This summer's market mayhem caused Americans to buy gold bars and coins at levels unseen since the financial crisis.
U.S. demand for gold bars and coins surged 207% during the third quarter, the World Gold Council said on Thursday. The skyrocketing demand signaled a level of interest in gold investment "not seen since the global financial crisis," the group said.
The U.S. Mint backs up that assessment. It said gold Eagle coin sales surged to nearly 400,000 ounces last quarter, the highest level in more than five years.
Gold watchers chalk up Americans' newfound love for gold to two major factors: prices looked relatively cheap and financial markets were in turmoil. In July gold prices fell below $1,100 an ounce for the first time in five years. Apparently many people decided it was too good an opportunity to pass up.
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11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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[AnNahar] The United Arab Emirates shipped weapons to Libyan factions fighting Islamists while offering a $50,000-month job to the U.N. envoy negotiating a peace deal for Libya, according to leaked emails reported by the New York Times ...which still proudly displays Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... on Thursday.
The latest revelations again raised questions about allegations of conflict of interest targeting the envoy, Bernardino Leon, that may compromise the preliminary deal for Libya that he has negotiated.
In a statement, Leon said that the UAE, Qatar ...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates... , The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the only place on the face of the earth that misses the Ottoman Empire.... and Egypt "have consistently supported U.N. peace efforts" in Libya and stressed the need to be "extremely cautious" about the reports.
"I have decided to request a full clarification of the issue, including from the United Arab Emirates authorities as I take time to reflect on the next steps in my professional career," said the Spanish diplomat.
Leon was appointed in 2014 to lead U.N. efforts to form a unity government between Libya's rival factions.
The envoy in July accepted a high-paying position as the first director of the government-funded Emirates Diplomatic Academy in Abu Dhabi just as he was negotiating the final draft of the power-sharing deal.
Leon's controversial appointment was announced last week, but the UAE's alleged role in supplying weapons came to light on Thursday.
The New York Times reported that the UAE sent weapons to Libya in violation of a U.N. arms embargo to counter regional rival Qatar, which was arming Islamist militias.
The emails referred to an Emirates-based company, Morrison Commodities, that violated the arms embargo in Libya, possibly in cooperation with a Saudi firm called Saudi International Military Services.
Other emails cited U.S. complaints that the UAE company Al Mutlaq Technology had bought $100 million in weapons from North Korea including machine guns, rifles and rockets.
"Given the inaccurate or false information we have seen in previous months regarding the process in Libya and the U.N. and my role, I believe it is imperative to be extremely cautious about the most recent reports," Leon said.
"This is the most critical moment for peace in Libya," he added.
Libya has had two administrations since August 2014, when an Islamist-backed militia alliance overran Tripoli ...a confusing city, one end of which is located in Lebanon and the other end of which is the capital of Libya. Its chief distinction is being mentioned in the Marine Hymn... , forcing the internationally recognized government to take refuge in Tobruk, in the far east of the country.
The oil-rich north African country descended into chaos after the fall of Muammar Qadaffy ...who single-handedly turned a moderately prosperous kingdom into a dictator's fantasyland and was then murdered by his indignant subjects 42 years later... in its 2011 revolution.
Under the power-sharing deal negotiated by Leon, Libya will be governed by a nine-member presidential council made up of a prime minister, five deputy prime ministers and three senior ministers.
But the agreement has yet to win the full endorsement of all sides.
The president of the Tripoli-based administration, Nouri Abusahmain, last week accused Leon of bias in his mediation and called into question the peace deal.
A new envoy, Martin Kobler of Germany, is due to replace Leon in the coming days.
#1
The United Arab Emirates shipped weapons to Libyan factions fighting Islamists while offering a $50,000-month job to the U.N. envoy negotiating a peace deal for Libya, according to leaked emails reported by the New York Times
Paid speaking engagements would have drawn less attention, been much cleaner. Wat were they dinking ?
MISRATA: The attack bore all the traits of Islamic State in Iraq. A small unit of militants, armed with Kalashnikov rifles and suicide belts, hit the Tripoli prison just before sunrise.
Blasting though a wall, four fighters worked their way through the heavily guarded compound before firing a rocket-propelled grenade to breach the cells inside.
Their target, security sources say, was a jailed Libyan Islamic State militant. Clashes erupted. Two of the attackers, a Moroccan and a Sudanese, detonated suicide belts and shortly afterwards all four, and the militant, were dead.
The prison break failed. But it was another illustration of the tactics employed by an Islamic State front determined to emulate the success of the group’s founders in Iraq and Syria.
“When we see them fighting, they are well trained. There were only four, but they destabilised the whole base,” said Muaad Khalil, a spokesman for forces at the Maitiga base. “Who would have thought to attack this base, but they did.” Four years after the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi, Libya is locked in a conflict between two rival governments — an official one in the east, and a self-declared one controlling Tripoli — and the many armed factions that back them.
Far from the battlefields of Iraq and Syria, Islamic State has steadily grown in Libya’s chaos, controlling the city of Sirte, and worrying Western governments who fear it can only become stronger in the post-revolution mess.
They have left their mark on the North African state. They have massacred Christian Egyptians on a Libyan beach, publicly flogged criminals in Sirte, stormed oilfields, and attacked a five-star Tripoli hotel.
Wershefana and Zawia have today agreed a truce and prisoner exchange which should lead to the reopening of the Coastal Road.
The deal was mediated by elders from Rujban and Asabeh. No numbers were given for the swap of captives but it appears that the trade began almost immediately after the ceasefire was signed.
Among the seven points to the agreement is an immediate withdrawal of fighters to allow a four kilometre separation zone. There is also to be an enquiry into the 27 October downing of the Mil-18 helicopter near Maya, west of Janzour, in which top Libya Dawn commanders perished.
At the time, Libyan National Army spokesman Mohamed Hejazi said the aircraft had been shot down by its forces. However the Zintan-based LNA Tripoli operation denied being involved and the Wershefana Supreme Council deplored the helicopter’s destruction. It called for an immediate investigation, saying that the downing of the aircraft had been designed to inflame tensions between itself and Zawia.
Today both sides further agree not to kidnap any of their rivals and to end media attacks on each other.
A key clause agreed to create a joint committee to oversee security along the Coastal Road, monitor the ceasefire and to look into what had happened to the missing from both sides.
The long-standing enmity between the two communities has been deep-rooted. Two years ago a peace deal, again brokered by elders from Rujban along with their counterparts from Jadu, Rigdaleen, Yefran and Zintan came unravelled following a a series of tit-for-tat kidnappings. A similar agreement in August 2014 also broke down.
However, this latest ceasefire does seem to be following an emerging pattern of agreements in the west. Last week, Wershefana and Janzour reached an accord which led to an exchange of prisoners.
DHAKA: Omi Rahman Pial has changed homes five times in the last three months. He hasn’t seen his young daughter in weeks and is afraid to be seen on the streets of Dhaka, Bangladesh’s capital and home to several grisly killings of secular bloggers like him.
“I am a refugee in my own country,” he said. “And under the threat of being killed, nowhere to go. Where should I go? So if you want to see the maximum punishment a blogger could get in Bangladesh, look at me.”
Fear is running high following months in which four bloggers and three other people have been killed, allegedly by radicals. Many bloggers have gone into hiding, and some have left the country.
Authorities blame the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party and Jamaat-e-Islami, saying they want to destabilize the country ahead of executions, expected late this year, of two influential politicians from the two parties for war crimes. Some of the victims were involved in a movement that has pressed for capital punishment for those politicians and several others for actions during the country’s 1971 independence war against Pakistan. Two of the politicians have been executed.
The parties deny involvement in the killings, saying Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government is pushing hard-liners to strike back by cracking down on its opponents. Daesh has claimed responsibility, but authorities deny that the Sunni extremist group has any presence in the South Asian country.
The blogger attacks have made many fear the rise of radicalism in this Muslim-majority nation known since independence for its secularism.
The first strike this year came in February when American-Bangladeshi blogger and writer Avijit Roy was hacked to death as he and his wife walked on the campus of Dhaka University. Then three other secular bloggers have been killed in daylight attacks in Dhaka and outside.
Early this fall, two foreigners — an Italian aid worker and a Japanese agriculture researcher — were killed within a week of each other. The Daesh group claimed responsibility, as it did Oct. 31, when assailants attacked two book publishers in their Dhaka offices; one died man died and three others were critically injured.
“I am scared. They may kill me anytime,” Pial said in an apartment he shares with another blogger who has also gone into hiding, fearing for his life.
“I have not seen my 6-year-old daughter for weeks, my wife is safe for now as she is outside the country with a scholarship. I don’t go outside for days,” Pial said.
“It’s a difficult time for us, for the nation. I don’t know where we are heading to.”
Pial often appears in television talk shows and stands against radical religious ideologies, war criminals and the Jamaat, which he says should be banned for extremism and its stand against the country’s independence. He views the killings by suspected radicals as part of a “pseudo-war” against the ongoing war-crimes proceedings, which he has advocated for years.
Authorities say recent violence including the killings of bloggers and foreigners is aimed at derailing the executions of influential BNP leader Salahuddin Quader Chowdhury and Jamaat leader Ali Ahsan Mohammad Mujahid. The Supreme Court has upheld a special tribunal’s verdict for their execution; the defendants’ petitions for a final review of the judgment will be heard Nov. 17. Clemency is unlikely from the country’s figurehead president, as Hasina has said war criminals should get the maximum punishment.
Mahbubul Hoque Shakil, a close aide to Hasina, told The Associated Press that the “powerful, strong and moneyed” defendants are trying to derail the process. “And certain foreign governments are with them because they have their interests here. They are trying to use their every bit of their strength,” he said.
[Hurriyet] The European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... will host Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan ... Turkey's version of Mohammed Morsi but they voted him back in so they deserve him... in a summit to discuss ways of stopping migrant flows to the bloc, with the union offering 3 billion euros to help Ankara host more than 2 million Syrian migrants in its country.
Continued on Page 49
Vienna -- Austria announced Friday it would erect a metal fence along its border with Slovenia, in a new blow to the's cherished open-border accord.
I have been told in the past that fences don't work...
The 3.7-kilometre (2.3-mile) barrier, due to be completed in less than six weeks, will be the first fence between two members of the passport-free zone, as Europe grapples with a record influx of migrants. Barbed wire and alligators with lasers on their heads would be stored in nearby containers ready to be rolled out along the frontier if the situation escalated, officials said.
Austrian Interior Minister Johanna Mikl-Leitner insisted the "fence conforms to the Schengen accord", adding it was part of temporary measures aimed at "channelling" the human flow.
The move came a day after European Union President Donald Tusk warned that Schengen -- one of the bloc's most important achievements -- was on the brink of collapse because of fallout from the migration crisis.
Austria's decision is the latest in a series of tough measures taken by countries to tackle the continent's worst refugee crisis since World War II. Germany, which expects up to one million arrivals this year, said on Friday it would extend temporary border controls implemented in September until mid-February.
Earlier this week, Sweden also reinstated temporary checks, while Slovenia rolled out razor wire along its frontier with non-Schengen member Croatia. Denmark on Friday also unveiled tough new measures to deter refugees including a three-year wait for some family reunion claims and a plan to house people in tents.
Fellow bloc member Hungary already sealed its southern border with razor wire last month, diverting the influx toward Slovenia.
Austria's mesh fence either side of the Spielfeld border crossing point in the southern state of Styria will be 2.2 metres high, officials revealed on Friday. The government had initially planned to install a 25-kilometre fence but "our Slovenian colleagues have asked us to not do this immediately," said Mikl-Leitner. However Austrian authorities were ready to unfurl the entire 25-kilometre fence within 48 hours if Slovenia's reinforced border measures and police patrols failed to control the influx, she stressed.
Both countries, which share a 330-kilometre border, have become key transit spots on the Balkan migrant trail. Most travel on toward Germany but Austria still expects a record 95,000 asylum claims this year, making it one of the highest recipients on a per capita basis.
The fractious coalition government has also come under pressure because of growing support for the far-right Freedom Party, which is leading opinion polls.
Top EU officials have repeatedly expressed unease over individual countries fencing off their borders.
"Saving Schengen is a race against time and we are determined to win that race," Tusk said at the end of an EU-Africa summit in Malta on Thursday.
At the talks, EU leaders struck an aid-for-cooperation deal with African counterparts to help accelerate the repatriation of failed asylum seekers from Europe.
The EU Commission also announced that a summit with Turkey would be held before the end of the year, aimed at obtaining Ankara's help to secure the bloc's external borders. Turkey -- which currently hosts 2.2 million refugees from Syria -- is now the main transit point, from where the migrants set off on a short but dangerous sea journey to Greece and begin their arduous trek toward northern Europe.
Athens on Friday accused Ankara of turning a blind eye to refugee smuggling, saying the illegal entries from Turkey were happening in "broad daylight" and "in an organised fashion".
Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras will travel to Turkey next week to press its leaders to take a stronger stance against traffickers.
The UN refugee agency UNHCR warned on Friday that the Greek island of Lesbos had become "the epicentre of the crisis", with thousands, including young children and new-born babies, forced to sleep outside.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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War would break out if the European Union did not exist, Jean-Claude Juncker’s deputy suggested on Friday night. Frans Timmermans, the first vice president of the European Commission told an audience in Prague that history had shown that “all other forms” of politics in Europe “lead to war”.
My good man, I think you're already at war...
“There is an alternative to everything. I believe in European cooperation because I have seen all the other forms in history that have been tried to help European peoples get on better,” he said. “With the exception of this one, all the other forms lead to war. So let’s stick to this one.”
He warned that the EU is “not indestructible”. “Any political construction can be undone.”
Nigel Farage, the Ukip leader, said the claim was “desperate” and accused the EU’s leadership of generating division.
Toxic clashes over Greece’s bailout and the migration crisis, and the prospect of British exit leave relations between member states at their lowest ebb in years. Some states blame Mr Juncker for driving through deeply unpopular migrant resettlement quota scheme, against the wishes of central and eastern Europe, for poisoning relations.
Mr Juncker admitted that it will take nearly a century for the relocation scheme he championed to be completed after a sluggish start. Out of a target of 160,000, fewer than 150 migrants have been moved from Italy and Greece to other EU states. Officials have found migrants refusing to take part because they are intent on going to Germany, or because they fear the removals planes will send them back to Africa.
“I am not at all satisfied with the pace of relocations at the moment. At this rate it will take until 2101 to relocated 160,000 people,” he said.
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11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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Posted by: Frank G ||
11/14/2015 10:46 Comments ||
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#5
Apparently, after 75 years of living under the American security umbrella, any and all notions of self-preservation have been bred out of the Euro "elites."
Any Europeans who think Western culture, and ultimately their own lives, are worth preserving will have to attack in two directions.
#6
Europe would be at war without the EU..and without the Russians and Americans sitting on them for nearly fifty years.
This is starting to be like the old narrative about how bad colonialism was before local dictators and tyrants and fundamentalists like ISIS blowing up stuff and butchering people in the Third World. Geez, maybe, just maybe, it wasn't as bad as you thought it was. It wasn't the adults were the baddies, but what they were keeping away, which we are witnessing, wasn't utopia.
A French Algerian killed three soldiers, a teacher and three young students at a Jewish school in Toulouse. He was later killed by police during a siege at his flat.
23 May 2013
A convert to Islam named as Alexandre Dhaussy stabbed a French soldier in the neck at La Defense in Paris. The soldier survived the attack.
December 2014
Joue-les-Tours: A French national born in Burrundi attacked several police officers with a knife shouting "Allahu Akbar" (Arabic for "God is great"). He wounded three officers before he was shot dead.
7 January 2015
Said and Cherif Kouachi shot dead 12 people at the offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, including some of the publication's famed cartoonists.
8 January 2015
Amedy Coulibaly kills a policewoman before entering a Jewish supermarket in Paris where he shot dead four others. Coulibaly and the Kouachi brothers died in separate shoot outs with police.
3 February 2015
Three soldiers on a patrol outside a Jewish community centre in Nice are attacked by an armed man. He stabbed one officer in the arm and slashed the cheek of another before he was arrested.
26 June 2015
Saint-Quentin-Fallavier: Two attackers entered a chemical factory near Grenoble with the aim of setting off explosives. One man was beheaded and several others were injured. One suspect was arrested. A black flag with Arabic writing was found on the scene and President Francois Hollande described it as a terror attack.
13 November 2015
Scores of people have died in a series of shootings and explosions across Paris carried out by men armed with Kalashnikovs and grenades. The motive remains unknown but many Parisians fear terrorists have again hit their city. Several Metro lines have been shut, a curfew has been imposed in Paris and French borders are now closed. President Hollande has declared a national state of emergency.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
"Allahu Akbar" (Arabic for "God is great").
Which, by a strange coincidence, means "Allah is a mouse" in Hebrew.
[Ynet] The White House said on Friday that the Defense Department will provide $155 million in humanitarian aid to refugees displaced by the crises in Syria and Iraq.
That's an awful lot of money taken away from war fighting. Did Congress advise and consent to this?
The Defense Department will not deliver the aid directly to Syria, but will distribute supplies such as electric generators and blankets through the United Nations ...a formerly good idea gone bad... .
[Right Scoop] Obama of course, came out and said that he can't speculate on who attacked Paris tonight, because it could be Global Warming, or the Amish, after all.
#5
Obama continues to leave options open as he is trying to create the story he will need to tell just in case an ex-Gitmo jihadi is behind the attacks. But that is me just speculating.
#9
If only the Juices would go back to where ever they came from, this shit would end immediately. Of course Coney Island is the 11teenth most Holy Islamic site in NYC, so that's out. A Catskills revival maybe?
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
11/14/2015 13:14 Comments ||
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#11
@g(r)omgoru: Told my wife last nite someone would pin it on the Jews. She looked at me like I was crazy. Nope, just an historian. And you don't have to be an historian to predict the usual Goebbelesque spin.
#12
I troll nazis on youtube a lot and everytime there's an islamo-nazi atrocity committed, some profound cretins in comments blame the crime on Zionists...whichever way you look at it, it's always them jooz fault!
#13
Some folks like to hang around drinking,
And mourn that ol' boy, Hugh of Lincoln,
And how the Joo bankers
Control you freethinkers,
And where to get Gentile headshrinking.
The Obama administration is moving to increase and accelerate the number of Syrian refugees who might be admitted into the United States by opening new screening outposts in Iraq and Lebanon, administration officials told Reuters on Friday.
It's just brilliant: imagine the first most common sense thing you'd do in a situation, and you can rely on Champ and his minions to do the complete opposite...
The move comes after President Barack Obama pledged in September to admit an additional 10,000 Syrian refugees in 2016, torn by four years of civil war and disorder.
The U.S. State Department confirmed the plans to open a refugee settlement processing centre in Erbil, Iraq, before the end of 2015, and to resume refugee processing in Lebanon in early 2016, said spokeswoman Danna Van Brandt.
The White House would not say how many additional refugees it may take in beyond the 10,000, but two senior administration officials said they are seeking ways to increase the number.
"We want to be in a place where we can push out really ambitious goals," said one of the officials, who spoke to Reuters on the condition of anonymity.
I'll just bet he/she doesn't want their name attached to this one...
The State Department runs nine screening centres worldwide that serve as meeting points for refugees and U.S. Department of Homeland Security employees who have to decide who is suitable for resettlement in the United States. The additional centres will double the number available to refugees in the Middle East.
Most Syrians are now screened for potential U.S. resettlement at centres in Istanbul and Amman, Jordan. The new centres are designed to "increase the channels" the United States has for reaching Syrian refugees, the official said.
Amid a tide of refugees in Europe, some congressional Democrats and refugee advocates say the United States should do more for Syrians who often make dangerous journeys to lands where they have no home or means of employment.
How about having the Syrians stay in Syria and fight for their country? That thought ever occur to anyone?
However, some Republicans have raised concerns that allowing more Syrians into the United States jeopardizes national security.
In another development, Anne Richard, U.S. assistant secretary of state, told C-SPAN's Newsmakers program on Friday that wealthy Gulf Arab states such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar as well as the so-called BRICs emerging market nations should do more to help Syrian refugee.
The fact that they haven't tells you everything you need to know about their assessment of the 'refugees'...
"I would like to see more aid come from the Gulf states that are in the Middle East area and are relatively wealthy compared to Jordan and Lebanon," she said. "We would also like to see more from the so-called BRICs — Brazil, Russia, India, China and, to a lesser extent South Africa," she added. "These are the wealthy states that care about the region that could and should be doing more on the humanitarian side."
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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#1
Barack just can't wait until we have multiple 'Paris style' attacks here that he can exploit.
Friday on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” President Barack Obama seemingly downplayed the threat of ISIS in an interview with ABC’s George Stephanopoulos that aired on Friday’s broadcast of “Good Morning America.”
Stephanopoulos asked Obama if ISIS was gaining in strength, to which Obama denied they were.
You might want to revise your opinion in light of yesterday's news, Mr. President...
“I don’t think they’re gaining strength,” Obama responded. “What is true is that from the start, our goal has been first to contain and we have contained them. They have not gained ground in Iraq, and in Syria they’ll come in, they’ll leave, but you don’t see this systemic march by ISIL across the terrain.”
“What we have not yet been able to do is to completely decapitate their command and control structures,” he admitted. “We’ve made some progress in trying to reduce the flow of foreign fighters and part our goal has to be to recruit more effective Sunni partners in Iraq to really go on offense rather than simply engage in defense.”
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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#2
How is reversing everything Bush working out for you Mr. president?
Posted by: Sven the pelter ||
11/14/2015 9:31 Comments ||
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#3
This muth****ker is crazy
Posted by: chris ||
11/14/2015 9:39 Comments ||
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#4
The problem with 'surgical' strikes or application of force is that they become in effect just another off shoot of primitive warfare. In modern parlance, PR wars. That is displays of force or dominance without serious and deep consequences for everyone involved. It is what leads to spiraling escalation by participants. Given that one side's only goal is the ultimate submission of the other, the other side can not assuage its need for self serving morality by seeking solutions other than the submission of the other opponent by any means available. It's either you or them. This man has already surrendered and he wants to take the rest of us with him.
#5
Not crazy, just uneducated, lacking the thick understanding of the Enlightenment and Anglo-American history. He makes Harding look like some damn genius. Yes, I'll say it, I would have much preferred that rat bastard William Jefferson Clinton over this disaster.
ISLAMABAD: Lal Masjid cleric Abdul Aziz held a rally to mark the initiation of a movement towards enforcement of a system based on the Holy Quran and Sunnah, after Friday prayers.
The rally, led by Abdul Aziz and Umme Hassan and comprising seminary students, took off from Lal Masjid in Islamabad’s G-6 Sector and ended at the Jamia Hafsa in Sector G-7 of Islamabad. Umme Hassan is the head of the Jamia Hafsa seminary and wife of Lal Masjid cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz.
"Abdul, dearest, what is that faint buzzing sound in the sky?"
"Tut tut, Umme, think nothing of it. And DUCK!"
Those attending the rally shouted anti-government slogans in favour of Maulana Abdul Aziz. They also demanded the enforcement of a system based on the Quran and Sunnah.
A heavy contingent of police and Rangers was deployed in the areas surrounding Lal Masjid and Jamia Hafsa in the federal capital city to maintain law and order.
District Magistrate of Islamabad Capital Territory has issued a warning notice to the Lal Masjid cleric for taking out rally ‘without informing and seeking permission from authorities, which could have jeopardised the law and order situation in Islamabad’.
The letter states that a previous notice issued by the office of the chief commissioner of Islamabad on August 3 this year, had included Aziz’s name in a watch list under the Fourth Schedule of the Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA). It further states that as per a surety letter submitted by Aziz to the inspector general of Islamabad Police, he is bound to respect and cooperate with the federal authorities.
The warning letter by Islamabad’s district magistrate states that Friday’s rally was in violation of Section 11EE of the ATA as he took part in a rally, organised with religious parties, without informing and seeking prior approval from the authorities concerned, which could have jeopardised the law and order situation in the federal capital.
The letter also warned the Lal Masjid cleric that he could even be arrested if found guilty of violation of Section 11EE of the ATA again.
This is not the first time Abdul Aziz has vowed to enforce Sharia in the country. Earlier in April 2007, Lal Masjid clerics had vowed to enforce what they called ‘Shariat’ in the country even if the government does not want to do so. The Lal Masjid administration had also threatened to unleash a wave of suicide bombers if the government took any action to counter it. The announcement was followed by agitation which erupted into street battles around the mosque between security forces and the militants. At least nine people died and some 150 were injured.
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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[IsraelTimes] With Hezbollah as its model, Al-Sabirin recruiting an initial intended force of 400, Israel's Channel 2 reports
Iran is trying to build a Hezbollah-style terror group in the Gazoo Strip, Israel's Channel 2 reported Friday night.
Al-Sabirin (the name comes from the Arabic word for "patience") has begun recruiting an intended initial force of 400 fighters, the TV report said, and is directly funded by the regime in Tehran.
Because it follows Shi'ite Islam -- as does Iran and the Iranian proxy militia Hezbollah in Leb -- it is having a difficult time gaining recruits among Gazoo's Sunni Muslims. Nonetheless, the report said, Iran's Revolutionary Guards is allocating funds to the nascent group, transferred through a charitable organization named after the founder of Iran's Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Khomeini.
Headed by a former Islamic Jihad ...created after many members of the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the assassination of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah... leader named Hisham Salem, Al-Sabirin has fired rockets into Israel, and lost one fighter, named in the TV report as Ahmed al-Sirahi, in festivities with Israel forces at the Gazoo border last month.
A rocket factory it established in Gazoo was blown up during the summer 2014 war with Israel, and the two Gazooks who were producing its rockets were killed, according to the report.
The symbol and flag of the group are very similar to those of Hezbollah, which in 2006 fought a major war against Israel, and which Israel today believes has an arsenal of some 150,000 rockets and precision missiles in south Leb ready for use against Israel should Iran give the word.
Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has repeatedly vowed to arm fighters in Paleostine against Israel -- a pledge he has restated in the wake of July's world powers' nuclear accord with his regime. Israel's leadership bitterly opposed the terms of that deal, warning that it would embolden Iran in its support for terrorism and regional aggression, and bolster the regime's finances, as well as paving its path to the bomb.
Iran's drive to establish its own organization in the Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason,-controlled Gazoo Strip began 18 months ago, the TV report said, and Tehran has now suspended all funding to Hamas and the smaller Islamic Jihad, in part because of their opposition to the Assad regime that Iran and Hezbollah are supporting in Syria.
Tehran is also channeling funds to woo recruits to the organization through the familiar path of philanthropy, the TV report said, citing school equipment and household goods purchased with Iranian money for needy Gazooks. It showed school supplies in Gazoo bearing the picture of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, and cooling fans purchased, ironically, in Israel.
Al-Sabirin "is still a small organization, with marginal influence" in Gazoo, the TV report said. "But these are the first seeds."
Posted by: trailing wife ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
#1
Yea, like they don't own Hamas lock, stock, and barrel?
#4
Because the Persians are tired of the Arabs mucking the whole thing up despite all the money and stuff they've supplied over the years? Plus, they are feeling frisky and have a lot of spare cash after Obama's nuke deal.
US Secretary of State John Kerry kicked off meetings in Vienna on Friday ahead of a critical new round of international diplomatic talks on the crisis in Syria.
Good timing, John...
On the eve of Saturday's larger gathering, Kerry was seeing the foreign ministers of Turkey and Saudi Arabia, as well as the UN special envoy for Syria. Saturday's meeting will include senior officials from 19 nations and groups and aims to chart a way toward a ceasefire and political transition in Syria to end the country's devastating war. They must overcome deep differences to do so. The meeting comes amid new pushes against Daesh extremists in Syria and Iraq.
On Friday, the US released a list of nations that are taking part in the meeting alongside the United Nations, European Union and Arab League. While nearly all are sending their top diplomats, China and Iran are sending deputy ministers. The participants will be grappling with questions that have scuttled all previous attempts to forge a ceasefire and usher in a political transition.
Other than the Daesh group, who are the extremists? Who from Syria's government and opposition should do the negotiating? How long can Syrian President Bashar Assad remain in power?
Failure to reach agreement could leave international peace efforts in tatters.
Kerry pointed out the difficulties himself in a speech about Syria in Washington on Thursday.
"We face an environment now that bears little resemblance to the kind of black-white scenarios that make decisions relatively easy," he said. "Put simply, there are bad guys all around and good guys who are not accustomed to working with each other."
Posted by: Steve White ||
11/14/2015 00:00 ||
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[FOX] CBS News reportedly reworked the format of its Saturday night Democratic debate agenda to focus more on terrorism, national security and foreign policy, in the hours following the deadly terror attacks in Paris.
Network executive Steve Capus told The New York Times late Friday that the adjustments were made during debate rehearsals in Des Moines, Iowa, after news broke about the deadly attacks.
You can understand that CBS would feel the need to rehearse Hilarity and Bernie rather extensively on the topic of national security...
"There is no question that the emphasis changes dramatically," said Capus, the network's executive editor and the executive producer of "CBS Evening News.'
The Islamic State jihadist group has claimed responsibility for the series of coordinated attacks in and around the French capital in which 127 people were killed. Another 200 people were critically injured, including some Americans, as a result of the attacks -- suicide bombings near France's national stadium and shooting at Paris cafes and a concert hall.
The debate is scheduled for 8 p.m. local time in the first-in-the-nation balloting state. It will feature frontrunning Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, a former secretary of state; Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders and former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley.
Clinton has faced sharp criticism from Republicans and others for how, as the State Department's leader, handled the Sept. 11, 2012, terror attacks on a U.S. diplomatic outpost in Benghazi, Libya, in which Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed.
#12
Clinton: We are at war with violent extremism...we are not at war with Islamism.
CBS is posting tweets on screen live with the debate video. The ones they select, of course. They are featuring Michael Moore's tweet wishing Clinton would repudiate her Iraq war vote. But Jeb's in there, too, and Huckabee: "Say it with me: Radical Islamic Terrorism."
#18
This debate is amazing, the crowd is silent as a funeral. Were they told to be quiet or do they realize their side is totally unprepared for the real world?
#21
Hillary: We have to go after the hedge funds and Lehman (!). Sanders: I will break up the banks. We will use credit unions!! It's the future of America!
Hillary to Sanders: you are impuning my integrity. I go after *all* of Wall St.
#22
This debate is amazing, the crowd is silent as a funeral. Were they told to be quiet or do they realize their side is totally unprepared for the real world?
#24
Hillary tweets in Spanish promising expansion of DAPA and DACA. #DemDebate
How is she tweeting while standing on the stage in front of the audience and the cameras? Or is this some invisible minion pretending to be her, the same as every other day?
#32
Hillary touting her Bin Laden take-down experiences. O'Malley: I'm experienced and a great manager. Sanders: I did something involving negotiation with McCain.
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.
This summer's market mayhem caused Americans to buy gold bars and coins at levels unseen since the financial crisis.
North Korea
MISRATA: The attack bore all the traits of Islamic State in Iraq. A small unit of militants, armed with Kalashnikov rifles and suicide belts, hit the Tripoli prison just before sunrise.
War would break out if the European Union did not exist, Jean-Claude Juncker’s deputy suggested on Friday night. Frans Timmermans, the first vice president of the European Commission told an audience in Prague that history had shown that “all other forms” of politics in Europe “lead to war”.
US Secretary of State John Kerry kicked off meetings in Vienna on Friday ahead of a critical new round of international diplomatic talks on the crisis in Syria.
