America launches the economic side of the Middle East peace plan amid skepticism

[10 YEARS LATER]

1 hour ago, King Bean said:

 

You beat me to the punch...again. So in response I say...."better Sunni than later". LOL. 

 

[Butifldrm]

Syrian rebels admit chemical use against Kurds

 Hisham Arafat |

April 09-2016     11:44 AM

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A child affected by the chemical attack in Sheikh Maqsoud quarter, Aleppo, Syria, April 7, 2016. (Photo: YPG Press Office)

 

Syrian Kurds YPG Syrian Opposition Jaysh al-Islam 

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ALEPPO, Syria (Kurdistan24) – On Thursday, a group of Syrian rebels admitted it used chemical weapons against Kurds in a mainly Kurdish populated area in the city of Aleppo, northern Syria.

Jaysh al-Islam, a coalition of Islamist units involved in the Syrian civil war, said in an official statement issued on Thursday, “One of the field commanders in Aleppo used weapons that he was not authorized to use in these kinds of confrontations.”

The group claimed that the brigade commander in question was summoned to a military court. “[He] has been referred to the Military Justice to receive the proper punishment,” the statement read.  

However, the spokesperson for the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava), Redur Khalil, told Kurdistan24, “The group’s statement came after many conclusive evidences and reports of chemical gas being used in shelling Aleppo’s Sheikh Maqsoud district.”

Khalil added that Jaysh al-Islam and al-Qaeda affiliated Nusra have attacked the Kurdish neighborhood of Aleppo with forbidden weapons many times since the beginning of the conflict a few years ago.

Additionally, Doctor Welat Mamo, a director of The Kurdish Red Crescent Health Centre in Aleppo’s Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood, stated that four civilians have been poisoned due to chemical gas attacks by the opposition groups.

“Those affected by the assault demonstrated difficulty breathing which made it possible to affirm that they were poisoned as a result of the use of banned toxic gases such as chlorine or other agents. All our patients have similar symptoms,” Dr. Mamo told Russian news outlet RT.

It is worth mentioning that Mohammed Alloush, Jaysh al-Islam’s former political leader, was chosen as the chief negotiator for the Syrian opposition in Geneva.

“Jaysh al-Islam, which is killing the civilians in Sheikh Maqsoud, is included with the Syrian opposition delegation in the Geneva peace talks, while Kurds who are seeking peace and fighting terrorism are excluded from any talks related to the Syrian war,” Khalil said.

Last month, Nusra Front, al-Qaeda's Syrian offshoot, attacked the Sheikh Maqsoud quarter with phosphorous weapons killing more than 10 civilians and wounding dozens.

http://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/7a0f6294-ab7f-4d15-b5af-3ff4b444ab3f

[Butifldrm]

Russia tells Turkey to hand Afrin over to Syrian regime

 Ari Khalidi |

April 09-2018     05:19 PM

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Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) and his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan arrive for a news conference following a meeting in Istanbul, Turkey, Oct. 10, 2016. (Photo: Reuters)

 

Erdogan Putin Assad Rojava InherentResolve YPG 

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ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – Moscow would want to see Turkey return the region of Afrin in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava) to the government of Syria, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Monday.

“We always proceed from the fact that the easiest way to normalize the situation in Afrin, now that Turkish representatives say that the main goals they set there have been achieved, would be to return the territory under the control of the Syrian government,” Lavrov said.

“[Turkish] President [Recep Tayyip] Erdogan has never said that Turkey wants to occupy Afrin,” Lavrov went on, according to remarks carried by the Russian government-owned Sputnik news agency.

Erdogan and his administration’s officials have hailed the Russian-approved Turkish army’s invasion of Afrin that began in January, as a “holy conquest.”

Only a day after the March 18 Turkish capture of Afrin from the US-armed Kurdish forces, Erdogan told the media he was even going to appoint a governor, other bureaucrats, and staff from the ministry of education to the Syrian Kurdish town.

Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) loot shops after seizing control of the town of Afrin in Syrian Kurdistan from the US-armed Kurdish forces, March 18, 2018. (Photo: AFP)

Moscow’s demand from Ankara to hand Afrin over to Damascus leaves Erdogan’s administration in a predicament.

Not only will Erdogan have to explain such a move to the public he mobilized behind the assault on the Kurds, but he will also have to withdraw the Turkish army’s proxy Free Syrian Army (FSA) factions from Afrin, an order the militants seeking to overthrow President Bashar al-Assad’s rule may find unacceptable.

It could also lead to a re-emergence of tensions between Moscow and Ankara, an uneasy relationship that went through several crises due to rival policies in Syria which culminated in the Turkish downing of a Russian warplane in late 2015.

There was no reaction from Turkish officials at the time of publishing this report.

Ankara launched the attack on Afrin in late January with the aim of securing its border from the US-armed Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) which it says are “terrorists,” and the Islamic State (IS) which has never had a presence in the Kurdish region there.

Despite calls of restraint from Western capitals, Turkey went on with the invasion of the Kurdish zone that killed at least 200 civilians and displaced about 200,000 people from the area Erdogan has declared belongs to ethnic Arabs.

Years-long American and French military backing of the YPG in the war on IS created a deep discord with the NATO ally Turkey.

Lavrov’s call for a Turkish departure from Afrin followed Erdogan’s weekend condemnation of Western nations’ inaction against reports of yet another deadly chemical attack by the Russian-supported Assad regime that cost scores of lives in an FSA-held Damascus suburb.

Turkey, along with Russia and Iran, since last year is a sponsor of Astana talks, a series of summits separate from the UN-initiated Geneva process aimed at solving the Syrian crisis.

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany

http://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/af0310d7-3e1c-4587-ac5e-c920e23ad33f

[10 YEARS LATER]

Putin is a pretty damn good Chess Player.

[siberian_shaddow]

Agreed 10 Years Later, he is a very strategic and experienced player 

[10 YEARS LATER]

5 minutes ago, siberian_shaddow said:

Agreed 10 Years Later, he is a very strategic and experienced player 

 

Pretty sure Uncle Putin was head of the KGB BEFORE being the Top Dawg of Russia - imagine the Intel this guy has at his fingertips and the Loyalty he demands and gets ( if ya know what’s good for ya ). 

[Butifldrm]

Reports of US destroyer being harassed by Russian jets in Syrian waters are false, US Navy says

By: Kyle Rempfer    2 hours ago

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The Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer Donald Cook fires a standard missile 3 during exercise Formidable Shield 2017. (MC1 Theron Godbold/Navy)

 

An Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyer has departed Cyprus and was reported by some news outlets to be pushing towards Syria as Russian fighters buzzed its deck, but the Navy is saying those stories are false.

The destroyer Donald Cook departed Larnaca, Cyprus, Monday, after completing a scheduled port visit, according to a Navy statement. The service didn’t say where the ship was cruising to next, but reports by CNN’s Turkey service claimed the destroyer had moved out to Syrian territorial waters where it was harassed by Russian jets.

However, Pentagon officials are denying that narrative, according to Task & Purpose.

“There are elements of that story that are just simply not true,” Navy spokesman Cmdr. Bill Speaks told Task & Purpose. Speaks said the reports that the ship was being buzzed by Russian aircraft were “completely bogus.”

 

 

Speaks also denied to Task & Purpose that the destroyer was in Syrian waters at all, and wouldn’t comment on whether it would be part of any future operations in the area.

The Donald Cook has been harassed by Russian fighters before. In April 2016, Russian Su-24 attack aircraft buzzed the destroyer in the Baltic Sea near the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad. U.S. Navy officials condemned that incident as “unsafe and unprofessional,” and said that it could lead to miscalculations between the two states.

A Russian Sukhoi Su-24 attack aircraft makes a very-low altitude pass by the USS Donald Cook (DDG 75) April 12, 2016. (Navy)

The Cook has been known to have BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missiles on board, the same weapons system used to attack a Syrian air base in April 2017 after Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was accused of using chemical weapons against his people in the Idlib region of the war-torn country.

Another asset known to be in the region is the San Antonio-class amphibious transport dock New York, which broadcast on Facebook Sunday that it has the Marine Corps Medium Tilt-rotor Squadron VMM 162 on board, as well as the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit.

https://www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2018/04/10/reports-of-us-destroyer-being-harassed-by-russian-jets-in-syrian-waters-are-false-us-navy-says/

[Butifldrm]

Israel Vows To "Wipe Assad Off The Map" If Iran Launches An Attack From Syrian Territory

 

by Tyler Durden

Wed, 04/11/2018 - 09:40

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After they launched a lethal strike (from Lebanese airspace, no less) against the T-4 airforce base in Syria in retaliation for the a chemical weapons attack on a rebel-held Syrian village - killing several Iranians in the process - senior Israeli officials have finally confirmed what many have long assumed since the country started escalating its military operations within the borders of its crumbling Levantine neighbor.

That is, if Israel even so much as suspects that Iranian agents are planning an attack against Israel from Syrian territory, it will be Syrian President Bashar al-Assad who ends up on the receiving end of a preemptive strike from the IDF, per the Jerusalem Post.

"If the Iranians act against Israel from Syrian territory, Syrian President Bashar Assad and his regime will be those that pay the price."

The aggressive rhetoric from senior officials in the IDF comes after Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei referred to Israel's attack on the T-4 air base as "Israel's crime" and threatened that it "would not remain without a response."

However, IDF officials are literally threatening to "wipe Assad off the map."

"Assad's regime and Assad himself will disappear from the map and the world if the Iranians do try to harm Israel or its interests from Syrian territory," said senior officials in the defense establishment.

"Our recommendation to Iran is that it does not try to act, because Israel is determined to continue on this issue to the very end," the officials said.

Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said Tuesday that Israel would take "all necessary steps" to stop Iran from establishing a permanent military base in Syria.

"No matter what the price, we will not allow Iran to have a permanent [military] foothold in Syria. We have no other choice," Liberman said.

Israeli officials believe Iran might try to retaliate either with Syrian weapons or by transporting Iranian arms to Syria.

Officials also expressed their hope that Lebanese militant group Hezbollah wouldn't be drawn into a potential conflict between Israel, Syria and Iran - though we imagine that outcome would probably be inevitable.

"We hope that Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah will not join and be drawn into the campaign if it breaks out," senior security officials told The Jerusalem Post's sister newspaper Maariv on Tuesday.

"We have no interest in widening the front but, should it happen, Nasrallah needs to understand that his fate will be no different from the fate of Assad and he will pay a very heavy price."

Israeli officials on Tuesday said they were confident US President Donald Trump would stand by his comments referring to a possible American strike in Syria, in response to another use of chemical weaponry by Assad's forces against his own citizens.

Meanwhile, Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution on Tuesday to launch an investigation into the alleged chemical attack in Syria after the US admitted it has "no evidence" the attack was carried out by the regime. A US strike in Syria is widely expected, and the White House is expected to announce its plans for retaliation later today after UN Ambassador Nikki Haley promised the US would resort to unilateral action if the Russians blocked their way at the security council.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-11/israel-vows-wipe-assad-map-if-iran-launches-attack-syrian-territory

[10 YEARS LATER]

Just a massive Black Hole of misery, despair & murder - no peace except for the dead.

[nannab]

They really mean Middle East PIECES Plan sadly.

[Butifldrm]

A potential US strike on Syria would ignite a new world war

13:17 - 12/04/2018

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BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The House Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday warned that a new world war could erupt if the United States carried out its threats and hit Syria, noting that Iraq would be most affected by any possible strike against Syria.

"Threats by a military strike against Syria will ignite a new world war," said member of the committee MP Hassan Shuwaird. "The threats of Washington are following their personal interests."

"Iraq categorically rejects a military strike against any Arab country or people, including Syria," Schuerd said, stressing the need to "adopt a diplomatic option rather than a military solution to the Syrian crisis."

The office of Prime Minister Haider Abadi said on Wednesday, the readiness of the Iraqi security forces to confront any hostile action may be launched from the Syrian areas adjacent to the Iraqi border, in response to the escalation of international positions and increased possibilities on the possibility of launching an American aggression on Syria. Ending / 25

http://www.almaalomah.com/2018/04/12/299852/

[Butifldrm]

A US official expects the "deal of the century" to be completed despite difficulties

April 13, 2018 | 12:42 PM   - The   number of readings: 275 views

 

Iraqi Position Network
 

A senior White House official said on Friday that the administration of President Donald Trump "almost completed" the completion of the peace plan to end the Israeli-Palestinian conflict known as a media "century deal."

 

"The plan still has difficulties in determining how and when it will be put forward, especially after the Palestinian Authority severed its contacts with Washington following Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel and his intention to relocate the US embassy," the official said.

 

The official acknowledged that the deadlock between the White House and the Palestinians "had an impact on the peace efforts," saying that "a break in communications is not easy."

 

He revealed that the Trump team had held informal consultations with "normal" Palestinians, but their leaders showed no sign of returning to negotiations, but the administration did not rule out moving forward with the initiative anyway.

 

The US plan raised widespread doubts even before it was announced. Critics were likely to be biased to Israel, the US ally, but the official said the parties would find "aspects they love and others hate."

 

Among the unresolved issues is the "future of Jerusalem," which is "one of the most thorny issues in the history of failed US-led peace efforts." But he did not deny the possibility of failure of the current administration's efforts to resolve, saying that "may not work for us as well."

 

"We are finalizing it (the plan) ... certainly we are still facing difficulties in the issue of Jerusalem ... but we are very close to completing it," he said. He stressed that the plan "is making progress ... and we will discuss all the circumstances and make the decision" on the date of its introduction.

 

Asked whether the plan would include America's commitment to a two-state solution as demanded by the Palestinians, the official said: "Everything President Trump has said can be upheld ... he will support that if the parties agree."

 

The plan is expected to propose detailed solutions to major differences, including borders, the future of Jewish settlements in the occupied territories, the fate of Palestinian refugees and security.

http://www.al-mawqif.com/87855

[10 YEARS LATER]

As if they EVER needed a “ Legitimate “ reason to kill Americans 

[10 YEARS LATER]

. . . Aaannndd, it’s time for “ Let’s Make a Deal ( Deal ) “ should be interesting.

[ChuckFinley]

On 4/9/2018 at 3:28 PM, King Bean said:

 

You beat me to the punch...again. So in response I say...."better Sunni than later". LOL. 

You guys are killing me, lol. You guys are bring are bring your A game.  

[Butifldrm]

 

What They're NOT Telling You About Syria

[Butifldrm]

The United Nations confirms the possibility of Iraq playing a role in resolving the Syrian crisis

Bertha News Agency48 2018-04-17

 

 

 

 The United Nations on Tuesday confirmed the possibility of Iraq playing a role in resolving the Syrian crisis, noting that Iraq has balanced relations with all.

"Jaafari concluded his participation in the 29th session of the Arab League Council at the summit level in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, in a meeting with the UN Secretary-General's envoy in Syria, Stephane de Demostura," said a statement by the office of Foreign Minister Ibrahim Jaafari.

The statement added that "Jaafari discussed with Dimestura the importance of the role played by the United Nations in Syria, especially in the humanitarian field, and accelerate the search for solutions to the Syrian crisis, and away from the conflict of international wills, and allowed the Syrian people to determine their fate, Calling on "Demestura to intensify his efforts, and to remove the specter of war from the peoples of the region."

"The position of Iraq supports the peaceful solution of the Syrian crisis," Jaafari said, stressing "the need not to interfere in the internal affairs of countries and not to resort to a military solution."

For his part, the envoy of the Secretary-General of the United Nations in Syria, Stephane de Demostra, that "it is not in the interest of the region to destroy Syria, or disintegration," pointing to "the possibility of Iraq to resolve the crisis, especially as Iraq has balanced relations with everyone

https://burathanews.com/arabic/news/331299

[Butifldrm]

U.S. ALLY IRAQ JOINS RUSSIA AND IRAN, SAYS TRUMP'S SYRIA STRIKES MAY HELP ISIS

BY TOM O'CONNOR ON 4/16/18 AT 2:24 PM

 

 

 

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U.S., U.K. and France Launch Joint Strikes Against Syria

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Iraq criticized President Donald Trump's decision Friday to target Syrian government facilities suspected to be involved in the production of chemical weapons, saying such missile strikes undermined the wider effort to combat terrorism in both neighboring Arab states.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari spoke on the phone Sunday with acting U.S. Secretary of State John Sullivan, discussing the trilateral U.S., French and U.K. missile attack on Syria, which Iraq considers an ally in the fight against the Islamic State militant group (ISIS). Jaafari emphasized "the necessity to prioritize finding a political solution and that the Syrian people alone should determine their own fate," according to a statement by the Iraqi Foreign Ministry.

Related: Russia Tells U.S. Do Not Go to War With Syria, ‘God Forbid’ It Ends Up Like Iraq and Libya

Jaafari condemned the production and use of chemical weapons, but warned that "any escalation in Syria will negatively affect the security and stability of the region as a whole, and will give terrorism an opportunity to regain its activity after the defeat it met in Iraq and its retreat in Syria. The risk of terrorism today threatens all countries of the world."

 

Iraqi protesters wave Syrian and Iraqi flags during a demonstration in Baghdad on April 15, opposing the joint Western air strikes against the Syrian government.AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

Washington and Baghdad became allies after the U.S. invaded in 2003 and overthrew the government of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, charging him with producing chemical and other weapons of mass destruction. Those accusations later turned out to be false, but the U.S. installed a friendly, majority-Shiite Muslim government as it faced an increasingly deadly insurgency from Sunni Muslim groups, including Al-Qaeda in Iraq, which later merged into the Islamic State of Iraq.

The U.S. mostly withdrew from Iraq in 2011, the same year Syria fell into turmoil after protests devolved into an uprising backed by the West, Turkey and Gulf Arab states. The Islamic State of Iraq became ISIS in 2013 and spread into Syria, absorbing much of the Syrian opposition and ultimately taking half of both countries in 2014. ISIS has since been largely defeated at the hands of a U.S.-led coalition as well as Russian and Iranian intervention.

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While jihadi remnants still exist and remained capable of launching attacks, Syria declared victory against ISIS in November, and Iraq declared its own war had been won the following month. Calls for the U.S. and Turkey—which has escalated its own war against Kurdish militias in Iraq and Syria—to withdraw their armed forces have since increased, and both the Iraqi and Syrian governments' close relations with Iran, an avowed foe of U.S. foreign policy, have complicated regional dynamics.

The U.S.-led strikes on Syria Friday came after a number of Western governments and their allies accused Syrian President Bashar al-Assad of using toxic gas on the rebel-held Douma district near Damascus the previous Saturday. Trump had warned that he would respond "forcefully" to the reports; after the dust settled, Iraq was one of the few Middle Eastern countries to condemn the attack. Lebanon also condemned the attack, which used its airspace without permission.

 

A map published on April 15 locates the three targets reportedly hit by over 100 missiles fired at Syria by the U.S., France and the U.K. The Syrian and Iraqi governments consider themselves, as well as Iran and Russia, allies in the war against ISIS, but the U.S. sees Iraq as a partner.INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDY OF WAR/REUTERS

"The Iraqi Foreign Ministry expressed concern over recent developments in Syria, and calls on the international community to intensify efforts to find a political solution to the Syrian crisis and to spare the region further tensions and focus the work on the fight against terrorism, particularly in the wake of its decline in Iraq and retreat in Syria," the ministry said Saturday in a statement that also condemned chemical weapons, recalling reports of their use under former leader Hussein.

Iraq's statements placed it in the camp of Russia and Iran, Assad's top allies in his seven-year war against rebels and jihadis, and the U.S.'s top competitors for influence across the Middle East. Russia had warned it would attack not only U.S. missiles but also their delivery vehicles in the event that Russian personnel were at risk. The targets, however, appeared to be limited to three state-run Syrian scientific centers in Damascus and Homs. Neither the U.S., Russia nor Syria reported any fatalities; however, the official Syrian Arab News Agency said three civilians were injured when air defenses forced a missile to go astray in Homs.

The Syrian government only recognizes Russia and Iran's military presence in the country and has called on the U.S. and Turkey to withdraw. Damascus, Moscow and Tehran have all accused the U.S. of supporting ISIS and other jihadi groups as a means of disturbing the regional order, something successive administrations in Washington have denied. Trump expressed an interest in expediting the departure of U.S. troops up until the alleged chemical attack in Douma, where Islamist Jaysh al-Islam insurgents recently surrendered and have begun to evacuate.

http://www.newsweek.com/us-ally-iraq-joins-russia-and-iran-says-trumps-syria-strikes-may-help-isis-887829

[Butifldrm]

Famed War Reporter Robert Fisk Reaches Syrian 'Chemical Attack' Site, Concludes "They Were Not Gassed"

by Tyler Durden

Tue, 04/17/2018 - 09:01

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Robert Fisk's bombshell first-hand account for the UK Independent runs contrary to nearly every claim circulating in major international press concerning what happened just over week ago on April 7th in an embattled suburb outside Damascus: not only has the veteran British journalist found no evidence of a mass chemical attack, but he's encountered multiple local eyewitnesses who experienced the chaos of that night, but who say the gas attack never happened.

Fisk is the first Western journalist to reach and report from the site of the alleged chemical weapons attack widely blamed on Assad's forces. Writing from Douma in eastern Ghouta, Fisk has interviewed a Syrian doctor who works at the hospital shown in one of the well-known videos which purports to depict victims of a chemical attack. 

The Independent: "Middle East Correspondent Robert Fisk in one of the miles of tunnels hacked beneath Douma by prisoners of Syrian rebels." (source: Yara Ismail via the Independent)

Importantly, the report, published late in the day Monday, is causing a stir among mainstream journalists who–minutes after the Saudi-sponsored jihadist group Jaish al-Islam (Army of Islam) accused the Syrian Army of gassing civilians–began uncritically promoting the "Assad gassed his own people" narrative as an already cemented and "proven" fact based on the mere word a notoriously brutal armed group who itself has admitted to using chemical weapons on the Syrian battlefield in prior years. Also notable is that no journalist or international observer was anywhere near Douma when the purported chemical attack took place. 

Controversy ensued immediately after Fisk's report, especially as he is among the most recognizable names in the past four decades of Middle East war reporting, having twice won the British Press Awards' Journalist of the Year prize and as seven time winner of the British Press Awards' Foreign Correspondent of the Year (the NY Times has referred to him as "probably the most famous foreign correspondent in Britain" while The Guardian has called him "one of the most famous journalists in the world"). An Arabic speaker, Fisk became famous for being among the few reporters in history to conduct face-to-face interviews with Osama bin Laden, which he did on three occasions between 1993 and 1997.

Fisk says he was able to walk around and investigate newly liberated Douma without Syrian government or Russian minders (in part this is likely because he has reported from inside Syria going back decades, in war-torn 1982 Hama, for example), and he begins his account as follows:

This is the story of a town called Douma, a ravaged, stinking place of smashed apartment blocks–and of an underground clinic whose images of suffering allowed three of the Western world’s most powerful nations to bomb Syria last week. There’s even a friendly doctor in a green coat who, when I track him down in the very same clinic, cheerfully tells me that the “gas” videotape which horrified the world– despite all the doubters–is perfectly genuine.

War stories, however, have a habit of growing darker. For the same 58-year old senior Syrian doctor then adds something profoundly uncomfortable: the patients, he says, were overcome not by gas but by oxygen starvation in the rubbish-filled tunnels and basements in which they lived, on a night of wind and heavy shelling that stirred up a dust storm.

Fisk goes on to identify the doctor by name - Dr. Assim Rahaibani - which is notable given the fact that all early reporting from Douma typically relied on "unnamed doctors" and anonymous opposition sources for early claims of a chlorine gas attack (lately morphed into an unverified "mixed" chlorine-and-sarin attack).

The doctor's testimony is consistent with that of the well-known Syrian opposition group Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), which initially reported based on its own pro-rebel sourcing that heavy government bombardment of Douma city resulted in the collapse of homes and underground shelters, causing civilians in hiding to suffocate.

According to SOHR, which has long been a key go-to source for mainstream media over the course of the war, "70 of them [women and children] have suffered suffocation as a result of the demolition of home basements over them due to the heavy and intense shelling."

Though outlets from The Guardian to The Washington Post to The New York Times have quoted SOHR on a near daily basis throughout the past six years of war, the anti-Assad opposition outlet's reporting of mass asphyxiation due to collapse of shelters has been notably absent from the same publications.

 

Fisk to Spirit Radio: "The video is real, but they are not suffering from gas poisoning..."

Fisk details the Syrian doctor's testimony, who is adamant in his emphasis that civilians were suffocating en masse, and were not gassed:

It was a short walk to Dr Rahaibani. From the door of his subterranean clinic–“Point 200”, it is called, in the weird geology of this partly-underground city–is a corridor leading downhill where he showed me his lowly hospital and the few beds where a small girl was crying as nurses treated a cut above her eye.

“I was with my family in the basement of my home three hundred metres from here on the night but all the doctors know what happened. There was a lot of shelling [by government forces] and aircraft were always over Douma at night–but on this night, there was wind and huge dust clouds began to come into the basements and cellars where people lived. People began to arrive here suffering from hypoxia, oxygen loss. Then someone at the door, a “White Helmet”, shouted “Gas!”, and a panic began. People started throwing water over each other. Yes, the video was filmed here, it is genuine, but what you see are people suffering from hypoxia–not gas poisoning.”

In addition to interviewing a doctor while standing in the very hospital featured in White Helmets footage of the events, Fisk cites the testimonies of multiple locals in the following:

Before we go any further, readers should be aware that this is not the only story in Douma. There are the many people I talked to amid the ruins of the town who said they had “never believed in” gas stories–which were usually put about, they claimed, by the armed Islamist groups. 

These particular jihadis survived under a blizzard of shellfire by living in other’s people’s homes and in vast, wide tunnels with underground roads carved through the living rock by prisoners with pick-axes on three levels beneath the town. I walked through three of them yesterday, vast corridors of living rock which still contained Russian–yes, Russian–rockets and burned-out cars.

And further fascinating is that the veteran British war correspondent comes upon local Douma residents who have so long been trapped in an isolated 'fog of war' battlefield environment, that they are not even aware of the international importance that the town has played in the US coalition decision to bomb Syria:

So the story of Douma is thus not just a story of gas–or no gas, as the case may be. It’s about thousands of people who did not opt for evacuation from Douma on buses that left last week, alongside the gunmen with whom they had to live like troglodytes for months in order to survive.

I walked across this town quite freely yesterday without soldier, policeman or minder to haunt my footsteps, just two Syrian friends, a camera and a notebook. I sometimes had to clamber across 20-foot-high ramparts, up and down almost sheer walls of earth. Happy to see foreigners among them, happier still that the siege is finally over, they are mostly smiling; those whose faces you can see, of course, because a surprising number of Douma’s women wear full-length black hijab.

...Oddly, after chatting to more than 20 people, I couldn’t find one who showed the slightest interest in Douma’s role in bringing about the Western air attacks. Two actually told me they didn’t know about the connection.

But it was a strange world I walked into. Two men, Hussam and Nazir Abu Aishe, said they were unaware how many people had been killed in Douma, although the latter admitted he had a cousin “executed by Jaish el-Islam [the Army of Islam] for allegedly being “close to the regime”. They shrugged when I asked about the 43 people said to have died in the infamous Douma attack.

 

Bassem@BBassem7

 

 

The Evidence thriller

8:38 AM - Apr 16, 2018

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Evidence? ...A video montage of the Pentagon and State Department's awkward attempts to dodge the question of evidence. 

Concerning the White Helmets, who have played a dubious role throughout the war while presenting themselves as "impartial" and "neutral" rescue workers and film-makers, though known to operate exclusively in al-Qaeda and other jihadist-controlled areas of Syria, Fisk reports the following: 

The White Helmets–the medical first responders already legendary in the West but with some interesting corners to their own story–played a familiar role during the battles. They are partly funded by the [British] Foreign Office and most of the local offices were staffed by Douma men. 

I found their wrecked offices not far from Dr Rahaibani’s clinic. A gas mask had been left outside a food container with one eye-piece pierced and a pile of dirty military camouflage uniforms lay inside one room. Planted, I asked myself? I doubt it. The place was heaped with capsules, broken medical equipment and files, bedding and mattresses.

Of course we must hear their side of the story, but it will not happen here: a woman told us that every member of the White Helmets in Douma abandoned their main headquarters and chose to take the government-organised and Russian-protected buses to the rebel province of Idlib with the armed groups when the final truce was agreed.

And Fisk further narrates the strangeness of some of the reporting now happening far outside of Douma which flatly contradicts the testimonies of civilians still inside Douma that he encounters: 

How could it be that Douma refugees who had reached camps in Turkey were already describing a gas attack which no-one in Douma today seemed to recall? It did occur to me, once I was walking for more than a mile through these wretched prisoner-groined tunnels, that the citizens of Douma lived so isolated from each other for so long that “news” in our sense of the word simply had no meaning to them. 

Syria doesn’t cut it as Jeffersonian democracy–as I cynically like to tell my Arab colleagues–and it is indeed a ruthless dictatorship, but that couldn’t cow these people, happy to see foreigners among them, from reacting with a few words of truth. So what were they telling me?

They talked about the Islamists under whom they had lived. They talked about how the armed groups had stolen civilian homes to avoid the Syrian government and Russian bombing. The Jaish el-Islam had burned their offices before they left, but the massive buildings inside the security zones they created had almost all been sandwiched to the ground by air strikes. A Syrian colonel I came across behind one of these buildings asked if I wanted to see how deep the tunnels were. I stopped after well over a mile when he cryptically observed that “this tunnel might reach as far as Britain”. Ah yes, Ms May, I remembered, whose air strikes had been so intimately connected to this place of tunnels and dust. And gas?

For a prime example of what Fisk references as refugees in Turkey "already describing a gas attack which no-one in Douma seemed to recall..." CNN aired a segment from one such refugee camp which is absolutely bizarre and stunning in its claims. 

During the segment which aired "hours after" the US-led airstrikes on Damascus, CNN's Arwa Damon began sniffing a 7-year-old Syrian girl's backpack while concluding, "I mean there's definitely something that stings..." - with the implication that empirical proof had been found of government chemical weapons use against the little girl and her family. 

 

Walid@walid970721

 

 

This CNN report by Arwa Damon is an example of what Western governments and media consider evidence that the Syrian govt used chemical weapons in #Douma. In fact it proves nothing. CNN continues to shamelessly promote Jihadist propaganda & western military intervention #Syria

7:09 AM - Apr 16, 2018

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And in the full segment, Damon attempts to subtly introduce the idea of a nerve agent used against the family (though initial claims were widely reported to be chlorine) by awkwardly including the account of the girl's escape from Douma: "She could barely breath... she felt as if her entire nerves basically released." 

 

CNN

 

✔@CNN

 

 

This Syrian girl hid her dolls inside a box, telling them "you're going to suffocate in here, maybe, but at least you might be safe from the bombings." CNN reports from inside a refugee camp in Syria hours after a coordinated US-led airstrike hit the area. https://cnn.it/2H2pCLe 

2:15 PM - Apr 14, 2018

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Though it's unclear what the strange phrasing of "her entire nerves basically released" actually means, CNN's Arwa Damon is ultimately claiming to be able to safely and comfortably handle and sniff a backpack which contains residual sarin and chlorine agents, while simultaneously presenting the backpack as "proof" of a chemical attack which happened a week prior (to say nothing the clearly unscientific and bogus nature all of the above). 

Notably, in addition to Fisk's bombshell report filed from ground zero of the claimed chemical attack in Douma, cable network One America News has also issued a report from on the ground in the newly liberated town, finding "no evidence" - in its words - that a chemical attack took place there. 

 

 YouTube ‎@YouTube

One America News

 

✔@OANN

 

 

OAN Investigation Finds No Evidence of Chemical Weapon Attack in Syria: http://youtu.be/lSXwG-901yU?a  via @YouTube

11:23 AM - Apr 16, 2018

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Robert Fisk's report for The Independent and the One America News segment constitute the first major international media reports from the location of the alleged chemical attack. But it will be interesting to see the extent to which international chemical and weapons experts either validate or refute their conclusions once the site is inspected. 

Meanwhile, the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) team arrived in Damascus on Saturday, April 14th - after the US-led overnight strikes which primarily hit government buildings in the capital. 

 

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-04-17/famed-war-reporter-robert-fisk-reaches-syrian-chemical-attack-site-concludes-they

[Butifldrm]

 

 

 

 

 

OAN Investigation Finds No Evidence of Chemical Weapon Attack in Syria

[Butifldrm]

• Security

Revealed the presence of about 12 thousand contractors supporting America's work in Iraq and Syria

13:15 - 18/04/2018

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Information / Translation

The US military newspaper Airforce Times reported on Wednesday that there were 1,965 retirees supporting the US government in Iraq, including 5508 contractors with the Pentagon.

"Of the contractors with the US Department of Defense in Iraq and Syria, 2,869 are US citizens, 760 are local residents and the rest are nationals of a third country," the paper said in a report.

"This is the first time that the Pentagon has revealed the numbers of contractors in Syria, according to the quarterly report issued in April," he said.

"As the Mission's mission grows and continues in Syria, the Ministry of Defense has secured those figures in regular reports," Pentagon spokeswoman Heather Bab said. "For security reasons, there are no independent contractors available to the Syrian duty station."

"Although the Pentagon does not differentiate between Iraq and Syria in the new data, given the report, it can be easier to determine the number of contractors in Syria," the report said.  

"In the January report, there were a total of 4,927 contractors reported to be in Iraq only. Of these, there were 2,767 Americans, 1,495 third-country nationals and 665 local residents, which means that there was an increase of 11.7 in the total number of contractors reported in the two countries. From these figures, it can be concluded that either there was an influx For contractors to Syria relatively recently, or there were former contractors not reported in Syria, or a combination of both. " Ending / 25 z

http://www.almaalomah.com/2018/04/18/301910/

[Butifldrm]

Iran announces the results of its presence in Iraq, warns Washington of arming Riyadh

 

 Twilight News    

 

 3 hours ago

 

 

The head of the General Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces, Major General Mohammad Baqri, on Monday accused America of preparing the war by selling arms to Saudi Arabia.

"Without a doubt, the world's traditional bipolar system has collapsed and new forces are being formed in the world, and the world needs new engineering, but some regional and international forces do not accept this," Baqeri said in a speech at the 6th International Conference of Naval Forces Leaders of the Indian Ocean Rift States. The new facts, there is no point in the world that is safe from the risks. "

"America is spreading chaos by sending soldiers to different parts of the world and using the literature of arrogance. It has destabilized much of West Asia through encouraging support, and in addition promotes the abrogation of covenants in international agreements," he said.

"Iran's presence in Iraq and Syria, along with the rest of its allies, has provided a great service for peace and stability in the region," Bagheri said. "A clear example of this is Iran's actions to combat terrorism in the region."

 

Keywords

http://www.shafaaq.com/ar/Ar_NewsReader/98abf45f-9ec1-4087-a97a-00a74772a01c

[jcfrag]

What a cluster fick of confusion and mis information........  What are we doing over there now, besides embarrassing ourselves???

[Butifldrm]

 2018-04-26 BY SOTALIRAQ

Israeli Defense Minister threatens to target Tehran, saying that the Iranian regime is living in the late days'

 

Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman threatened to target the Iranian capital of Dhahran, saying that "the Iranian regime is living in its late days."

Lieberman said that his country does not want war with anyone, but will not allow Iranian platforms in Syria at any price. He stressed that if Iran attacked Tel Aviv, Israel would strike Tehran and destroy every Iranian military site that threatens Israel in Syria at any price. .

The Israeli minister made the remarks to the London-based Elaph website ahead of his trip to the United States to discuss security issues with his US counterpart James Matisse and with new national security adviser John Bolton.

The visit of the Israeli defense minister to Washington is based specifically on security coordination, especially on Iran's military expansion in the region, with emphasis on the Syrian situation.

On the Palestinian issue, the Israeli Defense Minister says that the solution must be regional, not bilateral, not in stages, but in parallel and simultaneously, the two-state solution, peace with the Arab states and the solution of the situation of the Israeli Arabs, proposing the exchange of land and population between Israel and the Palestinians, Such as the Triangle area in Israel, from Israeli sovereignty to Palestinian sovereignty through the transfer of borders to the west.

As for relations with Arab countries, Lieberman says there is dialogue with Arab states that refuse to be named on the issues of the region. "Things are moving in the right direction. There is an understanding of 75 percent of things."

Lieberman believes that "the current Iranian regime is living in its late days," and that the US withdrawal from the nuclear agreement will lead to the collapse of Iran economically, which is feared by "the Iranian regime, which has so far spent more than $ 13 billion dollars," and spends $ 2 billion annually on the party God, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and other "terrorist" militias, he said, weakening Tehran and emptying its coffers.

Lieberman added that "the seizure by the Iranian leadership and the Iranian Revolutionary Guard of the country's resources and resources, and the exclusion of the people, caused the economy to collapse seriously and led to the outbreak of protest movements that are increasing and widening day by day."

The Israeli defense minister also criticizes Arab MKs and accuses them of supporting and supporting terrorism, calling them "enemies of Israel," pointing out that it is the duty of democracy to defend itself, as he put it.

https://www.sotaliraq.com/2018/04/26/وزير-الدفاع-الإسرائيلي-يهدد-باستهداف/

[ChuckFinley]

Israel will not be fooling around. IRAN is a cancer. The sooner they deal with this the better. It does not have to be a go to war situation  just a surgical strick to take out the leadership.