[ShaelleMedia] Somalia says Egypt has offered to deploy peacekeeping troops to the Horn of Africa nation in a security partnership that is emerging as the mandate of a long-time group of African Union ...a union consisting of 53 African states, most run by dictators of one flavor or another. The only all-African state not in the AU is Morocco. Established in 2002, the AU is the successor to the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), which was even less successful... peacekeepers winds down.
Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sissi on Thursday attended a summit in the 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... n capital, Asmara, where he and the leaders of Somalia and Eritrea pledged strong cooperation in regional security.
Somali authorities said in a statement at the end of the summit that they welcomed Egypt’s offer to deploy troops in Somalia as part of a stabilization force when the present African Union force disbands in December.
The statement said the leaders welcomed the African Union Peace and Security Council’s decision to launch the African Union Mission to Support Stabilization in Somalia, or AUSSOM, under whose mandate the Egyptians or others would be deployed.
A separate statement following the summit signed by representatives of Somalia, Egypt and Eritrea asserted Somalia’s sovereign right to determine the composition, tasks and deployment timeline for the AUSSOM troops.
Somalia’s federal government has been supported by an African Union peacekeeping mission since 2007 in fighting the Islamic Death Eater group al-Shabaab ... the Islamic version of the old Somali warlord... , which has ties with al-Qaeda and is responsible for deadly attacks in the country.
The summit in Asmara followed a period of tensions in the region stemming from disputes pitting Æthiopia against others.
The first dispute — between Æthiopia and Egypt — is over Æthiopia’s construction of a $4 billion dam on the Blue Nile, a key tributary of the Nile River. Egypt fears it will have a devastating effect on water and irrigation supplies downstream in Egypt unless Æthiopia takes its needs into account. Æthiopia plans to use the dam to generate badly needed electricity.
The second dispute — between Æthiopia and Somalia — is over Somalia’s breakaway region of Somaliland ...Republic of Somaliland is an unrecognised sovereign state in the Horn of Africa, recognised internationally as a de jure part of Somalia. It is located in the southern coast of the Gulf of Aden with approximately 5.7 million residents as of 2021. The capital and largest city is Hargeisa. The government regards itself as the successor state to British Somaliland, which united from 1960 to 1991 with the Trust Territory of Somaliland (the former Italian Somaliland) to form the Somali Republic. Under the Siad Barre regime, Somaliadestroyed ninety percent of Hargeisa Per international law, once you're in, you gotta stay in, no matter how bad it smells.... Somalia has sought to block landlocked Æthiopia’s ongoing efforts to gain access to the Red Sea via a contentious agreement with Somaliland to lease a stretch of land along its coastline, where Æthiopia would establish a marine force base. In return, Æthiopia would recognize Somaliland as an independent country, according to Somaliland authorities.
Somaliland seceded from Somalia more than 30 years ago but is not recognized by the African Union or the United Nations ...where theory meets practice and practice loses... as an independent state. Somalia still considers Somaliland part of its territory.
mmmn
#1
Understanding Hunger in Egypt With more than 98 million people, Egypt remains the most populated country in North Africa. More than 32.5% of citizens live below the poverty line, making malnutrition and hunger in Egypt pressing issues. The current influx of poverty leaves children and adults without proper education, left to partake in dangerous and under-compensated work such as mining, quarrying and cement production.
[Jpost] Majed Al-Zeer, who was designated by the US earlier this week, was set to lead an event at the private-owned Brussels Press Club with his lobbying organization, EUPAC.
A conference funded by Al-Jazeera and led by Hamas officials in Europe was deleted by its Brussels host venue’s website following a recent US treasury designation.
The event was organized by the European Palestinian Council for Political Relations (EUPAC), a Belgium-registered lobbying organization led by two Hamas officials in Europe, chairman Majed Al-Zeer and deputy chairman Mohammad Hannoun, both designated only this week by the US treasury as officials in Hamas who raised millions of dollars for the benefit of the terror group.
The conference was supposed to take place on October 14, yet now the invitation has been taken off the venue’s website, and a different event appears on that same date. It was originally titled "The Genocidal War in Gaza One Year On: Humanitarian, Legal and Political Implications in the European Context", and was supposed to feature members of the European Parliament, including Lynn Boylan (Ireland), Daniel Attard (Malta) and Vicent Marzà Ibáñez (Spain), with aforementioned EUPAC chairman Majed Al-Zeer as a key speaker. Despite this, as of now, the decision to freeze the conference altogether has not yet been taken, and it is unclear whether the conference will take place at the venue or at a different location.
THE AL-JAZEERA-HAMAS CONNECTION
As mentioned, the conference, which is meant to host a designated Hamas official, was funded by Al-Jazeera, a fact which may further highlight the relations between Hamas and the Qatari outlet.
Hamas, a terrorist organization designated by the EU, Canada, the US, and many other nations, defines itself as the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood, an Islamist political and social movement that was founded almost a century ago in Egypt and seeks to establish an Islamic state with Sharia as its law. Other tributaries of the Muslim Brotherhood include Al-Qaeda and ISIS, both of which are part of the Salafi Jihadist stream of the movement.
Qatar, who owns the Al-Jazeera network, is known as one of the major patrons of the Muslim Brotherhood, promoting its branches across the globe with funding and moral support. In Israel, local courts argued that Hamas views Al-Jazeera as their propaganda and intelligence arm, and indeed on many occasions the Qatari-owned channel publishes exclusive footage and first-hand statements and information originating from Hamas and its militia, the Al-Qassam Brigades.
The new US designation, which was published on the one year commemoration of the October 7th Massacre, stressed that other parties are prohibited from providing funds, goods or services for the benefit of the newly recognized Hamas officials, warning of ‘secondary sanctions’ to those who engage in “certain transactions.” However, it is unclear whether Al-Jazeera would also be subject to those sanctions in the case of funding this event.
ACTIVISTS AND POLITICIANS ENCOURAGE PRESS CLUB TO FREEZE THE EVENT
Michael Freilich, a member of the Belgian Parliament, encouraged the Press Club to freeze the conference, adding: “I urge the Press Club to adhere to the US designation and freeze the event. However, regardless of the outcome, nothing would absolve Belgium of its responsibility. The urgent need to shut down EUPAC, freeze its assets, and expel its leaders back to the West Bank cannot be ignored. With the U.S. Treasury's recent designation of this organization’s leaders, it is clear that the time for decisive action is now. The current Belgian government must prioritize this issue, especially given the disturbing tendency to blur the line between legitimate support for the Palestinian people and tacit acceptance of Hamas's violent agenda. This is not a matter of diplomacy, but of national security and moral clarity.”
A spokesperson for IMPAC, a Brussels-based not-for-profit engaged in promoting democratic values and countering radicalization, who highlighted Al-Zeer’s designation, commended the decision to take the event off the Press Club’s website, adding: “A swift and clear cancellation of the event would be a positive outcome that reflects the Brussels Press Club’s dedication to upholding its standards and ensuring that its premises are not exploited by individuals with ties to terrorist organizations. This would send a clear message that terrorism has no place in our public forum.”
Arsen Ostrovsky, a human rights attorney and CEO of The International Legal Forum, commented: “Common sense must prevail. It is inexplicable that on the anniversary of 12 months since the Hamas slaughter, the largest mass murder of Jews since the Holocaust, that anyone would contemplate even for a moment, to provide a platform to a Hamas-designated terrorist. The Press Club must implement a more stringent review process for future events and speakers, to ensure space is not provided to designated terrorists and individuals inciting racial hatred."
As Alinsky said, "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules. You can kill them with this, for they can no more obey their own rules than the Christian church can live up to Christianity." At least it’s a new fiscal year, so they’ll have plenty of money again.
[IsraelTimes] Donald Trump’s campaign has requested the use of military aircraft and vehicles to protect the former president as he campaigns during the final weeks of the presidential campaign, the New York Times and Washington Post report.
The request follows two recent assassination attempts against the Republican presidential candidate. It also comes after Trump’s campaign last month said he had been briefed by US intelligence officials on alleged threats from Iran to assassinate him.
A representative for the US Secret Service, which is charged with protecting presidential candidates, says “the former president is receiving the highest levels of protection” but confirms the Trump campaign had requested more.
“The Secret Service will remain vigilant and continue to adjust and enhance its protective posture as needed to mitigate evolving threats,” the representative says.
US President Joe Biden, speaking to reporters, says he has authorized security to protect Trump as if he were a sitting president, and if Trump’s request falls in that category it should be granted.
Representatives for Trump’s campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
According to the New York Times, Trump’s campaign has been in contact with White House chief of staff Jeff Zients and acting Secret Service Ronald Rowe asking for military assets to protect the Republican candidate, who is facing US Vice President Kamala Harris in the Nov. 5 presidential election.
[Ynet] As troops urge Gazans to leave, many remain fearing travel through areas under IDF control and after threats from Hamas that seeks to use them as human shields while forces hunt them down
The Hamas terror group has been preventing civilians from leaving areas under IDF attack and sheltering in humanitarian zones.
Yes, well it’s hard to hid behind your human shields if the selfish things rudely take themselves off to a safe zone.
The military has been urging civilians to leave ahead of an operation targeting Hamas terrorists. Some 200,000 people managed to leave,
…about half, which is something…
according to the military but many civilians remain.
Troops began going door to door, interrogating the men and asking the women and children to leave for an UNRWA school where they would be safe.
Some said they were afraid to move through areas under IDF control and others said Hamas terrorists were threatening them and demanding that they stay. The Hamas interior ministry also called on civilians to remain where they were, making them human shields for the terrorists.
Hamas health officials said the IDF demanded that hospitals in the area, evacuate. They said the Kamal Adwan hospital was surrounded and that the forces were shooting at the administration offices. Hamas also claimed there was a siege on northern Gaza and that basic supplies were not allowed in.
An Israeli security official said the Palestinians in northern Gaza are again experiencing fear of attack while Hamas attempts to assert its governing control of the area.
On Thursday, the IDF said it destroyed a Hamas command center inside what had been a medical facility, killing 12 terrorists. the military identified three of the dead as terrorists who participated in the Hamas massacre on Oct. 7 last year.
[Ynet] Wafiq Safa is under U.S. sanctions for exploiting Lebanese ports, border crossings to facilitate Hezbollah terrorists’ travel; known as Beirut Airport strongman overseeing weapons arrival from Iran that is stored in great amounts at the airport
IDF carried out two airstrikes on central Beirut on Thursday, targeting areas outside Hezbollah's stronghold the Dahieh, for the third time in the war. According to some reports, the attacks were an attempt to assassinate Hezbollah's Liaison and Coordination Unit head Wafiq Safa, a close ally of slain Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah who was killed in an Israeli attack last month.
Lebanese health officials said 18 people were killed and 92 injured in the strikes. Safa's fate was unknown, security sources told Sky News Arabic while other sources said he survived the attempt on his life.
According to the U.S. Treasury Department's website, Safa exploits Lebanese ports and border crossings to facilitate Hezbollah terrorists’ travel. The site adds that, together with senior Hezbollah member Mohammad Raad, Safa was involved in attempting to secure foreign citizenships for 100 Hezbollah operatives who were to be sent on "long missions" in Western or Arab countries.
Safa is a well-known figure in Beirut and his position in Hezbollah gave him incredible power. He was known as the man who was actually in charge of Beirut's Rafic Al Hariri International Airport, the main gateway into Lebanon.
An airport employee told the newspaper Safa maintained close ties with customs control. "Wafiq Safa is always showing up at customs,” one whistleblower claimed, citing close relationships with the customs managers. “I feel like if we don’t do what they say, our families will be in danger.”
According to an investigative report in the UK's Telegraph newspaper last June, Hezbollah was hiding a significant weapons stockpile at the airport. Officials there said the terror group receives weapons on flights from Iran that are then stored. According to the same sources, Hezbollah stores huge amounts of Iranian weapons, missiles and explosives inside the civilian airport.
“This is extremely serious, mysterious large boxes arriving on direct flights from Iran are a sign that things got worse. When they started to come through the airport, my friends and I were scared because we knew that there was something strange going on,” one source at the airport said.
The paper reported that a Lebanese official rejected the claims and Transport Minister Ali Hamie called the information incorrect. He has invited media and ambassadors to visit the airport to see for themselves. Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said he would be suing the publication.
As a member of Nasrallah's close circle, Safa was part of the negotiation committee Hezbollah established in 2000 during the kidnapping of three IDF soldiers on Mount Dov – Benyamin Avraham, Adi Avitan, and Omar Sawaid. The three bodies were returned to Israel in 2004 in a prisoner exchange deal.
He also participated in negotiations for the return of soldiers Ehud Goldwasser and Eldad Regev, who were kidnapped by the terror group shortly before the Second Lebanon War in 2006.
Not dead yet, just resting. Sepsis should kick in soon.
[AnNahar] Hezbollah senior leader Wafiq Safa was seriously injured and is in critical condition following the deadly Israeli airstrikes that targeted two buildings in Beirut’s Noueiri and Bourj Abi Haidar areas, sources told Sky News Arabia on Friday.
[IsraelTimes] The United States hits Iran’s oil and petrochemicals sectors with new sanctions in response to Tehran’s October 1 attack against Israel, designating dozens of new companies and firms.
The Treasury Department says it is going after Iran’s so-called "shadow fleet" of ships involved in selling Iranian oil in circumvention of existing sanctions, designating 10 companies and 17 vessels as "blocked property" over their involvement in shipments of Iranian petroleum and petrochemical products.
The State Department also announces it is slapping sanctions on six other firms and six ships for "knowingly engaging in a significant transaction for the purchase, acquisition, sale, transport, or marketing of petroleum or petroleum products from Iran."
"Today’s sanctions target Iranian efforts to channel revenues from its energy industry to finance deadly and disruptive activity — including development of its nuclear program, the proliferation of ballistic missiles and unmanned aerial vehicles," Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen says in a statement.
The sanctions form part of the US response to Iran’s attack, in which it launched some 200 ballistic missiles against Israel in retaliation for the killing of Tehran-backed terrorist leaders and a general from Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.
Israel has said its response to Iran’s second direct attack against its territory this year will be "deadly, precise, and surprising."
US President Joe The Big Guy Biden ...46th president of the U.S. The man who made Barack Obama and Jimmy Carter look competent, if only by comparison.... told news hounds last week that Israel should consider "other alternatives than striking oil fields," amid reports it was planning to do so.
His national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, says the sanctions are being announced after the president consulted with America’s allies and partners.
"These measures will help further deny 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... financial resources used to support its missile programs and provide support for terrorist groups that threaten the United States, its allies, and partners," Sullivan says in a statement.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken ...71st United States secretary of state and a leading light of the corrupt and inept Biden administration. He previously served as deputy national security advisor from 2013 to 2015 and deputy secretary of state from 2015 to 2017 under the corrupt and inept Obama administration. He advocated for the 2003 invasion of Iraq while serving as the Democratic staff director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 2002 to 2008. He was a foreign policy advisor for the Biden 2008 presidential campaign. During his tenure in the Obama administration, Blinken helped craft B.O.'s policy on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the nuclear program of Iran. We all saw how well each of those worked. After leaving government service, Blinken moved into the private sector, co-founding WestExec Advisors, a lobbying firm... says Washington had made clear after the October 1 attack that Tehran would face consequences.
"To that end, we are taking steps today to disrupt the flow of revenue the Iranian regime uses to fund its nuclear program and missile development, support terrorist proxies and partners, and perpetuate conflict throughout the Middle East," he says in a statement.
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#1
going after Iran’s so-called "shadow fleet" of ships
I'm reminded of Nemo's submarine program against slavers.
Who is going to complain about the loss of a 'ghost' oil tanker? Greta?
[IsraelTimes] Rumors have continued to swirl in recent days over the status of Esmail Qaani, the head of Iran's extraterritorial Quds Force who hasn't been seen in public for several weeks.
Qaani has been conspicuously absent since he traveled to Beirut two days after the massive Israeli airstrike late last month that killed Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and several other top commanders, including an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps deputy commander.
After unconfirmed reports that he had been killed in a subsequent Israeli strike in Beirut alongside a top Hezbollah leader,
…that would be Hashem Safieddine …
claims have now surfaced on Arabic and regional media that while he is alive, Qaani is being investigated by the IRGC, of which his Quds Force is part, on suspicion of involvement in Israeli intelligence infiltration and of playing a part in Israel's assassination late last month of Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah Times of Israel bases its reporting on info from the Saudis and Qataris.
#3
Actually, of course, Esmail Qaani is NOT a Mossad agent - though he did cooperate with Mossad. He's part of the Mazdaist conspiracy within IRGC. The purpose of the conspiracy is to abolish Islam (which they believe to be a tool of Ahriman) in Iran, and to return the people to the true religion.😎
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.
...Republic of Somaliland is an unrecognised sovereign state in the Horn of Africa, recognised internationally as a de jure part of Somalia. It is located in the southern coast of the Gulf of Aden with approximately 5.7 million residents as of 2021. The capital and largest city is Hargeisa. The government regards itself as the successor state to British Somaliland, which united from 1960 to 1991 with the Trust Territory of Somaliland (the former Italian Somaliland) to form the Somali Republic. Under the Siad Barre regime, Somaliadestroyed ninety percent of Hargeisa Per international law, once you're in, you gotta stay in, no matter how bad it smells....
...71st United States secretary of state and a leading light of the corrupt and inept Biden administration. He previously served as deputy national security advisor from 2013 to 2015 and deputy secretary of state from 2015 to 2017 under the corrupt and inept Obama administration. He advocated for the 2003 invasion of Iraq while serving as the Democratic staff director of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee from 2002 to 2008. He was a foreign policy advisor for the Biden 2008 presidential campaign. During his tenure in the Obama administration, Blinken helped craft B.O.'s policy on Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the nuclear program of Iran. We all saw how well each of those worked. After leaving government service, Blinken moved into the private sector, co-founding WestExec Advisors, a lobbying firm...
