As the US mainstream media obsessed last week about Russia's supposed “hacking” of the US elections and President Obama’s final round of Russia sanctions in response, something very important was taking place under the media radar. As a result of a meeting between foreign ministers of Russia, Iran, and Turkey last month, a ceasefire in Syria has been worked out and is being implemented. So far it appears to be holding, and after nearly six years of horrible warfare the people of Syria are finally facing the possibility of rebuilding their lives.
What is so important about this particular ceasefire? It was planned, agreed to, and implemented without the participation of the United States Government.
In fact it was frustration with Washington’s refusal to separate its “moderates” from terrorist groups and its continued insistence on regime change for the Syrian government that led the three countries to pursue a solution on their own for Syria. They also included the Syrian government and much of the opposition in the agreement, which the US government has been unwilling to do.
We have been told all along by the neocons and “humanitarian interventionists” that the United States must take a central role in every world crisis or nothing will ever be solved. We are the “indispensable nation,” they say, and without our involvement the world will collapse. Our credibility is on the line, they claim, and if we don’t step up no one will. All this is untrue, as we have seen last week.
The fact is, it is often US involvement in “solving” these crises that actually perpetuates them. Consider the 60-plus year state of war between North and South Korea. Has US intervention done anything to solve the problem? How about our decades of meddling in the Israel-Palestine dispute? Are we any closer to peace between the Israelis and Palestinians despite the billions we have spent bribing and interfering?
So why all the media attention on unproven accusations of Russian hacking and President Obama’s predictable, yet meaningless response? The mainstream media does the bidding of Washington’s interventionists and they are desperate to divert attention from what may prove to be the beginning of the end of Syria’s long nightmare. They don’t want Americans to know that the rest of the world can solve its own problems without the US global policemen in the center of the action. When it is finally understood that we don’t need to be involved for crises to be solved overseas, the neocons will lose. Let’s hope that happens soon!
The agreements between Russia, Turkey and Iran on the Syrian settlement will not result in the division of Syria, said Turkish political analyst and diplomat Aydin Sezer.
In late-December, Reuters reported citing sources that Syria would be divided into informal zones of regional power influence and Bashar Assad would remain president for at least a few years under a deal between Moscow, Ankara and Tehran.
The updated concept of Russia’s foreign policy unveiled in early-December read that Russia stands for the peaceful settlement of the Syrian conflict, the country's territorial integrity, independence and unity.
"Neither Turkey nor Russia does not want Syria to be divided. In the long-run Turkey will have to cooperate with Russia on Syria. This is the opinion of the Turkish government and of the Turkish people," Sezer told RIA Novosti.
The latest agreements on Syria were unveiled by Russian President Vladimir Putin on December 29. The three deals, brokered by Russia, Turkey and Iran, include a ceasefire agreement signed by the Syrian government and the armed opposition. The second document includes measures aimed at monitoring the truce, while the third states that signatories are ready to launch peace negotiations on resolving the years-long war.
Sezer underscored that the current ceasefire cannot be comprehensive since it involves only the so-called moderate opposition. There are various radical forces across Syria who did not join the deal.
"However, the ceasefire is a correct step. It is very important that Ankara and Moscow reaches an agreement on concrete steps on the Syrian settlement," he added.
The analyst underscored that Russia and Turkey managed to work out a compromised approach to armed groups operating across Syria.
A drone fitted with a video camera sailing through the skies over Mount Hebron crashed in a forest on Mount Hebron this week, prompting the residents of Moshav Ma’on to pick it up and take it to the Regavim organization, an NGO known in English as the Movement for Preservation of State Lands.
Regavim posted some of the video footage online.
According to a report broadcast by Israel’s Channel 2 television news, footage retrieved from the drone revealed an extensive operation by the European Union, acting in concert with residents of local Arab communities to gather intelligence on Jewish communities.
Numerous videos revealed footage of Jewish towns in Judea and Samaria, some of which also contain IDF bases. One of the videos showed the drone flying low over the residents of Ma’on before it crashed next to a car.
“What started as illegal construction continues and now is harmful to security,” said Regavim Land Division director Oved Arad. He warned the reconnaissance mission was logical, given the government’s weak response to European Union support for, and construction of illegal Arab houses and other structures in Area C.
“For years the European Union has been involved in illegal construction in Judea and Samaria. Now it’s clear that EU officials, with the Palestinians, are even documenting Israeli settlements and sensitive locations in Judea and Samaria,” he said.
“The Foreign Ministry must respond strongly and unequivocally against this activity, which crosses a red line and is very dangerous.”
Germany's Muslim population surpassed six million in 2016 for the first time ever. Germany now vies with France for the highest Muslim population in Western Europe.
The increase in Germany's Muslim population is being fueled by mass migration. An estimated 300,000 migrants arrived in Germany in 2016, in addition to the more than one million who arrived in 2015. At least 80% (or 800,000 in 2015 and 240,000 in 2016) of the newcomers were Muslim, according to the Central Council of Muslims in Germany.
In addition to the newcomers, the rate of population increase of the Muslim community already living in Germany is around 1.6% per year (or 77,000), according to data extrapolated from a Pew Research Center study on the growth of the Muslim population in Europe.
Based on Pew projections, which were proffered before the current migration crisis, the Muslim population of Germany was to have reached an estimated 5,145,000 by the end of 2015.
- Mass migration from the Muslim world is fast-tracking the Islamization of Germany, as evidenced by the proliferation of no-go zones, Sharia courts, polygamy and child marriages. Mass migration has also been responsible for a host of social disruptions, including jihadist attacks, a migrant rape epidemic, a public health crisis, rising crime and a rush by German citizens to purchase weapons for self-defense — and even to abandon Germany altogether.
- Development Minister Gerd Müller warned that the biggest refugee movements to Europe are still to come. He said that only 10% of the migrants from the chaos in Iraq and Syria have reached Europe so far: "Eight to ten million migrants are still on the way."
- "There are written instructions ... today we are not allowed to say anything negative about the refugees. This is government journalism, and this leads to a situation in which the public loses their trust in us. This is scandalous." — Wolfgang Herles, Deutschlandfunk public radio.
- The Turkish government has sent 970 clerics — most of whom do not speak German — to lead 900 mosques in Germany that are controlled by the Turkish-Islamic Union for Religious Affairs (DITIB), a branch of the Turkish government's Directorate for Religious Affairs, known in Turkish as Diyanet. Critics accuse Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of using DITIB mosques to prevent Turkish migrants from integrating into German society.
- A Cologne police superintendent revealed that he was ordered to remove the term "rape" from an internal police report about the mass sexual assaults in Cologne on New Year's Eve. He said that an official at the North-Rhine Westphalia Interior Ministry told him in an angry tone: "This is not rape. Remove this term from your report. Submit a new report."
- The German branch of Open Doors, a non-governmental organization supporting persecuted Christians, reported that thousands of Christians in German refugee shelters are being persecuted by Muslims, sometimes even by their security guards.
- A 23-year-old Iraqi asylum seeker wearing a T-shirt with the words "I'm Muslim Don't Panic" was assaulted by fellow refugees for offending Islam. He was beaten so badly that he was hospitalized.
- Half of the three million ethnic Turks living in Germany believe it is more important to follow Islamic Sharia law than German law if the two are in conflict, according to a survey.
- A document leaked to Der Spiegel revealed that more than 33,000 migrants who are supposed to be deported are still in Germany, being cared for by German taxpayers. Many of the migrants destroyed their passports and are believed to have lied about their countries of origin to make it impossible for them to be deported.
- Migrants committed 142,500 crimes during the first six months of 2016, according to a report by the Federal Criminal Police Office. This is equivalent to 780 crimes committed by migrants every day, or 32.5 crimes each hour, an increase of nearly 40% over 2015. The data includes only those crimes in which a migrant suspect has been caught.
- Bild, the largest-circulation newspaper in Germany, warned that the country was "capitulating to Islamic law."
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