A planning request for a new synagogue in the Sydney suburb of Bondi has been turned down by the local council. The council were concerned that a new Jewish house of worship would increase the risk of a terrorist attack in Bondi.
In other news, Spanish police broke up an Iranian people-trafficking ring, arresting 101 suspects. The ring, based in Malaga, charged large sums to smuggle migrants into the UK.
To see the headlines and the articles, click “Continue reading” below.
Thanks to Charles Low, Dean, JD, Jerry Gordon, JP, Reader from Chicago, SS, 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.
Ontario Government’s Timeline to Reduce Debt Lacks Specifics and Relies on Questionable Assumptions
Wishful Thinking: An Analysis of Ontario’s Timeline for Shrinking Its Debt Burden
Queen’s Park’s timeline for reducing the province’s historically high debt burden relies on optimistic and questionable assumptions and lacks a detailed, credible plan to achieve it, finds a new study released today by the Fraser Institute, an independent, non-partisan Canadian public policy think-tank.
The Ontario government has acknowledged the province’s current debt-to-GDP ratio-a measure used to evaluate a jurisdiction’s debt burden-is too high at 37 per cent of the economy and has pledged to lower it back to the pre-recession level of 27 per cent by 2029/30.
But the government has offered no specifics on how it will achieve that goal.
“Queen’s Park has picked a target date for reducing its debt burden several years from now and is simply hoping, somehow, that the mountain of debt it created will start shrinking on its own,” said Ben Eisen, director of the Fraser Institute’s Ontario Prosperity Initiative and co-author of Wishful Thinking: An Analysis of Ontario’s Timeline for Shrinking Its Debt Burden.
Specifically, the study finds that the Ontario government’s debt currently stands at $311 billion, and the province’s most recent budget will add billions of dollars of new debt until 2020. Specifically, the government’s latest budget calls for $11.4 billion (on average) in additional new debt each year until 2020. No plans are provided for eliminating the addition of new debt after 2020.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
A Crazed Left-Wing Academic Named Kevin Allred Took to Twitter to Wish Death Upon President Trump.
Presidential death-wisher Kevin Allred: Another argument for defunding the academy
Somebody should shoot Trump, lunatic prof says
“Trump is a # joke,” he tweeted. “[T]his is all a # sham. i wish someone would just shoot him outright.”
Allred is, or was, an adjunct professor in the Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies Department at taxpayer-funded Montclair State University in New Jersey. After news of the tweet spread, Montclair canned him, declaring him a nonperson. Well, the school didn’t actually do that but it did erase references to him on its website.
In November 2016 while an employee at Rutgers University he was subjected to a psychological evaluation after tweeting “will the 2nd amendment be as cool when i buy a gun and start shooting at random white people or no…?”
Allred alleged police deemed him a threat “based on political statements i’ve made on campus and on twitter” and warned that “Trump’s crackdown on free speech has absolutely begun.”
This is what your tax dollars support but you probably knew that already.
Here’s his bio from his personal website:
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Forbes Says Self-Reliant Homesteaders Are “Delusional” And “Mooching” Off “Civil Society”
It’s always interesting reading when someone smug and sanctimonious writes a clueless diatribe about another group of people being smug and sanctimonious. So when I saw that an economist for Moody’s and Forbes had written an op-ed calling self-reliant homesteaders “delusional,” I knew I’d be in for some misinformed hilarity.
The article, entitled, “Dear Homesteaders, Self-Reliance Is a Delusion” was published a couple of days ago on the Forbes website. You’ll be forewarned that the article won’t be deep in the first paragraph, when the author presents his claim to knowledge about self-reliant living comes from the fact that he is “a big fan of shows about doomsday preppers, homesteaders, survivalists, generally people who live off the grid.”
And the well-informed opinion of this arbiter of self-reliance?
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Is George Soros Behind This Plot to Topple Trump?
The Establishment is setting up Donald Trump.
The mainstream media hates him. Hollywood hates him. The “Intellectual Yet Idiot” academia class hates him.
Most critically, the CIA hates him. So does the rest of the Deep State, or the permanently entrenched “national security” bureaucracy. They did everything possible to stop Trump from taking office. None of it worked.
I think the CIA hates Trump for a very simple reason: he’s threatening to take away their livelihood.
Trump wants to make nice with Putin and the Russians. But countering the so-called “Russian threat” is how many thousands of Deep State bureaucrats make a living.
These people feed off the trough of the $1 trillion-plus military/security budget. Playing nice with the Russians would kill their jobs-and end their way of life.
Trump has said:
We will pursue a new foreign policy that finally learns from the mistakes of the past. We will stop looking to topple regimes and overthrow governments.
Toppling regimes is the CIA’s bread and butter. No wonder they hate him.
Of course, the feeling is mutual. Trump has used plenty of sharp words to describe the “intelligence community.” He’s reportedly aiming to fundamentally restructure the CIA…
How the Deep State Will Take Down Trump
The way I see it, the Deep State has three main cards to play against Trump. If one doesn’t work, they’ll move on to the next one.
1. The Delegitimization Card 2. The Herbert Hoover Card 3. The John F. Kennedy Card
[Comment: Recommended reading.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Kidd Creole Thought Homeless Man He Stabbed to Death Was ‘Hitting on Him’
A founding member of Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five stabbed a homeless man to death after a passing remark made him think the man was hitting on him, a law enforcement official said Thursday.
Kidd Creole, whose real name is Nathaniel Glover, was walking in midtown Manhattan on Wednesday near where he worked security and maintenance when he passed by 55-year-old John Jolly, police said.
Jolly said something that offended Glover, and they argued, said the official, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation. The fight escalated until Glover stabbed Jolly and then walked off, authorities said.
The official said it was an argument that got out of hand…
| — Hat tip: Dean | [Return to headlines] |
McMaster Purges Ezra Cohen-Watnick, 3rd National Security Council Aide in Weeks
Ezra Cohen-Watnick, the senior director for intelligence on the National Security Council, was dismissed Wednesday by National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, according to the White House.
A White House statement said:
General McMaster appreciates the good work accomplished in the NSC’s Intelligence directorate under Ezra Cohen’s leadership. He has determined that, at this time, a different set of experiences is best-suited to carrying that work forward. General McMaster is confident that Ezra will make many further significant contributions to national security in another position in the administration.
Cohen-Watnick’s firing, first reported by Conservative Review, came shortly after two other NSC aides were dismissed: Derek Harvey, director for the Middle East, and Rich Higgins, who served as director for strategic planning.
All three were brought on board by former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn. McMaster had previously tried to get rid of Cohen-Watnick, but was overruled by President Trump, White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, and Senior Adviser Jared Kushner.
The Conservative Review noted that the NSC continues to be “overwhelmingly staffed with Obama holdovers (almost all of whom have retained their positions).”
[Comment: All these holdovers from Obama such as McMaster MUST be fired immediately.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Nancy Pelosi Could Soon be the Speaker of the House, And That Should Freak You Out
If nothing dramatically changes between now and the 2018 mid-term elections, the Democrats will likely win a huge victory
Are you ready for the second coming of Speaker Pelosi?
As a result of the recent Obamacare debacle, the American people are deeply frustrated with the Republicans in Congress. And having nowhere else to go, many voters are considering turning to the Democrats for answers. As you will see below, one recent survey found that only 37 percent of voters nationally say that they plan to support Republican candidates for Congress in 2018. If the 2018 mid-term elections were held at this moment, the Republicans would be in big trouble and it would be quite likely that the Democrats would take back control of the U.S. House of Representatives.
And I am not the only one that is warning of political doom on the horizon. Earlier today, an editorial by Newt Gingrich and Brad Anderson also warned of what could happen if the Republicans don’t get their act together…
[Comment: Run back to the Democrats…that’s insane…instead Amercians should work hard to toss out traitorous RINO’s like McCain from the Republican party.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
New Calls for Criminal Investigation of Obama Aides in ‘Unmasking’ Scandal
In a letter Tuesday to the National Security Agency (NSA), the California Republican requested the agency report on improper “unmasking” requests made by Ben Rhodes
New calls are coming in for the Justice Department to launch a criminal investigation into the “unmasking” scandal swirling around a cluster of former Obama administration officials, The Daily Caller News Foundation Investigative Group has learned.
The calls came as House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes identified a fourth Obama national security official as a “person of interest” who improperly “unmasked” Trump officials and leaked the information to the news media.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Northwestern Professor Menaces Chicago After Brutal Murder
A Chicago judge has issued an arrest warrant charging a Northwestern University professor with first-degree murder after a 26-year-old man was found brutally stabbed to death in the professor’s apartment.
The Northwester professor is Feinberg School of Medicine microbiologist Wyndham Lathem, reports the Chicago Tribune.
Chicago police officers discovered the body of the victim, Trenton H. James Cornell-Duranleau, inside a 10th-floor apartment unit in the “sophisticated and timeless” Grand Plaza Chicago River North Apartments last Thursday night.
Cornell-Duranleau was dead inside the Grand Plaza apartment unit when police arrived. A subsequent medical examination showed that Cornell-Duranleau died after suffering multiple sharp force lacerations.
The judge who issued the warrant for Lathem also issued a warrant for another man, 56-year-old Andrew Warren, in connection with the same crime. Warren is a senior treasury assistant at Somerville College Oxford in England.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Rand Paul: Trump May Take Executive Action to Repeal ObamaCare
Senator meeting with POTUS this week.
Senator Rand Paul is advising President Trump on a potential executive order to repeal and replace Obamacare, a move that he says could help millions of Americans who cannot afford skyrocketing premiums.
In interviews with earlier this week, Paul noted that Trump is considering penning an executive order to get the job done, following the failure of Republicans in Congress to pass legislation.
“I just got off the phone with the president, and I think he and I both want to get something done,” Paul said.
“What I’m talking to him about is that I think through executive action, I think he can legalize the health associations that I’ve been talking about.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Report: McMaster Fired National Security Council Official for Penning Memo on Globalists
“Globalists and Islamists recognize that for their visions to succeed, America, both as an ideal and as a national and political identity, must be destroyed”
A top official on the National Security Council was fired last month by National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster reportedly after he argued in a memo that President Trump’s administration is under sustained attack from globalists and Islamists.
Rich Higgins, a former Pentagon official who served in the NSC’s strategic-planning office as a director for strategic planning was fired on July 21, The Atlantic first reported.
The memo, written in late May, described threats to the administration by globalists, bankers, the “deep state,” and Islamists.
“Globalists and Islamists recognize that for their visions to succeed, America, both as an ideal and as a national and political identity, must be destroyed,” it said.
[Comment: Read it all. Fired for speaking the truth. He should be rehired and appointed to McMaster’s position. McMaster should be the one fired as he is clearly a globalist tool and an enemy of the Republic of the USA.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
What Would Really Happen if California Seceded?
There are two kinds of people who support the Calexit movement. People living in California who think that their state would be far better off without being hitched to the rest of the union, and people living in every other state who can’t wait to get rid of California.
I’d wager that latter of those two know something that most Calexit supporters in California do not. They know that the golden state is a toxic influence on the rest of the country. It’s become a breeding ground for leftists ideologies, and the people who believe those ideologies have run the state into the ground. As California slips further into debt and the cost of living mounts, those people are moving away to states where there are more opportunities.
But rather than abandoning the beliefs that turned their previous home into an expensive bureaucratic hellhole, they often vote and behave just like they did in California. They turn cities in conservative states into bastions leftist deterioration… little microcosms of where they came from.
That’s why it’s pretty obvious that if California really did secede from the United States, it wouldn’t suddenly be unshackled from the rest of the country. The state wouldn’t become some beacon of progressive values and prosperity. Without the balancing influence of the rest of the country, which keeps California in check to some degree, everything wrong with the state would be amplified. Rather than being free to pursue some grand destiny, California would only be free to pursue the same wrongheaded policies that have driven it towards such a stark, downward trajectory.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Wow: Maine’s Governor Attacks Susan Collins for Saving ObamaCare
Calls her “downright dangerous” and explains how ObamaCare’s Medicaid expansion is killing the state’s budget while she obstructs every effort to solve the problem.
Maine Gov. Paul LePage, who appears to be a Republican of the authentic vareity, yesterday took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to call her out.
And I mean really call her out:
When it comes to expanding Medicaid, we have been there and done that. The results 15 years ago were disastrous. The state doubled the size of its Medicaid program, but this failed to reduce the uninsured rate, emergency-room visits or uncompensated care by hospitals. We were saddled with $750 million of Medicaid debt, and I spent my first two years as governor working to repay it.
By reforming Maine’s Medicaid and welfare programs, we directed resources toward the truly needy: elderly, disabled and extremely low-income Mainers. The Medicaid expansion now supported by Sens. Collins and King would open the program mostly to able-bodied people without children. These are not Maine’s most needy residents; providing them “free” health care is tantamount to giving them another welfare entitlement.
Maine’s Public Law 90, a state health-reform plan that I helped implement before it was voided by ObamaCare in 2012, can be a model for the nation. The law aimed to reduce costs by allowing Mainers to purchase health insurance across state lines and created a risk pool to cover people with pre-existing conditions.
Ms. Collins and Mr. King have ignored these ideas, since they are more interested in preening for the cameras than in making real progress. But I’ve repeatedly advised our congressional leaders about the key components of a successful health-care reform. First, any further Medicaid expansion under ObamaCare should be prohibited for the states that have declined it so far. Expansion would cost Maine $400 million to $500 million over the next five years, putting the state back into fiscal crisis.
Second, states should be given flexibility. The block grants outlined in the Senate’s original proposal would have moved Medicaid in the right direction, but still not far enough. Each state should have the autonomy to tailor its Medicaid program to suit the needs of its enrollees and taxpayers.
Third, states should be allowed to add work requirements, increase the frequency of eligibility determinations, and reduce retroactive eligibility from 90 days to 30. This would create greater accountability for Medicaid enrollees and ensure that recipients are invested in their own health care.
Given the opportunity last month to replace America’s failing health-care system with a more cost-effective plan, Sens. Collins and King instead chose to preserve the status quo while pushing an irresponsible Medicaid expansion here in Maine. Though they seem unwilling to deliver on their promises of better care, at least they have given Mainers a clear sense of their priorities.
Repealing ObamaCare clearly presents a difficult problem in that the expansion of Medicaid caused a lot more people to become dependent on it, and you have to work out some way for them to transition off it. This is why I never thought it was feasible to just do a “clean repeal” with no other legislation to deal with the problems — all caused by ObamaCare itself, to be sure — that would accompany repeal.
But people like Collins focus solely on the well-being of the newly minted Medicaid recipients and not at all on the problems of state-level taxpayers who have to foot the bill for the benefits. As Gov. LePage makes clear, Maine is one of a number of states whose budgets have already taken a severe hit from the Medicaid expansion. Even a number of states with Republican governors, mine included (sorry to remind you, Gov. Snyder, but it’s true), were enticed by the promise of federal money to fund the expansion without really thinking through the fact that the federal share would quickly decrease and eventually go away entirely.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Buyer’s Remorse: French President Macron’s Popularity Hits New Low in Embarrassing Poll
Approval rating quickly sinks to one-third
Emmanuel Macron’s approval rating has plunged to a new low, with only a little more than one-third of French voters saying they approve of the new French President’s performance, according to a new poll. Mr Macron’s popularity rating slumped by seven percentage points in July to 36 per cent, according to the YouGov poll published today for the Huffington Post France and CNews.
Almost half of French voters polled — 49 per cent — said that they “disapprove” of the job he’s doing as president.
To add insult to injury, the new president is now slightly less popular than his conservative prime minister, right-winger Edouard Philippe. Of those polled, 37 per cent said Mr Philippe was doing a “good job” as Mr Macron’s right-hand man.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
EU Airports Crack Down on European Vacationers While Jihadis Enjoy ‘Free Movement’
EU airports have been accused of punishing legitimate British holidaymakers for trying to enter Schengen countries — meanwhile, thousands of jihadis enjoy free movement across the continent.
Brits faced lines of up to four hours, including at Amsterdam’s Schipol and Paris’ Orly airports as the EU upped its security checks — but where are the strict checks on the Italian or Greek coasts where millions of migrants have arrived in the past few years?
Airlines for Europe, the lobby group which represents airlines including BA, EasyJet and Ryanair said: “We are urging member states to end this shameful situation at the EU borders. We are also urging the European Commission to use its influence on member states to ensure adequate staffing.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
A bogus policeman caught on camera smothering a computer technician in a bondage sex session murdered a second man and tried to kill a third while posing as a secret agent, a court has heard.
Jason Marshall allegedly stole £780 cash from Peter Fasoli, 58, and used his bank card to buy a ticket to Rome after attacking him in his own home in Northolt, north-west London, in January 2013.
Jurors at the Old Bailey watched disturbing footage recorded on Mr Fasoli’s computer showing how Marshall, 28, allegedly tied up and gagged his victim before smothering him with cling film after meeting him on the Badoo dating website.
After posing as a policeman Marshall set fire to the loner’s one-bedroom bungalow to cover up the killing and fled to Italy, the court heard.
For nearly two years the death was thought to be accidental until his nephew found footage of his violent death on the hard drive after Mr Fasoli unwittingly filmed the session.
An inquest in August 2013 — before the video was uncovered — recorded a verdict of accidental death.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
French President Support Drops in YouGov Poll
EMMANUEL Macron’s approval rating has plunged to a new low, with only a little more than one-third of French voters saying they approve of the new French President’s performance, according to a new poll.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Norway’s Infamous ‘Harbourmaster’ Swan Killed After Attack on Girl
After weeks of uncertainty about its fate, an aggressive swan in Hordaland has been killed after it attacked a 16-year-old girl on a boat.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
This Atomic Bomb-Proof Bunker for Sale in Sweden is the Weirdest Property You’ll Ever See
Not everyone is in the market for a building designed to withstand a nuclear attack, but that’s exactly what one estate agent has to try and sell in Sweden.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
‘Toxic Eggs’ Surfacing in Ever More German States, Officials Say
More eggs contaminated with traces of an insecticide have been discovered as not only Dutch farms but also a German facility have been found to be affected.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
A British soldier who was bitten by Britain’s most deadly spider was left with a gaping hole so deep it exposed his muscles.
Matt Clarke was ravaged by a false black widow spider and was unable to walk due to the horrendous bite to his leg.
The 31-year-old said he woke up with a ‘tingly sensation’ as he was bitten by the tiny brown spider, but brushed it off his leg and dismissed his injury at first.
Yet just days, Mr Clarke was in agony as the wound burst open and he felt hot puss dripping down his leg.
The gaping wound was so big it left him with a ‘hole he could see his muscles though’ and meant he was unable to carry out simple tasks.
Mr Clarke, from Mansfield, said: ‘I’ve been in the Army for ten years, I’ve been all over the world and slept next to more dangerous spiders and never got bit.
‘But I got bit in my own bed.’
When the pain from the wound became unbearable, Mr Clarke was forced to go to A&E.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Will Poland Leave the EU? Is Polexit About to Happen?
POLAND’s ruling party is taking a defiant stand against the European Union, refusing back down despite the threat of EU sanctions. Could Poland be the next country to leave the EU?
Brussels is threatening to strip away Poland’s right to vote on EU matters, unless the ruling party drops controversial plans to exert more control over the judiciary.
Last week EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker warned that he was prepared to impose the voting ban through Article 7 of the Lisbon Treaty.
He said: “If the Polish government goes ahead with undermining the independence of the judiciary and the rule of law in Poland, we will have no other choice than to trigger Article 7.”
But Professor Piotr Wawrzyk, of the University of Warsaw, has argued that the EU is issuing empty threats and would not follow through on sanctions.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
NSC Purge: McMaster ‘Deeply Hostile to Israel and to Trump’
Jerusalem Post columnist Caroline Glick wrote Wednesday evening that National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster is purging pro-Israel staff from the National Security Council (NSC), turning the administration against President Donald Trump’s policies.
In a Facebook post, Glick noted that “all of these people” whom McMaster has fired this week — Rich Higgins, Derek Harvey, and Ezra Cohen-Watnick — “are pro-Israel and oppose the Iran nuclear deal, positions that Trump holds.”
She noted that the firings were the latest evidence that NSA McMaster is “deeply hostile to Israel and to Trump”:
According to senior officials aware of his behavior, he constantly refers to Israel as the occupying power and insists falsely and constantly that a country named Palestine existed where Israel is located until 1948 when it was destroyed by the Jews. […] Meanwhile, she noted, McMaster has replaced pro-Israel officials with anti-Israel, anti-Trump officials, and he allowed anti-Israel Obama holdovers to continue in their jobs: […]
Glick noted that “McMaster disagrees and actively undermines Trump’s agenda on just about every salient issue on his agenda,” including the Iran deal: “As for Iran, well, suffice it to say that McMaster supports the deal and refuses to publish the side deals Obama signed with the Iranians and then hid from the public.”
She also noted the irony that Trump had only hired McMaster, under pressure, because he was recommended by Sen. John McCain (R-AZ):
[Comment: McMaster is also deeply hostile to the USA and Trump’s vision for the USA. He is clearly a traitor and a globalist stooge planted by McCain. It is stunning that he has not been ejected from his position. This garbage of sabotaging Trump cannot continue.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Senate Foreign Relations Committee Passes the Taylor Force Act Aimed at Defunding Palestinian Terror
by Jerry Gordon
Before Congress adjourned today, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed the Taylor Force Act (S. 1697) on a bi-partisan basis with all Republican members voting. Most Democratic members voted for the measure with one amendment introduced by Virginia Democrat Sen.Tim Kaine to keep any impounded funds for the Palestinian Authority in escrow for a year beyond any sequestration action. Other Democratic members of the Committee who voted for the Act included, Ranking Member Ben Cardin (Md), Robert Menendez (NJ), Chris Coons (De) and Ed Markey (MA).
The Act is directed at withholding US funds from supporting the Palestinian Authority “pay for slay” program providing monthly stipends to terrorists in Israeli jails or their surviving families.
Analysis of the Palestinian Authority budget for 2017 revealed that such payments accounted for half of foreign aid of $693 million, $345 million. The only exempted funding allowed is for humanitarian and security purposes…
| — Hat tip: Jerry Gordon | [Return to headlines] |
CNN’s ‘Exclusive’ Report on Russia Arming Taliban Debunked by Their Own Expert-Exposed as Propaganda
Atlanta, GA — In just the latest example of CNN operating as a deep state propaganda outlet, on July 25, the cable news network published a bombastic report; releasing two exclusive videos intimating that the Russian government was covertly arming the Taliban, which has returned to significant prominence in Afghanistan since the 2014 cessation of NATO combat operations.
The large-scale anti-Russia propaganda operation, meant to indoctrinate Americans into a mindset that demonizes Russia as “the enemy,” and Putin as a dictator, has been pushed en masse to the American public at a steady rate since the end of the 2016 election cycle.
The explosive CNN report, which was widely reported across the media landscape, noted that two separate groups of Taliban fighters have received “improved weaponry … that appears to have been supplied by the Russian government.” The weaponry reportedly included Kalashnikov rifles, heavy machine guns, and sniper rifles. And while many of the weapons in the video appear to be of Russian origin, there is nothing to connect the Russian government to the weapons.
While the news made headlines and was shared widely across social media — the problem is that CNN’s report has lots of bark and no bite. Aside from a flashy headline, the report provided no evidence of the Russian government providing or transferring weapons to the Taliban. This was established according to weapons experts from U.S. Special Operations Command and several non-governmental conflict arms organizations.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
‘Leave Chinese Land or Face War’: China MOD Official Warns India Amid Border Standoff
A combative Indian defense expert who accused Beijing of running bellicose news stories against Delhi drew a strong response from his Chinese TV show counterpart, who said Indian troops must leave the contested Doklam area if they do not want war.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Bondi Synagogue Ban Over Terrorism Risk Leaves Jewish Community Shocked and Furious
A LOCAL council has banned the construction of a synagogue in Bondi because it could be a terrorist target, in a shock move that religious leaders say has caved in to Islamic extremism and created a dangerous precedent.
The decision, which has rocked the longstanding Jewish community in the iconic suburb, was upheld in court this week as the nation reeled from the alleged airline terror threat and debate raged over increased security measures at airports and other public places.
The Land and Environment Court backed the decision by Waverley Council to prohibit the construction of the synagogue in Wellington St, Bondi — just a few hundred metres from Australia’s most famous beach — because it was too much of a security risk for users and local residents.
Jewish leaders are shocked the decision appears to suggest they cannot freely practice their religion because they are the target of hate by Islamist extremists — and that the council has used their own risk assessment of the threat posed by IS against it.
The head of the local Jewish community said the council and the court had effectively stifled freedom of religion and rewarded terrorism.
“The decision is unprecedented,” Rabbi Yehoram Ulman told news.com.au.
“Its implications are enormous. It basically implies that no Jewish organisation should be allowed to exist in residential areas. It stands to stifle Jewish existence and activity in Sydney and indeed, by creating a precedent, the whole of Australia, and by extension rewarding terrorism.”…
| — Hat tip: JP | [Return to headlines] |
A young Melbourne man who sexually assaulted a 13-year-old girl and stole her mobile phone may face deportation to his native Ethiopia after serving a sentence, a court has been told.
| — Hat tip: SS | [Return to headlines] |
Sydney Terror Plot: Bid to Smuggle Bomb Through Airport Thwarted at Check in
A Sydney-born terrorism plot to place a bomb on a passenger plane was dangerously close to being carried out before it was unwittingly thwarted at an airline check-in counter.
New details about the attempt to bring down the commercial flight out of Sydney provides a chilling insight into how close Islamic State-inspired terrorists allegedly came to executing the mass-casualty attack.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
An alleged terror plot to blow up a plane was thwarted by staff at Sydney Airport’s check-in desk, because the bag allegedly containing the bomb was too heavy to carry on board.
| — Hat tip: SS | [Return to headlines] |
African Migrants Descend on Brussels Park
A park in the middle of Brussels has filled up with camping migrants still hoping to find a way of sneaking into the UK.
In the last week, dozens of migrants have set up camp again in the Maximilian Park in the Belgian capital, directly opposite from the Belgian Immigration Office.
The migrants — largely from the east African countries of Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea — are said to be uninterested seeking asylum in Belgium.
It comes shortly after France announced it would open two shelters for migrants sleeping rough in Calais, raising fears it could lead to a new ‘Jungle’ camp.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
‘Bomb Italian Ships!’ Shock as Libyan General Threatens Italy Over Migrant Rules
LIBYA has ordered its military to bomb Italian ships in a shocking threat to naval fleets heading to the coast to help with the migrant crisis.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Calais Migrants Try to Enter Britain 18,000 Times Despite Jungle Camp Cleared
CALAIS migrants tried to cross the Channel and enter Britain almost 18,000 times this year alone despite the Jungle camp being cleared.
The former French president Francois Hollande demanded the shanty town be torn down in October last year — with around 8,000 migrants from countries including Eritrea, Sudan, Syria and Iraq being dispersed around France.
However within weeks of the demolition, many gradually returned to the site.
And now around 1,000 migrants are believed to be sleeping rough in the area a year on.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Canada Turns Olympic Stadium Into Welcome Center for ‘Refugees’ From U.S.
Self-deportation increasing under President Trump
Faced with a flood of asylum seekers traveling from the United States into Quebec, Canada, local authorities have repurposed Montreal’s Olympic Stadium and turned it into a refugee welcome center.
A spokesperson for PRAIDA, the local government agency that helps refugees, tells the CBC more than 1,000 asylum seekers crossed the border into Quebec last month. “In comparison, PRAIDA helped 180 people in July 2016,” the CBC writes.
The vast majority of the asylum seekers are Haitians who initially fled the devastating earthquake in 2010, and whose future status in the U.S. is unclear under the Trump administration.
The surge of refugees overwhelmed the YMCA facilities that are normally used to temporarily house new arrivals.
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Cultural Enrichment: Grenade Attacks in Sweden Increase Sevenfold
Police stations, social offices targeted
Grenade attacks in the progressive paradise of Sweden have increased sevenfold as a result of the country’s proud embrace of cultural enrichment.
“Police figures show that there were eight reported cases pertaining to hand grenade attacks in 2014,” reports SVT. “Last year the figure was 52.” All of the hand grenades seized by police were obtained from the former Yugoslavia. Sweden has accepted hundreds of thousands of migrants from Middle East and North Africa over the last few years.
An expert at the National Police Department who wanted to remain anonymous (speaking on record negatively about anything connected to migrants in Sweden now requires anonymity), said the use of hand grenades was
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
German Mayor Furious After Sudanese Migrant Molests Ten-Year-Old Girl
Jan Peter Bechtluft, mayor of the German town of Papenburg, has expressed fury after a 26-year-old Sudanese asylum seeker was arrested for sexually molesting a ten-year-old girl at a local shop.
The Papenburg mayor said: “For people who commit crimes, there can be no right to asylum.” His comments come after a pair of Sudanese asylum seekers in their 20s were arrested by police on suspicion that one of them had sexually molested a ten-year-old girl by grabbing at her chest, Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung reports.
Police spokesman Achim van Remmerden also told German press that the 26-year-old asylum seeker had been arrested a week prior to the sex attack after getting overly intoxicated with a group of other asylum seekers. The man is said to have attacked and injured police officers on more than one occasion in the past.
The sex attack occurred in the toy section of the Kaufland supermarket according to officials. They say that the man approached the ten-year-old, molested her, and then fled the scene after employees called the police. He then returned to the shop later in the day with another asylum seeker and the pair attempted to steal items by putting them under their clothes.
When officers arrived on the scene, they overpowered the two resisting asylum seekers and brought them into custody. “In the subsequent review by the police, the two perpetrators made considerable resistance by kicking and hitting. In addition, the policemen were spat on,” police said. Mayor Bechtluft took to Facebook after the incident writing: “A handful of criminals now discredit more than 800 refugees in our city.”
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Germany Could Have Deported Hamburg Supermarket Attacker in 2015
New reports show the German government attempted to deport Islamist and failed asylum seeker Ahmad A., who stabbed a person to death last week, but were unable because authorities missed a key deadline by one day.
A new report reveals that the German government made an attempt to deport the Islamist killer to Norway under the Dublin agreement. The Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) missed the deadline for the deportation application by a single day and as a result, the Norwegians refused to cooperate, Die Welt reports.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Iranian People-Smuggling Ring Smashed as Spanish Police Arrest 101
MORE than 100 people have been arrested as police smashed a smuggling ring trafficking Iranian migrants as young as five into the UK.
Officers closed in on the gang after seven Iranian nationals were caught carrying fake passports while trying to board a commercial flight from Hamburg, Germany, to the UK a year ago, the European Union’s law enforcement agency Europol said.
In all, some 44 Iranian nationals were stopped at airports across Europe and were found to be carrying forged passports.
The group, operating out of Malaga, in southern Spain, charged each migrant €25,000 (£22,380) for forged Spanish passports, travel documents, transfers and accommodation at their intended destination.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
Italy Seizes German NGO Boat for ‘Clandestine Immigration’ And Contacting People Smugglers
ROME (AP) — Italian authorities ordered a German group’s migrant rescue vessel seized Wednesday, alleging that its crew took on migrants directly from smugglers’ boats near Libya’s coast.
The vessel operated by Jugend Rettet was seized in the port of Lampedusa, a tiny fishing island off Sicily, where many of the hundreds of thousands of migrants rescued at sea in the last few years are taken.
| — Hat tip: Reader from Chicago | [Return to headlines] |
The report, by the Heritage Foundation think tank, found that attacks across Europe by foreign trained militants increased dramatically in 2016, following the height of the migrant influx, with Germany becoming a much more popular target.
“The increase in the threat to Germany is especially stark,” the report’s authors write. “There were no plots in Germany in 2014, and only two in 2015. In 2016, this increased eightfold.
“There is a straightforward reason for this: In 2015, Germany took in over 1 million refugees and 2016 saw a surge in plots involving refugees.”
[Comment: Angel “We Can Do It” Merkel is basking in a job well done for her globalist masters who seek to destabilize western civilization and balkanize Europe. A necessary step for the globalist creation of an even more tyrannical EU superstate. In the traitorous globalists eyes, fellow citizens murdered by jihadis is just “teething pains” on the road to the glorious superstate.]
| — Hat tip: JD | [Return to headlines] |
Sweden’s Armed Forces Show Support for Pride With Rainbow Laces
Sweden’s Armed Forces have marked Stockholm Pride with a Facebook post showing the colours of the rainbow flag on a pair of military boots.
| — Hat tip: Charles Low | [Return to headlines] |
Let me know if anyone records Sweden’s Armed Forces singing THE LUMBER JACK ditty.
“Let me know if anyone records Sweden’s Armed Forces singing THE LUMBER JACK ditty.”
Your wish is my command:
(With not-so-sincere apologies to Terry Jones, Michael Palin, and Fred Tomlinson.)
I’m a Swedish guy and I’m okay
My government tells me what to say
He’s a Swedish guy and he’s okay
His government tells him what to say
I will appease, the Liberal bunch
I eat lingonberries
På onsdag when I’m popping
I’ll sit down when I pee
He will appease, the Liberal bunch
He eats lingonberries
På onsdag when he’s popping
He’ll sit down when he pees
He’s a Swedish guy and he’s okay
His government tells him what to say
I’m on my knees, and then my rump
I drop soap in the showers
With gender reassignment, I’ll get my general’s stars
He’s on his knees, and then his rump
He drops soap in the showers
With gender reassignment, he’ll get his general’s stars
He’s a Swedish guy and he’s okay
His government tells him what to say
With négligées and well-timed squeals
Just like dear Evelyn Waugh
I want to be a tranny, just like my dear mama.
With négligées and well-timed squeals
Just like dear Evelyn Waugh
He wants to be a tranny, just like his dear mama.
He’s a Swedish guy and he’s okay
His government tells him what to say
Should one wonder where the migrants sleeping rough in Brussels are taking care of their necessary bodily functions? And before they were allowed into Europe did they have to show proof of currently valid protection against yellow fever and that they have enough money to support themselves for the duration of the Schengen visa they obviously applied for, were granted and are carrying?
Just joking. But it [annoys] me that I have to pay my taxes and dues and follow a set of rules while others, who think it’ll be nice to live over here, don’t have to.
And if the boot is on the other foot and westerners are travelling en masse to the countries these folk come from, does the same set of rules apply? Just asking.
Once upon a time immigrants that showed up to become wards of the state were immediately barred and deported.
How amazing would the West be if those policies were still in force?
A planning request for a new synagogue in the Sydney suburb of Bondi has been turned down by the local council. The council were concerned that a new Jewish house of worship would increase the risk of a terrorist attack in Bondi.
If anyone is wondering if this will change the passionate support given by the Jewish Community in Australia to mass immigration by Muslims, I can answer with confidence: it won’t.
Yet another nauseating demonstration of cowardice by so-called Western ‘leaders’.
Gosh, the mayor of the German town of Papenburg is furious after a Sudanese migrant has assaulted a young girl in a shop, tried to steal things, spat at and attacked police officers, and have attacked and injured police ON MORE THAN ONE OCCASION. These high-spirited people should be very scared.
Erm, the article didn’t mention that these [choose your descriptor] have already been ejected from Germany and that the good people of Papenburg may therefore proceed with their lives in the manner to which they’ve been accustomed. But they WON’T be ejected and will be allowed to proceed with their applications. And if these fail, still they won’t be ejected.
Did anyone else see this report from today’s “Khartoum Times”: “German asylum seeker sexually assaults ten-year old girl in Khartoum shop. The same man had already been grossly intoxicated and had attacked and injured police officers on more than one occasion. Later, he and another German returned to the same shop, tried to steal certain items, and spat at and attacked police officers who tried to arrest them. The mayor of Khartoum is very angry. However, the foreigners involved are still in the Sudan. Their asylum claims will be duly processed. Meanwhile they will be housed, fed, given pocket money and medical care.’All people are equal’ stated a government spokesman, ‘no culture is better than any other and we must not risk infringing their human rights. Their journey here was hazardous and they have risked their lives.’ Asked whether rights carried with them corresponding obligations, he replied that in Khartoum it was yet again a very hot day. Pressed as to whether the rights of the Sudanese people were not more important than those of German and other interlopers attracted by the Sudan’s high level of culture and civilisation, not to mention its very generous welfare payments, available practically on demand, he stated that borders were in any case artificial constructs and that his interlocutor was ‘a racist and worse than a Nazi’.”
The RINOs of congress like Ryan, McCain and Collins deserve to be thrown into the political darkness and find a real job. They appear eager to destroy the USA.
“Its implications are enormous. It basically implies that no Jewish organisation should be allowed to exist in residential areas. It stands to stifle Jewish existence and activity in Sydney and indeed, by creating a precedent, the whole of Australia, and by extension rewarding terrorism.”…
If I were a hot headed Jewish youth I would blow up every mosque in Sydney!
Of course, groups that pose a credible threat of violence will always be rewarded.
Always. That much has been made clear to me in following the ascent of Islam in the West for the past 30 years.
Comment: McMaster is also deeply hostile to the USA and Trump’s vision for the USA. He is clearly a traitor and a globalist stooge planted by McCain. It is stunning that he has not been ejected from his position. This garbage of sabotaging Trump cannot continue.
Trump’s Administration needs to get out the National Security Criminal Laws (covering treason, espionage, sabotage and terrorism), from the bottom drawer, dust them off, [redacted] and start [using them]!
‘I think the CIA hates Trump for a very simple reason: he’s threatening to take away their livelihood.’
But there are many in the CIA and FBI who support Trump. National Security is threatened by others than Russia – North Korea, China, and the Arabs as well as Iran. The CIA and Trump would agree on this.
The problem as I see it, and I could be wrong, is that Trump’s enemies have their own agenda, to get rid of him because he is not a globalist and he is not a New Left ideologue of the Alinsky type. He stands for the Judeo-Christian West of nation states. That is what the globalists are hell bent on destroying so he has to be sidelined or eliminated.
We know the financial institutions will desert him when it suits them and he may even be under a lot of pressure from his clever son-in-law, in a financial crisis, to buckle under and fall into line with them.
Knowing he has an emotionally charged temperament and can act impulsively, the Obama saboteurs, holed up in a bunker near the White House, are determined to PROVOKE him into making a move they can impeach, or even execute a military coup, ‘for the protection of the public.’ That explains the recklessness and boldness of their behavior. Hopefully General Kelly will prevent this from happening.
Also driving them is fear of exposure. Having got away with murder for eight years by treating the Constitution as not worth the paper its written on and the institutions of government as tools to leverage their own agenda, they thought that Hillary’s victory would permanently hide from the public the volley of scandals and illegality which characterized the Obama administration.
If all the scandals, which the DemocRAT media turned a blind eye to were now unmasked, the party would be destroyed as having zero integrity! Even the Democrats, who see themselves as decent people, seem uneasy and troubled by the intensity of their party’s unrelenting witch hunt against Trump. It has gone beyond the bounds of normal, acceptable behavior.
But if there were an ‘engineered’ catastrophic financial crash, normality would go out the window, and riots in the streets would justify a coup! That is perhaps the biggest danger. I’m sure Soros is working on this plan 24/7!
I believe Trump’s perceived willingness to act without due consideration is entirely a perception that is not based in how Trump has proven his ability to think and talk on his feet time and again. For example; He demolished all his opponents on the race to the White House, and sometimes devastatingly so, if one considers Jeb Bush’s bowing out after finding himself humiliated following a barrage of facts thrown at him by Trump.
I agree with much of what you have written here however, and would put forward that there has never been anyone, nor is there likely to be in future, anyone with the gravitas and metel of Trump who seems able to read between the lines of every conversation he has ever had, and has an ability rarely seen, to draw out exactly what the speaker really means.
Unfortunately, Trump is a one off, and what he can achieve in his time as President is really up to how he can circumvent and then neuter, the status quo in place that is pushing back hard against him and will use any means necessary to to be rid of him. He is now in the battle of his life and not just for his own survival, but for that of his family and his country.
He is a brave man, a Patriot and it grieves me that there are many who not having any dog in this fight, fail to appreciate what they now have.
About the human trafficking band in Spain:
There should be a lot more bands like that. UK is the main destination for Iranian passport holders. Around 3-4 years ago, I was informed about a Turkish band by someone who claimed to be a close friend of theirs. The costs, as he told me, is around 10 times a simple worker income (around 4000 USD). I figured out some will end up working in potato farms for free until freed to wander around towns; and I guess the traffickers coordinate with British partners who chase these illegals. Some will be hired by the same Turkish band inside UK (possibly illegal jobs). By the way, I doubt anyone worth anything will ever take that kind of path to UK. Most of these guys are hot-headed adventurers at best. (Please be informed: These Turkish traffickers are citizens of Iran not Turkey)