Arab News reported (6/7/2017) that “Suicide bombers and gunmen attacked the parliament building and the Mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini in the Iranian capital. Islamic State (IS) claimed responsibility and released a video purporting to show gunmen inside the parliament.” The twin attacks on Wednesday killed 12 Iranians, and embarrassed the radical Islamist regime by showing its vulnerability at home. IS terrorists hit the most potent symbols of Iran’s Islamic Republic on Wednesday. It has brought into sharp focus the high cost of Tehran’s involvement in Syria, which according to the powerful Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) leadership, was meant to ward off terrorist attacks at the home front. With an economy that has barely recovered from sanctions imposed on it by the international community, the Iranian regime of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei can hardly justify the huge cost to the treasury of exporting its revolution and backing Assad in Syria with Iranian cash, if not in blood.
Given the Sunni-Shiite conflict engulfing the Middle East, it was inevitable that IS will ultimately strike at Iran - the patrons of Shiite-Islam. The antecedents of IS in Iraq proved that the Sunnis who ruled in Iraq albeit, as a minority with a Shiite majority, won’t easily allow Shiites to disenfranchise them. In Syria however, the Sunnis are the majority, and have been ruled for almost 50 years by the Alawite (Shiite) clan of the Assads. It was never a question of whether or if IS will strike at Iran but rather when.
To expand its influence throughout the Middle East region, and extend the Shiite Crescent, the Ayatollahs' regime in Tehran has devoted huge resources to protect its turf in Syria, and maintain it as a bridge to Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea.
The Syrian dictator who has now earned the moniker “the butcher of Damascus” can count on the Iranian ‘Foreign Legion’ made up of Shiite fighters from Lebanon (Hezbollah), Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Yemen. They provide the manpower that serves the Iranian agenda in Syria.
In Israel, there is particular attention being paid to the Al Nujaba group. Israeli Col. (retired) Dr. Jacques Neriah, suggested that at “The end of February, 2017, the leader of Al-Nujaba’, Akram el-Q’aabi, declared in an unprecedented announcement that his forces were to fight together with the Syrian army to ‘liberate’ the Golan.
Therefore, it was time to decapitate the head of the Zionist snake. Neriah added, “The Brigade announced in March, 2017 the creation of “The Liberation of the Golan Brigade” (Liwa’ Tahrir el-Jolan). The Brigade whose members have fought in Lebanon, Syria, and Iraq will have one mission: to assist the Syrian army in liberating its “stolen lands.”
According to the spokesman of the Al-Nujaba, ‘The creation of this Brigade was but a step toward liberating the holy places in occupied Palestine.”
The Iranian strategy, it appears, is to consolidate is forces in southwestern Syria facing the Druze area of Dar’aa, and gradually move their commanded forces toward the Israeli border in the Golan. Iran has sought for a long time now to establish its proxies, including Hezbollah units in the Golan facing Israel. Israel however, was able to dislodge these Iranian efforts. Nevertheless, the Iranian cooperation with Russia in Syria, and the lucrative arms deals between them, may persuade Russia to consider the Iranian efforts.
Bashar Assad’s troops and his allies, the Iran-backed Lebanese Hizballah, are notorious for their barbaric cruelty to the populations they conquer. But even by their own appalling standards, the massacre they wreaked against the 100,000 citizens of the southern Syrian town of Daraa this week must stand out as a milestone from hell.
Posted in the town, just one kilometer from the Jordanian border, were 3,000 anti-Assad rebels, some of whom joined the Free Syrian Army to be trained and armed by the United States and Jordan. The offensive the Syrian government army and Hizballah launched against their positions on Sunday, June 11, left 140 dead and hundreds injured in its first hours.
DEBKAfile’s military sources report that it started with dozens of Syrian air force helicopters dropping 150 explosive barrels on those positions, while Syrian bomber-fighter planes conducted at least 25 sorties against rebel rooftop positions atop the highest buildings, and Syrian artillery fired off some 120 ground-to-ground missiles against various key points in the town of Daraa.
Syrian and Hizballah forces advanced into the town under this hellish blitz.
Our sources report that the spearhead consisted entirely of Hizballah’s Al Qaim Brigade, followed by units of the Syrian army’s elite 4th armored Division, armed with advanced Russian-made T-90 tanks. The commander of the offensive was Col. Ghayath Galla.
After capturing Daraa, the next victim of a Syrian-Hizballah massacre is most probably Quneitra, which lies less than 9km from the Israeli border. Its capture would bring every last Syrian town bordering Jordan and Israel under their domination.
The Western Wall should always remain under Muslim control and we will not give a single millimeter to the Israelis, the Palestinian Authority’s supreme Sharia judge and senior adviser to PA President Mahmoud Abbas said on Friday, contradicting earlier remarks made by a PA official who acknowledged that the Wall is one of Judaism’s holiest sites and as such should remain in Jewish hands.
“The al-Buraq wall is an integral part of the Islamic faith and religion, and is associated with the Prophet Muhammad,” Mahmoud al-Habash said in a sermon broadcast on official Palestinian Authority TV, using the Islamic name for the Western Wall.
“It is an Islamic Waqf (endowment) that can never be for non-Muslims. It cannot be under the sovereignty of non-Muslims. … The al-Buraq wall belongs to us and cannot be conceded,” he added.
“We cannot possibly relinquish a single millimeter, a single stone, a single micromillimeter of the Al-Buraq Wall and of the blessed Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
North Korea is likely to keep lobbing missiles off the Korean Peninsula, about every two weeks for the rest of the year, according to the calculations of a US expert at the Korea Economic Institute of America.
“If North Korean tests continue at the same pace as they have so far this year, we should expect a new missile test every 2.1 weeks and another 13-14 tests,” Troy Stangarone wrote in an article for the KEI’s The Peninsula website.
While intelligence assessments can certainly change over time, the CIA compiled a report for the US National Intelligence Council titled “North Korea: Likely Response to Economic Sanctions” that concluded sanctions alone would not push Pyongyang off its desired path to obtain an arsenal of powerful nukes.
The report, classified as “secret” in 1990, stated, “The Intelligence Community believes that economic sanctions per se would not cause North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapon program.” It added that if Pyongyang viewed any sanctions as threatening its “basic survival,” it would likely strike South Korea in retaliation.
This would be amusing if the subject matter weren't so serious.
CNN was caught on video last week literally staging an anti-terror protest by a group of Muslim women.
The crew tightly packs the approximately two dozen protesters together with signs facing the camera, while Anderson monologues about the “beautiful” anti-terror protest.CNN International responded to the claims that they staged the protest, writing, “This is nonsense. Police let demonstrators through the cordon to show their signs. CNN along with other media simply filmed them doing so.”
Oh, really? Here's a YouTube video showing what was going on prior to the Twitter video:
Youtube video taken by Claire Jordan shows her milling around the scene and “protest” prior to CNN lining up the protesters for their on-air shot.
There is a group of people in the area, both Muslim and non-Muslim, and some of them can be seen handing out bouquets of flowers and posters.
Jordan, narrating the video, observes, “you see more press than anyone else.
Jordan then crosses the street and shows the Muslim women who were featured on the CNN broadcast. They are located on the opposite side of the street and “they’re taking selfies, none of them have got flowers.”
“I was there just before,” she explains, “and you see, again, this is the group of women and the little boy–they’re just getting their posters now.”
The Muslim women then gather their posters and cross the street to set up for the CNN shot that was used in the broadcast.
"Nonsense," eh? They "simply filmed" this "authentic" display of anti-terrorism sentiment by a small group of Muslim women? (We had bigger protests against "meatless Fridays" at my high school back in the day.)
Question: Where did the flowers come from? Who made up the signs? Are we to believe that a group of random Muslim women spontaneously showed up and wanted to express their sentiments against terrorism?
CNN could claim that the sentiment expressed at the demonstration was real and that they just helped get the message out a little bit. But no matter how authentic the feelings, the fact that CNN inserted themselves into the scene to heighten the dramatic effect is inexcusable.
As Venezuela enters year eighteen of the Bolivarian Socialist Revolution, the international community is finally paying attention, as Venezuelans struggle to find food, medicine, and an outlet for their frustration that will not trigger rampant state violence.
There is no short version of the story of how South America’s wealthiest nation, which boasts the world’s largest known oil reserves, became a nation where 15 percent of people need to scavenge through garbage to eat while the nation’s dictator dances on state television. Venezuela’s decline is the inevitable endgame of socialism, told by the deterioration of its streets, the abuse of its opposition politicians, and the use of the military to maim and kill Venezuelan children as young as 14.
Below, 20 images show the true toll of socialism in Venezuela.
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