#2
Post war America where simple things like a small Levittown house with a white picket fence was enough to start a family. Way too many GenZ princesses literally want a chateau mansion.
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/15/2024 16:49 Comments ||
Top||
#6
Assassination attempt by a white male in his sixties with an AK-47. Captured in his getaway truck by the police after the Secret Service shot back, and missed.
President Trump is unharmed and safe.
See posts here and here. With thanks to Frank G and NN2N1, who both got us the information.
For our Russian military readers, this is the advantage of a free people with free access to communications: the professionals simply cannot have as many eyes and hands as the common folk do when they self-organize.
[8am] The Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems.... (ISIS) has grabbed credit for the attack on Daykundi residents.
On Thursday night, September 12, 2024, ISIS issued a statement on its Amaq news site, claiming that its forces killed 15 Shia individuals and maimed six others.
ISIS has a thing about the Shiites in its neighbourhood, especially Afghanistan’s Hazeras.
ISIS reported that the attack occurred in the Qariodal mountain pass, on the border between Daykundi and Ghor provinces.
Earlier, sources informed the Hasht-e Subh Daily that gunnies attacked a vehicle carrying Daykundi residents, resulting in 14 deaths and six injuries.
The Taliban ...the once and current oppressors of Afghanistan... in Ghor have not yet commented on the incident.
Hazara ...a grouping of Dari-speaking people of Sino-Tibetan descent inhabiting Afghanistan and Pakistain. They are predominantly Shia Moslems and not particularly warlike, which makes them favored targets... and Shia communities frequently face attacks in various provinces, with ISIS claiming responsibility for most attacks against Hazaras.
Meanwhile,
...back at the shouting match, the spittle had reached unprecedented levels... the Taliban assert that they provide nationwide security and deny the presence of ISIS in Afghanistan.
According to local officials, the victims of this incident were residents of the Sang-Takht and Bandar districts of Daikundi who had gone to welcome pilgrims returning from Karbala.
[Garowe] At least five people were killed and eight others maimed in a series of roadside explosions in Mogadishu's Kahda district on Saturday, according to local officials. The blasts targeted a popular spot where young people often gather for recreational photography, escalating concerns over security in the Somali capital.
Abdullahi Sheikh Abdirahman, the district commissioner of Kahda, confirmed the incident, describing the scene as chaotic with immediate emergency response efforts hampered by secondary explosions. "The first explosion caused a rush of people to assist the injured, and that's when the second blast occurred, causing most of the casualties," Abdirahman told news hounds.
Witnesses at the scene recounted the horror of the incident. "I saw several people lying on the street minutes after the first explosion, and when rescuers came to assist, another blast happened,".
The attack bears the hallmark of al-Shabaab ... the personification of Somali state failure... which has grabbed credit for numerous attacks in Somalia, aiming to destabilize the federal government. Although no group has officially grabbed credit for this latest incident, local officials and security analysts point towards al-Shabaab, given the group's history of targeting civilian gatherings.
[IsraelTimes] Greek-flagged Sounion was abandoned in August with 150,000 tons of crude oil, sparking warnings of potential environmental disaster
An operation to tow an abandoned tanker struck by Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of... ’s Iran's Houthi sock puppets ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The legitimate Yemeni government has accused the them of having ties to the Iranian government. Honest they did. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews They like shooting off... ummm... missiles that they would have us believe they make at home in their basements. On the plus side, they did murder Ali Abdullah Saleh, which was the only way the country was ever going to be rid of him... rebels in August, threatening environmental disaster, began Saturday and is ongoing, a Greek defense ministry source told AFP. The Greek-flagged Sounion is being towed northwards under military escort, the source said.
The tanker was hit last month by Iran-backed Houthis off the coast of Hodeida while carrying 150,000 tons of crude oil.
"(The tugboat) Aigaion Pelagos has begun to gradually tow the tanker northwards, escorted by military vessels," the defense source told AFP, adding that the ships’ radars had been turned off for security reasons.
The official added that a rescue team had boarded the tanker and attached tow cables, overcoming "adverse conditions."
Once the tanker is safely out of the area, the source said that an update would be given on the operation.
Greek state news agency ANA said the tugboat was escorted by three frigates, helicopters and a special forces team, without disclosing the states of origin.
A Greek fireship also stood ready to lend assistance if required, ANA said.
The tanker had been anchored west of the rebel-held port city of Hodeida, midway between Yemen and Eritrea ...is run by the People's Front for Democracy and Justice (PFDJ), with about the amounts of democracy and justice you'd expect from a party with that name. National elections have been periodically scheduled and cancelled; none have ever been held in the country. The president, Isaias Afewerki, has been in office since independence in 1993 and will probably die there of old age... The European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... ’s Red Sea naval mission, Aspides, said earlier Saturday that the salvage operation of the Sounion "is essential in order to avert a potential environmental disaster in the region."
"To achieve this, several public and private actors are working together," it added.
OIL SPILL FEARS
The Sounion was hit by missiles off the coast of Hodeida on August 21. After the initial strike, the Houthis returned and detonated charges on the ship’s deck, setting off new fires.
Damage to the vessel had threatened a Red Sea oil spill four times the size of the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster off Alaska.
The Sounion’s crew — made up of 23 Filipinos and two Russians — was rescued the day after the attack by a French frigate serving with the EU mission.
A salvage operation had been attempted earlier this month, but Aspides at the time had said that "the private companies responsible for the salvage operation have concluded that the conditions were not met to conduct the towing operation and that it was not safe to proceed."
The vessel was still on fire on September 12 but there were no signs of an oil spill from the main cargo hold, Aspides said Friday.
2024.08.29
[BenarNews] Families speak of hiding sons to prevent them from becoming cannon fodder.
Muhammad often stares at this snapshot of his kid brother, Farhad. It’s one of the few pictures he has of the 13-year-old who has been missing for months.
In May, Farhad was kidnapped while coming home from his school inside Bangladesh’s sprawling Balukhali refugee camp. (Both brothers’ names along with those of other camp residents have been changed to protect their safety.) Farhad and his four brothers had lived in the camp since August 2017 after fleeing a bloody military crackdown in neighboring Myanmar.
"I’m not just like his brother," Muhammad, 26, told Radio Free Asia in June. "I’m like his father; he’s like my son."
In the weeks after Farhad’s disappearance, a desperate Muhammad pieced together some of his brother’s movements through a handful of phone calls with him. But there have been far more questions than answers.
While Muhammad didn’t know who exactly kidnapped Farhad, the camp in Cox’s Bazar is overrun by gangs. Several of these have been abducting Rohingya and smuggling them back across the border to fight in the war raging inside Myanmar.
Along with other forms of violence, abductions have long plagued the camps. Men and women are trafficked for labor or sex work, leaders are kidnapped as punishment for their advocacy and sometimes refugees are kidnapped simply to extort funds from their family.
But starting earlier this year, a different form of kidnapping became common. Facing mounting battlefield losses, Myanmar’s military government announced in February that it would begin enforcing a long-dormant conscription law.
In Rakhine state, where the junta is fighting a number of resistance groups, its efforts to add soldiers have not stopped at the border. Just to the north, the Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh, camps, with their large, trapped refugee population and entrenched criminal enterprises, appear to have become feeder lots for the military — and for its opposing forces.
In their phone calls, Farhad told Muhammad that he had been smuggled into Rakhine state and taken south to Buthidaung. Later, he was handed over to the Myanmar military, which placed him in a training camp with about 40 other Rohingya men and boys. For the first two weeks, Farhad was given arms training, but eventually, he was pulled out of formal training and ordered to assist with cooking and running errands for soldiers, he told his brother on the phone.
"The abduction and forced conscription in Myanmar and in the camps — it’s one of those things that’s so horrific that even though everything is already so terrible for them... here things are getting worse again," said Jessica Olney, an independent analyst who has covered the Rohingya refugee crisis for years and in May published a paper for the United States Institute of Peace on conditions inside the camp.
Kidnappings including Farhad’s have changed the contours of life in the refugee camps, instilling a new form of terror among a deeply traumatized population. Shops are staying closed, as are doors. Roads that were once crowded with children playing and young men milling around have gone quiet. The appearance of an outsider brings only looks of distrust. Many families have taken to hiding their sons, brothers and nephews.
Since Farhad’s abduction, his classmates have lived in fear of becoming the next victim, according to Muhammad. "Most of the students are afraid," he said. "But it’s kind of a new normal now."
’NOW OUR OWN PEOPLE TORTURE US’
An ethnic Moslem minority, Rohingya have long faced violence and persecution in their native Myanmar where they are not legally recognized as citizens. For decades, many who fled wound up inside the dozens of camps in Cox’s Bazar — a city on the coast of Bangladesh named for an 18th century British colonial who managed refugee resettlements.
The bloodshed reached a crescendo in August 2017, when a Myanmar military campaign of rape, arson and murder sent more than 740,000 Rohingya fleeing into Bangladesh. The U.S., U.N. and others have classified those attacks a genocide.
Today, more than 1 million Rohingya live inside these tightly packed camps of tarps and bamboo where Muhammad and his family have tried to eke out an existence.
But the Bangladesh government still views the Rohingya as temporary residents and conditions inside the camps are bleak.
Landslides and fires regularly kill while a lack of sanitation and clean water means scabies, cholera and other diseases are disturbingly common. Schooling and health care are hard to come by, there’s not enough food and almost no one is legally allowed to hold a job.
Added to these challenges is a worsening security situation — sending more people fleeing from the camps. Abductions and arson have become commonplace, as have drugs, human trafficking and extortion. Last year, at least 90 people were killed in the Cox’s Bazar camps amid fights over criminal territory.
Still, a steady stream of Rohingya have nowhere to go but Cox’s Bazar. Back in Myanmar, the war in Rakhine state may be edging toward another genocide, according to observers. Amnesty International this month warned the latest attacks, in which fleeing civilians were bombed, "bear a terrifying resemblance to the atrocities of August 2017."
The situation has made Rohingya doubly vulnerable to criminals: Those fleeing Myanmar must pay off smugglers to get them to Cox’s Bazar. At the same time, those trying to leave the refugee camps — via a risky sea voyage to Malaysia or Indonesia — must also pay hundreds or even thousands of dollars to the traffickers.
Often, the traffickers are tied to gangs controlling the camps. The largest of these groups originated inside Myanmar as murderous Moslem Rohingya movements but have expanded operations into crimes outside the country’s borders.
The kidnappings of men and even boys to serve as fighters, assistants and cannon fodder for both the junta and its opposing forces — or to sell back to their desperate families — appears to have become yet another source of their revenue, Rohingya refugees told Radio Free Asia, a news service affiliated with BenarNews.
Moustafa, another refugee living in the camps, used to visit his relative’s tea shop often. The gossip he and his friends shared there represented a rare taste of normality for those whose lives had been repeatedly upended.
Now, such moments are impossible, he told RFA in June. One week earlier, Moustafa was sitting in his usual seat when a group of gunnies grabbed two youths just outside the shop. The kidnappers were thought by Moustafa to be working for the Arakan Army (AA) — the armed wing of the predominantly Buddhist Rakhine, or Arakanese, self-determination movement.
The AA has denied forced conscription, calling such claims "unfounded" in an interview published by The New Humanitarian.
Days after witnessing the abduction, Moustafa was still shaken.
"Sometimes the camp administration sends police, but most of the time they do not," he said. "Living in the camp is very hard now. We were tortured and displaced by different groups [in Myanmar], and now our own people torture us."
While gangs operate inside the camps, chief among them are the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army (ARSA) and Rohingya Solidarity Organization (RSO). Analysts and refugees alike say the militia groups, along with the lesser-known Arakan Rohingya Army, bear the brunt of the responsibility for the conscription abductions.
ARSA first came to widespread notice in August 2017 when it attacked 30 police outposts and army bases in Rakhine, killing at least 12 officers and triggering the brutal military crackdown that followed. The murderous Moslem group gained notoriety in the months and years that followed, including for a particularly violent mostly peaceful attack on a Hindu village that saw scores, if not hundreds, killed.
By 2019, the turbans had turned their attention to criminal activity inside the camps, with a report by rights group Fortify Rights noting that ARSA had begun abducting, detaining and torturing its critics.
RSO, which has been in existence for four decades, has carried out a similar campaign inside Cox’s Bazar.
In the case of kidnappings for conscription, the group appears to have gone after minors.
"We noticed that RSO was doing forced coercion and putting pressure tactics on really different parts of the population," said John Quinley III, a director of Fortify Rights. "There were some cases of forceful conscription of children."
Under international law, it is illegal for children younger than 15 to be recruited or sent to fight, though an optional children’s rights protocol ratified by most countries, including Myanmar, raises the age to 18. Conscription of civilians of any age by non-state actors, such as ARSA and RSO, is also illegal.
In July, Fortify Rights released an investigation detailing how armed Rohingya groups were kidnapping refugees from the camps and turning them over to the junta. Refugees who had been kidnapped and later escaped told Fortify Rights of being nabbed at a market or cafe, brought across the border and handed over to soldiers. One said he had been released only after his family handed over $850.
’THERE IS NO SAFE PLACE FOR US’
The threat of abduction has prompted desperate families to try to move their sons to safety. Given the security situation across Cox’s Bazar, that’s a near impossibility.
In mid-May, Damira sent her 22-year-old son to stay with relatives in a neighboring refugee camp. The family had recently arrived from Myanmar, fleeing violence in Maungdaw that saw their house burned and relatives killed. But their new home inside Cox’s Bazar has offered little sense of security.
"Compared to Bangladesh, the fear inside Myanmar was less," Damira told RFA in June. "We never imagined we would have to hide our son here."
There are almost no protected spaces within the massive, little-policed camps. Bangladesh’s strict controls on freedom of movement for refugees make it almost impossible to leave, Quinley said. And while the U.N. refugee agency can move anyone facing threats from one camp to another, "RSO has a huge presence around all the camps," he said.
It is impossible to know how many children — or adults — have been kidnapped from the camps to fight inside Myanmar. Citing a confidential U.N. report, the Agence La Belle France-Presse news service reported that about 1,500 Rohingya had been forcibly conscripted from the camps as of May.
One local aid worker told RFA he believed 3,000 had been kidnapped, but several humanitarians and analysts acknowledged there was no way to know for sure how many refugees have been sent to fight.
Ali, who crossed into Bangladesh from Myanmar seven years ago, told RFA that whatever normality he and his family had managed to carve out in the years since disappeared the moment forced recruitment began.
"For the last few months we have been living in extreme fear," he said. In May, he sent his 16-year-old son to live with relatives elsewhere in the camps. Almost every day since he has heard of a boy being kidnapped for suspected forced recruitment. He is anguished by the idea that he cannot protect his child.
"The day before yesterday, my son told me that the area is also not safe. Every night a group of people have been patrolling. Whenever they spotted a young man, they targeted them to drag them to Myanmar," he said.
"Until death there is no safe place for us."
So far, Bangladeshi authorities appear unable or unwilling to address the security situation. Both Fortify Rights and Human Rights Watch last year released reports revealing widespread corruption, abuse and extortion by the Armed Police Battalion, or ABPn, which since 2020 has been responsible for camp security. Several bigwigs at ABPn declined to comment when reached by RFA, though previously the ABPn defended their record, telling BenarNews last year they had done much to protect those living inside the camps.
AN ENDLESS TRAP
Quinley of Fortify Rights said that RSO appeared to change tactics in May, following protests by women inside the camp and significant pushback from the larger community. RSO has denied both the use of children and a reported shift to going after teachers and leaders, insisting it’s carried out no forced recruitment. In audio messages published by Shafiur Rahman, a journalist who runs Rohingya Refugee News, RSO leader Ko Ko Linn referred to such reports as propaganda and boasted of having thousands of trained volunteers.
"There’s no need for the general public to be afraid or leave the camps," he said, according to a translation by Rahman.
But such claims do little to calm the nerves of those living inside the camps.
Months after his brother’s abduction, Muhammad is no closer to knowing whether it was RSO, ARSA or another group that took Farhad. All he knows is his brother went to school, tried to come home and disappeared.
"I don’t know if he is alive or not because the last time I was able to talk to him, my brother told me that they are out of food," Muhammad told RFA in June. While he spoke, rain pounded at the thin walls of their sparse home, seeping through one edge of the roof. His 4-year-old lay sleeping in the corner.
According to Muhammad, about six weeks after being forced across the border, Farhad managed to escape with three other boys. He called his brother from the jungle, telling him they found a trafficker who could smuggle him back into Bangladesh if given enough money. Muhammad thought the boy’s voice sounded weak and Farhad admitted he was sick. As Muhammad considered how to scrape together the funds to pay for Farhad’s release, his brother became unreachable — he could no longer get through on the phone.
From time to time, when he is feeling scared or stressed or angry, Muhammad dials a now useless number. At the other end, a prerecorded message tells him the phone has been switched off. But this is the last number at which he heard from Farhad, so what else can he do but try it, over and over again.
[IsraelTimes] This year, the Islamic Republic set a new benchmark for its cyber strategy, which extends far beyond the battlefield to include influence operations and intelligence gathering.
Iranian cyberattacks on Israel have surged in the wake of the October 7 onslaught by the Iran-backed terror group Hamas ..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,... , and as the Israel-Hamas war continues to rage, cybersecurity analysts warn these digital incursions will continue regardless of any ceasefire or de-escalation in the Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... Strip.
Meanwhile,
...back at the pie fight, Bella opened her mouth at precisely the wrong moment... with Israel-Hamas negotiations stalled, Tehran’s hackers, backed by the regime, are further honing their capabilities in what experts say could become a forever war in cyberspace.
Despite efforts to tamp down the flames of war, experts told The Times of Israel, any calming of hostilities will not stop digital conflict between the two nations.
"I don’t think [Iran] is going to be happy with Israel, even in the case of a ceasefire or some sort of improvement in conditions" in Gaza, said Ben Read, who heads cyberespionage analysis at Mandiant, a Google-owned cybersecurity firm.
Iran’s cyber capabilities have become a key element of its broader strategy to defend national interests, deter Western intelligence, and engage in espionage, said John Fokker, who leads threat intelligence at cybersecurity company Trellix. Under the auspices of a branch of the armed forces and a government ministry, Iran ...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate JewsZionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol... has steadily expanded its offensive cyber programs, he said.
Since the Hamas-led October 7 massacre, Iranian operatives and cybercrime groups aligned with the Khamenei regime have escalated their cyberattacks on Israeli government and private sector infrastructure. In retaliation, suspected Israeli-aligned hackers have launched their own cyber offensives, targeting Iranian critical infrastructure, including gas stations.
Iran’s cyberwarfare capabilities have long been in development. In 2012, its "Shamoon" virus crippled 30,000 computers at Saudi Aramco in one of Iran’s most notorious attacks. More recently, in 2020, its hackers targeted Gilead Sciences to steal COVID vaccine research. In 2019, the regime’s cyber operatives carried out a wave of attacks on American cities and airports, highlighting the regime’s ability to disrupt critical infrastructure, Fokker noted.
"These incidents reflect the rapid advancement of Iran’s cyber capabilities, making it a significant threat," Fokker told The Times of Israel.
Now, amid the Gaza conflict, Iranian hackers have targeted Israeli assets more aggressively. In November, the Iran-linked "Cyber Av3ngers" hacking group grabbed credit for breaching industrial water treatment equipment in America. Tehran is in the global public eye again for cyberwarfare after the US intelligence community said its hackers targeted the Donald Trump ...They hit him with slander, they impeached him twice. Nancy Pelosi tore up his State of the Union address on national TV. They stole an election and put his adherents in jail. They vilified him. They couldn't crucify him, so they shot him. Still, they can't keep him down... and Kamala Harris So Ukraine is a country in Europe. It exists next to another country called Russia. Russia is a bigger country. Russia is a powerful country. Russia decided to invade a smaller country called Ukraine. So, basically, that’s wrong presidential campaigns.
James Shires, a technology and global affairs expert who co-directs the European Cyber Conflict Research Initiative, said much of Tehran’s work has been centered on influence operations. Iran’s state-sponsored actors have been amplifying propaganda, spreading disinformation and manipulating social media narratives as part of their broader cyber strategy, Shires said.
The war itself has hinged heavily on perception and reputation, Shires said, stressing the importance of online perception battles in modern conflicts.
It’s a two-sided game, though. Israel ran its own secret influence campaign targeting US politicians, according to a June report from The New York Times
...which still proudly claims Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... that cited officials involved in the effort and documents tied to the operation.
"Anything that can change that perception is massively valuable for both sides," Shires told The Times of Israel.
Iranian spin doctors have also embraced artificial intelligence tools to spread disinformation. One AI-driven covert campaign produced fake news websites aimed at influencing American voters, though, according to OpenAI, the effort failed to gain significant engagement.
Three government-linked cyber entities have been driving Tehran’s cyber efforts, according to Read at Mandiant.
These advanced persistent threat (APT) groups — APT33, APT34 and APT42 — operate with sophisticated tactics. APT33 and APT42, for example, are linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and have been targeting Israeli military officials and individuals involved in American presidential campaigns. In the past six months alone, the US and Israel accounted for around 60 percent of APT42’s known targets, according to Google threat intelligence findings.
APT34, meanwhile, is likely tied to Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security, and has been found conducting espionage campaigns against African and Saudi Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat Frational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start... n targets. It’s also previously compromised Israeli companies, including a human resources website.
Despite the technical prowess of these groups, experts say Iran’s cyber capabilities fall short of those of cyber titans such as Russia and China. However,
you can observe a lot just by watching... the attacks can still be disruptive.
"They can’t necessarily shut down power to the White House," Read said, "but if they want to get into a US business, that’s well within their capabilities."
Read described much of Iran’s recent activity as targeting "low-hanging fruit," including universities and businesses, rather than sensitive defense assets.
Iran’s cyber influence extends beyond its borders, with proxy groups like the Leb ...an Iranian satrapy currently ruled by Hassan Nasrallah situated on the eastern Mediterranean, conveniently adjacent to Israel. Formerly inhabited by hardy Phoenecian traders, its official language is now Arabic, with the usual unpleasant side effects. The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else? It is the home of the original Hezbollah, which periodically starts a war with the Zionist Entity, gets Beirut pounded to rubble, and then declares victory and has a parade. The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers... -based terror group Hezbollah also engaging in cyberattacks. In November, Hezbollah-linked hackers breached Ziv Medical Center in the northern Israeli city of Safed. Meanwhile,
...back at the pie fight, Bella opened her mouth at precisely the wrong moment... Iranian-backed Iran's Houthi sock puppets ...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the Believing Youth. Hussein Badreddin al-Houthi is said to be the spiritual leader of the group and most of the military leaders are his relatives. The legitimate Yemeni government has accused the them of having ties to the Iranian government. Honest they did. The group has managed to gain control over all of Saada Governorate and parts of Amran, Al Jawf and Hajjah Governorates. Its slogan is God is Great, Death to America™, Death to Israel, a curse on the Jews They like shooting off... ummm... missiles that they would have us believe they make at home in their basements. On the plus side, they did murder Ali Abdullah Saleh, which was the only way the country was ever going to be rid of him... groups in Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of... have deployed phone spyware against targets across the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the occupiers of Greek Asia Minor... , according to mobile cybersecurity company Lookout.
A ceasefire or any reduction in fighting between Israel and Hamas wouldn’t slow the tempo of Iran’s cyber buildup, Shires said, underscoring the ongoing threat that Iran poses in cyberspace. But he stressed that if a positive diplomatic outcome isn’t reached soon, then a miscalculated cyberattack from either side could skyrocket tensions even further.
"That could very quickly be read into this tit-for-tat escalation... where each side is trying to calibrate very carefully what is appropriate and proportionate to respond, while also not going too far," he said.
Iran’s lesson after October 7 is clear: Cyberspace is not just a battleground for war, but a powerful medium for influence operations and intelligence gathering. And it is just getting started.
"The cyber stuff seems to be a way for Iran to both impact Israel and be seen impacting Israel that does not incur a significant escalation," Read said. "I don’t see it changing."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
09/15/2024 00:00 ||
Comments ||
Link ||
[11130 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
Iran carries out dozens of DDOS attacks each day on Israel. Several start ups in Israel now specialize in protecting against DDOS attacks and these start ups are in the process of going global to protect US and other industrial countries from these attacks.
Israel has had some pretty effective cyberattacks on Iran as well.
Just a few years ago, a cyber attack on Iran caused a major industrial disaster at a steel mill, messing up train schedules and paralyzing pumps at gas stations.
Posted by: Lord Garth ||
09/15/2024 0:21 Comments ||
Top||
Brown University trustee resigns in protest of upcoming vote on Israel divestment
[IsraelTimes] Politically conservative, multi-billionaire hedge fund manager Joseph Edelman decries school’s ‘stunning failure of moral leadership’ in agreeing to student protesters’ demand in letter also published in the Wall Street Journal; university criticizes his ‘misunderstanding’ of decision.
Carlson is not a student, staffer or faculty member at Columbia, Bragg’s office said. The son of the late advertising executive Dick Tarlow, he owns a multi-million dollar townhouse in Park Slope, Brooklyn and has a history of arrests dating to 2005, according to the New York Post,. He is one of more than a quarter of the people arrested at the Hamilton Hall protest who were not affiliated with Columbia, according to the NYPD.
”You embarrassed our beloved school. Now you will pay! BWAHAHAHAH”
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Students who took part in the pro-Palestinian protests last spring are now being punished by universities with protracted suspensions and mandatory contrition essays. As the fall term gets underway, college authorities figuring out the right disciplinary actions to take against the groups who gathered on campus and erected encampments as they demanded their schools sever financial ties with Israel.
“The practice of issuing statements supports some members of our community while disregarding others, intentionally or otherwise,” Maud Mandel, the president of Williams College and a Jewish Studies scholar, wrote in a letter to campus last week explaining her own decision to remain neutral after Oct. 7 — a decision she has now codified into college policy. “It makes some issues visible while leaving many more unseen.”
She wasn’t the only one to opt out. This week the University of Pennsylvania, Barnard College and the University of Alabama’s campuses were some of the latest schools to announce they would institute a broad policy of “institutional neutrality” on world events that do not directly affect the populations of their universities. Yale University, too, announced it would be exploring whether to adopt a similar policy.
These schools join around two dozen others that already have codified some policy of political neutrality, according to the campus free-speech organization FIRE, which supports adopting such policies. Most of them have only been implemented within the past few months. And Jewish leaders, many of whom pushed for strongly-worded university statements in the wake of Oct. 7, are divided on the issue.
In a statement to JTA, Hillel International CEO Adam Lehman called institutional neutrality “a good step forward in returning campuses to their core missions of education, learning and research.”
But, he said, the policy “is not a panacea that solves the problems of harassment, intimidation and discrimination directed at Jewish students.”
The list of schools that adopted a neutrality policy this year includes elite universities such as Harvard, Columbia, Stanford and the University of Southern California, all schools that faced significant unrest over campus responses to Oct. 7. It also includes some large public universities and systems, including Syracuse, and the University of Texas. The University of North Carolina adopted such a policy in July 2023.
Neutrality is also the word of the moment for closely-watched university investments in Israel. The University of Minnesota recently said its investing strategy would “adopt a position of neutrality” and that “investment decisions continue to be based on financial criteria already defined in policy.”
But other Jewish activists in the campus space are against institutional neutrality. Speaking to Jewish Insider, Mark Yudof, chair of the pro-Israel Academic Engagement Network and former president of the University of California system, said the idea had “iffyness” when it came to Israel because what happens there does directly affect Jewish members of campus.
“If you’ve had assaults of women, racist misbehavior, if Jewish students can’t cross campus safely, I expect presidents to speak out about that and I don’t want institutional neutrality to say they can’t look out for the best interests of students, faculty and staff,” Yudof said. At least one Jewish college president, Oakland University head Ora Pescovitz, said she opposed neutrality.
Even schools that had already embraced institutional neutrality before Oct. 7 found themselves wading into the dialogue on Israel. Notably, Michael Schill, the Jewish president of Northwestern University, condemned Hamas after Oct. 7, even as he used the same statement to endorse a policy of institutional neutrality. Months later, Schill was pilloried by Jewish groups including the ADL, who called for his resignation for brokering a deal with his school’s pro-Palestinian encampment; Northwestern this week announced an investigation of a faculty member who took part in the encampment, and said it is canceling his classes for the semester.
#4
FBI and Secret Service both calling it an assassination attempt. White male in his sixties arrested in car with AK-47 after he fled Secret Service return fire and drove away.
#6
Fog of war, Glavinter Peacock7962. Not reported is not the same as didn’t happen, so we’ll see.
But I hope one of President Trump’s first steps in the Oval Office is to order the old standards of ability and training are reestablished, and all who don’t make the cut let go immediately, without fear or favour.
Secret Service agents opened fire on a man who was seen with what may have been a gun while former President Trump was on the golf course, according to law enforcement sources, the New York Post reported.
"Sources said the Secret Service spotted a suspicious individual on the Trump International Golf Course West Palm Beach, and opened fire when agents saw what appeared to be the barrel of a gun," according to the Post.
CNN is now reporting that it is believed the shots were intended for former President Trump and that the shooter had an AK-47 rifle.
The suspect remains unidentified, though Florida state Rep. John Snyder has stated that the suspect is a "white male, in his mid 60's."
This article has been updated again — go to the link to see, as I can’t keep up.
Townhall is also updating their story here: FBI is calling this an assassination attempt.
Instapundit is updating his post on the subject here.
Added per comment below: assassin named as Ryan Wesley Routh.
According to CNN; several Shots were fired in the direction of Former U.S. President Donald J. Trump, with Secret Service Agents having returned Fire in the direction of where the Shots occurred from as the Suspect fled the Area in a Vehicle. Witnesses provided an Accurate…
Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor-Greene reported that there was another assassination attempt on Trump. There was a shooting in the area where Agent Donald was. Trump is alive and well, the bullets went somewhere further this time.
The series, to survive until the US elections, continues...
A Kalashnikov assault rifle was found at the scene of the shooting. Russian trace.
#5
NY Post reports he is 58, lives on Hawaii, and is of the left, though reading deeper into the article suggests to me he will turn out to be off his rocker.
A Facebook search gives a photo that purports to be the man, but they may have another of the same name — it’s happened before. 48 Hour Rule, always.
Second Trump assassin, Ryan Wesley Routh, was connected to Rep Adam Kinzinger through his support of Ukraine. Here he’s being interviewed by Newsweek about his effort to recruit mercenaries to fight in Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/6SnLYFkHv7
#11
That Corella DeVille style hair, if you will, especially when black and white, is a dated fashion stating one's commitment to the 'alphabet people cause'.
He is not dead. So I assume he is a nut job.
Or social media scrubbed.
That said - how did he get the rifle if he is from Hawaii? The two legal ways I can think of is purchased in Hawaii and traveled with it, or purchased it once there and if you have never tried to purchase any firearm as a non-state resident is a real hassle.
[KhaamaPress] Quetta police in Pakistain have reported that two people were killed in a bomb explosion targeting a police vehicle in the center of Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... The Quetta police announced on Saturday, September 14, that two coppersbit the dust in the earth-shattering kaboom that hit a police vehicle.
So far, no group has grabbed credit for the attack in Quetta.
According to reports, Pakistain’s Prime Minister, Shehbaz Sharif, condemned the terrorist bombing in Quetta in an official statement.
This incident occurred just a day after a roadside kaboom explosion in the "Qalat" region of Balochistan injured eight Pak soldiers.
The security situation in Pakistain has tanked in recent months as turban groups have escalated their attacks, particularly targeting security forces in Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa provinces.
Militant groups such as the Tehrik-e-Taliban ...Arabic for students... Pakistain (TTP) and Baloch bully boyz have intensified their operations, leading to increased instability in the region.
The rise in turban activity poses a serious threat to Pakistain’s internal security, with frequent attacks disrupting daily life and endangering both civilians and law enforcement agencies.
[IsraelTimes] Videos and pictures posted online show smoke rising from scrubland near the Route 1 highway near central Israel, apparently from shrapnel after the Israel Defense Forces attempted to shoot down a ballistic missile launched from Yemen ...an area of the Arabian Peninsula sometimes mistaken for a country. It is populated by more antagonistic tribes and factions than you can keep track of... A picture shows damage to an escalator at a train station on the outskirts of Modiin, some 25 kilometers (18 miles) east of Tel Aviv.
Police say they are searching for shrapnel in the Judean lowlands area east of Tel Aviv.
The IDF said earlier that the missile landed in an open area, after sirens were activated in areas stretching from Tel Aviv east to Modiin. It said it was investigating the interception attempts.
According to reports, an initial interception attempt may have failed to hit its target before reaching Israeli airspace, which would explain why shrapnel fell inside Israel.
The military made several attempts to intercept a ballistic missile fired from Yemen by the Iran-backed Houthis at central Israel this morning, the IDF says, though the results of the attempts are still being investigated.
The army says the missile fell apart in the air, citing an initial probe.
“From a preliminary examination, it appears that the missile apparently disintegrated in the air,” the IDF says.
The missile was launched at around 6:21 a.m., and sirens sounded across central Israel at 6:32 a.m. According to the Houthis, the missile reached hypersonic speeds and reached Israel in 11 minutes. Some have questioned more warning time was not given.
The military attempted to shoot down the missile using both the long-range Arrow defense system and the Iron Dome, which is usually used for shorter-range attacks, the IDF says.
Shrapnel from the missile and the interceptors impacted open areas in the Ben Shemen forest, close to Kfar Daniel, as well as at a train station near Modiin. No serious injuries were reported.
In a short televised speech, Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree claimed responsibility for the ballistic missile attack.
Saree said a hypersonic missile was launched at an unspecified military target in the Tel Aviv area, boasting that the projectile eluded the gauntlet of American and Israeli aerial defense systems, and caused “fear and panic” in Israel.
“It forced more than two million Zionists to run to shelters for the first time in the enemy’s history,” he said.
He warned that Israelis could expect more attacks and “quality operations” in the lead-up to the anniversary of the Hamas terror group’s October 7 massacre, including a response to Israel’s June bombing of the Hodeida port in Yemen, a lifeline for the terror group, and in order to perform the Houthis’ “religious and moral duty” to support Palestinians, he said.
[IsraelTimes] Airstrikes target Hamas operatives in Gaza City school-turned-shelter and other buildings used for weapons manufacturing; IDF says it killed 100 gunmen in Rafah in recent days
The Israel Defense Forces on Saturday called on Paleostinians in parts of the northern Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... city of Beit Lahiya to evacuate, following rocket fire from the area aimed at the southern coastal city of Ashkelon.
Two rockets were launched at Ashkelon earlier in the day, with one being intercepted and the other impacting the sea.
The IDF in recent months has repeatedly issued evacuation orders for areas from which faceless myrmidons launched rockets at Israel.
Col. Avichay Adraee, the IDF’s Arabic-language front man, published a map on of the zones to be evacuated, saying "the specified area has been warned many times in the past."
The area is "considered a dangerous combat zone" following repeated rocket attacks on Israel, Adraee said.
Also on Saturday, an Israeli Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... in Gaza City targeted a group of Hamas ..always the voice of sweet reason... operatives using a school-turned-shelter as a command center, the IDF said.
In a statement, the IDF said that the terror group was using the Shuhada al-Zeitoun School, which has been serving as a shelter for displaced Gazooks, to plan and carry out attacks against Israel and Israeli forces.
The IDF added that it took steps to mitigate civilian harm in the strike and noted that Hamas "systematically" uses civilian sites for terror.
First responders in Gaza reported five dead, including two children and a woman, and several others maimed.
The bodies "were pulled from under the rubble after Israeli warplanes hit the Shuhada al-Zeitoun school with two missiles," said Mahmud Bassal, front man for the Hamas-run civil defense agency.
Israel says Hamas regularly uses schools and other civilian sites for its operations.
In a separate airstrike Saturday, the IDF struck two buildings used by Hamas in Gaza City’s Sheikh Radwan neighborhood, also close to a school-turned-shelter, the military said.
The military said the buildings were used by Hamas operatives for various attacks and to manufacture weapons. The IDF denied some Paleostinian reports that the strike targeted a fuel facility in the area, near the Dar al-Arqam School.
Gaza’s Hamas-run civil defense reported five dead in the strike.
Meanwhile,
...back at the desert island, Bert was realizing to his horror that he'd had only one bottle for one message, and he'd forgotten to include a return address... the IDF said Saturday that troops had killed more than 100 button men during operations in the southern Gaza city of Rafah’s Tel Sultan neighborhood.
Soldiers also located rocket launchers, weapons caches, and other infrastructure belonging to Hamas, the military added.
[IsraelTimes] 15 arrested in Tel Aviv as hostage deal protest again merge with anti-government groups, drawing hundreds of thousands of attendees.
Most of the hysterical anti-Bibi verbiage left at the link for those who really want to read such vicious nonsense.
The mother of an kidnapped Israeli soldier played an audio clip of her son addressing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu from his captivity in Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with an iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... at a weekly protest in Tel Aviv on Saturday evening, as hundreds of thousands of people gathered at multiple locations across the country to demonstrate against the government and call for a hostage release-ceasefire deal.
Recall that protest leaders there overestimate crowd sizes by between half and an order of magnitude.
The audio clip of Matan Angrest, roughly 30 seconds in length, was the first public sign of life from him since he was kidnapped from the Nahal Oz military base on the morning of October 7.
In the recording, which the Hostages and Missing Families Forum said was recently obtained in Gaza, Angrest used terminology highly likely to have been dictated by his Hamas ..a regional Iranian catspaw,... captors, and referred to himself and his fellow hostages as "prisoners."
If it was dictated by Hamas then it has absolutely no value except as proof of life on that day, whenever it was. The words of the message are themselves meaningless, no matter how much they accord with the desires of that portion of the hostage families.
"Netanyahu," he said in the clip, "you must, must do this exchange between the [Paleostinian] prisoners in Israel and the prisoners here. I very much want to see my family and friends, it’s very important. I think you’re capable of it. I trust you."
His mother Anat Angrest chose to play the recording at the weekly rally in Tel Aviv to drive home her demand for a deal to secure the release of the 101 hostages still captive in Gaza.
Demonstrations calling for a hostage deal have taken place on a near-weekly basis following the October 7, 2023, Hamas terror onslaught, when thousands of snuffies invaded southern Israel from the Gaza Strip, killing some 1,200 people, taking 251 hostages and sparking the war with Israel inside the Paleostinian enclave.
The protests surged in numbers at the start of September, following the recovery from a tunnel in southern Gaza of the bodies of six murdered hostages, who autopsies revealed had been shot by their captors just days before Israeli soldiers reached them.
In Tel Aviv last week, the hostage deal rally and the anti-government protest merged for the first time, drawing what organizers claimed was roughly half a million people — making it the largest protest in Israeli history.
Except that they had to merge two causes to achieve whatever the real number was, suggesting that neither anti-Bibi cause was drawing enough on its own.
The two demonstrations merged once more on Saturday, and the joint Tel Aviv rally lasted several hours before dispersing — mostly peacefully — at around 11 p.m.
The police said, however, that 15 people had been arrested for disturbing public order after they attempted to block the Ayalon freeway by lighting bonfires in the middle of the road.
Antifa tactics, bought and paid for by rich transnational Progressives with the help of the Biden State Department.
Accompanying the mainstream protest, various left-wing groups were dotted around near the Kaplan-Begin interchange throughout the protest, demanding an end to the IDF’s campaign in the Gaza Strip.
A 20-strong group called on Israelis to refuse military service as they waved flags of the far-left Antifa ...the armed wing of the Democratic Party... movement.
See? Not even hiding it a little anymore…
and hoisted a banner of Hadash, an Arab-Jewish communist party.
Arab anyway, with a couple of symbolic Jewish communists to act as fig leaves.
Nearby, a woman wore a sign assailing protesters for ignoring the "criminal killing in the West Bank and Gaza," and a man lay in a pool of mock blood next to a rubber mask of Netanyahu.
Lying down in fake blood with a mask — check. Now all they need are the bigger-than-life plaster of Paris puppets.
Toward the end of the evening, young right-wing agitators clashed with some protesters who remained even as the event dispersed. Officers attempted to chase away the band of youths, although no arrests were made as they appeared at the end of the rally to taunt and clash with the few remaining protesters, ripping down posters in their wake.
Passing a stand offering free water to protesters, a pair shouted "For leftists it’s with cyanide."
Meanwhile a group of some 20 agitators stole a shirt from an anti-government vendor. Pushed off the main road to Kaplan Street, they then attempted to light the shirt on fire until police forces appeared to once more chase them off.
Along with Angrest and Zangauker, the rally featured speeches from Michal Lobanov, wife of Alex Lobanov, one of the six hostages executed by Hamas two weeks ago; Raz Ben Ami, wife of hostage Ohad Ben Ami who was herself released from captivity in the November ceasefire; friends of hostages Gali and Ziv Berman, identified only as Sapir and Iddo; and, via video message, celebrated educator Adina Bar-Shalom, daughter of the late former chief rabbi and Shas party spiritual leader Ovadia Yosef.
Bar-Shalom, who has publicly criticized her late father’s party for failing to press for a deal, said that she was raised to place human life before all else.
"Anyone who saves a soul from Israel — it’s as though they upheld an entire world,’" she quoted the Talmud. "Do we have to put these values aside?" she asked. "What makes us Jewish?"
And so you are willing to trade the entire population of Israel, all eight million or so including Arabs and other non-Jews, in order to get back about 65 hostages and half as many corpses? Because Hamas has promised to repeat the 10/7 massacre again and again until they conquer all of Israel and move in. How does your unbelievable selfishness fit with the Jewish upbringing that you boast of?
Urging concessions as part of a hostage deal, she implored the government not to "think what will come later. The certainty of now trumps any future worries."
Since the future is only a few weeks or months from now, that seems a bit short-sighted. Suicidally short-sighted, not to put too fine a point on it.
Bar-Shalom’s brother Yitzhak Yosef — until recently Israel’s Sephardic chief rabbi— has also publicly called for far-reaching concessions to secure the hostages’ immediate release.
It sounds like he got the job through nepotism, rather than because of any ability of his own.
As protesters marched to Gay Paree Square in central Jerusalem, small skirmishes broke out between police and protesters, with police pushing the crowd toward the sidewalk and arresting at least one protester for allegedly violating the conditions of their probation.
Possibly releasing them after the last round of arrests was also short-sighted.
It is believed that 97 of the 251 hostages kidnapped by Hamas on October 7 remain in Gaza, including the bodies of at least 33 confirmed dead by the IDF.
Hamas is also holding two Israeli civilians who entered the Strip in 2014 and 2015, as well as the bodies of two IDF soldiers who were killed in 2014.
[IsraelTimes] Terror group claims attacks in response to previous IDF strikes in southern Lebanon; Hezbollah weapon depots in northeastern Lebanon destroyed in strikes Saturday evening.
The Israel Defense Forces launched Arclight airstrike ...KABOOM!... s deep in Leb on Saturday, after the Hezbollah terror group bombarded northern Israel with over 60 rockets, including a barrage launched in the early morning hours.
On Saturday evening, the IDF said it carried out airstrikes deep in Lebanon, targeting what it said were Hezbollah weapons depots in the Beqaa Valley and Baalbek region. Some of the strikes were reported by Lebanese media near the Syrian village of Hawsh al-Sayyed ...Arabic term meaning your/his lordship. Groveling in His Exalted Presence is encouraged... Ali, adjacent to Lebanon’s Hermel District, some 140 kilometers (85 miles) from Israel. Additional strikes targeted weapons depots and buildings used by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, the IDF added. The military released footage of the strikes.
The rocket attacks marked the second day in a row that Hezbollah has targeted the Safed area,
…more accurately, the ancient Jewish city of Safed, which dates back to the Biblical Era …
though the terror group has claimed to have targeted nearby Israeli military bases. Safed lies some 13 kilometers (eight miles) from the border with Leb, and unlike many communities nearer the frontier, the city of some 38,000 remains largely inhabited, with attacks that deep into Israel relatively uncommon.
In the first attack at around 1 a.m., the Israel Defense Forces said a salvo of five rockets was fired from Lebanon toward the Safed area. Sirens had sounded in the northern city and several other towns. The IDF said air defenses intercepted some of the five rockets and others hit open areas.
Later in the morning, two barrages were launched at the Safed area, the first with 20 rockets and the second with some 35, the IDF said. The military said that air defenses intercepted several of the rockets and others hit open areas. Some of the impacts in open areas sparked fires. There were no injuries in the attacks.
In statements claiming the attacks, Hezbollah said that it had launched barrages as Dire Revenge for Israeli strikes in southern Lebanon on Friday, which the IDF said targeted sites used by the terror group and its operatives. The Iran-backed group claimed to have targeted military bases near the northern communities of Amiad and Elifelet, south of Safed.
Also early Saturday, the IDF said a drone launched from Lebanon was intercepted by air defenses after sirens sounded in the Western Galilee town of Gornot HaGalil. Later Saturday, two drones launched from Lebanon impacted an area north of Kiryat Shmona, the IDF said. There were no reports of injuries in the attacks, also claimed by Hezbollah.
A short while after the morning barrages, one of the rocket launchers used in the attack was destroyed in a dronezap, the military said. Another Arclight airstrike targeted a launcher used in an overnight barrage. A separate strike hit a building used by Hezbollah in southern Lebanon’s Kfar Roummane, the IDF added.
Later in the day, Israeli fighter jets struck a building in southern Lebanon’s Blida where the IDF said it identified a group of Hezbollah operatives. Another building used by Hezbollah in Blida was also hit, the military added.
Lebanese media reported casualties in an alleged Israeli dronezap on a cycle of violence in the coastal village of Sarafand, south of Sidon. There was no immediate comment from the IDF on the strike.
#2
imo its time for israel to sh** or get off the pot. Gaza and West-Bank need to be eliminated first and then eliminate hezbollah. How can lebanon be invaded with those two open sores? As gen swartzkopf said when asked about forgiveness. "That's gods job mine is to arrange the meeting."
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
...the once and current oppressors of Afghanistan...
... the personification of Somali state failure...
...a Zaidi Shia insurgent group operating in Yemen. They have also been referred to as the 
...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat Frational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
...Arabic for 
..always the voice of sweet reason...
..a regional Iranian catspaw,...
...Arabic term meaning 
