The Afghanistan pamphlets and all Cultural Knowledge Consortium (CKC) publications can be found in the document library of the Cultural Knowledge Consortium link. Don't forget to check out the mission statement and learn more about your tax dollars at work in DoD!
To get to the Document Library:
Step 1 - Register (requires Name and e-mail address) in the upper right hand portion of the homepage.
Step 2 - once registered, log in and this will give you access to the full range of resources and functional capabilities.
Step 3 - Across the top of the CKC webportal you will see a number of tabs, click on "Document Library"
Step 4 - Once inside the Document Library, select the folder titled "CENTCOM documents and updates" (We had to use an icky DoD library because we are not yet a full-fledged gov't agency)
Step 5 - Inside "CENTCOM documents and updates" select the folder: "Afghan Cultural Sensitivity Training Pamphlets". to view the four files.
"Cross-Cultural Competance", don't leave home without it!
[Tolo Newa] Three Afghan police in western Badghis province have joined the Taliban jihad boys, taking their weapons with them, local officials said.
The men from the Dara Boum area of Badghis' Qades district joined the Taliban recently, but no further details were available, according to the Badghis police front man.
Investigations are ongoing, he said.
It was not clear if the three men were members of the national police force or the local police.
Meanwhile, ...back at the Council of Boskone, Helmuth had turned a paler shade of blue. Star-A-Star had struck again... six civilians were maimed Sunday morning by the blast of an improvised bomb (IED) in the same Badghis district as the police deserters, police chief Abdul Jabar Saleh told TOLOnews.
The IED detonated at a funeral in the Qades district while mourners were gathered, he said Sunday.
[Tolo News] Newly-appointed Minister of Interior Mujtaba Patang said Sunday that he will reinforce security forces along the Afghan-Pak border as a means to prevent further shelling into Afghanistan's eastern provinces.
"We have planned to reinforce the border police to prevent these attacks," Patang said.
Patang's predecessor Bismillah Mohammadi was dismissed by the Afghan parliament early August mainly for his apparent inaction over the shelling.
Afghan senators on Sunday urged the United Nations ...aka the Oyster Bay Chowder and Marching Society... Security Council to take the shelling seriously.
The Senate called on the UN Security Council to step up pressure on Pakistain's military to prevent the attacks.
Because a stern note of warning in best calligraphy on perfumed paper will really get the attention of those who, for some reason, consider themselves preeminent military men.
"The international community should pressure Pakistain to stop these attacks -- the international community is obliged to do this to help Afghanistan as per their strategic agreements," head of Senate Fazel Hadi Mohammedanyar said.
God helps those who help themselves. The best the UN will do is interfere with those who have such ideas, without helping those who don't.
"This problem should be solved. It has been two years since the continuation of these rocket attacks," Senator Gul Ahmad Azimi said.
The shelling into Afghanistan's eastern regions, particularly Kunar province ... which is right down the road from Chitral. Kunar is Haqqani country..... , has been intermittent but ongoing for the last two years with hundreds of people displaced and at least a dozen killed.
Meanwhile, ...back at the revival hall, the SWAT team had finally arrived... the Pakistain military claims that snuffies have safe havens in the eastern region of Afghanistan and are crossing the border to launch attacks on the Pakistain security forces.
[Tolo News] Two planners of 'insider attacks' were tossed in the calaboose Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! in the Pul-e-Alam district of central Pashtun-infested Logar province on Friday, Isaf said in a statement.
At the time of their arrest, the planners were intending to launch an attack on a coalition base including attempted to infiltrate the Afghan cops, Isaf said Sunday. One other suspected jihad boy was also set to sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock, in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! An 'insider attack' refers to an assault on an Isaf soldier by a member of the Afghan cops. Such attacks have killed at least 51 Isaf soldiers this year.
Meanwhile, ...back at the hoedown, Bob finally got to dance with Sally... a senior Taliban capo and weapons dealer was set to sit in solemn silence in a dull, dark dock, in a pestilential prison with a life-long lock Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! in Talah wa Barafak district of north-eastern Baghlan province on Sunday after the joint forces killed one other jihad boy, Isaf said.
Multiple arms were seized during the operation. No civilian casualties were reported, it added.
Separately, joint Afghan and NATO ...the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. A collection of multinational and multilingual and multicultural armed forces, all of differing capabilities, working toward a common goal by pulling in different directions... operations also led to a Taliban weapons expert being tossed in the calaboose Drop the rosco, Muggsy, or you're one with the ages! in the Panjwai district of southern Kandahar province while two armed jihad boys, including the leader of a Taliban group, were killed in Sayyidabad district of central Wardak province Sunday.
Afghanistan on Saturday banned all Pakistani newspapers, accusing the publications of supporting the Taliban and seeking to undermine the government, an official said.
The papers will be blocked at their entry points in the eastern provinces of Nangarhar, Kunar and Nuristan which border Pakistan.
The Afghan government decided to ban all Pakistani newspapers in Afghanistan, government spokesman Sayed Ihsanuddin Taheri told AFP.
In recent months Pakistani newspapers have started an anti-Afghan government campaign, especially in the eastern provinces.
The papers print Taliban propaganda, question the presence of foreign troops in Afghanistan and run an anti-government campaign, he added.
The attack in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three other Americans has dealt the Central Intelligence Agency a major setback in its intelligence-gathering efforts at a time of increasing instability in the North African nation.
Have they considered contracting out to CNN? Clearly that three-letter organization has good contacts for getting key information -- they did find the ambassador's diary, after all.
One wonders if they're keeping the juiciest bits quiet, however -- they still have to drag Champ across the finish line...
Among the more than two dozen American personnel evacuated from the city after the assault on the American mission and a nearby annex were about a dozen C.I.A. operatives and contractors, who played a crucial role in conducting surveillance and collecting information on an array of armed militant groups in and around the city.
"It's a catastrophic intelligence loss," said one American official who has served in Libya and who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the F.B.I. is still investigating the attack. "We got our eyes poked out."
The C.I.A.'s surveillance targets in Benghazi and eastern Libya include Ansar al-Sharia, a militia that some have blamed for the attack, as well as suspected members of Al Qaeda's affiliate in North Africa, known as Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.
Eastern Libya is also being buffeted by strong crosscurrents that intelligence operatives are trying to monitor closely. The killing of Mr. Stevens has ignited public anger against the militias, underscored on Friday when thousands of Libyans took to the streets of Benghazi to demand that the groups be disarmed. The makeup of militias varies widely; some are moderate, while others are ultraconservative Islamists known as Salafis and still others are loyalists from the government of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi, the deposed Libyan leader.
#2
"It's a catastrophic intelligence loss," said one American official who has served in Libya and who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the F.B.I. is still investigating the attack. "We got our eyes poked out."
A strange turn of phrase, but an appropriate diary entry nonetheless. No mention of the dead or wounded. And then there is the "ongoing FBI investigation" by criminal investigators who cannot reach the now fully contaminated "crime" scene just yet.
#6
Among the more than two dozen American personnel evacuated from the city after the assault on the American mission and a nearby annex were about a dozen C.I.A. operatives and contractors,
Yea, no contact with those phuechs in the consulate. 9/11 is approaching and anything could happen. Keep you NTV's fueled up and don't deviate from the link-up plan if it all goes south.
Egyptian Foreign Affairs Council member Ahmed Abdel Halim, member said Sunday that "an Israeli attack against Egyptians in Sinai is impossible."
For a given value of impossible that means very possible indeed, I quite agree.
As for the bolstering Egyptian Army's presence in Sinai, Halim said: "We have informed Israel that we were sending more troops than allowed in the Camp David Accords, so we could conclude all the military operations in Sinai. This is so that Israel stays calm; we will not act against it," he said.
A jihadist group called Ansar Beit al-Makdas has grabbed credit for Friday's terror attack on the Egyptian border, which left one Israeli soldier dead.
The group said the attack was carried out to protest the anti-Islam video that sparked Mohammedan riots worldwide.
Sure, sure. Every day there's a new name and a new reason, but it all boils down to the same people and the same jihad.
CAIRO -- Egypt's chief forensic doctor told a state-run newspaper in an interview published on Saturday that Hosni Mubarak has never suffered a stroke and that he is not in critical condition, contradicting earlier medical reports that the former president's health was deteriorating.
Personally, when I see a 'forensic doctor' making statements, I assume the worst...
For months, there have been conflicting reports about the health of the 84-year old Mubarak, who was sentenced in June to life in prison for failing to stop the killing of hundreds of protesters during last year's uprising. He is the first Arab president to serve a prison sentence.
While he was in power, Mubarak's health was treated almost as a state secret. But since his ouster some 20 months ago, Mubarak's supporters have released details of his allegedly failing health in what critics say is an attempt to curry sympathy from the public and appeal for leniency from the courts.
Less than three weeks after he was convicted and sent to Cairo's Tora prison, Mubarak was abruptly transferred to a military hospital amid reports that his heart had stopped beating. The state news agency said at the time that Mubarak had suffered a stroke. He returned to prison a month later.
Ihsan Kameel Gorgy, Egypt's chief forensic doctor, told the Al-Ahram daily that the prosecutor general asked him to put together a medical team to check on Mubarak's health after he was transferred to the military hospital.
Gorgy said he led a team of forensic doctors during two check-ups on the former president, one at the military hospital and the other at Tora prison. Gorgy said Mubarak only had low blood pressure and dizziness from standing up too quickly.
He also dismissed reports presented by Mubarak's private doctor which said the former leader had suffered a series of strokes after returning to prison. Gorgy said medical reports showed that Mubarak has never suffered a stroke.
He also dismissed claims by Mubarak's doctor that the aging former leader suffered a pulmonary embolism, or a blocked artery of the lungs.
Gorgy said that after conducting his own check-up on Mubarak, that there was no indication that the former president had any difficulty breathing and that he did not need a respirator.
"He does not need to be transferred to another hospital," Gorgy told the paper.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2012 00:00 ||
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An Islamist group in the United Arab Emirates denied reports that its members had set up an armed wing with the aim of seizing power and establishing an Islamic state in the Gulf Arab country.
Just a heads up, dear Reader, so you are prepared when the violence starts.
Of course they have to have an armed group. You can't be a proper Islamist group without guns and ammo. And splodydopes...
Local media in the UAE reported on Thursday that Islamists, who had been jugged Yez got nuttin' on me, coppers! Nuttin'! by the Gulf state's authorities in the last few months, confessed to setting up a secret organization with an armed wing.
DUBAI Police in Bahrain said on Saturday they arrested 29 people suspected of involvement in acts of violence during a protest in the capital of the Gulf state.
During Fridays demonstration in a Manama shopping centre, rioters threw Molotov cocktails, iron bars and stones at police and shoppers, the capitals police chief said in a statement. Witnesses said dozens of people joined the protest, which was called by the February 14 Youth radical opposition coalition. Anti-riot police responded with teargas and stun grenades, and fired birdshot to disperse the crowd, the witnesses said.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2012 00:00 ||
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The U.S. has reportedly agreed to let South Korea extend its ballistic missile range from 300 km to 800 km while maintaining the weight of the warhead at the current 500 kg. In protracted talks, the two sides also agreed to scrap a trade-off clause in a bilateral agreement that says if the maximum range is extended, the payload weight must be reduced.
They remain at loggerheads over Washington's dogged opposition to Seoul's development of combat drones and civilian solid-fuel rockets. As a result, South Korea may have to abandon plans to develop state-of-the-art combat drones for which it has already budgeted W500 billion (US$1=W1,119) and will also have trouble pursuing its civilian space project.
The missile guidelines were last revised in 2001.
A government source on Sunday said the two countries have "virtually finished" the missile talks that started early last year and hope to issue a statement by mid-October. "There's been progress in issues like missile range, missile payload weight, and unmanned aerial vehicles but not over development of civilian solid-fuel rockets," the source added.
Seoul had hoped to extend the missile range to 1,000 km, which would cover all of North Korea from Jeju, and increase the payload weight to 1 ton. But Washington is worried that this would also bring the Chinese and Japanese capitals within reach.
For drones, Seoul wanted to increase the current payload of less than 500 kg to 2.5 tons and develop not only reconnaissance UAVs but also combat drones. The U.S. agreed to increase the payload of reconnaissance drones up to a point but is against letting Seoul develop combat drones, the source said.
The talks are expected to wind up by mid-October so South Korea can declare its new missile policy before the two defense ministers meet at the annual Security Consultative Meeting in Washington late next month.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2012 00:00 ||
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Hundreds of Mohammedan protesters staged a rally in front of the US embassy in central Athens on Sunday, in protest against a film which mocks Islam's Prophet Mohammad. The protesters chanted "All we have is Mohammad" and held banners reading "We demand an immediate punishment for those who tried to mock our Prophet Mohammad."
Some 500 people assembled in Istanbul, protesting against the anti-Islamic film, calling out "Allah Akbar," "Death to America" and "Death to La Belle France."
Hook-handed hate preacher Abu Hamza is to be booted out of Britain within days after Euro judges tonight rejected his final appeal against extradition.
The ruling brings an end to a legal saga which has lasted eight years and cost the UK taxpayer more than £1million.
Hamza, whose vile sermons outside the Finsbury Park Mosque earned him global notoriety, is wanted by the U.S. authorities for plotting to set up a jihadi training camp in Oregon.
Hamza and four other alleged terrorists had complained that jail terms of up to 50 years in the U.S without parole breached their human right to be protected from 'inhuman or degrading treatment'.
In April, the European Court of Human Rights - after two years of hugely expensive deliberation - rejected this argument. But the men were allowed to make a final plea for the grand chamber of the Strasbourg court to re-open the case.
Tonight, judges also threw out this bid. There are now no more legal steps the men can take in Europe to halt extradition.
Whitehall officials said he would be put on a plane to America 'as soon as possible'.
Al-Fawwaz, allegedly a close associate of Osama bin Laden, was arrested in connection with bomb attacks on two U.S embassies in east Africa which killed more than 260 people in 1998.
He was jailed for seven years in February 2006 for preaching hate and inciting murder at Finsbury Park Mosque.
#7
SO IIUC, the Brits wanna extradite ole' ABU HAMZA to the US while the latter gets ready to release 1/3 of Gitmo detainees back into the wild[-ing] - UH, UH, OBVIOUSLY WE'RE TRYING TO WIN THE GWOT, + NOT TO LOSE IT???
#8
BTW, any news on OBL's missing Sonny-Boy the "Crown Prince of AQ/Terror/Jihad", repor last seen skedaddling for the hills-n-dales of Central Asia + regions thereabout after Abbottabad???
US President Barack Obama described the Israeli pressure to draw a "red line" for Iran as "noise" he is trying to block out.
In an interview with CBS' "60 Minutes" that aired Sunday, the president addressed the crisis between Washington and Jerusalem over the handling of the Iranian nuclear issue. Obama stressed he feels "an obligation, not pressure" to coordinate with Israel.
Meanwhile, Israeli and US officials are still struggling to reach understandings on the matter behind the scenes. US Ambassador to Washington Michael Oren has traveled to Israel to meet Netanyahu before the latter heads to New York for the UN's General Assembly on Wednesday night.
Obama said he "understands and shares" the Israeli prime minister's "insistence" that Iran should not obtain a nuclear weapon as this "would threaten us, it would threaten Israel and it would threaten the world and kick off a nuclear arms race."
However, in a jab to Netanyahu, he remarked that when it comes to US national security "any pressure that I feel is simply to do what's right for the American people. And I am going to block out any noise that's out there."
Tensions between Israel and the US mounted when Netanyahu demanded that Obama's administration draw "red lines" for Iran that if crossed would prompt a US reaction. Washington refused to comply but stressed its commitment to prevent Tehran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.
The crisis between Netanyahu and Obama exacerbated as Israeli elements accused the US president of refusing to meet with the prime minister. The White House claimed that schedule constraints prevented any meeting between the two on the sidelines of the General Assembly.
On Sunday, Obama stressed he feels "an obligation, not pressure to make sure that we're in close consultation with the Israelis on these issues because it affects them deeply." Earlier this week he noted in another interview that Israel was one of the US' closest allies in the region.
#4
and the rape and execution of an Ambassador (first since '79), deaths of three other Americans, sacking and burning of teh Consulate and safe house, and teh protest and flag-burnings at other American embassies/consulates...that was a "road bump"
Would like to get Stevens',et al's,opinions on how it feels to be a road bump?
Posted by: Frank G ||
09/24/2012 9:45 Comments ||
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#5
You know, they always say we should respect the office of the president. But honestly, I have no respect for the worthless turd in office. At best he's a traitor, at worst he's a foreign agent. I consider him and everyone supporting him to be traitors who are intent on subverting the Constitution and destroying my country. I hope that when he's tossed out of office like the sack of shit he is, that all these investigations can go forward and all the criminals in his administration are tried and convicted.
My line of thought is fast becoming - "What would Andrew Jackson do?" I hope that one day we'll have a real man as president again.
#7
Yes, tipper, Drudge has a link to that article as well. The funny part is that Dinnerjacket talks about the Juice being a lot of noise as well. Kinda makes you wonder if they both got their talking points from the same source.
Drudge also ran a picture of the diminutive little fellow from Iran. My question is: Why is he wearing a woman's ring on his finger?
#12
Again, iff Iran steadfastly follows through wid its desired "Japan/Egypt" Nuclear Model, there will be no NucWeaps per se for the US-Israel to use as rationales for attacking Iran via LR Airstrikes, etc. only Iran's latent or subjective ability to quickly produce same in time(s) of contingency = national crisis.
By this scope, Iran intends that the burden be on the US-Allies, AND ONLY THE US-ALLIES, NOT IRAN, to find something other than NucWeaps as a basis to initiate milstrikes andor major ground war agz Iran.
Prolly safe to say that, likewise, ditto as per the BURDEN TO PRECLUDE IRAN FROM ORDERING PROXY TERROPS AGZ US, WESTERN TARGETS IN RESPONSE TO ANY ISRAELI ATTACK AGZ ITS NUCPROGS, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO TERROPS INSIDE THE US + AGZ US GOVT. + GOVT. PERSONAGES.
IRAN > PREMISES OF US-WESTERN, MSM-NET PROMOTED
"GLOBALISM" + GLOBAL "MULTI-POLARISM" = iff tiny Judaic/Hebrew Israel whom is not considered a "great power" can have 00's of NucWeaps in their arsenal, WHY NOT MUSLIM STATES E.G. IRAN, ETAL. After all, it is the US-West + MSM that says "Globalism" = the traditional Great Powers/States will give up or share Power + Influence, etc. wid the Lessor States.
SURELY THE US-WEST + MSM DIDN'T LIE, OR DID THEY?
OOOOOOOOOOPPPPPPPSSSSSSIES .......
"SAMEO-SAMEO" AS PER WORLD ORDER ENDED BACK ON 9-11.
---------------
* FYI RENSE > ISRAEL DENIES TRYING TO STOP JORDAN NUCLEAR PROGRAM [Civie NucEnergy].
versus
* DEFENCE.PK/FORUMS > IRAN PLANS TO EXPAND PRESENCE IN SOUTH POLE,i.e. actually "plant the flag" in both North + South polar regions.
National Security Council spokesman Tommy Vietor previews the president's speech to the UN General Assembly next week:
"UNGA always provides an opportunity for the President to put the international situation in context, and to put forward a vision of US leadership. I would certainly expect the President to address the recent unrest in the Muslim world, and the broader context of the democratic transitions in the Arab World."
"As he has in recent days, the President will make it clear that we reject the views in this video, while also underscoring that violence is never acceptable[.]
#5
The leftist/Progressive agenda, not being a particularly universally loved agenda in the U.S. has always been pushed through the U.N.; small arms treaty, environmental treaties, law of the sea treaty. Now P.C. censorship. These have all been attempts to usurp the sovereignty of the U.S. and weaken our Constitution.
[Ma'an]Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, on Saturday denounced a Israel-backed UN conference to discuss claims that Jews who used to live in Arab countries were forcibly expelled.
Hamas front manSami Abu Zuhri ...a senior front man for Hamas. Zuhri gained notoriety in 2006 when he dropped his money belt containing somewhere between 640,000 and 900,000 euros, which was confiscated by Paleostinian security and customs officials at a routine border crossing from Egypt to Gazoo. The news brought competing Hamas and Fatah forces to the crossing checkpoint for an epic face-making and hollering contest... said in a statement that "those Jews were not refugees as they claim. They were actually responsible for the displacement of the Paleostinian people after they secretly migrated from Arab countries to Paleostine before they expelled the Paleostinians from their lands to build a Jewish state at their expense."
He added: "Those Jews are criminals rather than refugees. They are the ones who turned the Paleostinian people into refugees, and for that reason, the Hamas movement views this conference as a dangerous, unprecedented move which contributes to the falsification of history and reversing of facts."
The conference, to discuss recognizing as refugees Middle Eastern Jews who immigrated, was denounced by Arab envoys at the UN who lodged unsuccessful protests to call it off.
But Israeli leaders considered it a victory for a population that is increasingly being linked to the grinding of the peace processor with the Paleostinians.
"Between the walls of the UN we are starting to bring justice to the Jewish refugees who were tortured, persecuted and driven away, and whose rights were revoked," said Danny Ayalon, Israel's deputy foreign minister, according to Israeli media.
"We are 64 years late, but it's never too late to bring justice and discuss the historic facts."
Hundreds of thousands of Middle Eastern Jews left predominantly Arab countries amid growing hostility following the establishment of Israel in the late 1940s.
Israel had also drafted a "Law of Return" that granted instant citizenship to anyone who can claim Jewish lineage. Most immigrants had no modern ties to the land.
At the same time, over 700,000 Paleostinians were driven from or fled historic Paleostine and today make up the largest refugee population on earth.
Israeli media reported a week earlier that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was preparing to add compensations for Jews who came from Arab and Mohammedan countries as a condition for any future peace deal.
PLO negotiator Saeb Erekat ...negotiated the Oslo Accords with Israel. He has been chief Paleostinian negotiator since 1995. He is currently negotiating with Israel to establish a de jure Paleostinian state... said in response that there was no connection between Paleostinian refugees and Israelis whose families are from Arab countries, but he supported their right of return.
"We are not against any Jew who wants to return to Morocco, Iraq, Libya, Egypt and elsewhere. I believe no Arab state rejects the Jewish right of returning to their native lands," he said.
THE divide in world opinion over what constitutes free speech will be on display again this week at the United Nations ...an international organization whose stated aims of facilitating interational security involves making sure that nobody with live ammo is offended unless it's a civilized country... , where arguments over a proposed blasphemy law were an annual feature for a decade.
This time it is the global reaction to a YouTube video that disparages Islam's prophet Muhammad that is sure to roil the meeting of the UN General Assembly.
Moslem leaders have vowed to discuss the offensive video from their UN platforms, sowing concern among free-speech activists of a fresh push toward an international law that would criminalise blasphemy. Human rights groups and Western democracies resisted such a law for years and thought they had finally quashed the matter after convincing enough nations that repressive regimes used blasphemy laws to imprison or execute dissidents.
''I expect that we'll regress to where we were a couple of years ago,'' said Courtney Radsch, program manager for the Global Freedom of Expression Campaign at the non-profit group Freedom House.
''Human rights are not about protecting religions; human rights ...which are usually open to widely divergent definitions... are to protect humans,'' she said. ''Who is going to be the decision-maker on deciding what blasphemy is?''
At one end of the spectrum is La Belle France, where a magazine on Wednesday published cartoons of Muhammad as a naked, cowering man to underscore a point that even the most offensive expression should be protected.
At the other end of the spectrum is the UN Secretary-General, the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon ... of whom it can be said to his credit that he is not Kofi Annan... , who disappointed many free-speech activists last week by suggesting limitations to freedom of speech when it was ''used to provoke or humiliate''.
For years the Organisation of Islamic Co-operation, a 57-member bloc of countries, has proposed a resolution criminalising the defamation of religion. By last year free-speech proponents had persuaded so many countries to ditch the cause that no new defamation-of-religion resolution was proposed.
Now, Turkey heads the Organisation and the Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has said he would raise the topic in New York next week.
Politburo Chief Khaled Mashaal will not seek reelection; says he's 'tired of policy challenges'
First Abu Abbas for the PA, now Mashaal for Hamas. Truly, we live in interesting times. Not that they can be blamed -- with the way the world economy is going, it's about to become no fun at all for those nominally in charge.
Can we still drone-zap him? Can we? Pleaaaaase?...
Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason,, always the voice of sweet reason,' leader in exile, Khaled Mashaal, is tired of policy challenges from the Islamist group's Gazoo-based leadership and is not seeking reelection in a vote now underway, political and diplomatic sources said Sunday.
Over the past five months, Hamas, which has ruled the Gazoo Strip since 2007, has been quietly holding a leadership ballot among activists in the territory, the West Bank, Israeli prisons and in Arab and other foreign countries.
Mashaal, who has led Hamas since 1996 from various Arab capitals, told a meeting of its bigwigs in Cairo last week that he had no desire to remain its chief and his decision not to run in the election was final, said a source close to Hamas.
"He (Mashaal) told them to pick another leader," the source said.
Mashaal and other Hamas officials have made no public comment on his future leadership or on the Cairo meeting.
Earlier this year, Mashaal angered Hamas's Gazoo-based leadership by agreeing that its main rival Fatah, headed by Paleostinian President the ineffectual the ineffectual Mahmoud Abbas ... a graduate of the prestigious unaccredited Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow with a doctorate in Holocaust Denial... , could lead any future unity government.
Egypt has brokered a reconciliation pact between Hamas and Fatah, which fought a brief civil war in 2007 that left the Islamist group in control of the Gazoo Strip and Abbas in charge of the West Bank.
But implementation of the pact, which envisages a governing partnership and new Paleostinian elections, has been held up by the two sides' failure to carry out its clauses on the ground.
Mashaal has also voiced what critics in Hamas saw as approval for Abbas' now-stalled talks with Israel, saying in 2011 that 20 years after a 1991 international Middle East conference, Paleostinians were willing to give peace another chance.
"Mashaal has grown impatient with some of his Gazoo officials who recently tried to undermine decisions he took on behalf of the group," said a diplomatic source in the region.
Hamas has repeatedly denied any internal rift.
Haniyeh, Abu Marzouk shortlisted
Mashaal, the source added, was more politically savvy and more pragmatic than Hamas leaders who have lived only in the Gazoo Strip.
Israel has dismissed such distinctions, blaming Mashaal for planning attacks that have killed hundreds of its soldiers and civilians. In 1997, Mossad agents botched an attempt to kill him in Amman, an incident that strained ties with Jordan.
The diplomatic source said Mashaal was likely to come under pressure from within Hamas and from some Arab countries to agree to stand as a candidate before a final vote, whose date remains secret.
Another source, privy to the Hamas meeting in Cairo, said Ismail Haniyeh ...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank... , the group's leader in Gazoo, and Moussa Abu Marzouk, who headed Hamas in the early 1990s, were the top candidates to replace Mashaal.
Both Haniyeh and Abu Marzouk support closer relations with Arab countries and Europe, while adhering to Hamas's policy of refusing Western demands to recognize Israel's right to exist.
The location of a new Hamas chief could be key to winning votes. Hamas activists have traditionally preferred leaders in exile, in venues seen as offering better personal security than in the Gazoo Strip which Israeli drones overfly frequently.
Paleostinian security forces have uncovered a Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, underground detention facility in the West Bank village of Urif, police chief Adnan Damiri said. The dungeon was equipped with communication equipment.
"Hamas is building these facilities, but we don't know for what purpose," the top Paleostinian official said, noting that several suspects have been tossed in the clink Book 'im, Mahmoud! in connection with the case.
Israel has agreed to open talks with the Palestinian Authority to develop and operate the Marine natural gas field offshore from Gaza, according to an official Israeli report. If that is the case, this is a major development for the Palestinian natural gas market and economy.
Not that any will get to the pockets of the peepul, but whatever. Still, better the PA than Hamas, I s'pose.
The government report to donor countries entitled "Measures Taken by Israel in Support of Developing the Palestinian Economy and Socio-Economic Structure" states, "After discussions between PM Netanyahu and Mr. Blair, following an approach by the Palestinian Authority, Israel confirmed its intention to engage in a meaningful discussion with the aim of developing the Gaza Marine gas field.
In this context, official letters were submitted and meetings took place between Israeli representatives and the Palestinian leadership."
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said Sunday that Israel would not agree to reevaluate its peace deal with Egypt, days after the latest attack along the shared border killed an Israeli soldier and three gunmen.
In a bid to restore security to the increasingly lawless Sinai peninsula, Israel and Egypt have agreed to temporarily waive limits on troops included in the historic 1979 peace deal, allowing Egypt to send heavier weaponry into the vast desert region which borders Israel.
Iran is following through with previously reported plans to move its citizens onto a domestic Internet network, Reuters reported. Meanwhile, the country is about to start blocking Google, also according to Reuters. It's unclear whether the two moves are related.
A government deputy minister today announced the domestic Internet plans as a way to improve cybersecurity, adding that all government agencies and offices have been connected to the "national information network." The next step would be to connect everyday citizens to the network as well, he said.
Separately, state television reportedly announced Google's search engine and e-mail would be blocked "within a few hours." Reuters reported. The news service quoted an official only identified as Khoramabadi as saying "Google and Gmail will be filtered throughout the country until further notice."
Rebels in the war-ravaged northern city of Aleppo greeted the announcement that their central command has moved from Turkey to inside Syria with indifference bordering on hostility.
"The arrival of one single new fighter would be more useful than the Free Syrian Army chiefs," said Abdullah, spokesman for the Al-Tawhid Brigade, the most important rebel unit in Aleppo, of Saturday's announcement.
"Combatants on the ground are worth more than REMFs guys who've been sitting behind a table for a year and a half outside Syria," he said.
While the FSA leadership has presented its transfer to inside Syria as "good news," it barely registered with front line fighters in Aleppo who have developed their own tactics.
Abu Somer, head of the Ahfad al-Rasul Brigade (Grandchildren of the Prophet) had learned three days previously that the FSA's command, holed up thus far in neighboring Turkey, was moving across the border. But he and his men, positioned on three fronts in the Salaheddin and Saif al-Dawla districts of the city, continued operations as if nothing had changed.
"At this very moment I have men on the front," he told AFP, stressing that "strategy is decided by those on the ground."
The rebels in the city, beset by violent clashes and bombardments since July 20, already have their own local command center and meet up regularly.
"We don't follow any religious or political ideology. Not the Muslim Brotherhood, Al-Qaeda, or any other foreign movement. We are the FSA on the ground," he said.
Abu Somer takes his orders at meetings with other brigades in the city, in consultation with the recently set up Aleppo military revolutionary council. The commanders on the ground share one goal: "That (President) Bashar Assad falls as soon as possible."
Around 400 people demonstrated in front of the French embassy in Tehran on Sunday to protest inflammatory depictions of Islam's Prophet Mohammed in an American-made film and in a French satirical magazine.
The crowd, shouting "Death to America," "Death to Israel," "Death to Britannia" and "Death to La Belle France," was kept away by police in anti-riot gear, witnesses said.
Posted by: trailing wife ||
09/24/2012 00:00 ||
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The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) will hold 15,000-man strong maneuver in Shahr-e-Rey district of Tehran Province for two days from September 27-28, commander said on Sunday.
IRGC Commander in charge of the operations, General Nasiri told IRNA that some 70 `Beit-ul-Moqaddas' battalions will take part in the exercise, code-named 'Followers of Supreme Jurisprudent' (Rahrovan-e Velayat). The commander said that the exercises aim to raise combat readiness of the ground forces. He said that the troops will conduct shooting, night war, relief and rescue operations.
Posted by: Steve White ||
09/24/2012 00:00 ||
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#1
Some points:
1) Shar-e-Rey is a district just outside Tehran. it is a largely urban district, so the target seems more domestic than foreign.
2) The Beit-ul-Moqaddas battalions are part of the Quds Force. Apparently each "battalion" has less than 200 men.
Posted by: Frozen Al ||
09/24/2012 13:34 Comments ||
Top||
#2
Usually it Basij units that are doing urban exercises like this. There are several Basij battalions (about the same size as the units mentioned by Frozen Al) equipped with heavy weapons. The Basij have been brought under more direct control of the IRGC over the past few years.
That the Beit-ul-Moqaddas battalions are part of the Quds Force is interesting; the Quds Force generally is responsible for extra-national activities.
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.
CAIRO -- Egypt's chief forensic doctor told a state-run newspaper in an interview published on Saturday that Hosni Mubarak has never suffered a stroke and that he is not in critical condition, contradicting earlier medical reports that the former president's health was deteriorating.
Hundreds of 
Hook-handed hate preacher 
US President Barack Obama described the Israeli pressure to draw a "red line" for Iran as "noise" he is trying to block out.
the ephemeral Ban Ki-moon
Politburo Chief Khaled Mashaal will not seek reelection; says he's 'tired of policy challenges'
Iran is following through with previously reported plans to move its citizens onto a domestic Internet network, Reuters reported. Meanwhile, the country is about to start blocking Google, also according to Reuters. It's unclear whether the two moves are related.
Around 400 people demonstrated in front of the French embassy in Tehran on Sunday to protest inflammatory depictions of Islam's Prophet Mohammed in an American-made film and in a French satirical magazine.
