US Lawmakers Debate Strategy After IS Gains
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Islamic State militants have made significant gains in recent days, following temporary setbacks inflicted by coalition air strikes on their positions. The radical Islamist group seized the historic Syrian city of Palmyra Thursday just days after capturing Ramadi in Iraq. Republican lawmakers in the U.S. Congress are calling for greater U.S. military engagement against Islamic State, but the Obama administration rejects that strategy. Zlatica Hoke has more.
 Первый канал |
Боевики "Исламского государства" установили полный контроль над границей между Сирией и Ираком
Первый канал Экстремисты захватили последний из удерживавшихся правительственными восками контрольно-пропускной пункт Эт-Танф. Они напали на него после того, как овладели Пальмирой и Эс-Сухной, а также несколькими нефтепромыслами и газовыми место-рождениями на востоке ... и другие » |
The former head of famed Russian space company Energia, which launched the first satellite and manned space flights, was charged with abuse of power and placed under house arrest by a Moscow court May 21.
 Politico |
Hollande's calculated turn on Russia
Politico “There are two camps in the French establishment: the so-called Gaullist line which sees Russiaas a partner in an enlarged, continental Europe; and those who are much more critical of its record on human rights, and its historical revisionism in ... Hollande says Russia, rebels must be pressured to respect ceasefireYahoo News Reuters: Hollande says Russia, rebels must be pressured to respect ceasefireKyiv Post Hollande Says Russia And Rebels Need To Be Pressured To Respect TruceRadioFreeEurope/RadioLiberty all 12 news articles » |
The United States has sent a top envoy to Israel to try to revive talks on a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons.
 УНИАН |
Американский ракетный эсминец "Росс" зайдет в Черное море
Интерфакс Москва. 22 мая. INTERFAX.RU - Эскадренный миноносец DDG 71 "Росс" войдет в субботу в акваторию Черного моря, сообщает 6-й флот ВМС США. "Эсминец "Росс" из состава Шестого флота ВМС США сейчас находится в Эгейском море и завтра войдет в Черное море", - информирует ... Эсминец ВМС США завтра войдет в Черное мореРБК Украина ВМС США: Эсминец Ross войдет в Черное море 23 маяФонд стратегической культуры В Черное море войдет ракетный эсминец СШАСводка Украинских и Мировых Новостей Eynulla Fatullayev -Голос UA Все похожие статьи: 29 » |
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Islamic State militants are reported to have seized another town in Iraq's western Anbar Province, less than a week after capturing the provincial capital, Ramadi.
The beatification of an assassinated archbishop is an important marker in the routing of hard-line conservatives in the church.
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Obama Speaks About Anti-Semitism at Washington Synagogueby webdesk@voanews.com (Jerome Socolovsky)
President Barack Obama will visit one of Washington's largest synagogues Friday and is expected to outline his administration's response to the resurgence of anti-Semitism in Europe. The speech at Adas Israel Congregation coincides with a "Solidarity Sabbath," in which government officials in the U.S. and Europe are going to synagogues to show their support for Jewish communities on both sides of the Atlantic. Seventy years after the Holocaust, a number of Jews have left or are considering leaving Europe because they fear for their safety. Jews have been bullied and beaten, and were targets of murder in the recent attacks by Islamist militants in Paris and Copenhagen. “A speech by a U.S. president cannot stop Jews from making the assessment that it's not safe to be there for themselves or for their children, or their grandchildren,” Jason Isaacson of the American Jewish Committee said in an interview. But, Isaacson added, “the president can inspire and encourage European leaders to seize this issue and make it their own, and make the fight against anti-Semitism a fight to protect European values.” Obama's synagogue visit follows friction with Israel and some Jewish leaders over his strategy for a nuclear deal with Iran. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has criticized it as weak. Obama won large majorities of Jewish votes in both of his presidential elections, and Isaacson said the president has been seeking lately to reassure this traditionally Democratic voting bloc. “I think the president sees all that, sees that there is an important constituency that he has in the American Jewish community,” said Isaacson, who was part of a meeting Obama held with Jewish leaders last month in which the Iran deal and America's relationship with Israel were reportedly discussed. “He wants to reach out to that community and reassure that community that he continues to take their concerns very seriously,” Isaacson added. Obama's visit is also intended to mark Jewish Heritage Month, which honors the contributions of Jews to American society and culture.
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Are Chinese/Russian Military Exercises an Effort to Offset US Primacy? by webdesk@voanews.com (Li Bo)
China and Russia conducted joint naval exercises this week in the Mediterranean Sea — a sign, some security experts say, that the two countries are stepping up defense cooperation to offset U.S. military primacy. The Russian Defense Ministry said a total of 10 warships from the Russian Navy and China’s People's Liberation Army Navy took part in the week-long exercises. The Chinese Defense Ministry said the joint exercises focused on navigation safety, at-sea replenishment, escort missions and live fire exercises. The goal of such exercises “is to strengthen mutual understanding between the navies... regarding boosting stability, countering new challenges and threats at sea," Vice-Admiral Alexander Fedotenkov, a deputy commander of the Russian Navy, said before the exercises began. Fedotenkov is leading the Russia navy in the exercises. The Russian-Chinese exercises come as NATO and its allies are also holding military drills in Europe. But Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov, insisted “the war games aren’t aimed against any third country and aren’t linked to the political situation in the region.” Former U.S. Deputy Undersecretary of Defense Jeffrey Bialos told VOA that China may be using the exercises to try and keep its strategic options open. "Maybe the Chinese see this as a way to offset the U.S. situation, and keep their foot in both camps, but this is too soon to tell,” Bialos said. Former Japanese Minister of Defense Satoshi Morimoto said early in May in Washington that the joint exercises can help both China and Russia position themselves against the U.S. diplomatically. “If you look at the contents of these exercises, they increase the skills of their troops, they also have cooperation of equipment, they can invite third country to join,” he said. But Richard Weitz, Director, Center for Political-Military Analysis, Hudson Institute, told VOA that Beijing and Moscow are not becoming military allies despite growing defense ties. “Their exercises are becoming more robust in East China, off Chinese coast, but it is nothing like the U.S. would do with Japan or our NATO allies,” he said. China and Russia “are not testing joint military operation at any capacity,” he added. Experts say Russia has increased cooperation with the Chinese in both economic and military spheres while relations between Moscow and the U.S. have deteriorated amidst the standoff over Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping recently signed large economic deals after Putin gave Xi a warm welcome at the Victory Parade earlier in May. Chinese troops marched on Red Square during that event. China has also invited Russian troops to march in a parade in Beijing in September to commemorate the end of World War II.
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Russia Now in ‘a State of War for Survival with the US,’ Russia Today Commentator Says by paul goble (noreply@blogger.com)
Paul Goble
Staunton, May 22 – Rostislav Ishchenko, a commentator for Russia Today who gained notoriety for arguing that Moscow should “preventively occupy” the Baltic countries, says that Russia today “is in a state of war with the United States and that each of its citizens is on the front lines regardless of whether he is fighting with arms in his or her hands.”
In a speech to a May 17 conference on “The Ukrainian Crisis and Global Politics” organized by the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies (RISI) and in an interview given to Prague’s “Parlimentni Listy” portal yesterday, Ishchenko presents these and other notions which because of his closeness to the Kremlin deserve attention.
(For his speech to the RISI meeting in St. Petersburg, see riafan.ru/278739-rossiyanam-pora-ponyat-chto-oni-uzhe-na-voyne-ekspert/as discussed by Kseniya Kirillova innr2.com.ua/blogs/Ksenija_Kirillova/Kremlevskiy-analitik-priznal-chto-lidery-LNR-rossiyskie-marionetki-97299.html.For his interview, see parlamentnilisty.cz/arena/rozhovory/Ukrajinsky-politolog-vazne-mluvi-o-veseni-oligarchu-Valka-pry-zaplavi-celou-zemi-a-pricina-je-v-USA-375962 and in Russiantopwar.ru/75365-intervyu-rostislava-ischenko-cheshskomu-izdaniyu.html.)
In his speech in St. Petersburg, Ishchenko, who is also president of the Moscow Center for Systems Analysis and Prediciton, said that it was already long past time to speak about the existence of a state of war, about why it had come about, and about how Russia must prosecute it in order to ensure its national survival.
According to Ishchenko, “the war was inevitable” because the US needed to expand its markets and could do so only by turning Ukraine against Russia. Only Russia could resist the US, he says, because of Moscow’s nuclear arsenal, one “approximately equivalent” to that of the US, even though Russia’s economy is much smaller.
Indeed, he continued, “GDP and other economic indicators do not play as important a role” as many imagine. “The barbarians destroyed the Roman Empire even though their GDPs were microscopic” in comparison with Rome’s. That must be kept in mind, he said, now when “a war for survival, for determining who will live in the brave new world,” is taking place.
In this situation, he argued, it is important to understand that “we are on the frontlines. We have a common enemy and we have a common victory. Each of us is fighting for his or her future. It is not important what weapons we are employing, guns, computers, or pieces of paper. We are fighting for our lives” and for “the survival of our people and of ourselves.”
“Unfortunately,” Ishchenko said, “the eney is a very serious one. This is the largest economy in the world. One cannot defeat it today or tomorrow however much we would like. Yes, we will take losses, in the Donbas and in other places, not just in Ukraine.” Instead, Russia is facing as its zone of operations “all of Eastern Europe.”
In his Prague interview, Ishchenko provides context for these extremely militaristic and aggressive views. He argues that Putin’s “greatest service” to Russia has been that he has restored the country’s power step by step rather than by radical measures, so gradually that only now can Russians “see the gigantic extend of the work he has carried out.”
The war in Ukraine is a result of a general overreaching by the United States, a trend that reflects the “dizzy with success” feelings many American officials had after the collapse of the USSR and their sense that the US could do anything. Now, thanks to Putin’s rebuilding of Russia, they are learning that they have underrated the power of those arrayed against them.
“Putin has acted correctly,” Ishchenko says. “Now his time has come and he can calmly offer the US any compromise. Washington has gone too far. Compromise for it is defeat and loss of face.” Because that is the case, the US will increase tensions in what will prove a failed effort to reverse the situation.
As far as Ukraine is concerned, Ishchenko argues that “the civil war [there] will not only continue” in the Donbas “but spread throughout all of Ukraine.” And he adds that those parts of Ukraine, like those parts of other former Soviet states, will ultimately rejoin Russia in one form or another.
“There won’t be such small states around Russia,” he suggests. “Most likely they will become part of Russia [because] that is what the people populating these regions are seeking. If there won’t be such a possibility, then they will form under a Russian protectorate a confederal or federal union (or even two or three of these).”
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Amnesty International says both warring sides in eastern Ukraine are almost daily perpetrating war crimes, including torture and summary killings of prisoners.
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RIGA, Latvia — The last time European leaders gathered to discuss the future of the nations that lie between E.U. borders and Russia, the talks sparked a biting Russian response and the crisis in Ukraine. This time, they are treading lightly.Read full article >>
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One of the Twin Cities men charged with supporting terrorism planned to kill FBI agents who were investigating their activities over the last 10-months, according to federal authorities who’ve reviewed a confidential informant’s secret recordings of conversations in early April that detailed the threats.
“If there’s no way out, I’m saying. If our backs are against the wall, I’m gonna go kill the one who punks me,” said Mohamed Farah, one of seven men from the Twin Cities who is charged with supporting terrorists in the Middle East. “You know the one. Everybody has that one Fed that you know. Yours is the one, that tall-assed nigga, M***.”
Farah, who drove to San Diego in late April with another Somali-American man from Minneapolis and a confidential informant working for the FBI, said in another conversation what he would do once he crossed into Mexico in hopes of then being able to fly to Turkey. “I’m going to spit on America at the border crossing,” he told Abdirahman Yasin Daud, another defendant in the case.
The two men then talked about what they’d do upon their arrival in Syria, specifically naming two FBI agents involved in the investigation. Farah is recorded saying he would tweet the agents and ask them, “What up suckas?”
While driving from Minneapolis to San Diego, Farah discussed how they would obtain an “AK” assault rifle immediately after getting into Syria, according to documents filed in the case based on the informant’s recording. Farah said that he “would become ‘shaheeds’ (martyrs)” before they even entered a training camp.
The threats against the agents were revealed Thursday by federal prosecutors, who argue in court filings why the entire group of suspects should be considered dangerous and not be released from custody pending trial.
To further buttress their case, prosecutors released a text transcript of a conversation Daud allegedly had with a terrorist in Syria. Daud sought advice on what his next step should be as he attempted to leave the U.S. by crossing into Mexico and then flying to Turkey. Daud is told what city he should book a flight to and to couch it with making reservations for a hotel stay to avoid suspicion. “IF you are questioned at airport you have holiday package to show,” Daud was instructed, according to the text. “So its like they can’t do nothing. And your alibi should be you coming to have a party. Then when you touch down inshaAllah.”
The new twist in the sprawling case, which has drawn international attention to the Twin Cities’ Somali community comes on the eve of a Friday detention hearing for Daud, who was returned from San Diego earlier this week and made his first court appearance on Tuesday. Defense attorneys for the all of the suspects vehemently argued in court last week that their clients had no criminal records and could be electronically monitored from the homes of their families or correctional halfway houses, rather than being held in various county jails across the metro area.
Over the last two years, more than 20-Somali-Americans from the Twin Cities area have left to fight alongside terrorists aligned with the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). This latest case represents a new wave of recruits, young men and a few women who’ve sought to flee the U.S. for Syria. Previously, there have been at least four waves of young men who, beginning in 2007, fled to Somalia to fight with Al-Shabab, a terrorist brigade linked to Al-Qaida.
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In the midst of the
last-minute Congressional debate
about whether to re-authorize Patriot Act Section 215, the Justice Department Inspector General (IG)
released a long awaited report
today on how the FBI has used (and abused) Section 215 for the past few years. Unfortunately, the report is heavily redacted so the law's use remains largely shrouded in secrecy, but one passage in the IG report is particularly revealing: It directly contradicts what Attorney General Loretta Lynch said just today about Section 215’s supposed importance.
As ACLU's Jameel Jaffer pointed out, one of the IG report's main conclusions is that FBI “did not identify any major case developments that resulted from use of the records obtained in response to Section 215 orders.”
Meanwhile, today Attorney General Loretta Lynch weighed in on the debate in Congress, claiming the exact opposite. She was quoted by CBS News as saying that if Patriot Act Section 215 expires: “[W]e lose important tools. I think that we lose the ability to intercept these communications, whichhave proven very important in cases that we have built in the past.” (emphasis mine)
So to sum up: the Justice Department’s own Inspector General said information collected under Section 215 did not lead to "any major case developments,” but the Attorney General said that Section 215 has “proven very important in cases that we have built.” Both statements cannot be true.
It’s no wonder hardly anyone believes what government officials say about the alleged importance of the FBI or NSA’s mass surveillance programs anymore.
About the Author
Trevor Timm is a co-founder and the executive director of the
Freedom of the Press Foundation
. He is a writer, activist, and lawyer who specializes in free speech and government transparency issues. His work has appeared in The Atlantic, Al Jazeera, Foreign Policy, The Guardian, Harvard Law and Policy Review, Politico, PBS MediaShift and Salon. Trevor formerly worked as an activist at the
Electronic Frontier Foundation
. Before that, he helped the longtime General Counsel of The New York Times, James Goodale,
write a book
on the Pentagon Papers and the First Amendment. In 2013, he received the Hugh Hefner First Amendment Award for journalism.
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After months of fierce fighting, the Islamic State of Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) captured the town of Palmyra northeast of Syria’s capital Damascus on Thursday, leaving the group in control of more than half of the country’s territory—and raising fears among experts that its fighters will begin smashing spectacular ancient sites.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has ordered a review of the circumstances that allowed Islamic State militants to seize the key city of Ramadi several days ago.
Is Fall of Palmyra a Strategic Loss for Syria?by webdesk@voanews.com (Heather Murdock)
The swift takeover of Palmyra—after only days of fighting—may have been a huge military victory for the Islamic State group but it may have also been, in part, a calculated strategic loss for the Syrian government. Mario Abou Zeid, a researcher for the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, says Damascus is fighting rebel forces that it considers a much greater threat than the Islamic State “The Assad regime would rather pave the way for the Islamic State,” he said, "rather...
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 Haaretz |
Concern in Jerusalem over international decision against Israeli nuclear program
Haaretz Israeli officials worried Obama administration won't help foil creation of international committee for nuclear-free Middle East; White House says it won't 'break commitments to our Israeli partners.' By Barak Ravid | May 22, 2015 | 12:44 AM ... Israel nuclear weapon 'secret' could be exposedgulfnews.com all 117 news articles » |
FBI used Patriot Act to obtain 'large collections' of Americans' data, DoJ finds by Spencer Ackerman in New York
Report by department’s inspector general found that the FBI received from the Fisa court 51 orders for such data between 2007 and 2009
As lawmakers and security agencies braced for a potential loss of the heart of the Patriot Act, a long-delayed Justice Department report showed that the FBI uses the surveillance authorities it provides for “large collections” of Americans’ internet records.
Section 215 of the Patriot Act permits the FBI to collect business records, such as medical, educational and tax information or other “tangible things” relevant to an ongoing counter–terrorism or espionage investigation. Since 2006, the NSA had also secretly used it to collect US phone data in bulk.
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 NEWS.com.au |
'This is the Chinese navy ... You go!'
NEWS.com.au CHINA says it is entitled to keep watch over airspace and seas surrounding artificial islands it created in the disputed waters of the South China Sea, following an exchange in which its navy warned off a US surveillance plane. The US Navy P8-A Poseidon ... and more » |
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