[KyivPost] Iranian Missile Strike on US Base in Kuwait Wounds 5 and Destroys MQ-9 Reapers
Iran launched a short-range ballistic missile targeting the US Ali Al Salem Air Base in Kuwait over the past 24 hours, directly threatening a pending peace agreement. Kuwaiti air defense systems intercepted the Iranian Fateh-110 missile, but falling debris wounded approximately five US service members and civilian contractors, while completely destroying one MQ-9 Reaper drone and severely damaging another.
Posted by: Frank G ||
05/31/2026 15:43 Comments ||
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#6
I suspect they assign drones for more dangerous missions to avoid losing manned aircraft. These last two were destroyed on the ground though. At 30 million a pop any loss hits the pocketbook - and reduces flexibility for future mission tasking.
[Breitbart] Nigel Farage has announced that a Reform UK government would release all government files concerning the scourge of child rape grooming gangs, and quadruple the budget for investigating the scandal and the local officials and police who “enabled” the mass rape of English girls. OK, but what are you doing NOW?
Now Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour is still in charge, so all Mr. Farage can do is make speeches.
[Breitbart] The Balkan nation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is being overwhelmed by a surge in illegal migration, with migrant arrivals jumping 67.5 percent in the first four months of 2026 compared to the same period last year, according to the country’s Ministry of Security. The spike is fueling renewed pressure along the Western Balkan route and triggering a wave of smuggling arrests as migrants push toward the European Union through Croatia.
The surge in migrant arrivals is straining Bosnia’s reception centers, which are already operating near capacity. FRONTEX reports that while irregular crossings along the Western Balkan route dipped slightly year‑over‑year, the corridor remains one of the EU’s most active migration pressure points.
Europol also announced the dismantling of a large multinational smuggling network that used Bosnia as a staging hub for moving more than 600 migrants toward Slovenia, Austria, and Germany. The network coordinated travel from Istanbul to Sarajevo and then on to the Croatian border, using encrypted messaging apps and recruiting drivers from Central Europe to transport migrants deeper into the EU, according to Europol.
Hat tip Gates of Vienna, which pretty much daily has a useful roundup of articles.
[SultanKnish] ’Fighting antisemitism’ by funding antisemitism.
When the New York Times
...which still proudly claims Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... published the false claim that Israeli dogs were ’raping’ Hamas ..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",... terrorists, it was sourced to a Hamas-linked group that calls itself the Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor. After Jewish groups condemned it, a radical leftist groups that calls itself the Nexus Project and claims to fight anti-semitism popped up on X to defend the Times smear, which had been circulated to preempt a report about Hamas rapes, calling it "challenging and important".
What united Euro-Med Human Rights and the Nexus Project is their role in the Soros network.
The Open Society Foundations, the face of the Soros network, had pumped over $2 million into Euro-Med, despite or because of its alleged Hamas links, and $400,000 alone in 2023.
The Nexus Project was created by Jonathan Jacoby, an anti-Israel activist, who had headed Peace Now, which received hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Soros network, and was one of the founding members and an executive director of the New Israel Fund, which served as a major vector for Soros money flowing to anti-Israel groups operating inside the Jewish State.
Now Alex Soros,
…who is not nearly as clever in any way as his horrible father…
the son of George Soros ...either Ernst Stavro Blofeld or Auric Goldfinger come true. Maybe both.... , a Nazi collaborator who admitted to helping in the confiscation of Jewish property during the Holocaust, has announced that Nexus will be one of the organizations benefiting from a $30 million fund to ’fight Islamophobia ...the irrational fear that Moslems will act the way they usually do... and antisemitism.’
The move is a clumsy one because it exposes the ’Jewish front groups’ like Nexus that have been advancing the profoundly antisemitic agenda of empowering Islamic terrorism.
Some organizations like Nexus, which work to actively sabotage the fight against antisemitism, and the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, a formerly venerable group hijacked by the Soros network into supporting antisemitic riots on college campuses worked best by hiding their affiliation with one of the primary funders of antisemitism rather than flying it publicly.
Other reported grantees are less of a secret.
Alex Soros personally heads the action arm of Bend the Arc, which has called for an arms embargo on Israel and defended the campus harassment of Jews. After the murders of Jews in D.C. and Boulder, Colorado by anti-Israel terrorists, Bend the Arc responded with a letter to Congress opposing any moves to prevent campus attacks on Jews while complaining that "police actions have been taken disproportionately toward pro-Paleostinian protests."
The Jewish Social Justice Roundtable is a grab bag of leftist groups including T’ruah, an anti-Israel group whose CEO Jill Jacobs had protested Israel and falsely accused it of genocide, and claimed that blowing up Hezbollah beepers was a ’war crime’, New York Jewish Agenda, an anti-Orthodox and anti-Israel group co-founded by Rachel Timoner, an anti-Israel activist with T’ruah, who also serves as Senator Chuck Schumer ...Senator-for-life from New York, renowned for his love of standing in front of cameras and microphones. Schumer has been a professional politician since 1975, when disco was in flower, which is NaN years. Senate minority leader as of 2017... ’s ’rabbi’, along with HIAS, the JCPA and other radical leftist groups. Many of these groups were already funded by the Soros network.
The move by Alex Soros has made it publicly obvious what researchers have long known about the Soros network and the coordination between the various anti-Israel elements of the machine. And the announcement has been awkward for some of the front groups leading to ambiguous statements trying to implausibly claim distance from the rest of the Soros network.
"JCPA is a legacy Jewish organization [that] already collaborates with other legacy Jewish organizations," Amy Spitalnick, the CEO of the JCPA claimed. "No grantee of any foundation agrees with every position of every other grantee. We’ve been a clear voice calling out antisemitism wherever it exists across the ideological spectrum."
That of course is not true.
Spitalnick had formerly served as the spokeswoman for J Street, the first major Soros attempt at creating a ’Jewish’ anti-Israel front group, and the JCPA stopped being a "legacy organization" in 2023 and is now a Soros-funded anti-Israel and anti-Jewish operation. The JCPA is formally a member of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, which makes it a useful front group for the Soros network, but it coordinates its attacks on Israel and Jews with other Soros network groups like J Street, Bend the Arc, T’ruah and the New Israel Fund.
These are not ’Jewish’ groups, no one elected them to do anything, and the only reason they exist is that a small number of wealthy and powerful people, led by the Soros family, hate Israel, and seek to undermine it by creating a network of radical ’enemy within’ groups to hijack the Jewish community and claim to speak for Jews because they have better media access.
[AnNahar] The Trump administration has extended protections shielding about 11,000 Lebanese from deportation, allowing them to stay and work in the United States for another six months.
The decision, announced Thursday by the Department of Homeland Security, marked a rare reprieve for people protected by temporary measures which have been harshly criticized by Republicans. The extension comes amid ongoing fighting in southern Leb ...The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. Only one of those statements is an exaggeration.... between Israeli troops and Hezbollah fighters.
The decision was automatic, meaning that the administration missed the deadline by which they were supposed to decide on whether to extend the measure called Temporary Protected Status for Lebanese people living in the U.S. who are covered by the program. By statute, the status automatically extends for six months if the department misses the deadline.
Whoops! Oh well, it’s only six months. Get it right next time, guys.
It was an unusual outcome for an administration that has cancelled the protections that had covered people from 13 countries, including Venezuela
...a country in Central America that sits on an enormous pool of oil. Formerly the most prospereous country in the region, it became infested with Commies sniffing almost unlimited wealth. It turned out the wealth wasn't unlimited, the economy collapsed under the clownish Hugo Chavez, the murder rate exceeded places like Honduras and El Salvador. A significant proportion of the populace refugeed to Colombia and points south... , Haiti, Nicaragua and Syria from deportation.
TPS was created by Congress in 1990 to prevent deportations to countries suffering from natural disasters or civil strife, giving people authorization to work in increments of up to 18 months. More than 1 million immigrants colonists from 17 countries were protected by TPS at the beginning of the Trump administration, after the Biden administration greatly expanded its use.
The program has been at the center of a controversy.
Republicans and critics of TPS argue that the program and its protections deviate from their original temporary intent, taking on a quasi-permanent character when extended. Its defenders assert that it is a fundamental humanitarian program that prevents vulnerable individuals from being forced to return to dangerous conditions.
The DHS notice said that former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and current Secretary Markwayne Mullin, who has led the department for the past two months, "were unable to make an informed determination on Lebanon's TPS designation."
The extension allows existing beneficiaries to keep their protections through Nov. 27, 2026, "if they still meet the eligibility requirements for TPS," according to the notice. The work permits that were already issued for Lebanese TPS holders will be valid until the same day.
This is the second time the Trump administration has automatically extended a TPS designation. The first happened nearly a year ago with South Sudan ...a Moslem country located in the Horn of Africa. It is noted for its affinity for rule by ex- or current generals, its holy men, and for the oppression of the native Afro population by its Arab conquerors. South Sudan, populated mostly by the natives, split off from Sudan proper, which left North and South Darfur to be oppressed by the guys with turbans... , but the protections were terminated in November 2025, after the six-month extension period.
There are dozens of lawsuits challenging the termination of TPS at federal courts in different states. The Supreme Court is set to make a decision on TPS that protected Haitians and Syrians during the summer, and the result is expected to have an impact on all the other cases.
What’s really going on: Not integrating the two militaries, which wouldn’t work at all, but starting up more joint R&D projects. Because Israel is much better at getting such things done on time and on budget instead of decades later and billions of dollars more than planned. The Trump administration is strongly results-oriented, you see.
Woodworm pushing Russian hype.
Dull video of 11Bs trudging thru a kill zone.
Guess they missed the IED video "walk on the grass not the gravel"
#1
Cross training has been going on for quite a while.
Lo, 20 years ago, at eldest son's airborne graduation at Benning, I noted 5 IDF paras there getting their US jump wings.
Posted by: ed in texas ||
05/31/2026 9:39 Comments ||
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#2
The last 40 years they've dismantled US SHORAD and replaced them with _nothing_ just in time for the great drone wars.
And now we're supposed to dissociate ourselves from the only ally that has them.
[PJMedia] The human rights ...which are often intentionally defined so widely as to be meaningless... violations in Pakistain have reached such an alarming rate that the organization Genocide Watch has called for genocide monitoring in Pakistain.
Genocide Watch issued a report on May 8, which stated that Pakistain is now at stage 3 of genocide (discrimination), stage 5 (organization), stage 6 (polarization), and stage 9 (persecution) in terms of abuses against women, religious minorities, and other vulnerable groups. Persecution is the final stage before extermination.
According to the organization, the perpetrators include the Pakistain Tehrik-e-Insaf ...a political party in Pakistan. PTI was founded by former Pakistani cricket captain and philanthropist Imran Khan. The party's slogan is Justice, Humanity and Self Esteem, each of which is open to widely divergent interpretations.... Party, the State Police, and bully boy groups (Pak Taliban ...Arabic for students... /TTP, Lashkar-e-Jhangvi ... a 'more violent' offshoot of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain. LeJ's purpose in life is to murder anyone who's not of utmost religious purity, starting with Shiites but including Brelvis, Ahmadis, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Rosicrucians, and just about anyone else you can think of. They are currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of al-Qaeda ... /LeJ), amongst others.
Targeted groups are religious minorities (Shia, Ahmadiyya, Christians, Buddhists, Hindus), political opposition, women, and gays.
Genocide Watch reported:
Because discrimination against women and minorities is deeply embedded in society, and violence against them is both widespread and tolerated, Genocide Watch considers Pakistain to be at Stage 3: Discrimination and Stage 5: Organization. Deepening divisions along religious, gender, and political lines, reinforced by restrictive laws, censorship, and weak protections, place the country at Stage 6: Polarization. The continued targeting of vulnerable groups through violence, persecution, and displacement further reflects elements of Stage 9: Persecution.
Gregory H Stanton, President of Genocide Watch, developed the 10 stages of genocide, which explain the process that leads to genocide. They are classification, symbolization, discrimination, dehumanization, organization, polarization, preparation, persecution, extermination, and denial.
These stages refer to the developments or circumstances that cause, incite, or bring about the deliberate destruction of a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group.
Women remain the most severely abused group in the country, according to the report:
Women face the most severe consequences of Pakistain’s structural inequalities in the form of a growing femicide crisis. Gender-based violence remains widespread and includes acid attacks, forced and child marriage, rape, trafficking, forced conversion, and domestic abuse. Hundreds of women are killed annually in so-called "honor killings," often by relatives, over perceived family shame. At least 405 cases were recorded in 2024, but the real figures are likely higher, due to low reporting and weak, inconsistent enforcement. Also in 2024, over 2,000 domestic violence cases and 5,000 accounts of rape were recorded, reinforcing Pakistain’s status as one of the most dangerous countries in the world for women.
Additionally, in September 2025, the Lahore High Court ruled that marriages after puberty are valid under Islamic law, as girl marriage remains widespread in Pakistain, with millions married before 18.
Pakistain also ranked last in the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index, and it faces a massive education crisis, with more than 21 million children reportedly out of school due to poverty, social pressures, child labor, and discrimination.
Religious minorities also remain deeply vulnerable. Blasphemy laws, combined with weak enforcement, expose Ahmadis, Christians, and Hindus to discrimination, violence, and social exclusion.
Non-Moslems in Pakistain survive in a tyrannical environment. Christians comprise just 1.8% of the population and are particularly marginalized. 96% of the population is Moslem, of which the majority follow the Sunni tradition.
As a minority in Pakistain, Christians are exposed to many challenges, which range from everyday discrimination to threats of deadly violence.
On May 27, EWTN News reported that the son of a Pak Christian man was murdered by a mob over blasphemy ...the act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence to a deity, or sacred objects, or toward something considered sacred or inviolable. Some religions consider it to be a crime. In Pakistain you can commit blasphemy by looking cross-eyed at a Koran... allegations in 2024. His family says that they have received neither compensation nor justice:
As Moslems across Pakistain celebrate Eid al-Adha ...a major Moslem holiday, marked by animal sacrifice and ritual rioting... , Sultan Gill is quietly preparing for the death anniversary of his father, who died after a violent mostly peaceful mob attack over allegations of blasphemy in 2024.
"Nearly 2,000 people attacked Gillʼs family in Sargodha, in northern Punjab ...1. Little Orphan Annie's bodyguard
2. A province of Pakistain ruled by one of the Sharif brothers
3. A province of India. It is majority (60 percent) Sikh and Hindoo (37 percent), which means it has relatively few Moslem riots
.... province, on May 25, 2024, after allegations emerged that his father, Nazir (Lazar) Masih, had desecrated pages of the Koran. EWTN News covered the attack at the time.
The mob ransacked the familyʼs home and shoe factory in Mujahid Colony and later set the business on fire after a mosque announcement reportedly amplified the accusations.
Police managed to evacuate nine members of the family, but Masih was caught by the crowd and beaten with stones, bricks, and sticks. The 74-year-old departed this vale of tears on the night of June 2—3, 2024.
Nearly two years later, the family says it is still waiting for justice and compensation for the destruction of their property, which remains abandoned after they fled Sargodha.
'Our wounds became fresh during Eid. The cruelty cannot be described in words,' Gill told EWTN News.
'The confidence is gone. We cannot move around or talk freely. Two of my children had to discontinue their education and start working to support the family in a new city and help pay house rent,' he said.
Masih and his family are not the only victims. Pakistain’s blasphemy laws are increasingly used to intimidate Christians and other religious minorities. The laws are often exploited to target Christians during unrelated feuds (such as land disputes). Even an accusation can provoke mob violence against victims, their families, and the wider Christian community — just like what happened to Masih's family in 2024.
Religious freedom in the country further deteriorated in 2025 for minority groups, with Hindus, Shi’a and Ahmadi Moslems continuing to experience prosecutions for blasphemy whilst also suffering violence at the hands of mobs as well as the police.
At the same time, journalists, activists, and academics face censorship, violence, threats, arrests, and murder, all perpetrated by the Pak government and contributing to growing self-censorship and restricted public discourse, reports Genocide Watch.
Security challenges further complicate Pakistain’s human rights, as deadly attacks were carried out by holy warrior groups in 2025 and 2026, including Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistain, the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that they were al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're really very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allah around with every other sentence, but to hear western pols talk they're not really Moslems.... of Khorasan Province, al-Qaeda, and the Balochistan ...the Pak province bordering Kandahar and Uruzgun provinces in Afghanistan and Sistan Baluchistan in Iran. Its native Baloch propulation is being displaced by Pashtuns and Punjabis and they aren't happy about it... Liberation Army.
Regional instability leads to the worsening of human rights conditions... Escalating fighting between Pakistain and Afghanistan has caused serious human rights violations. In 2024, Pakistain deported 315,100 undocumented Afghan refugees, with thousands arrested amid harassment and coercion.
The report added that homosexual individuals and transgender individuals are also at a heightened risk of police abuse, discrimination, and violence.
"Genocide never just happens," says Holocaust Memorial Day Trust (HMDT). "There is always a set of circumstances which occur or which are created to build the climate in which genocide can take place."
The circumstances under which women, religious minorities, political dissidents and other vulnerable communities demonstrate that a genocide is likely to occur in Pakistain if precautions are not taken by the international community.
In its report, Genocide Watch shares recommendations for preventing the plight of these communities from worsening.
The organization recommends that the European Union ...the successor to the Holy Roman Empire, only without the Hapsburgs and the nifty uniforms and the dancing... should use GSP+ review procedures to press Pakistain on narrowly implemented reforms in freedom of expression, religious freedom, and women’s rights. The United Nations ...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks... High Commissioner for Human Rights should campaign to consider Pakistain a country of special concern because of the country’s concerning record of human rights abuses against ethnic and religious minorities. The United States, China, and the United Kingdom should urge and incentivize the country to combat honor killings and implement structural and systemic changes that would protect the lives and futures of women.
Posted by: ||
05/31/2026 00:00 ||
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#1
"The United States, China, and the United Kingdom ...". Ah, no. I am quite tired of other people seeking one redress or another via Uncle Sam. If the few Christians left in Pakistan and other similar environs can't take the hint that they are unloved, so be it.
MOVE, idiots! And leave your Pakistani 'culture' behind.
Posted by: Whiskey Mike ||
05/31/2026 2:59 Comments ||
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[WashingtonFreeBeacon] Momentum is growing for UNRWA to lose its diplomatic immunity, which would expose it to lawsuits from Oct 7 survivors and victims’ families.
The federal investigation into staff at the United Nations ...an organization which on balance has done more bad than good, with the good not done well and the bad done thoroughly... Relief and Works Agency—the U.N. Gazoo
...Hellhole adjunct to Israel and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, inhabited by Gazooks. The place was acquired in the wake of the 1967 War and then presented to Paleostinian control in 2006 by Ariel Sharon, who had entered his dotage. It is currently ruled with a rusty iron fist by Hamas with about the living conditions you'd expect. It periodically attacks the Hated Zionist Entity whenever Iran needs a ruckus created or the hard boyz get bored, getting thumped by the IDF in return. The ruling turbans then wave the bloody shirt and holler loudly about oppression and disproportionate response... relief organization that's been closely linked to Hamas ..a regional Iranian catspaw,... —will soon encompass at least 1,500 UNRWA-linked individuals suspected of terror ties. This unprecedented dragnet—reported here for the first time by the Washington Free Beacon—exposes an aid group brimming with Hamas operatives, and is generating momentum in Congress and the Trump administration for harsher sanctions on the embattled aid group, according to congressional staffers briefed on the matter.
The punitive measures up for consideration include stripping UNRWA of its diplomatic immunity under U.S. law, which would open it up to legal action from terror victims, and fully designating the aid organization as a foreign terrorist organization, according to three Trump administration officials and other sources tracking the matter in Congress.
These discussions have accelerated since the Free Beacon first reported in April that UNRWA and other U.N. agencies are stonewalling a federal probe into their ties to Hamas. The U.S. Agency for International Development inspector general's office, a law enforcement agency separate from the largely defunct USAID, has spent months independently unearthing evidence that multiple UNRWA employees participated in Hamas's Oct. 7 terror attack. The probe will soon expand to at least 1,500 suspected faceless myrmidons with UNRWA ties.
UNRWA, an official organ of the notoriously anti-Israel United Nations, is the only aid group with a large operation in Gaza, with as many as 13,000 Gazook employees and a large distribution network. U.N. officials have insisted for years that it is the only viable option for getting relief to Gazooks. But Israel and its supporters have long claimed that UNRWA is fully infiltrated by Hamas and has cemented the terror group's control over aid distribution.
The USAID inspector general is currently working with the State Department in the latter's effort to build a blacklist that will ensure terror-linked UNRWA employees cannot circulate to other aid organizations within the U.N. system. The inspector general has already confirmed that one UNRWA school principal participated in the Oct. 7 attacks as a member of Hamas's East Jabaliya Battalion, and has flagged multiple others for the State Department.
"The USAID inspector general's cases, coming in droves, are corroborating the obvious parent-subsidiary relationship between UNRWA and Hamas in Gaza," a senior State Department official familiar with the investigation told the Free Beacon. "If UNRWA was not a U.N. organization, it'd be undeniably facing terrorist sanctions based on what USAID IG has uncovered." That ongoing USAID inspector general investigation, the source said, would logically lead to labeling UNRWA as a foreign terrorist group. If the probe "confirms that if it walks like an FTO and talks like an FTO and employs FTO personnel, a case exists that it should be an FTO."
A second U.S. official said the Trump administration must consider a "whole-of-world approach" to UNRWA that includes further executive action and policies that would strip the aid group's diplomatic immunity. If UNRWA could be sued in the American courts, the agency could very well collapse under the strain of defending itself from a torrent of Oct. 7-related complaints.
"There is a lot here we can do," said the official, who would speak only anonymously due to the sensitivity of the ongoing discussions. "There has to be consequences for UNRWA—for its conduct in the run-up to and role in October 7, and continuing all the way to today with its ongoing refusal to adhere to legitimate and pressing American inquiries."
While the Trump administration stripped virtually all remaining American funding to UNRWA in February, citing its established links to Hamas, the agency still enjoys diplomatic immunity, can access some funds from the larger U.N. budget, and has facilitated Hamas's continued control over aid distribution in Gaza.
"Without immunities," the source explained, "there is a potential exposure to an FTO designation and massive lawsuits, which would then be for the courts to adjudicate." Additionally, UNRWA funding remains "a line item in the U.N. budget, and there's still American taxpayer dollars going towards that, and that's unacceptable."
A third U.S. official confirmed that appetite for such action has been building since it became clear that UNRWA and other U.N. organizations were not cooperating with the USAID inspector general's probe.
The USAID inspector general sent letters to six separate U.N. agencies and the International Committee of the Red Thingy in December 2025, asking them to name all employees "who worked on U.S.-government funded awards" and provide their contact information and "date and place of birth." The office also asked the agencies to detail their "interactions with Hamas," among other requests. "None of the responding U.N. recipients provided the requested information pertaining to their personnel," the inspector general disclosed last month.
"Given its history with Hamas, UNRWA does not have the luxury of not cooperating with an investigation and thinking there might not be consequences," said the third U.S. official. "We will respond accordingly."
Elements of these discussions have spilled into public view in recent weeks as politicians call for UNRWA to be fully dismantled.
Sen. Tom Cotton (R., Ark.) and 24 of his colleagues, citing the USAID inspector general's ongoing work, urged the Trump administration in a May 19 letter "to take decisive action to fully dismantle UNRWA and eliminate it from the UN budget." On Wednesday, Rep. Mike Lawler (R., N.Y.) and 90 other politicians issued a similar call.
Cotton told the Free Beacon that "UNRWA's terrorist ties are clear, and the U.N.'s attempt to hide those ties from the U.S. government is deeply concerning. It's long past time to completely dismantle the organization."
Sens. Ted Cruz;
...US Senator from Texas. Republican contender for president in 2016, his stiff and abrasive manner earned him the title most hated man in the Senate. After a close win over Beto O'Rourke, who tried to out-Lastino him, he grew a beard and let his biting wit shine through. Cruz's comments have been known to leave life-threatening wounds at better than forty feet... (R., Texas) and Bill Hagerty (R., Tenn.), influential members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, both told the Free Beacon that it is time to move beyond merely freezing UNRWA's funding, particularly as the USAID inspector general continues to unearth evidence of Hamas complicity.
"Either they come clean, or I expect growing momentum for designating them for the support they give to terrorists," Cruz said. Hagerty called it "appalling that other U.N. agencies today are still stonewalling the Trump Administration's ongoing investigations," adding that, "if U.N. agencies refuse to show basic transparency and accountability, then the Executive Branch and Congress must respond appropriately."
Richard Goldberg, who served in both Trump administrations and is currently a senior adviser with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, said authorities already exist to impose terrorism sanctions on UNRWA if the president so chooses.
The Justice Department's "position right now is that UNRWA does not enjoy privilege or immunity," Goldberg said. "That means nothing stops the Treasury Department from imposing terrorism sanctions on UNRWA to force its closure. Some people might be afraid of breaking eggs at the U.N. while the [Gaza] Board of Peace is still young, but I guarantee UNRWA's survival will be the death of the Board of Peace the second Donald Trump ...dictatorial for repealing some (but not all) of the diktats of his predecessor, misogynistic because he likes pretty girls, homophobic because he doesn't think gender bending should be mandatory, truly a man for all seasons... leaves office."
#3
"Either they come clean, or I expect growing momentum for designating them for the support they give to terrorists,"
Most things in Washington move at glacial speed or slower. What's the holdup? Same thing with ANTIFA. They were designated as a terrorist group sometime back and yet the beat goes on.
[Rudaw] The Iran-aligned Iraqi armed group Kata’ib Hezbollah on Saturday welcomed efforts by armed factions to surrender their weapons to the state, offering to assume responsibility of specialized military equipment and even pay for them, as Baghdad continues negotiations aimed at bringing weapons under state control.
In a statement, Abu Mujahid al-Assaf, the spokesperson and senior security official of the powerful armed group, praised what he described as a decision by “[armed] brothers not involved in the Islamic Resistance [of Iraq]” to end their armed activities and hand over their weapons.
Assaf said the move would help “confine weapons to the hands of the state and enhance security, stability, and civil peace,” proposing coordination with the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) command to oversee the handover process and provide “facilities and guidance” for the transfer of arms.
The statement comes as the government of Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi continues indirect talks with several Iran-aligned armed groups aimed at restricting weapons to state control.
Officials from the ruling Shiite Coordination Framework told Rudaw earlier this week that "indirect" discussions are underway with three to four factions operating outside the PMF structure, with a final agreement expected after the Eid al-Adha holiday, which was celebrated between Wednesday and Saturday.
Among the measures outlined in the proposal, Kata’ib Hezbollah offered to take possession of weapons that require specialized expertise to operate.
Assaf said they are ready to "receive certain specialized weapons for which the state apparatus lacks specialists, such as drones, loitering munitions [suicide drones], cruise missiles, anti-armor weapons, and others.”
He added that the group was also prepared to purchase the weapons, stating, “We are also prepared to pay for them.”
The proposal also included overseeing the inventory, transportation and storage of surrendered weapons, as well as support for “the families of the martyrs and the wounded of those groups, as well as the mujahideen whose services will no longer be required.”
Concluding the statement, Assaf said Kata’ib Hezbollah respected the decision of groups choosing to lay down their arms.
“We affirm that we disassociate ourselves from anyone who has insulted or insults any group or faction that decided in the past, present, or will decide in the future to leave jihadi work,” he said, adding that the group “praise[s] the relinquishing of their weapons in favor of the state.”
The latest remarks also mark a shift from the position previously expressed by Saraya Awliya al-Dam (Guardians of the Blood Brigades), a shadowy armed group operating under the banner of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (IRI). On Saturday, the group rejected surrendering its weapons, with spokesperson Abu Mahdi al-Jaafari saying, “There will be no surrender of weapons and no talk of reassurance before the injustice is lifted and the [American] occupation of Iraq comes to an end.”
Saraya Awliya al-Dam was among the factions that claimed responsibility for attacks on alleged US targets in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region during the six-week Iran-Israel war, including drone strikes targeting Erbil International Airport and other American-linked facilities. The IRI, which emerged after the outbreak of the Gaza war in October 2023, is widely believed to include several powerful Iran-aligned Iraqi factions, including Kata’ib Hezbollah, Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq, Harakat Hezbollah al-Nujaba, and Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada. In early April, the umbrella group claimed responsibility for more than 750 attacks against alleged US-linked targets in Iraq and the wider region since the start of the Iran war, though such attacks have sharply declined in recent weeks.
[Rudaw] Iraq has increased its daily gasoline production by seven million liters to meet rising domestic demand during the Eid al-Adha holiday, the oil ministry said on Saturday.
Hussein Talib, director general of the Oil Products Distribution Company (OPDC), told the Iraqi News Agency (INA) that the company had taken proactive measures to secure strategic reserves of fuel products and gas in line with directives from the oil minister ahead of periods of increased consumption.
The OPDC, an affiliate of the oil ministry responsible for distributing fuel products across Iraq, normally supplies around 33 million liters of gasoline per day.
Talib said demand surged during the four-day Eid al-Adha holiday, which began on Wednesday, due to increased travel and movement by families. To prevent shortages and ensure uninterrupted supply, the company raised daily gasoline production and distribution to 40 million liters.
He added that both premium and regular gasoline supplied to the domestic market are produced locally and that current production levels are sufficient to meet demand.
Iraq has in recent years expanded the capacity of its refineries, reducing reliance on imported fuel and increasing domestic production of gasoline and other petroleum products.
Posted by: ||
05/31/2026 00:00 ||
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[IsraelTimes] The New York Post reports that one of the final sticking points for the US to approve a memorandum of understanding with Iran is the unfreezing of $6 billion in Iranian funds parked in Qatar following a 2023 US-Iran prisoner swap deal.
A US official cited by the Post says the funds would be released gradually in the form of food and medical supplies as Iran meets benchmarks, including opening and demining the Strait of Hormuz.
It’s unclear from the report if the official is describing a US proposal or a clause of the draft agreement.
In September 2023, as part of a deal that saw Washington and Tehran set free five of each other’s nationals, then-US president Joe Biden waived sanctions that prevented Iran from withdrawing the $6 billion from South Korea.
The funds were transferred from South Korea to Qatari accounts, but were withheld after Iran-backed terror group Hamas stormed southern Israel on October 7, 2023, sparking the war in Gaza.
US President Donald Trump said yesterday that he was entering the White House Situation Room for a “final determination” on the talks with Iran. A senior administration official later told The New York Times that the meeting ended inconclusively, with an agreement close but further debate required on issues including the unfreezing of Iranian funds.
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05/31/2026 00:00 ||
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#1
Just take it.
Posted by: Chris ||
05/31/2026 1:13 Comments ||
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[Rudaw] A Syrian displacement camp that has relied on UN support for years is on the verge of closing after most of its residents returned home, with only 20 families remaining.
Ibrahim Khalaf, director of the social affairs and labor office in Hasaka, told state-run SANA on Saturday that about 75 percent of the camp's residents have left since the beginning of the year.
The al-Arisha camp, located south of Hasaka, was home to thousands of displaced families, most of them from Deir ez-Zor province. Before Damascus took control of the facility in January, Kurdish authorities had launched initiatives encouraging residents to return to their areas of origin. The Syrian government has since continued efforts to facilitate voluntary returns.
Khalaf said a committee that includes representatives from the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, was recently formed to help address obstacles facing displaced families seeking to leave the camp voluntarily.
According to the official, 93 families departed the camp over the past two weeks, leaving only 20 families still residing there.
The camp housed around 2,000 families, or roughly 10,000 people, as recently as July 2025 and had received UN assistance for years.
Established in 2017 in Hasaka province, al-Arisha camp was created to shelter people displaced by conflict and instability, primarily from Deir ez-Zor and Raqqa provinces. At its peak, it hosted nearly 18,000 displaced people, according to SANA.
[Rudaw] The January advance of Syrian government forces into northeast Syria (Rojava) accelerated the withdrawal of American troops from the country, the inspector general for the US-led Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS reported, adding that it further created security vacuums in areas previously held by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), including detention facilities holding ISIS militants, and left “future Syrian counter-ISIS partnerships in limbo.”
In a newly declassified quarterly report to the United States Congress covering January to March 2026, the Lead Inspector General for Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR) - the official name of the Washington-led coalition’s anti-ISIS campaign - stated that the capture of northeastern Syria by Damascus forces in January prompted “an accelerated transition and realignment of US forces.”
The report said that Syrian government forces “rapidly and, according to security analysts, often chaotically captured most of northeastern Syria from the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF),” effectively bringing “an end to the decade-long U.S. counter-ISIS partnership with the SDF.”
US forces were instructed to “remain neutral and did not intervene in the hostilities,” the report added, which ultimately led to a full withdrawal by mid-April, as “U.S. forces closed their remaining bases,” marking the official end of the 10-year Combined Joint Task Force-Operation Inherent Resolve (CJTF-OIR) presence in Syria.
The SDF and Damascus reached a landmark agreement on January 29, reportedly following significant mediation by US Special Envoy for Syria Tom Barrack, as well as Kurdish political figures from the Kurdistan Region.
The deal came after a sharp escalation in mid-January, when Syrian government forces and affiliated armed groups seized territory previously held by SDF forces in eastern Aleppo, Raqqa, Deir ez-Zor, and Hasakah provinces.
The SDF, which serves as the de facto military force in Rojava and is a key on-the-ground partner of the US-led Global Coalition to Defeat ISIS, played a central role in liberating these areas from the extremist group in 2019 and had since maintained control to prevent its resurgence.
During the Syrian government offensive, SDF units were also forced to withdraw from several detention facilities holding thousands of ISIS prisoners, many of whom escaped amid the ensuing chaos.
According to the Lead Inspector General’s report, the rapid advance forced “SDF personnel guarding detention facilities holding ISIS detainees to redeploy to front lines, at times before government forces could take control.”
The report confirmed that “at least 150 ISIS fighters escaped detention facilities as a result of the Syrian government offensive and its aftermath.”
Meanwhile, US Central Command (CENTCOM) deployed forces to secure another critical site, the Panorama detention center, where over the following weeks American troops carried out emergency evacuations, transferring “5,704 remaining ISIS detainees from detention facilities in Syria to government facilities in Iraq to prevent further ISIS escapes.”
At the same time, Kurdish guards withdrew from the al-Hol displaced persons camp - long used to house ISIS family members. The report noted that the “SDF’s sudden departure created a significant security vacuum.”
Under the limited oversight of incoming Syrian forces, “as many as 20,000 residents - including thousands of ISIS family members and affiliates - departed unmonitored,” the report added, noting that the US-led Coalition had previously warned that such an unmonitored exodus created an ongoing security concern with “broader regional security implications.”
In conclusion, the report stated that the wholesale restructuring of the Syrian map has left Washington scrambling to build a new framework for regional counterterrorism. It cited the Office of the Under Secretary of War for Policy as reporting that the rapid integration of local actors, combined with the accelerated withdrawal of American ground forces, “disrupted U.S. forces’ ability to vet Syrian actors, leaving future Syrian counter-ISIS partnerships in limbo.”
[IsraelTimes] The shoulder-launched missile used to down the F-15 fighter jet over southwest Iran last month was likely made by China, NBC reports, citing three people with knowledge of the matter.
One of those sources and a US official told NBC that China may have also given Iran stealth aircraft and long-range early-warning radar equipment early in the war launched by Israel and the US on February 28, the network says.
The sources say the downing of the jet, which set off a 36-hour race to find the pilot, is still being investigated.
US President Donald Trump said last month that he had asked Chinese President Xi Jinping not to provide weapons to Iran. Xi assured Trump “that, essentially, he’s not doing that,” Trump said at the time.
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.
..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",...
...The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. Only one of those statements is an exaggeration....
...Arabic for 
... a 'more violent' offshoot of Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistain. LeJ's purpose in life is to murder anyone who's not of utmost religious purity, starting with Shiites but including Brelvis, Ahmadis, Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Rosicrucians, and just about anyone else you can think of. They are currently a wholly-owned subsidiary of al-Qaeda ...
..a regional Iranian catspaw,...
