protect against, and respond to nuclear security threats, including sabotage.”..
| — Hat tip: RL | [Return to headlines] |
‘You Should Know Better’: Obama Scolds Critics, Press on Iran Nuke Deal
President Obama on Wednesday staunchly defended the newly struck Iran nuclear deal, using a press conference to lecture critics and assembled media on the agreement — even admonishing a reporter who questioned his resolve on U.S. prisoners left behind that “you should know better.”
The president met the press as his national security team, and Vice President Biden, began to lobby skeptical lawmakers in Congress to back the agreement. Obama already faces bipartisan resistance to the deal, but on Wednesday challenged critics to present an alternative.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Ukraine Clashes Raise Questions Over Right Sector Militia
Clashes over the weekend in south-western Ukraine between members of a far-right volunteer militia and local authorities have raised fears that violence is spreading beyond the conflict in Ukraine’s east and could further destabilise the country’s fragile political balance.
They also underline the delicate and highly risky relationship between the Ukrainian government and the volunteer militias, who are helping fight Moscow-supported militants in eastern Ukraine.
On Saturday, in the city of Mukachevo, around 20 members of the ultra-nationalist Right Sector volunteer battalion exchanged gunfire with police and the security detail of a local politician.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Venezuela is Suddenly Intent on Annexing Two-Thirds of Neighboring Guyana
Venezuela has fallen on hard times, as its economy collapses amid a crippling shortage of goods and the world’s highest inflation rate. In what may seem a sign of increasing desperation, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has revived a territorial dispute with neighboring Guyana over a stretch of territory that makes up approximately two-thirds of the tiny South American country. A long-simmering disagreement over the Essequibo region, as the territory is known, has lain dormant for more than 15 years, Maduro appears to have been prompted to extend his country’s claim after the discovery of a potentially rich oil deposit in the area.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
150 Syrian Christians Arrive in Poland to Start New Lives
Some criticism because of discrimination against Muslims
(ANSA-AP) — WARSAW — Some 50 Christian families fleeing war in Syria have arrived in Poland to begin new lives.
A chartered plane from Beirut carrying about 150 refugees landed in Warsaw late Friday. The Syrians are being taken to a hotel, and within days they will begin the process of requesting asylum and being placed in housing.
A few spoke to reporters, but they refused to be photographed or filmed, fearful of putting loved ones back home at more risk.
Poland’s decision to take in the refugees, who hail mostly from Damascus and other cities, is a humanitarian gesture by predominantly Catholic Poland in the face of a massive humanitarian crisis in Syria.
However, the decision to accept only Christians for now has faced some criticism as being discriminatory against Muslims.
Separately, Poland is also considering accepting 2,000 refugees from Africa and the Middle East as part of a larger European Union resettlement plan.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Every Pro-Immigration Claim is a Lie
Reason magazine boasts, for example, that El Paso, Texas, has a large Hispanic population and yet El Paso “is among the safest big cities in America.”
In fact, however, El Paso’s “safe city” ranking is based on an outdated FBI crime index that includes only eight crime categories, excluding such crimes as drunk driving, narcotics offenses and weapons violations. When the FBI’s more complete crime index is used, El Paso has a higher crime rate than the national average.
The reason crime has plummeted around the nation in the last few decades is aggressive policing, increased prison sentences and the expansion of concealed carry permits. (All policies currently being jettisoned by liberals.)
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
France and UK Set Up Special Zone for Trucks at Calais
The UK and France will set up a secure zone at the port of Calais to stop immigrants climbing onto trucks to get across the English Channel, UK Home Secretary Theresa May said Tuesday. She said over 8,000 migrants were intercepted at Calais between June 21 and July 11.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Germany: Asylum Applications, + 132% in 2015
Since January, over 179,000 requests, most of them from Syria
(ANSA) — BERLIN — More than 179,000 people have applied for asylum in Germany, in the first six months of this year. The news was announced today in Berlin by the German Interior Ministry, who added that there has been an increase by 132% over the same period in 2014.
“The current flow of refugees poses a huge challenge”, minister Thomas de Maiziere commented. Syria, Kosovo, Albania, Serbia, Iraq and Afghanistan stand out among the countries of origin of asylum seekers.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Immigrants ‘Revolt’ at Refugee Center, Police Arrest 12
Accused of kidnapping and attempted robbery
(ANSA) — Ragusa, July 14 — Police arrested 12 immigrant asylum seekers on Tuesday after they allegedly staged a revolt at the refugee center where they were living.
The immigrants are accused of kidnapping and attempted robbery.
Police said the refugees claimed they hadn’t been paid their daily pocket money since the beginning of July, when they had technically been transferred to another center but didn’t want to move from the center where they were already living.
On Tuesday the men allegedly entered the directors office and demanded their pocket money, which the director refused to give them. Police said the men then locked him and a co-worker in his office, taking his cell phone and keys, including the key to the safe.
The director called police who freed him and his colleague and placed the 12 immigrants on house arrest.
| — Hat tip: Insubria | [Return to headlines] |
Investigative journalist Jim Simpson discusses the invasion of the USA through illegal and legal immigration, via Mexico and the Middle East. However, Christians are NOT part of this wave of immigrants from the Middle East. Simpson is the author of the new book, The Red-Green Axis: Refugees, Immigration and the Agenda to Erase America, available for only $2.99 as a Kindle edition through Amazon.com He also addresses the problem of Sanctuary Cities. He says Catholic Charities, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, and its grant-making arm, the Catholic Campaign for Human Development, are prominent elements of the open borders/amnesty/sanctuary city movement. This unlimited legal and immigration are going to mean the end of America as we know it.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
UK to Create ‘Secure Zone’ At Calais to Protect Trucks From Refugees
Britain is planning to establish a “secure zone” at Calais to protect trucks from migrants hoping to cross the Channel. Thousands of migrants fleeing war and political turmoil attempt to enter the UK illegally every day.
| — Hat tip: Fjordman | [Return to headlines] |
Gay Man Sues Bible Publishers Over “Homosexuality is a Sin” Verses
A gay man has filed a $70 million lawsuit against two Bible publishers, claiming their translations of the Bible calling homosexuality a sin caused him “emotional distress.”
The man, Bradley LaShawn Fowler, claims the publishers, Zondervan and Thomas Nelson, have manipulated scripture with the use of the term “homosexuals” in certain revised editions of the Bible.
“Fowler alleges that the term homosexual was deleted in later versions by Zondervan but in their 1982 and 1987 translations the publisher uses the term in First Corinthians 6:9 incorrectly,” Liberty Voice reported. “The older King James Version, from which his family pastor preaches, has caused him to be cast away by his family for its use of the word homosexual.”
“As a result of suffering 20 years of mental instability and emotional duress, Fowler is suing $60 million from Zondervan and $10 million from Thomas Nelson Publishing.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
New England Witch Hunts Revisited
It seems we have entered a new version of the 17th century witch hunts in New England. The country now finds it acceptable to persecute people for their beliefs, religion and political persuasion as well as looking in every corner for something that offends.
In a country gone mad, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches are racist. Gender restrictions in bathrooms are sexist. Santa Claus saying “ho, ho, ho” is offensive to prostitutes. ‘Manhole’ is now ‘maintenance hole.’ In Seattle, Easter eggs are now ‘spring spheres’ in order to not offend anyone who doesn’t celebrate Easter. A student at Sonoma State University was told to take off her cross because someone could be offended (I didn’t know vampires were admitted to the State University system). Profiling in airport security areas is racist, so every grandma and grandpa is almost strip searched. The Obama administration has banned all government agencies’ training materials from linking Islam with terrorism. An entire high school track team was disqualified because one of the students made a gesture thanking God after crossing the finish line.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Wake up Homeschoolers: They’re Coming for Your Children
This is a call for ALL homeschoolers to pick up the phone IMMEDIATELY and call their U.S. Senators and DEMAND that they vote NO on Senator Lamar Alexander’s Every Child Achieves Act of 2015 (S.1177) which would reauthorize the Bush-era No Child Left Behind law until 2021. Phone number to call is: 202-224-3121.
Homeschooled children are NOT being excluded from the INTERNATIONAL United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)-DICTATED GLOBAL WORKFORCE TRAINING AND VALUES AND ACADEMICS DESTROYING CURRICULUM.
In fact, passage of Republican Rep. John Kline’s HR5 July 8, 2015 by a 5-vote margin (!) will allow for all the tax-funded school choice/charter schools, with unelected boards, requirements, necessary to implement this evil unconstitutional/international/totalitarian workforce training agenda across the board, around the world. (HR-5 is basically a copy-cat version of Sen. Alexander’s S1177 which will be voted on early next week.)
Across the board means: HOME SCHOOLED CHILDREN ARE INCLUDED!
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
When Injustice Looks, Smells and Has the Color of Law
There are many in America, who are acting as if they were surprised to see what decision the Supreme Court would come out with concerning a redefinition of marriage. This decision was brought about by 9 attorneys who are unelected by the people…
These injustices are acting outside of their scope of authority, as well as engaging in anything but “good behavior.” It is the duty of the judges to discover and apply, not to legislate from the bench.
Their recent decision regarding redefining marriage to include sodomites has never occurred in the history of mankind! So, what is it really all about? Look to Canada.
Speaking of sodomy-based “marriage,” what would America expect from a radical lesbian named Elena Kagan, who is known for “queerifying Harvard” as to how she would vote?” I warned in December of 2012, “Elena Kagan had never judged a case a day in her life, yet Obama, unqualified for office himself, has seen fit to ‘qualify’ her on the Supreme Court bench — just in time for the Court to review homosexual marriage.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Good grief, it’s worse than I thought; not only do they feed, clothe and house the [epithets], but supply them with pocket-money? Unbelievable!
Jizya.
The money that civilization is required to pay to the mohammedan conquerors unless they agree to join their death cult.
The Labour Youth is building a monument over July 22 at their island where it all took place in 2011.
How tragically ironic.
By the time they connect the dots, it will be too late. The buildings will be there for generations, reminding them of the catastrophe awaiting the Norwegian people in the years, and the decades to come, for a start.
– A monument over insufficient police forces
– A monument over all the things they were unwilling to see in time
– A monument over Labour Governments’, subsequent, lack of preparation for jihad attacks
– A monument for cultivating the problems and helping them better grow
– A monument over the shortcoming of red roses