Gates of Vienna News Feed 8/10/2015

Two people were stabbed to death in the kitchenware section of an Ikea store in the Swedish city of Västerås. One other victim was seriously injured. A suspect has been arrested, but no name or description has been released, so the Mohammed Coefficient of the incident cannot yet be determined.

In other Swedish news, another hand grenade exploded late last night in Malmö. There have been more than thirty grenade blasts so far this year in Malmö.

To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.

Thanks to Dean, Fjordman, JD, Seneca III, Srdja Trifkovic, 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.

Financial Crisis
» For Norway, Oil at $50 is Worse Than the Global Financial Crisis
» Gerald Celente is Predicting That a Stock Market Crash Will Happen by the End of 2015
» Germany Gained Eur 100 Bn From Greece Crisis: Study
» Russian GDP Plunges 4.6%
 
USA
» AIM Editor on FAA’s Air Traffic Control Hiring Scandal [Video]
» Documents Reveal the Fearmongering Local Cops Use to Score Military Gear From the Pentagon
» Google Creates New Company Called Alphabet, Restructures Stock
» Hillary Clinton Dismisses Trump Campaign: ‘it’s Entertainment’
» Lois Lerner Emails Released — She Exclaimed: “Lincoln Should Have Let the South Go…”
» MIT Researchers Develop ‘Real Steel’ Robot With Human-Like Reflexes
» Oregon State Police Collecting Data on Gun Sellers
» Sandra Bland Protest: All White People Should be Killed
» Southwestern Cities Forced Onto “90-Day Supply of Water” After Toxic EPA Spill Contaminates Entire River
» Space Station Astronauts Make History, Eat First Space-Grown Veggies
» State of Emergency Issued in St. Louis County, Mo.
» With Trump Dominating News, Fellow GOP Candidates Challenged to Get Out Message, Avoid Political Storm
 
Europe and the EU
» Brussels Promote the EU With a Series of ‘Sinister’ Propaganda Cartoons
» Denmark: Three Arrested After Violent Weekend Demonstration in Nørrebro
» Explosion in Reports of Radicalised Prisoners in Denmark
» Extremist Inmates ‘Huge Problem’ For Denmark
» Iron-Age Britons Engaged in Mysterious Pig Trotter Festivals
» Norway: Polar Bears ‘A Nightmare’ For Arctic Scientists
» Scotland: Fireman John McGinn Raped Young Girl He Rescued From Blaze
» Surprising Math Rules of Saturn’s Rings Revealed
» Sweden: Malmö Shaken by Another Grenade Attack
» Sweden: New Hand Grenade Explosion in Malmö
» Sweden: Two Stabbed to Death in Ikea Store in Västerås
» Sweden: Man and Woman Killed in Ikea Store Stabbing
» Swedish Ikea Knife Attack in Vasteras Leaves Two Dead
» UK: HTC Caught Storing Fingerprints as World-Readable Cleartext
» UK: Ted Heath Case Adds to Government Corruption, Says Nick Ferrari
» Wild Boar Kills Sicilian Pensioner
 
North Africa
» Egypt Hands Out Death Sentences, Spares Al-Qaeda Chief’s Brother
 
Israel and the Palestinians
» Israeli Defense Minister: ‘We Can in No Way Tolerate an Iran With Nuclear Weapons’
 
Middle East
» 2 Russian Warships Dock in Iran for Joint Naval Exercises
» ISIS Seen Building Capacity for Mass Casualty Attacks
» Teenage Swedish Couple Held by ISIS in Syria
» Turkey Attacks: Deadly Violence in Istanbul and Sirnak
» Turkey Finishes Underwater Pipeline to Northern Cyprus
» Turkey’s Strikes on Kurds Could Drag US Into New Front, Military Sources Fear
» US Consulate in Istanbul Attacked as Violence Escalates in Turkey
» What Do Kurds Make of Turkey-PKK Fighting?
 
Russia
» National Endowment for Democracy is Now Officially “Undesirable” In Russia
» The World Hates Russia. Russia Hates it Back.
» Ukraine Reports Heavy Shelling and Warns of Imminent Escalation
 
South Asia
» Calls for Tougher Laws Amid Pakistan’s Child Abuse Scandal
» In Pakistan, Horror Grows Over Allegations of Children Being Sexually Abused by Blackmail Ring
» Pakistan Child Sex Abuse: Seven Arrested in Punjab
 
Far East
» China TV Anchor Bi Fujian to be Punished for Mao Insult
» China Gets a Little More Fresh Air
» Chinese TV Host to be Punished for Mao Insult
» Seven Decades of the Bomb
 
Australia — Pacific
» Cryptolocker Virus: Australians Forced to Pay as Latest Encryption Virus is ‘Unbreakable’, Security Expert Says
» New Zealand Selects 40 Designs for New Flag
 
Latin America
» Community Leader Who Searched for Missing Iguala Students Shot Dead
 
Immigration
» Danes Publish Pro-Refugee Advertisement
» Germany’s Ukrainian Refugee Puzzle
» German News Anchor Anja Reschke Uses Slot to Attack ‘Little Racist Nobodies’ In Impassioned Call to End Hatred Towards Refugees
» German TV Presenter Sparks Debate and Hatred With Her Support for Refugees
» Lebanon Seizes Boat Suspected of Smuggling Syrians to Europe
» Unsettling Encounters: Tourists and Refugees Cross Paths in the Mediterranean
» Weekend Sees Large Number of Migrants Land in Greece
 
Culture Wars
» Concern That Transgenders Excluded at Eurogames
» Planned Parenthood’s Evil Empire
» Sweden: Activists Complain ‘Skin-Colored’ Band-Aids Are Always Beige
» Swedish PM Homes in on Feminism in Key Speech
 

For Norway, Oil at $50 is Worse Than the Global Financial Crisis

Scandinavia’s richest nation is facing a mess

When the financial crisis brought the global economy to its knees, Norway was largely unscathed. But oil under $50? That’s another story.

Unemployment peaked at about 3.7 percent in 2010 in the post-crisis aftermath. Falling oil prices already pushed the jobless rate to 4.3 percent in May, the highest in at least 11 years, and that was before a renewed drop in Brent crude.

As a key driver for growth in Norway, it was largely its oil wealth that kept the nation afloat during the financial crisis.

But with its key sector in trouble, there are few other industries for the nation to look to for growth.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Gerald Celente is Predicting That a Stock Market Crash Will Happen by the End of 2015

Gerald Celente of the Trends Research Institute has just gone on the record with a prediction that there will be a stock market crash by the end of this calendar year. If you are not familiar with Gerald Celente, he is one of the most highly respected trends forecasters in the entire world. He has been featured on CNN, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The Today Show, Good Morning America, CBS Morning News, NBC Nightly News and Coast to Coast AM. Personally, I have a lot of respect for him. While it is true that not every single one of his forecasts about the future came to pass over the years, he does have a very solid track record that goes back for decades. He correctly predicted the 1987 stock market crash, the bursting of the dotcom bubble and the financial panic of 2008. Just a couple of days ago, he told Eric King the following: “ I’m now predicting that we are going to see a global stock market crash before the end of the year.” Celente says that it won’ t just be U.S. stocks either. He believes that crashes are also coming to “ the DAX, the FTSE, the CAC, Shanghai, and the Nikkei” . It other words, it is going to be a truly global financial crisis and he says that there is “ going to be panic on the streets from Wall Street to Shanghai and from the UK down to Brazil” .

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Germany Gained Eur 100 Bn From Greece Crisis: Study

(BERLIN) — Germany, which has taken a tough line on Greece, has profited from the country’s crisis to the tune of 100 billion euros ($109 billion), according to a new study Monday.

The sum represents money Germany saved through lower interest payments on funds the government borrowed amid investor “flights to safety”, the study said.

“These savings exceed the costs of the crisis — even if Greece were to default on its entire debt,” said the private, non-profit Leibniz Institute of Economic Research in its paper.

“Germany has clearly benefited from the Greek crisis.”

When investors are faced with turmoil, they typically seek a safe haven for their money, and export champion Germany “disproportionately benefited” from that during the debt crisis, it said.

“Every time financial markets faced negative news on Greece in recent years, interest rates on German government bonds fell, and every time there was good news, they rose.”

Germany, the eurozone’s effective paymaster, has demanded fiscal discipline and tough economic reforms in Greece in return for consenting to new aid from international creditors.

Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble has opposed a Greek debt write-down while pointing to his own government’s balanced budget.

The institute, however, argued that the balanced budget was possible in large part only because of Germany’s interest savings amid the Greek debt crisis.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Russian GDP Plunges 4.6%

Russia’s economy shrank the most since 2009 after a currency crisis jolted consumer demand, while a selloff in oil threatens to drag the country into a deeper recession.

Gross domestic product contracted 4.6 percent in the second quarter from a year earlier after a 2.2 percent decline in the previous three months, the Federal Statistics Service in Moscow said on Monday, citing preliminary data. That was worse than the median forecast for a 4.5 percent slump in a Bloomberg survey of 18 analysts. The Economy Ministry had projected that output shrank 4.4 percent in the period, calling it “the lowest point” for Russia.

The rout on commodities markets has overshadowed the first signs of stabilization in Russia by hammering the ruble and shaking a country that relies on oil and gas for about half of its budget revenue. The world’s biggest energy exporter is enduring its first recession in six years after the nation’s biggest currency crisis since 1998 and a surge in inflation eroded consumer buying power as sanctions over Ukraine choked access to capital markets.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

AIM Editor on FAA’s Air Traffic Control Hiring Scandal [Video]

Accuracy in Media Editor Roger Aronoff recently appeared on The Daily Ledger on the One America News Network to discuss an ongoing scandal at the Federal Aviation Administration which has prompted an investigation by the department’s inspector general.

Prior to 2014, as Aronoff reported in May, the FAA recruited its air traffic controllers from either the military or from the pool of people who had graduated after spending years studying and training at FAA programs called Collegiate Training Initiative, or CTI schools. However, it now uses a walk-in process combined with a biographical questionnaire asking questions such as, “How many sports did you play in high school?”

“And what this is really about is ethnic diversity,” said Aronoff on The Daily Ledger. Peter Kirsanow, of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, also came to the same conclusion.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Documents Reveal the Fearmongering Local Cops Use to Score Military Gear From the Pentagon

Mother Jones obtained more than 450 local requests, filed over two years, for what may be the most iconic piece of equipment in the debate over militarizing local police: the mine resistant ambush protected vehicle, or MRAP.* And an analysis of these documents reveals that in justifying their requests, very few sheriffs and police chiefs cite active shooters, hostage situations, or terrorism, as police advocates do in public.

Mother Jones obtained more than 450 police department requests for armored tactical vehicles from the Pentagon. Did your police force request one? Browse all of them here.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Google Creates New Company Called Alphabet, Restructures Stock

Google Inc. is reorganizing into a holding company that gives its main Web operations greater independence while offering investors more visibility into ambitious plans to expand new businesses, including health and Internet access.

Alphabet Inc. will be the name of what will effectively be a new holding company. Google Inc. will be part of that and include YouTube, Android mobile software and other Web-based products. Alphabet will also include Calico, Google Ventures, Google Capital, Google X and other subsidiaries, the Web company said in a blog post Monday.

The new structure will give greater clarity into how Google invests in various ventures, including driverless cars, high-speed Internet service and health-related technologies. That helped to boost shares by as much as 5.8 percent in extended trading.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Hillary Clinton Dismisses Trump Campaign: ‘it’s Entertainment’

Washington (CNN) Hillary Clinton mocked Donald Trump as the Republican presidential field’s shock jock on Monday but said other candidates’ positions on women’s rights are more offensive.

After a town hall meeting in New Hampshire, the Democratic presidential frontrunner trained most of her fire on Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who said during Thursday night’s GOP debate that he opposes abortion in all instances, and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who suggested women’s health is overfunded — he later said he “misspoke” — during an attack on Planned Parenthood last week.

“Yes, I know it makes great TV. I think the guy went way overboard — offensive, outrageous, pick your adjective,” Clinton said of Trump. “But what Marco Rubio said has as much of an impact in terms of where the Republican Party is today as anybody on that stage, and it is deeply troubling. And it should be to the press, not just to those of us who have been doing this work for so long.”

It was an effort by Clinton to make the entire Republican field pay for the ascendance of Trump to the top of its presidential primary polls, even as she dismisses the real estate mogul himself.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Lois Lerner Emails Released — She Exclaimed: “Lincoln Should Have Let the South Go…”

Lois Lerner, the central figure in the IRS targeting controversy, called Abraham Lincoln the country’s worst president in an email disclosed in a bipartisan Senate report, according to USA Today.

“Look my view is that Lincoln was our worst president not our best,” Lerner wrote in an email dated March 6, 2014.

Lerner, the former IRS director of Exempted Organizations, joked in one email that the 16th president should have just let the South secede, rather than fighting the Civil War.

“He should [have] let the south go,” Lerner wrote in response to a friend who disparaged Texas as a “pathetic” state. “We really do seem to have [two] different mind sets.”

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

MIT Researchers Develop ‘Real Steel’ Robot With Human-Like Reflexes

Could we soon see “Real Steel” or “Pacific Rim” come to life? It sure does at least look somewhat plausible, as MIT researchers have developed HERMES, an advanced robot that is capable of manipulating objects and environments in nearly the same way as humans do. But this isn’t just a project design of a robot only mimicking the actions of its human controller; it can also learn and make precise movements that weren’t possible with prior robots, thanks to its impressive sensor suite.

The HERMES robot is controlled by a human operator who wears a remote controller exoskeleton. Movements carried out by the human operator are directly transferred to the humanoid robot with human-like reflexes and haptic feedback in return to the human. This means that HERMES can successfully perform actions such as picking up objects, delicately pouring coffee into a cup and even punching through walls should the need arise.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Oregon State Police Collecting Data on Gun Sellers

Just a few days before the universal gun owner registration bill kicks in, it appears that the Oregon State Police are planning on collecting data on sellers of guns, not just buyers.

We’ve been telling you all along that SB 941 was never intended to be anything but a vast database of gun owners and now it’s being proven to be all too true.

Starting today, gun dealers are seeing a new interface on their computer screens when they log in to conduct a background check on a gun sale. Now there is a box they can check for “Private Party Through Dealer.” While not fully functional, it is clear that the Oregon State Police plan to demand, and database, personal information on the seller, or transferor, of the firearm.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Sandra Bland Protest: All White People Should be Killed

After saying she was a follower of Malcom X, Breitbart Texas asked “Sunshine” if she agreed that all white people should be killed. She retorted, “You’re damn right I do! You think I am scared to say that to you?!”

Breitbart Texas caught this on video, and Sunshine said she was recording this on her live stream.

She continued, “You mother-f**ckers thought we should be killed when ya’ll came and stole us from Africa and put us in chains and murdered us for over 400 years, so yeah, you do need to die. I think everybody else on the planet would have peace when you’re dead.”

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Southwestern Cities Forced Onto “90-Day Supply of Water” After Toxic EPA Spill Contaminates Entire River

Thanks to the EPA, these towns have been cut off from their source of water overnight — due to incompetence by the federal government no less. Their populations have been warned that they must rely upon a 90-day estimated supply of water until the EPA can thoroughly test the water, and clear it for safe usage.

The incident took place in southwest Colorado, spilling into the Animas River near the town of Silverton. The contaminated waters have overwhelmed at least two towns downstream in New Mexico, while the EPA admits the severe levels of toxins are also headed for parts of Utah, after the Animas joins a larger river.

[Comment: Was this a dry run? Will water contamination be used against “hostile States” ? Perhaps more such “accidents” by the Federal government will occur in “hostile” States inthe future.]

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Space Station Astronauts Make History, Eat First Space-Grown Veggies

Astronauts on the International Space Station made history Monday when they munched space-grown vegetables for the first time.

Crew members, including American one-year astronaut Scott Kelly, sampled the delights of Red Romaine lettuce grown in the microgravity environment of space. The lettuce was grown on the ‘Veggie’ plant system in NASA’s orbiting lab on the space station.

“Crew tastes red romaine lettuce with oil & vinegar for #NASAVeggie study and #JourneyToMars,” tweeted the International Space Station’s Twitter account.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

State of Emergency Issued in St. Louis County, Mo.

St. Louis County, Mo. has issued a state of emergency following a spate of violence amid protests marking the one-year anniversary of the death of Michael Brown.

“In light of last night’s violence and unrest in the City of Ferguson, and the potential for harm to persons and property, I am exercising my authority as county executive to issue a state of emergency, effective immediately,” St. Louis County Executive Steve Stenger said in a statement obtained by FOX2.

Stenger said Police Chief Jon Belmar will have the authority to “exercise all powers and duties necessary to preserve order, prevent crimes, and protect the life and property of our citizens.”

Two instances of gun violence broke out Sunday night as protesters commemorated the death of Brown, an unarmed black man shot by a white police officer.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

With Trump Dominating News, Fellow GOP Candidates Challenged to Get Out Message, Avoid Political Storm

Even Republican presidential candidates who have declined to jump into the political fray and comment on Donald Trump’s frequent, headlining remarks are struggling to stay quiet, as the top GOP challenger continues to dominate the news cycles.

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee has for weeks told Fox News and others that he would rather talk about his campaign than score political points by criticizing Trump. However, Trump’s comments about Fox anchor Megyn Kelly this weekend and reporters hunting for a reaction have practically forced a response.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Brussels Promote the EU With a Series of ‘Sinister’ Propaganda Cartoons

Brussels officials have been accused of creating ‘sinister propaganda’ for children after producing a series of cartoons designed to teach children the virtues of the European Union.

The pro-EU comics, games and colouring books aim to counter growing euroscepticism across the continent by explaining how Brussels spends money helping hard-up businesses, farmers and hospitals.

The cartoons teach children about the Common Agricultural Policy, the work of the European Commission and how free movement across the continent helped erode national border controls…

Ukip MP Douglas Carswell said the comic books were like something produced by communist dictatorships in the 1980s.

He said: ‘This is propaganda. On one level it’s hilarious. It shows a total lack of self-awareness. It’s comically ridiculous.

‘But there’s also something that is a little bit sinister. It’s something that the East German regime might have done in the 1980s, or any number of unsavoury dictatorships trying to promote their legitimacy with the young.

[Comment: Could have been straight from peoplescube.com]

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Denmark: Three Arrested After Violent Weekend Demonstration in Nørrebro

Vandalism and attacks on police mark Saturday demonstration in Copenhagen

Copenhagen police officers had to protect themselves from stones, bottles, fireworks and Molotov cocktails after a Saturday night demonstration in Nørrebro turned violent.

“We got it stopped a little after two o’clock in the morning, when protesters began digging up the stones from Sankt Hans Torv,” Copenhagen police security head Henrik Brix told DR Nyheder.

“Three people were arrested. One was carrying a knife, another was also carrying a weapon, and we were already looking for the third.”

The area around Fælledvej suffered what police called “extensive” vandalism before the demonstration was controlled.

“Windows were shattered at banks and real estate offices and the police museum was also vandalised,” said Brix.

The walls of Assistens Kirkegård cemetery, the resting place of noted theologian Søren Kierkegaard, were particularly targeted for graffiti by the demonstrators.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Explosion in Reports of Radicalised Prisoners in Denmark

The prison system lodged 59 reports regarding the radicalisation of 50 prisoners since the Copenhagen terrorist attack

Since the terror attack in Copenhagen in February, 50 prisoners serving time in Danish prisons have been reported to the Danish intelligence agency PET for being radicalised.

A report from the Justice Ministry in July showed the prison system lodged 59 reports regarding the radicalisation of 50 prisoners from February to May, up considerably from the just 37 prisoners reported during the past two years.

“Now we would rather report a prisoner too many than one too little,” Kim Østerbye, the head of the prison association Fængselsforbundet, told Metroxpress newspaper.

“We’re talking about prisoners who speak of going to Syria or decorate their cells with messages inciting terror. We have also begun conducting exit programs for radicalised prisoners the same way we would with gang members.”

A report from the Justice Ministry in March showed that every fifth Danish jihadist fighter had been to prison at some point.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Extremist Inmates ‘Huge Problem’ For Denmark

In the ten weeks that followed February’s twin fatal shootings in Copenhagen, the number of warnings about potentially radicalized prison inmates exploded.

The gunman who killed two people during the February 14-15 shootings at a Copenhagen cultural centre and synagogue is believed to have been radicalized while in prison and authorities now seem to be taking the threat more seriously.

Metroxpress reported on Monday that in the ten weeks that followed Omar El-Hussein’s attack, the Danish Prison and Probation Service (Kriminalforsorgen) gave 59 reports warning the Danish Security and Intelligence Service (PET) that 50 individual inmates are suspected of having radical beliefs.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Iron-Age Britons Engaged in Mysterious Pig Trotter Festivals

It wasn’t so much bring a bottle to British Iron Age parties, as bring a pig’s leg. At a site in South Wales, huge gatherings involved people apparently feasting almost exclusively on the right forelegs of pigs — a mysterious ritual they kept up for centuries.

The dawn of the Iron Age in Britain, beginning about 2900 years ago, was a time of uncomfortable change. The social order in the preceding centuries was based around trade in bronze artefacts — but bronze suddenly lost its value leading to widespread cultural and economic collapse across Europe and Asia.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Norway: Polar Bears ‘A Nightmare’ For Arctic Scientists

Residents of the remote Arctic settlement of Ny-Ålesund never lock their homes — happy to sacrifice privacy for the option of barging through the nearest door if a polar bear attacks.

The research centre, formerly a coal mining town, is perched on theNorwegian island of Spitsbergen, which is also home to a sizeable polar bear community in one of the most extreme landscapes on Earth.

The northernmost permanent human settlement, Ny-Ålesund hosts about 150scientists, researchers and technicians during the Arctic summer, dwindling to a handful of caretakers in the colder months.

New arrivals are swiftly initiated into the dos and don’ts of life in closequarters with a formidable predator.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Scotland: Fireman John McGinn Raped Young Girl He Rescued From Blaze

A firefighter has been found guilty of raping a nine-year-old girl hours after he rescued her from a blaze.

John McGinn, 56, saved the girl, whom he knew, from a fire at her house in Bellshill, North Lanarkshire, in 1994.

The now-retired firefighter later raped her and threatened to kill her mother if she told anyone.

The girl, now aged 30, later contacted police. An investigation of McGinn’s past led to him being convicted of six charges against the girl and others.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Surprising Math Rules of Saturn’s Rings Revealed

As particles race around Saturn at breakneck speeds, their jostling and crashing may look random and haphazard — but a new mathematical theory brings a simple kind of order to the chaos that will help reveal more about rings across the universe.

A group of physicists, mathematicians and astronomers has more rigorously explained a longstanding mystery of Saturn’s rings: why the distribution of different particle sizes, ranging from inches to more than 30 feet (10 meters) across, follows a very simple ratio. Their model also suggests why very large bodies in the rings never last long.

The theory not only explains the regularity of Saturn’s rings, but also may reveal more about planets’ and asteroids’ ages and conditions based on the distribution of their rings.

“The law follows from a 1-centimeter-sized (0.4 inches) particle to house-sized,” said Nikolai Brilliantov, a mathematician at the University of Leicester in England and lead author of the new study. “This is mathematically quite beautiful, but (we had) no idea why it happens. Now, we understand that it’s perfectly correct, and we know why, and can prove that there is a very universal mechanism behind these particular features.”

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Sweden: Malmö Shaken by Another Grenade Attack

Another hand grenade attack shook central parts of Malmö overnight — the latest in a series of explosions rocking Sweden’s third largest city this summer.

Malmö has been hit by more than 30 explosions since the start of the year. At one point in July four grenade attacks were reported in under a week. Last year, a total of 25 blasts took place in the city over the whole of 2014.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Sweden: New Hand Grenade Explosion in Malmö

A hand grenade exploded in the Malmö neighborhood of Möllevången late Sunday night, bringing the total number of explosions in the city this year to over 30 according to news agency TT.

The explosion occurred around 11 p.m. outside an apartment building and was strong, Swedish Radio News reports.

“When we arrived, there was broken glass on the road and the building is damaged,” police spokesman Stephan Söderholm says.

Nobody was hurt in the incident.

The police believe many of the explosives used in Malmö this year come from the Balkans.

Last September, thanks to an international operation, the police seized 100 grenades which were being transported to Stockholm from the former Yugoslavia.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Sweden: Two Stabbed to Death in Ikea Store in Västerås

A man and a woman have been stabbed to death in an Ikea store in Västerås, according to public broadcaster SVT.

Another man is seriously injured after the attack, which took place around 1 p.m.

A man has been arrested on suspicion of murder.

Store manager Mattias Johansson tells local newspaper VLT all three victims are customers.

The store has been cordoned off by the police and the staff and customers are being evacuated from the building.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Sweden: Man and Woman Killed in Ikea Store Stabbing

A man has been arrested after two people died and another was seriously injured following a stabbing inside an Ikea store in Västerås, just outside Stockholm.

The three victims were stabbed early on Monday afternoon inside the Västerås branch of the global furniture giant, with police called to the scene at around 1pm.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Swedish Ikea Knife Attack in Vasteras Leaves Two Dead

Two people have been killed and another seriously injured in a knife attack at an Ikea store in Vasteras in Sweden, according to police.

The dead are a man and a woman, police said in a statement. A man has been arrested on suspicion of murder.

Ikea spokeswoman Anna Pilkrona-Godden said that the Erikslund shopping centre containing the store had been closed.

The injured victim is a man of about 35, Swedish television reported, citing eyewitnesses.

Officers were called to the store at 13:00 (11:00 GMT) and found three people with knife injuries in the kitchenware section, police spokesman Per Stromback told reporters at the scene.

“The suspect had stabbed three people, of whom two died at the scene and one is very seriously injured and is being operated on,” Mr Stromback said.

“We do not have a motive at the moment,” he added…

           — Hat tip: Seneca III [Return to headlines]
 

UK: HTC Caught Storing Fingerprints as World-Readable Cleartext

Four FireEye researchers have found a way to steal fingerprints from Android phones packing biometric sensors such as the Samsung Galaxy S5 and the HTC One Max.

The team found a forehead-slapping flaw in HTC One Max in which fingerprints are stored as an image file (dbgraw.bmp) in a open “world readable” folder.

“Any unprivileged processes or apps can steal user’s fingerprints by reading this file,” the team says, adding that the images can be made into clear prints by adding some padding.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

UK: Ted Heath Case Adds to Government Corruption, Says Nick Ferrari

AN EVIL paedophile ring involved in rape, murder and bribery with tentacles reaching into the very heart of the Government and ensnaring everyone from a prime minister to a known Russian spy, as well as judges, senior Army officers and even pop stars and TV presenters, with the compliance of a corrupt police force that chose to look the other way or chase down the accusers.

[Comment: David Icke, 17 yrs ago, made the same claims of an organized pedophile ring at the highest levels government. People said he was a wingnut and conspiracy theorist…www.davidicke.com/headlines/heath-case-adds-to-uk-government-corruption/ . Time has proven him correct.]

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Wild Boar Kills Sicilian Pensioner

A 77-year-old man died after being attacked by a wild boar while out walking his dogs near his home in Cefalù, Sicily.

Salvatore Rinaudo was walking his dogs on Saturday morning when the pets were charged by a group of wild boars.

Rinaudo intervened, trying to protect the animals, but one of the boars leapt on him and knocked him to the ground, before biting him to death.

Rinaudo’s wife, Rosa, was watching everything from their nearby home and ran to help her husband.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Egypt Hands Out Death Sentences, Spares Al-Qaeda Chief’s Brother

The Cairo Criminal Court handed death penalties to 10 defendants on terrorism-related charges, while 58 other defendants, including Mohammed al-Zawahiri, brother of al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri, had their verdicts postponed until September.

The 10 defendants were sentenced to death for “joining a terrorist group, inciting the killing of police and army officers and attacking police and government buildings,” reported AFP news agency, citing a court official.

The verdicts will be passed to Egypt’s senior religious authority Grand Mufti Shawqi Allam, who will review the cases and decide whether to ratify the sentences.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Israeli Defense Minister: ‘We Can in No Way Tolerate an Iran With Nuclear Weapons’

In an interview, Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Yaalon explains why he considers the nuclear deal with Iran to be an historical error. He also addresses recent crimes committed by extremist Israelis.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

2 Russian Warships Dock in Iran for Joint Naval Exercises

Two Russian warships have docked in northern Iran “carrying a message of ‘peace and friendship,’“ and preparing for naval training exercises with the Islamic Republic, the Washington Free Beacon reported.

The vessels docked in Iran’s Anzali port Sunday in anticipation of “joint naval exercises during the three-day stay,” according to a Persian-language report in Iran’s state-controlled Fars News Agency. The Free Beacon also cited Persian-language reports translated by the CIA’s Open Source Center.

“The (Russian) warships, Volgodonsk and Makhachkala docked in Anzali Port (near the Caspian Sea), in the fourth naval zone, on the afternoon of 9 August,” the Fars report said.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

ISIS Seen Building Capacity for Mass Casualty Attacks

(CNN) Some in the U.S. intelligence community warn that ISIS may be working to build the capability to carry out mass casualty attacks, a significant departure from the terror group’s current focus on encouraging lone wolf attacks, a senior U.S. intelligence official told CNN on Friday.

To date, the intelligence view has been that ISIS is focused on less ambitious attacks, involving one or a small group of attackers armed with simple weapons. In contrast, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, or AQAP, has been viewed as both more focused on — and more capable of — mass casualty attacks, such as plots on commercial aviation. Now the intelligence community is divided.

Meanwhile, the U.S. effort to train rebels in Syria to fight ISIS is having trouble. The few rebels that the U.S. has put through training are already in disarray, with defense officials telling CNN that up to half are missing, having deserted soon after training or having been captured after last week’s attack by the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front attack on a rebel site.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Teenage Swedish Couple Held by ISIS in Syria

A pregnant 15-year-old Swedish girl and her 19-year-old partner have been captured by extremist Islamist fighters in Syria, Swedish media are reporting.

The teenage girl is understood to have telephoned her parents and explained that she and the older boy were being held by Isis troops.

“It really is a critical situation,” her father — who has not been named by Swedish media — told regional newspaper Borås Tidning.

He said that the couple had married in a Muslim ceremony earlier this year and suggested that the pair had been questioned about their marriage by the extremist group because they were unable to provide any formal documentation to prove their partnership.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Turkey Attacks: Deadly Violence in Istanbul and Sirnak

Six members of the security forces have been killed in a series of attacks in Turkey amid rising tension between the government and Kurdish militants.

In south-eastern Sirnak province, four police officers were killed by a roadside bomb and a soldier died when gunmen fired on a military helicopter.

In Istanbul, a police officer was killed in clashes after a car bombing.

Meanwhile, the city’s US consulate was attacked by two assailants. A leftist group said it carried out that attack.

The outlawed Revolutionary People’s Liberation Army Front (DHKP-C) made the claim in a statement on its website.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Turkey Finishes Underwater Pipeline to Northern Cyprus

(ANSAmed) — NICOSIA, AUGUST 10 — The final section of an underwater pipeline that will make it possible to transport millions of cubic meters of water from Turkey to Northern Cyprus, occupied by Turkish troops since 1974, has been completed. The pipeline is the first underwater pipeline between the mainland and an island in the world and will address a chronic water shortage suffered by Turkish Cypriots. Local media have called it a ‘dream project’. The announcement, reported the Turkish-Cypriot broadcaster BRT, was made on Friday by Turkish forestry and water affairs minister Veysel Eroglu, who said that water would begin to arrive on the island starting in October. The pipeline is made of sections of plastic material welded together and suspended about 200 meters under the sea using steel stay rods anchored to the sea bed. It is 107 kilometers long and will transport water from the Alakopru dam on the Anamur river, in the Mersin region on Turkey’s Mediterranean coast, to Northern Cyprus.

Several Greek-Cypriot political representatives have however long criticized the building of the pipeline, saying that it is an attempt by Ankara to bolster its influence in the ‘Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC)’, which is recognized only by Turkey. Cyprus was been divided since 1974, after Turkish military intervention to protect the Turkish-Cypriot minority after a failed coup d’état by nationalist Greek-Cypriots planning to annex the island to Greece.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Turkey’s Strikes on Kurds Could Drag US Into New Front, Military Sources Fear

Just hours after a deal last month allowing the U.S. to use Turkey’s air bases to launch sorties against ISIS, Turkey pulled a move that left American military leaders surprised and outraged, and raised questions about the two nations’ alliance in the war on the jihadist army.

With only 10 minutes notice to their American partners, Turkey launched a massive air strike of its own July 24 against a Kurdish militant group in the northern mountains of Iraq. The U.S. had barely enough warning to make sure its own forces were out of the way, according to a military source with knowledge of the tension Turkey’s attack caused in the Combined Air and Space Operations Center, the allied headquarters in the air war against ISIS.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

US Consulate in Istanbul Attacked as Violence Escalates in Turkey

ANKARA, Turkey — Two assailants opened fire at the heavily protected U.S. Consulate building in Istanbul on Monday, touching off a gunfight with police before fleeing the scene, Turkish media reports said.

One of the assailants, a woman, was later captured at a nearby building and hospitalized. Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency, quoting unnamed police sources, said she has been identified as a member of a banned leftist group. The Istanbul governor’s office said police were searching for a second woman involved in the attack.

Anadolu named the captured assailant as 42-year-old Hatice Asik and said she is a member of the far-left Revolutionary People’s Liberation Army-Front, or DHKP-C. The group claimed responsibility for a 2013 suicide attack on the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, which killed a Turkish security guard.

No one else was injured in the onslaught.

Hours earlier an overnight bomb attack at a police station in Istanbul injured three policemen and seven civilians and caused a fire that collapsed part of the three-story building. Police said the assailants exploded a car bomb near the station. Unknown assailants later fired on police inspecting the scene of the explosion, sparking another gunfight with police that killed a member of the police inspection team and two assailants…

           — Hat tip: Dean [Return to headlines]
 

What Do Kurds Make of Turkey-PKK Fighting?

For the past two and a half years, the people in the mainly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir in south-east Turkey have lived in delicate peace — the result of an undeclared ceasefire between Turkey and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

But when a bomb exploded in the town of Suruc in July, that peace was shattered.

“A lot has changed in this last month and half. The jets are repeatedly taking off from Diyarbakir to bomb PKK camps.

“All this causes uneasiness in Diyarbakir. We worry about going out. We are used to some insecurity but this time I witnessed a gunfight myself.

“Two weeks ago, heavy gunfire broke out in my neighbourhood of Sehitlik and a police officer was killed.

“I was out at that time to buy a bus ticket and found myself in the middle of a war zone. I’ve never witnessed such a thing before.”

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

National Endowment for Democracy is Now Officially “Undesirable” In Russia

Vladimir Putin! Now you’ve really done it. You have had the temerity to declare our National Endowment for Democracy (NED), America’s most important Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) to be “undesirable.” Where will this end? Don’t you respect our right, as a US Government-financed NGO, to meddle in internal Russian affairs? After all, we are the most important NGO of the world’s Sole Superpower. We can go wherever we want and do whatever we like. We are truly upset!

This is the clear reaction of Washington to the decision by the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office on July 28 to declare the activities of the US National Endowment for Democracy as “undesirable in the territory of Russia.” The official statement stated that, “the National Endowment for Democracy used Russian commercial and non-commercial organizations under its control to take part in campaigns aimed at denying the legitimacy of results of Russian elections; organize political actions designed to influence the authorities’ decisions and discredit the service in the Russian Armed Forces.” It further elaborated, “In pursuit of these goals, the fund allocated about 2.5 million US dollars to Russian commercial and non-commercial organizations in 2013-2015.”

Under Russia’s law on Undesirable NGOs, adopted by the Duma or parliament and signed into law by President Putin this May, any foreign or international non-governmental organization could become “undesirable” if it threatened the foundations of Russia’s constitutional order, the country’s defense capability and the security of the Russian state.

Significantly, in a statement regarding the decision, Russia’s Foreign Ministry named Carl Gershman, the neo-conservative who has been president since NED was founded in 1983. They noted that Gershman said — absolutely openly — that the NED organization was intended to be a beautiful facade for distributing funds among opposition circles in foreign countries. That suggests they have done their homework very well before banning the NED.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

The World Hates Russia. Russia Hates it Back.

By Leonid Bershidsky

Russian President Vladimir Putin’s propaganda targeted at audiences outside Russia doesn’t work, but neither will any Western counter-efforts directed at Russians. A new report from the Pew Research Center explains why.

Pew surveyed public opinion among 45,435 respondents in 40 nations between March and May and found that almost everywhere, people had an unfavorable opinion of Russia.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Ukraine Reports Heavy Shelling and Warns of Imminent Escalation

Ukraine has accused pro-Russian rebels of carrying out the heaviest artillery attacks on government positions in six months. Ukrainian authorities have warned of mounting signs that the conflict was escalating.

Ukraine said it had repelled a tank assault by pro-Russian rebels that threatened to halt a shaky ceasefire and escalate the 16-month conflict in the breakaway east of the country.

The Ukrainian military said that up to 400 rebel fighters supported by tanks had attacked government forces around the village of Starohnativka, 50 km (30 miles) north of the Kyiv-held port city of Mariupol.

Control of Mariupol could help the rebels form a corridor to the Crimea peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine last year.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Calls for Tougher Laws Amid Pakistan’s Child Abuse Scandal

Revelations of a massive child abuse scandal in Pakistan have triggered widespread shock and anger. With the Pakistani police now under fire, child rights groups are urging the authorities to urgently take action.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

In Pakistan, Horror Grows Over Allegations of Children Being Sexually Abused by Blackmail Ring

In this dusty town near Pakistan’s border with India, families kept quiet for years about the blackmail gang that locals believe filmed some 270 children being sexually abused, fearful the videos could appear online or sold in markets for as little as 50 cents.

Those living in Hussain Khan Wala say the gang forced children at gunpoint to be abused or drugged them into submission. It was only after one family spoke up that others rose against the gang, with police later arresting 11 suspects.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Pakistan Child Sex Abuse: Seven Arrested in Punjab

Seven people have been arrested in Pakistan on suspicion of involvement in child sexual abuse and extortion.

The chief minister of Punjab province, Shahbaz Sharif, ordered a judicial inquiry into reports that hundreds of children had been abused over a period of several years.

Local media say a gang made videos showing the abuse of children, whose parents were then subject to blackmail.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

China TV Anchor Bi Fujian to be Punished for Mao Insult

A Chinese star TV anchor is facing “severe punishment” over jokes he made about Mao Zedong, state media report.

A video of Bi Fujian singing a parody song at a private banquet and insulting the former Chinese leader in strong language was posted online in April.

Mr Bi was taken off air shortly after the incident, amid great controversy.

But People’s Daily said officials had ordered his employer, state broadcaster CCTV, to punish him for “a serious violation of political discipline”.

Mao, who led the country through the Cultural Revolution and a crippling famine which killed millions, remains the subject of much debate.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

China Gets a Little More Fresh Air

Idled factories, less coal use, and lower emissions make breathing easier

Using data from the U.S. Embassy’s air-pollution monitoring station, a popular website and app display air-quality information in real time. At that moment, just a few minutes after noon, the level of particulate air pollution was 96 on a scale of 500. That’s comparatively tolerable for the capital, where the index exceeded 500, its nominal maximum, during the 2012-13 winter “airpocalypse.” “We’re lucky—we have blue sky for these photos,” Chen says. “Otherwise we’d have to fix the sky with Photoshop.”

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Chinese TV Host to be Punished for Mao Insult

Chinese state media say a TV celebrity must be punished for singing insults about Communist Party founder Mao Zedong at a private dinner earlier this year.

Bi Fujian was a talent show host on state broadcaster China Central Television when a video circulated showing him mocking Mao in a song. He apologized at the time and was suspended.

However, the China Discipline Inspection Daily, a newspaper under the party’s anti-graft watchdog, said Sunday that discipline inspectors at the broadcasting watchdog had found that Bi had violated “political discipline” in harming Mao’s image.

The report said the broadcasting administration had ordered CCTV to deal with the matter “severely.”

In the home video that was circulated widely online before censors removed it in April, Bi sings a song about Communist Party-led soldiers battling bandits in northeastern China in the 1940s called ‘Taking Tiger Mountain’. To the laughter of guests at a dinner, Bi adds his own commentary in a speaking voice between lines.

When the lyrics referred to Mao, Bi called the revolutionary leader a vulgar phrase and said “he has ruined us all.”

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Seven Decades of the Bomb

by Srdja Trifkovic

Seventy years ago first Hiroshima, then Nagasaki, were obliterated. Three generations later the grand-strategic consequences of those events can be discerned with reasonable clarity. They are by no means uniformly bad.

The claim that the destruction of two large cities and the killing of over two hundred thousand humans was justified in order to prevent an even greater carnage on both sides, resulting from the putative U.S. invasion of Japan in late 1945, is historically disputable and morally unsustainable. The horror itself—including the unexpected effects of radiation and fallout—has had a salutary impact on the great and minor powers alike in the ensuing decades, however. It is arguable that its deterrent effect has spared the world a major war costing millions of lives.

In most bipolar confrontations known to history—from Assyria versus Egypt, Persia vs. Greece, Athens vs. Sparta, and Rome vs. Carthage onwards—coexistence (peaceful or otherwise) was not an option. In a classic bipolar model, America and the USSR likely would have gone to an all-out war some time 10-15 years after 1945, a war probably no less destructive than the one preceding it. The constraints against first use of nuclear weapons, and the related fear of escalation leading to their inadvertent application, introduced an element of caution and moderation on both sides—the “nuclear taboo.” A complex system of informal checks and balances within the political, military and bureaucratic apparata operated in different ways on different sides of the Iron Curtain, but its effects were broadly similar. It was in evidence in the U.S. for the first time in the critical Korean winter of 1950-51, when President Harry Truman overruled General Douglas MacArthur. President Eisenhower did say in 1955 that nuclear weapons could be used “just exactly as you would use a bullet or anything else,” but during the 1958 Taiwan Strait Crisis he admitted that, with the bomb, “you cross a completely different line.” That line was in Central Europe and in the homeland then, and it had remained there until the fall of the Wall. Restraint was notably present on both sides during the Cuban Missile Crisis of 1962: ideological differences and divergent strategic interests were transcended by mutually compatible rational calculations. Neither side seriously considered the possibility of preemptive attacks thereafter, Nixon’s and Kissinger’s fleeting “madman” threats to Hanoi notwithstanding…

           — Hat tip: Srdja Trifkovic [Return to headlines]
 

Cryptolocker Virus: Australians Forced to Pay as Latest Encryption Virus is ‘Unbreakable’, Security Expert Says

Australians are paying thousands of dollars to overseas hackers to rid their computers of an unbreakable virus known as Cryptolocker.

There has been a rise in the number of people falling victim to the latest version of an encryption virus which hijacks computer files and demands a ransom to restore them.

The “ransomware” infects computers through programs and credible-looking emails, taking computer files and photographs hostage.

Cryptolocker comes in a number of versions, the latest capitalising on the release of Windows 10.

It can arrive in an email disguised as an installer of the new operating system in a zip file.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

New Zealand Selects 40 Designs for New Flag

New Zealand has published 40 designs, one of which could become its new national flag.

Prime Minister John Key first mooted the change last year. He called for the Union Jack to be removed as it represents the country’s colonial era “whose time has passed”.

He also complained that New Zealand’s flag looks too much like Australia’s.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Community Leader Who Searched for Missing Iguala Students Shot Dead

Using his bare hands, Miguel Ángel Jiménez would dig into mass grave sites looking for the remains of the 43 teaching students who were kidnapped in the Guerrero city of Iguala last September and later murdered in a notorious incident that still has Mexico looking for answers.

On Saturday, the community leader, who was well-known throughout the region, himself became a victim of the cruelty he loathed and that made Guerrero infamous as one of Mexico’s most dangerous states.

Jiménez was shot dead as he was driving his taxi near his birth town of Xaltianguis, about 50 kilometers from the Pacific resort of Acapulco.

He was the leader of the so-called Union of People and Organizations of Guerrero State (UPOEG), a vigilante group whose members hold licenses to carry weapons to enforce security in towns and rural areas where police and law enforcement are absent.

For nearly two years, Guerrero has been under siege by an internal war between vigilante groups and drug traffickers, who have moved in to control the sprawling marijuana and opium fields found across the region.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Danes Publish Pro-Refugee Advertisement

A privately-funded initiative to counter the government’s anti-refugee message placed a full-age advertisement in The Guardian on Monday.

A Danish Facebook campaign that began as a response to the government’s announced intention to run anti-refugee advertisements in foreign newspapers placed an advertisement of its own in Monday’s edition of UK paper The Guardian.

The advertisement, which the group reportedly paid around 200,000 kroner for, tells refugees that “we welcome you to Denmark”.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Germany’s Ukrainian Refugee Puzzle

A growing number of Ukrainians are applying for refugee status in Germany. Most of them are looking for economic betterment, and very few are genuine political refugees. Should they be deported or welcomed?

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

German News Anchor Anja Reschke Uses Slot to Attack ‘Little Racist Nobodies’ In Impassioned Call to End Hatred Towards Refugees

A German news anchor has sparked a huge debate after using her evening TV slot to wage verbal war on those who racially attack refugees.

Anja Reschke expressed her anger at how worryingly normal it now is to publish “hate tirades” under real names in comment pieces she believes has contributed to a “rise in extreme right wing acts” including arson.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

German TV Presenter Sparks Debate and Hatred With Her Support for Refugees

Anja Reschke uses regular slot on evening news to lambast hate-filled commentators whose language she says incites arson attacks on refugee homes

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Lebanon Seizes Boat Suspected of Smuggling Syrians to Europe

The Lebanese Army seized at dawn Monday a boat that docked near a Tripoli port after suspecting it was being used to illegally transport Syrians who sought refuge in Europe.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Unsettling Encounters: Tourists and Refugees Cross Paths in the Mediterranean

Two worlds are colliding on the beaches of the Mediterranean this summer: Vacationers looking for relaxation and migrants seeking relief from poverty or warfare. The result is a moral conundrum for Europe.

The Greek island of Kos is only a few nautical miles from the Turkish coast. Ali, an 18-year-old migrant from Pakistan, left Turkey in a rubber boat the night before. He traveled alone, unable to afford the cost of a spot on board a smugglers’ ship. Not far from Kos, his boat capsized. Though he can’t swim, Ali somehow he managed to make it to the beach.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Weekend Sees Large Number of Migrants Land in Greece

People fleeing war continue to land in Greece, as the cash-strapped country sees migration numbers soar. Tens of thousands of refugees have made the journey in 2015, hoping for a better life in Europe.

The Greek coast guard pulled more than 1,400 migrants out of the sea between Friday and Monday, authorities announced at the start of the week.

Most arrive on the five islands of Chios, Kos, Leros, Lesbos and Samos, a presence that is overwhelming the cash-strapped nation.

The majority of the migrants are Syrian, a coast guard official told news agency DPA. Most are hoping to continue their journey to northern Europe via Central Europe, he added.

Arrivals continued on Monday morning, with reports of more than 150 migrants in six vessels reacing the shores of Kos. The island is a popular tourist destination.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Concern That Transgenders Excluded at Eurogames

The LGBT sports tournament, the Eurogames, which wound up here in Stockholm over the weekend, offered participants an opportunity to compete in gender-neutral events like boule, golf, and ballroom dancing. But the gender classes at some of the other events have come in for criticism that transgenders can be excluded.

The Eurogames are the world’s largest sports event for the LGBT community. But some of the events are divided into traditional male and female classes, which is not unproblematic. Kian Sigge, a personal trainer, who also gave a lecture during the Eurogames, says this approach excludes many transgender people:

“For example, I couldn’t take part in swimming if I wanted to,” he says, “because I can’t compete in the women’s class because my testosterone count is too high. But I can’t take part in the men’s class either, because you’re not allowed to have full-covering bathing suits, and aren’t allowed to expose so-called women’s breasts. So under these circumstances, some trans people can’t take part at all.”

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Planned Parenthood’s Evil Empire

The grisly revelations about Planned Parenthood that have come to light in the videos released by the Center for Medical Progress document a national criminal enterprise backed by $500 million federal dollars each year. The United States Senate’s failure to cut off federal funds in the face of such grotesque moral depravity boggles the mind and proves yet again just how dysfunctional Congress has become. The Obama Administration and Hillary Clinton’s defense of Planned Parenthood in the face of the revelations sharply reminds us that neither is possessed of even a modicum of decency and respect for human life. Of all windows into the character of one’s soul, there are few examples more painfully illustrative than when a person cavalierly dismisses respect for human life, particularly the lives of infants.

The Center for Medical Progress interviews reveal that Planned Parenthood Federation of America collaborates with obstetricians to alter their abortion procedures in order to harvest specific fetal tissue and organs and intact fetuses for profitable sale. The process, partial birth abortion, is horrific with healthy fetuses having their skulls crushed and their saleable body parts extracted so as to maximize the utility of the parts in medical procedures. In short, Planned Parenthood is in the business of selling dissected infants.

The grotesque inhumanity attendant to such trafficking is all too reminiscent of Nazi abuses at Buchenwald. Upon liberating that concentration camp Eisenhower learned of a macabre practice performed by the SS. After executing Jews, Nazis rendered Jewish body parts saleable items. In this way, Planned Parenthood’s President Cecile Richards is like the infamous Nazi SS agent Ilse Koch, who collected human tattoos and was said to be responsible for causing the skin of concentration camp victims to be made into household goods, like lampshades. Unlike Koch, who was sentenced by the allies to life in prison, Richards remains free despite the atrocities performed under her watch.

           — Hat tip: JD [Return to headlines]
 

Sweden: Activists Complain ‘Skin-Colored’ Band-Aids Are Always Beige

Some band-aids in Sweden are called skin-colored, but they are all the same color: beige. People with a different complexion, have to buy their band-aids abroad if they want them to match their skin, Swedish Radio News reports.

Activist Steffi Aluoch complains that skin has many colors, not just beige.

“If you google ‘nude dress’, you get an idea of what people mean by nude. It’s just beige. Companies take for granted that their customers are white. This is also about the value of people. This means that we’re not good enough for companies to create products for us,” Aluoch says.

John Womack is the spokesman for plaster maker Cederoth. He says that there has been no demand for other colors but that he understands critics who argue the beige ones seem to be intended exclusively for white skin.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

Swedish PM Homes in on Feminism in Key Speech

Sweden’s Prime Minister Stefan Löfven returned to the hot seat after the summer holidays on Monday with a speech referencing international feminist icons Lena Dunham and Emma Watson.

           — Hat tip: Fjordman [Return to headlines]
 

25 thoughts on “Gates of Vienna News Feed 8/10/2015

  1. According to avpixlat, all involved were Africans. “vittnesuppgifter talar om en konflikt mellan män av afrikansk härkomst.” (witness testimony indicates a conflict among men of African origin.)

  2. Re: The Ted Heath scandal. David Icke was warning, but no one with any authority wished to pursue the trail. Back during the early 1990s, I was told of similar occurrences within the New South Wales parliament and judiciary and to the credit of two independent MPs, they sought a Royal Commission into pedophilia that they believed was occurring throughout the four estates – parliament, judiciary, police and the media. In the end, they got a watered down Royal Commission into police corruption only. Fast forward to 2012, and the then Federal Labor Government headed by the unelected Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, commissioned an investigation into pedophilia that encompassed all Christian/Jewish denominations, but excluded, any reference to Federal Parliament, the judiciary and Islam.

    It must now be obvious to even a simpleton that the Collective Left do not wish to mess with their own kind when it comes to criminality.

    • Of course not, and there’s a basic philosophical underpinning for this.

      Socialism says that people only have rights in groups, not as individuals. As long as the whole group of all children overall isn’t threatened then, as Hillary Clinton said, “what difference at this point does it make?”

      The “at this point” is important as it clearly indicates the priority: there’s no problem for the whole group “at this point” so what difference does it make?

      This is similar to a commander marching their army toward an objective with guerrillas occasionally picking off some of the solders as they’re marching. The priority of the commander is to get to the objective before it’s too late. The attrition and casualties are ignored. The army must keep moving because the real problem is not the few individual deaths, but the slowing of the march which might cause the objective at the destination to be lost.

      “KEEP MARCHING!” Strategically these are minor acceptable losses. “What difference at this point does it make?”

      “SHUT UP OR ILL SHOOT YOU MYSELF!”

      “FOREWARD!” (Hey, wasn’t that a campaign slogan?)

      The Socialist Army marches onward.

      • Sorry, I meant FORWARD! Stop laughing, soldiers, or I’ll shoot you myself!

        Then again, maybe I should have typed FOREWORD since perhaps the commander is writing the introduction to a book.

        • No need for the apology, I got the meaning. The mindset that prohibits individual suffering at the hands of some within the Collective is no different to the practises of the well known tyrants and their lackeys from the past and the present.

  3. Updates to IKEA incident via (google translations of) Vasteras, Swedish source:

    Second suspect in surgery a second time
    The 55 year old woman and her 28 year old son were from outside the village of Skellefteå The 23 year old suspect was living in Arboga , he denies murder. The 35 year old suspect remains in critical condition. Police are convinced the two are culprits.

    Both suspects reside at Cold Stone Farm, Arboga (currently cordoned off) where Eritrean asylum seekers receive accommodation while awaiting residency decision

    Photo of 23 year old murder suspect arrested at bus stop in Erikslund?

    No political motive behind the knife attack
    There is no link between the two suspects for knife murders in Västerås and the victims, police said at a news conference. The conclusion is that the attack was not politically motivated.

    “The 23-åringe suspects were arrested in connection with that he ran from the IKEA store in Vasteras after the knife attack. In the interview after he was arrested he denied the charges.
    Lawyer Maria Wilhelmsson met on Tuesday morning his client, who continued to claim his innocence.
    – He has been there but have not done anything, says Maria Wilhelmsson told TT, adding: – It may suffice that you are at the wrong place at the wrong time you can be reasonably suspected. It’s very low standard of proof for that one should be reasonably suspected, she says.” . . . “The alleged perpetrators, who are not known to police for previous crimes, knew each other, according to data Aftonbladet”

    • For your amusement, re: Ikea…Emirates24/7: Ikea Attack Suspects Identified
      By AFP Published Tuesday, August 11, 2015

      The two suspects in a knife attack at an Ikea store in Sweden that left two dead are Eritrean asylum seekers, one of whom is in critical condition, police said Tuesday.
      The motive for the midday attack on Monday in the central town of Vasteras was still unknown, deputy prosecutor general Eva Moren told reporters.
      “The two suspects are both from Eritrea. They have been living at an asylum centre,” she said, adding that the pair knew each other.
      “We know nothing about the motive yet, the investigation will have to determine that,” Moren said.
      The suspects’ identities were not disclosed.

    • Look… This is obviously the fault of the knives. The knives involved should be put on trial, convicted, and destroyed.

      How dare these reporters suggest that any human might be responsible! I mean, who is more politically important here? Humans, who can vote, or knives that can’t?

      Obviously a final solution to the menace of the evil knives is needed. All knives should be rounded up and destroyed.

  4. “The alleged perpetrators, who are not known to police for previous crimes, knew each other, according to data Aftonbladet”

    Aftonbladet is the Pravda for the extreme left in Sweden.
    I wouldn’t trust them with a roll of toilet paper let alone running a newspaper.

    • No wonder they were not, yet, known to the police. They didn’t have all that time to commit crime yet. At least, one of them only arrived in Sweden on July 13.

  5. The muhammad coefficient in the stabbing attack in Västerås, Sweden seems to be low. One of the suspects is called Yohannes.

      • Described by police as being Eritrean, may only indicate that the individual is East African. Since most of the illegal muslims arrive in Northern Europe with no identity and erased fingerprints, an individual claiming to be Eritrean may as well, be Somali, Ethiopian or originating from somewhere else in East Africa.

        Furthermore, an individual from rather successful Somaliland, may as well pass as belonging in chaotic Somalia, as most people may not even know the existence of Somaliland, thinking there is only one Somalia, and that no one can live in Somalia, so therefore must be upgraded to, preferably, Nordic countries like Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Minnesota etc.

      • Or a christian name. We don’t know yet if his age, name or identity is validated by the authorities in Eritrea.

  6. How many hand grenade attacks have occurred in other western countries? How many car burnings do we have in the U.S. compared to say Sweden and France?

    I wonder how long it’s going to take before people in Sweden realize how highly unusual all of this is and, if they do realize it, will they overcome their Lysinkoist “settled science theories” about what’s going on?

  7. Amnesty approves policy to decriminalize sex trade

    LONDON (AP) — Amnesty International has approved a controversial policy to endorse the de-criminalization of the sex trade, rejecting complaints by women’s rights groups who say it is tantamount to advocating the legalization of pimping and brothel owning.

    At its decision-making forum in Dublin on Tuesday, the human rights group approved the resolution to recommend “full decriminalization of all aspects of consensual sex work.” It argues its research suggests decriminalization is the best way to defend sex workers’ human rights.

    The Coalition Against Trafficking in Women has argued that while it agrees with Amnesty that those who are prostituted should not be criminalized, full de-criminalization would make pimps “businesspeople” who could sell the vulnerable with impunity.

    Amnesty’s decision is important because it will lobby governments to accept its point of view.

    ****well, this appears to be one way to make all those pesky “sex grooming” and “pedo” investigations/prosecutions disappear. [/sarc]

  8. IKEA decapitation
    – Not verified by official statements in Sweden

    The local police is acting on behalf of the politicians in power, talking about “dark powers” while covering up any piece of information of the deadly attack at IKEA, Västerås on Monday, and at the same time enforcing protection(?!) of the local asylum center in question.

    In short, the police seem to be following every point in the PC book when it comes to Nothing to do with.

    Comments from the public, however, is talking about are indicate that there was – at least – one decapitation, probably of the mother. One commenter talks about a “doctor and her son”. Sooner, or later, information is bound to surface, confirming or contradicting this.

    One thing is for sure, the locals knowing the woman and her son, are litterate, and capable of communicating the facts, be it already now, in comments sections, or later in other forums, for the sole purpose of having the truth be known.

    Until then, all we can do is read between the lines, listening to what is not being said in the Swedish state, or mainstream, media.

    On the other hand, will the IKEA decapitation now bring SD to becoming the biggest political party in Sweden?

  9. Edit

    Comments from the public, however, indicate that there was – at…

    I’d like to add that there must have been quite a few unfortunate – even unfortunately unprepared – onlookers to the tragic attack. What they were witnessing at IKEA the time, the police and the media may be able to hide and cover up for some time, but the truth will come to public knowledge at one moment in time.

    • Just guessing

      The mother, as a female, and presumably an easier target, may have been attacked first. Then the son may have tried to fight off the attackers, managing to wound one of them will still fighting for his life.

      Now Suleiman, from Ghana, and a fellow resident at the asylum center in Västerås, talks about how the perpetrator played volleyball and played around in the backyard at the asylum center the day before the IKEA killing spree, while giving the mainstream media the positive phrases “polite and nice”.

      Another resident points out how the perpetrator used to wear a black suit.

      Neighbors think he was at IKEA in order to find equipment for his apartment in Skellefteå, according to Aftonbladet. He allegedly, only arrived in Sweden on July 13.(….!!!)

      • Sorry! Clarifying

        Please disregard this in part, as it was neighbors talking about the man who was killed, who had just moved to an apartment.

        Neighbors think he, Emil Herlin was at IKEA with his mother, in order to find equipment for his apartment in Skellefteå, according to Aftonbladet.

        The supposedly Eritrean perpetrator did, on the other hand, allegedly, only arrive in Sweden on July 13, however.

    • Probably halal slaughter

      Photo from outside the building
      Reference also to above mentioned witness Mirjam Tapper’s horrified description of the head being parted from the body. (In Swedish)

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