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Friday, July 5, 2013

Syria Goes Hot: Russia To Deliver Weapons, Deploys Air Defense; Israel Warns Russia; Obama Demands No Fly Zone

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 05/28/2013 16:32 -0400

Those who were intently following the USDJPY pair formerly known as the stock market today missed the biggest news of the day: the proxy war in Syria just went hot, following a confluence of news, first that Russia insisted "it would deliver anti-aircraft missiles to Syria despite international criticism, as fears of spillover from the conflict grew" and in logical retaliation to yesterday's decision by Europe to lift an arms embargo to the Al Qaeda-supported, Qatari mercenaries operating in Syria, also known as "rebels.
This lead Israel's defense minister Moshe Yaalon to immediately signal that "its military is prepared to strike shipments of advanced Russian weapons to Syria."
Meanwhile back in the US "the White House has asked the Pentagon to draw up plans for a no-fly zone inside Syria that would be enforced by the U.S. and other countries such as France and Great Britain, two administration officials told The Daily Beast."
And just to make it very clear that Russia is not bluffing, it announced overnight that its four regiments of S-300 air defense systems have been deployed at the Ashuluk firing range in southern Russia as part of another snap combat readiness check of the Russian armed forces "The missions will be carried out in conditions of heavy electronic warfare to test the capabilities of the air defense units to the highest limit."
And to think: yet another threat of a global war over some natgas pipelines from Qatar to Europe, and a threat to Gazprom's monopoly.
From AFP:

Russia insisted Tuesday it would deliver anti-aircraft missiles to Syria despite international criticism, as fears of spillover from the conflict grew after three Lebanese soldiers were killed in a border-area attack.

Israel warned Russia it would "know what to do" if the delivery went ahead, and Syria's top rebel commander gave Hezbollah, the powerful Lebanese Shiite movement, a 24-hour ultimatum to stop fighting alongside regime forces.

The developments stoked tensions after the European Union decided to lift an embargo on weapons to Syria's rebels, in a move the opposition reacted to with caution.

Syria's regime joined its ally Russia in condemning the EU decision as an "obstruction" to peace efforts, while accusing the bloc of supporting and encouraging "terrorists".

Moscow said it would go ahead with its plans to deliver the S-300 missiles to Syria, despite international concerns, saying the weapons were part of existing contracts.

"We consider these supplies a stabilising factor," deputy foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov said, adding they could act as a deterrence against foreign intervention.

Israel's immediate response via the Guardian:

Israel quickly issued a thinly veiled warning that it would bomb the Russian S-300 missiles if they were sent to Syria, as such a move would bring the advanced guided missiles within range of civilian and military planes over Israel. Israel has conducted three sets of air strikes on Syria this year, aimed at preventing missiles being brought close to its border by the Lebanese Shia group Hezbollah.

"The shipments haven't set out yet and I hope they won't," Moshe Ya'alon, the Israeli defence minister, said. "If they do arrive in Syria, God forbid, we'll know what to do."

Russia's deputy foreign minister, Sergey Ryabkov, argued that the delivery of the S-300 system had been previously agreed with Damascus and would be a stabilising factor that could dissuade "some hotheads" from entering the conflict. That appeared to be a reference to the UK and France, who pushed through the lifting of the EU embargo on Monday night and are the only European countries considering arming the rebel Free Syrian Army (FSA).

After much deliberations, and unable to find the much needed "weapons of mass destruction" to justify intervention, the US is nonetheless escalating next and Obama is now said to demand plans for a No Fly Zone over Syria from the Pentagon. From the Daily Beast:

Along with no-fly zone plans, the White House is considering arming parts of the Syrian opposition and formally recognizing the Syrian opposition council.

The White House has asked the Pentagon to draw up plans for a no-fly zone inside Syria that would be enforced by the U.S. and other countries such as France and Great Britain, two administration officials told The Daily Beast.

The request was made shortly before Secretary of State John Kerry toured the Middle East last week to try and finalize plans for an early June conference between the Syrian regime and rebel leaders in Geneva. The opposition, however, has yet to confirm its attendance and is demanding that the end of Syrian President Bashar al Assad’s rule be a precondition for negotiations, a condition Assad is unlikely to accept.

In April, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey told the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense that the military was planning for a range of options in Syria but that he did not necessarily support using those options.

"We're prepared with options, should military force be called upon and assuming it can be effectively used to secure our interests without making matters worse,” he said. “We must also be ready for options for an uncertain and dangerous future. That is a future we have not yet identified."

And finally going back full circle, Russia announced overnight that its four regiments of S-300 air defense systems have been deployed at the Ashuluk firing range in southern Russia as part of another snap combat readiness check of the Russian armed forces, the Defense Ministry said. From RIA:

The regiments were airlifted on Thursday by military transport planes to designated drop zones where they will carry out a variety of missions simulating the defense of the Russian airspace from massive attacks by “enemy” missiles and aircraft.

“The missions will be carried out in conditions of heavy electronic warfare to test the capabilities of the air defense units to the highest limit,” the ministry said.

A total of 8,700 personnel, 185 warplanes and 240 armored vehicles are involved in the three-day exercise, overseen by Col. Gen. Vladimir Zarudnitsky, head of Russian General Staff’s Main Operations Directorate.

Surely all of the above is very beneficial for future global GDP prospects.
Finally, here is the Russian S-300 system causing Qatar gas pipeline plans global democracies so much consternation:

Al Qaeda Linked Gaza Terrorist Group Claims Credit for Arizona Wildfires

July 5, 2013 By Daniel Greenfield 7 Comments

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Whether you believe Masada al Mujahideen or not is another matter, but arson has been their M.O. for a while now. They claimed credit for a series of fires in Israel and for the Reno, Nevada wildfires last year. But an elderly man came forward claiming to have accidentally started that.

So it’s entirely possible that Masada al Mujahideen just makes things up.

A Palestinian jihadist group, Masada al Mujahideen, recently claimed credit for ongoing wildfires in Arizona in a statement posted to jihadist forums today. The statement, titled “Masada al-Mujahideen Fulfilled its Promise and Attacked America Again After the Expiration of the Period with Fires that Achieved Historic Results,” was obtained and translated by the SITE Intelligence Group.
“We had previously announced an unconventional war against the occupation state of Israel, and then we escalated this war to reach its main supporter, America, so that it receives a major share of it, which will destroy their flora and fauna, with permission from Allah and then with our hands,” the group said.
The statement further said that the group targeted the United States “in order to make it clear and to make it know we can reach it when we warn it, and to make it certain that our hands don’t just reach it but also strike it.”
The group warned that the attacks “will not be the last…if America does not respond to our demands.” The statement boasted that 19 firefighters had been killed in the fires.
Contrary to the claims of Masada al Mujahideen, authorities have said that they believe the fires were started as a result of lighting.

The authorities do have every reason to cover up Al Qaeda attacks in the United States considering Obama’s current policies, but I would still say that the lightning is more likely. And that Masada al Mujahideen are clowns who take responsibility for any fire that appears in the news.

Filed Under: The Point Tagged With: Arizona, arson jihad, Gaza

Russia Builds Missile Defense It Would Deny U.S.

Posted 07/03/2013 06:34 PM ET

Weaponry: As Moscow complains about U.S. missile defense plans in Europe, it is completing an anti-missile radar site in southern Russia to protect its homeland against missile strikes. Our flexibility meets their hypocrisy.
On the heels of a test last month of a missile that U.S. intelligence officials believe violates the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, Russia is completing a large radar station near Armavir situated near the Black Sea and designed to detect missiles launched from Europe and Iran.
During a flight test of the Yars-M road-mobile missile on June 6, the missile traveled from a launch center at Kapustin Yar and landed at an impact range at Sary-Shagan, about 2,000 kilometers, or 1,242 miles, away. The distance would make the missile an INF-covered weapon.
While President Obama in his Berlin speech committed the U.S. to reducing its nuclear warhead stockpile by one-third, Moscow is clearly committed to modernizing and expanding its strategic nuclear weapons capability, matching it with a missile defense capability as it seeks to limit ours.
The Armavir radar is one of four advanced missile defense radars built by Russia in recent years and being rushed into service by 2020. Each of the radar can track up to 500 objects simultaneously. Two of the stations already are deployed near St. Petersburg and in Siberia in the Irkutsk region.
The fourth radar is located in the Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad. That's where Moscow threatened to deploy advanced Iskander short-range nuclear-capable missiles if the U.S. went forward with Bush administration plans to deploy ground-based interceptors in Poland and missile defense radars in the Czech Republic. All the the radars are protected by highly advanced Russian S-400 air defense and anti-missile interceptors.
After Russia objected, Obama caved and dropped those plans, abandoning NATO allies who had stuck their necks out for us but claiming he had a better plan. To reassure the Russians we meant them no harm, the president said last year during an open-microphone exchange with then-Russian President Dmitri Medvedev that he would have "more flexibility" to dismantle U.S. missile defenses after his re-election.
Typical of the way Obama has treated loyal allies such as Britain and Israel, the Poles were notified with a midnight phone call on Sept. 17, 2009 — the 70th anniversary of the Soviet invasion — that we were pulling the plug on that system due to Russian objections.
Since then, Obama has also scuttled his "better plan." Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel announced in March the U.S. was canceling the fourth phase of its new missile defense plan for Europe, again to assuage Moscow's fears. The fourth and last phase of the program would have included interceptors that could stop missiles from hitting U.S. territory.

Russia Builds Missile Defense It Would Deny U.S.

The three earlier phases are targeted on missiles aimed solely at Europe. Phase 4 included development of the SM-3 IIB interceptor, an advanced version of the missile now aboard our Aegis missile defense warships.
Ironically, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement shortly after Hagel's announcement criticizing the Pentagon for continuing "to maintain a course toward strengthening its system of global missile defense and raising its effectiveness" even as Moscow was busy strengthening its own missile defense systems.
While the Russians have been highly vocal about any U.S. move to modernize its nuclear deterrent or missile defense capabilities, President Obama has been strangely silent on Russia's missile defense and strategic nuclear arms buildup. It also has sought no limits on Russian missile defenses in talks with Russian officials.
We only wish the Obama administration is as interested in defending the United States as it is in seeking a world without nuclear weapons. So far all we see is ours being eliminated.

Venezuela's Maduro is Offering Edward Snowden Asylum

This Country is Offering Edward Snowden Asylum

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro said on Friday he had decided to offer asylum to former U.S. intelligence contractor Edward Snowden, who has petitioned several countries to avoid capture by Washington.

"I have decided to offer humanitarian asylum to the young American, Edward Snowden, so that in the fatherland of (Simon) Bolivar and (Hugo) Chavez, he can come and live away from the imperial North American persecution," Maduro told a televised parade marking Venezuela's independence day.

Snowden is believed to be holed up in the transit area of a Moscow international airport.What are your thoughts?

I POSTED ABOUT THIS LAST YEAR EVERY ONE SAID I AM CRAZY NOT SO CRAZY ANY MORE

(IBD) While Obama Disarms, Russia Builds Missile Defense It Would Deny U.S.

On the heels of a test last month of a missile that U.S. intelligence officials believe violates the 1987 Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, Russia is completing a large radar station near Armavir situated near the Black Sea and designed to detect missiles launched from Europe and Iran.
During a flight test of the Yars-M road-mobile missile on June 6, the missile traveled from a launch center at Kapustin Yar and landed at an impact range at Sary-Shagan, about 2,000 kilometers, or 1,242 miles, away. The distance would make the missile an INF-covered weapon.
While President Obama in his Berlin speech committed the U.S. to reducing its nuclear warhead stockpile by one-third, Moscow is clearly committed to modernizing and expanding its strategic nuclear weapons capability, matching it with a missile defense capability as it seeks to limit ours.
The Armavir radar is one of four advanced missile defense radars built by Russia in recent years and being rushed into service by 2020. Each of the radar can track up to 500 objects simultaneously. Two of the stations already are deployed near St. Petersburg and in Siberia in the Irkutsk region.
The fourth radar is located in the Baltic enclave of Kaliningrad. That's where Moscow threatened to deploy advanced Iskander short-range nuclear-capable missiles if the U.S. went forward with Bush administration plans to deploy ground-based interceptors in Poland and missile defense radars in the Czech Republic. All the the radars are protected by highly advanced Russian S-400 air defense and anti-missile interceptors.
After Russia objected, Obama caved and dropped those plans, abandoning NATO allies who had stuck their necks out for us but claiming he had a better plan. To reassure the Russians we meant them no harm, the president said last year during an open-microphone exchange with then-Russian President Dmitri Medvedev that he would have "more flexibility" to dismantle U.S. missile defenses after his re-election.
Read More At Investor's Business Daily: http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/070313-662526-russia-build...
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Indubitably True That Obama Is Enabling Christian Persecution

By Ted on July 5, 2013 in Blog, General

From FrontPage Magazine:

LOPEZ: What do the Copts need?
IBRAHIM: All that the Copts want is equality — to be seen and treated as full Egyptian citizens, irrespective of their Christian faith. Under the era of Westernization and modernization, they were indeed largely seen as “regular” Egyptians. But, as Muslims went from emulating the West, to having contempt for it — I discuss this phenomenon at length in my book Crucified Again — so too did they begin to reclaim their Islamic heritage, and its teachings, which are fundamentally hostile to non-Muslims, and so Egypt’s most indigenous and native inhabitants — the Christian Copts — come to suffer for it.
LOPEZ: Who was Cyril Yusuf Sa’ad?
IBRAHIM: He was a six-year-old Coptic Christian boy who was abducted and held for ransom. Muslim abductions of Christians is an increasingly common practice, not just in Egypt, but in Pakistan, Iraq, Syria, etc. (as I show in Crucified Again). The boy was eventually killed in late May. According to the Arabic language report, the boy’s “family is in tatters after paying 30,000 pounds to the abductor, who still killed the innocent child and threw his body into the toilet of his home, where the body, swollen and moldy, was exhumed.”
LOPEZ: Who was Agape Essam Girgis?
IBRAHIM: She is a 14-year-old Coptic girl who, on her way to school accompanied by a Muslim social worker and two teachers — one of whom was a Salafi — never returned. She was drugged and awakened to find herself in a secluded place with an elderly woman and Salafis who tried to convert her to Islam, forced her to wear the full hijab, and beat her. She was eventually released — she’s actually one of the few lucky Coptic girls who made it back home (one recent study states that well over 500 Coptic girls have been abducted, raped, seduced, blackmailed, etc., in the last few years).
LOPEZ: Is it an exaggeration to argue that there is a jihad on children in Egypt? And is there a danger in relying on some of the news accounts?
IBRAHIM: Well, what more must happen before highlighting the plight of Christian youth under Islam is justified? Christian boys and girls in Egypt are frequently targeted, often for “ransom” money — as they are in Pakistan, Syria, Iraq, and all throughout sub-Saharan Africa. Those targeting them are Muslims who, for a variety of reasons, have concluded that their actions — targeting Christians for extortion, and often yanking them from the doorsteps of their “infidel” churches — are legitimate in the context of Islam and jihad. I explain this phenomenon — doctrinally and historically – in Crucified Again. Indeed, only the other day, I wrote about new threats directed against Egypt’s Christians, telling them not to join protests against Morsi, otherwise their “businesses, cars, homes, schools, and churches” might “catch fire.” The message concluded by saying: “If you are not worried about any of these, then worry about your children and your homes. This message is being delivered with tact. But when the moment of truth comes, there will be no tact.” Around the same time, Sheikh Essam Abdulamek, a member of parliament’s Shura Council, warned Egypt’s Christians on live TV against participating in the June 30 protests, saying, “Do not sacrifice your children.”
LOPEZ: Is it really fair to say that the Obama administration is enabling Christian persecution, as you do?
IBRAHIM: It’s not just fair — it’s indubitably true. In every single country where Christian minorities live among Muslim majorities, Obama’s policies have empowered the Islamist parties, with the obvious consequence that the Christians are first to suffer. In Egypt, as expected, since the Obama-backed Brotherhood came to power, the persecution of Copts has practically been legalized, as unprecedented numbers of Christians — men, women, and children — have been arrested, often receiving more than double the maximum prison sentence, under the accusation that they “blasphemed” Islam or its prophet. It was also under Brotherhood rule that another unprecedented scandal occurred: St. Mark Cathedral — the holiest site of Coptic Christianity and home of the pope himself — was besieged in broad daylight by Islamic rioters. When security came, they too joined in the attack on the cathedral.

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California Passes K-12 CHILD TRANSGENDER Choice Law welcome to the judgement of the lord

California Passes K-12 CHILD TRANSGENDER Choice Law

July 5, 2013

What is wrong with a society that condones and allows children as young as FIVE YEARS OLD to suffer mental and in some cases, where hormones are given, physical sexual abuse. Children need love, guidance, fun, creativity. They do NOT need to learn about sex or gender orientation! Little 5 year old girls do NOT need to know about male sex organs! This is CRIMINAL!
Article submitted by: Veronica Coffin

California lawmakers approved a bill Wednesday that would require public K-12 schools to let transgender students choose which restrooms they use and which school teams they join based on their gender identity instead of their chromosomes.

Some school districts around the country have implemented similar policies, but the bill’s author says AB1266 would mark the first time a state has mandated such treatment by statute.

Existing state law already prohibits California schools from discriminating against students based on their gender identity, but the legislation that passed the state Senate on Wednesday spells that out in more detail, said Carlos Alcala, a spokesman for the bill’s author, Democratic Assemblyman Tom Ammiano of San Francisco.
At least two others state, Massachusetts and Connecticut, have statewide policies granting the same protections, but neither policy is in statute, according to the Gay-Straight Alliance Network.
The issue has become a battle in some local school districts around the country. For instance, a Colorado family filed a complaint with the state’s civil rights office in March, claiming that their local school had violated the state’s nondiscrimination laws.

The family had been told that their first-grader, who was born a boy, could not use the girl’s bathroom and would have to use the restroom in the nurse’s office or the teachers’ lounge.

California’s bill would give students the right “to participate in sex-segregated programs, activities and facilities” based on their self-perception, regardless of their birth gender.
It sparked an impassioned debate on the Senate floor about when transgender students’ right to expression might conflict with other students’ discomfort and right to privacy.
Supporters said the bill is needed to protect students from bullying and other abuse. They also said it represents the next front in their effort to provide equal rights for lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals, just days after same-sex marriages resumed in California.
“There should be certainty that every kid has the chance to go to school and be treated equally and fairly,” said Sen. Mark Leno, D-San Francisco, who carried the bill in the Senate.

“We know that these particular students suffer much abuse and bullying and denigration. We can’t change that overnight, but what we can do is make sure that the rules are such that they get a fair shake.”

Opponents said the state is going too far if it permits opposite-sex students to use restrooms and locker rooms.
“It is not all about discrimination. Elementary and secondary students of California — our most impressionable, our most vulnerable — now may be subjected to some very difficult situations,” said Republican Sen. Jim Nielsen.
Parents, school administrators and school board members would have no say over students who identify themselves as transgender and enter shower rooms or bathrooms used by the opposite sex, Nielsen said, warning that the privilege could be abused by youthful sex offenders.
“Think about the millions of California parents and students who at the least would be extraordinarily uncomfortable with what this bill would impose upon them,” Nielsen said.
Sen. Steve Knight, R-Palmdale, and Sen. Rod Wright, D-Inglewood, each said that male athletes who are mediocre in competition against their own gender could game the system by competing against female athletes.
“There are kids out there that are struggling, that are having difficult times,” Knight said. “But there are also kids that are going to take advantage of the system.”
Nielsen and Knight voted against the bill, while Wright was among eight members of both parties who did not vote. Wright also worried that schools could eliminate football and other contact sports if they faced increased liability by letting girls play.
Sen. Ricardo Lara, D-Bell Gardens, said several major California school districts have had similar policies for years covering thousands of students.
“To date there’s been no single reported incident of any misconduct,” Lara said.”Let’s not confuse silly behavior issues with sensitive gender identity issues.”
The Senate passed the bill on a vote of 21-9. It previously passed the Assembly and now goes to the governor.
A spokesman for the Democratic governor said the administration would not comment on pending legislation.