[IsraelTimes] London police request organizers of event memorializing massacre put banner up only when it opens on Wednesday to avoid giving away location to potential protesters, attackers
Organizers of an upcoming London exhibition on Hamas ..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,... ’s October 7, 2023, massacre at the Nova music festival took down the exhibition’s main banner after a police request due to fear that the location could be targeted by terror attacks or hard boy protests.
Police requested that the organizers only restore the large sign on the actual day the exhibition begins — which is Wednesday — to avoid revealing the location of the venue ahead of time, Hebrew media outlets reported.
The reports said police officials discussed several threat scenarios with the organizers and said forces would be placed in and near the venue area, including undercover cops, to protect them.
The steps came amid a wave of anti-Israel and antisemitic attacks targeting Jewish targets in the UK.
The Nova massacre saw Hamas-led forces of Evil invade from 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... , kill over 360 participants of the rave near Re’im, and take dozens to the Strip as hostages. The Nova victims were among the 1,200 people killed and 251 taken hostage on the day.
In June 2024, anti-Israel protesters waved terror group flags and carried signs glorifying October 7 outside an exhibit on the massacre held in New York.
Britannia has seen a surge in antisemitism against the country’s 290,000-strong Jewish community since the 2023 Hamas massacre that triggered the Gaza war, with a spate of arson attacks on Jewish sites in London in recent weeks and two Jewish men stabbed in April in what police are treating as a terrorist incident.
The British Jewish community has long accused authorities of not taking strong enough action, particularly in the wake of the deadly Yom Kippur terror attack at a synagogue in Manchester.
Some politicians and Jewish community leaders said the antisemitism has been fanned by hard boy messages at pro-Paleostinian protests.
Earlier this month, London police announced the creation of a special unit to protect Jews.
[IsraelTimes] Data shows Iran’s crypto exchange has processed at least $2.3 billion on the same two blockchains that the Trump family used to prop up their fledgling World Liberty Financial
When customers of Iran’s largest crypto exchange needed to move billions of dollars, networks created by two of the industry’s biggest players served as conduits.
And from the early stages of US President Donald Trump ...His ancestors didn't own any slaves... ’s flagship digital currency venture, the same two players lent credibility to the startup.
According to data analyzed by Rooters, Iran’s Nobitex exchange has processed at least $2.3 billion since 2023 on Tron and BNB Chain, blockchains established respectively under crypto billionaires Justin Sun and Changpeng Zhao. Users of Tron and BNB Chain pay fees to use the blockchains, which serve as secure, tamper-resistant record keepers.
Iranian money has kept moving through those two digital ledgers during the US and Israeli war against the Islamic Theocratic Republic.
Sun and Binance, the crypto exchange owned by Zhao, are both prominent backers of World Liberty Financial, the crypto firm co-founded by Trump and his family.
There’s no suggestion that the Trump family knew of Nobitex’s use of Tron and BNB Chain.
Still, the Iran ...a theocratic Shiite state divided among the Medes, the Persians, and the (Arab) Elamites. Formerly a fairly civilized nation ruled by a Shah, it became a victim of Islamic revolution in 1979. The nation is today noted for spontaneously taking over other countries' embassies, maintaining whorehouses run by clergymen, involvement in international drug trafficking, and financing sock puppet militias to extend the regime's influence. The word Iran is a cognate form of Aryan. The abbreviation IRGC is the same idea as Stürmabteilung (or SA). The term Supreme Guide is a the modern version form of either Duce or Führer or maybe both. They hate JewsZionists Jews. Their economy is based on the production of oil and vitriol... transactions highlight the potentially conflicted position in which the Trumps’ sprawling business interests have placed the US presidency. The family-owned Trump Organization real-estate empire, for example, continues to pursue foreign deals.
The use of the blockchains by institutions in a country the United States is at war with is a "dramatic irony," said John Reed Stark, a former chief of the Securities and Exchange Commission’s Office of Internet Enforcement. "The entities doing crypto financing through these platforms are the very ones that the president is trying to defeat in the war."
The administration denies that Trump’s businesses pose any conflict of interest. "Rooters’ bizarre attempts to link President Trump to Iran’s banking system are totally laughable," said Anna Kelly, a White House spokeswoman. She referred Rooters to World Liberty for further questions.
A spokeswoman for World Liberty said the company has no relationship with Nobitex and follows US law. "World Liberty does not own, operate, or control Tron in any way, and has no authority over transactions conducted on it," she said.
Nobitex, which is used extensively by sanctioned Iranian institutions and ordinary citizens, has processed more than $2 billion on Tron since January 1, 2023, according to a Rooters breakdown of public blockchain data from crypto analytics firm Arkham.
Since 2023, Nobitex also has processed at least $317 million on BNB Chain, a blockchain formerly known as Binance Smart Chain that was developed by Binance, the world’s biggest crypto exchange.
Rooters is reporting the data from Arkham, which did not respond to a request for comment, for the first time.
BLOCKCHAIN LINKS
Since the Iran war started in February, crypto worth at least $22.6 million has moved through Nobitex on BNB Chain, and at least $550,000 has moved via Tron.
Rooters reported on May 1 that Nobitex is controlled by two brothers from a powerful Iranian family that has close ties to the new supreme leader. Under the brothers’ leadership, the exchange has grown from a startup into a central node of a parallel Iranian financial system used to evade Western sanctions. Rooters found that its users have included Iran’s central bank and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, known as the IRGC.
About $7.8 billion in crypto flowed between Nobitex and the Binance exchange between 2018 and 2022, Rooters reported in 2022. About three-quarters of the Iranian funds that passed through Binance were in Tron’s cryptocurrency. Nobitex encouraged clients to use Tron’s crypto to trade anonymously without "endangering assets due to sanctions," Rooters reported.
Four crypto analysts, including two specialists in Iran’s use of digital assets, reviewed Rooters’s calculation that Nobitex has handled at least $2.3 billion in transactions via BNB Chain and Tron. All said it was sound.
One of the Iran specialists, independent researcher and investigator Rich Sanders, said the true volume was likely significantly higher because flows are visible only for wallet addresses known to be owned by Nobitex. The Iranian company has publicly said it switches addresses to make tracing and intercepting transfers harder.
Presented with a detailed summary of this article, spokespeople for both Binance and BNB Chain told Rooters that Binance neither operates nor controls BNB Chain.
"BNB Chain is a public, permissionless blockchain maintained by an independent global community of validators," BNB Chain spokeswoman Ana Nicoara said in a statement to Rooters. "It is not an exchange, not a company, and not Binance."
The Binance spokesperson said the firm was "an initial contributor and incubator" of BNB Chain and provided early operational support. The operations and intellectual property of the BNB Chain website, which is the primary interface for users and developers of the blockchain, were transferred to a company called BNB Chain Technology Holding Limited in 2023, the spokesperson added.
Corporate records from Abu Dhabi, however, document ongoing ties between Binance and BNB Chain Technology. The filings, reviewed by Rooters, show that Zhao, the Binance founder and majority shareholder, is BNB Chain Technology’s only listed shareholder.
Relations between Tron’s founder Sun and World Liberty have recently turned sour. Sun in April sued World Liberty, accusing it of extortion for allegedly pressuring him to invest in its stablecoin. World Liberty countersued in early May, alleging defamation.
Asked about Nobitex’s use of Tron, a spokeswoman for Tron said it is a technology provider and unable to "monitor and investigate every user and every transaction" or prevent their trading. Nonetheless, Sun helped create an initiative that works with law enforcement, the spokeswoman said, without offering details. The initiative has frozen "hundreds of millions" in funds, including those "tied to sanctioned entities and terror financing," she said.
In statements to Rooters, Nobitex denied having direct Iranian government connections or assisting the state, and said that any illicit funds moving through the exchange did so without management approval or awareness.
The US Treasury Department, Iran’s government and its central bank did not respond to requests for comment about the ties between Binance, Tron and illicit Iranian funds.
BANK CHAINS
Crypto exchanges such as Binance are platforms where people buy, sell or trade digital assets. Blockchains such as BNB Chain and Tron are public ledgers that record transactions and the digital "wallets" used to make them. Some exchanges, like Binance, have launched blockchains and issued their own digital tokens.
Like other blockchains, Tron and BNB Chain host a variety of crypto tokens, from coins issued by Tron and Binance themselves to stablecoins such as tether, whose value is pegged to other assets. The Iran-linked transactions make up a small fraction of these networks’ overall volume.
Sanders and the other Iran crypto specialist, who requested anonymity, said that among those to use Tron and BNB Chain was the Central Bank of Iran. The United States sanctioned the central bank in 2019 for allegedly providing billions of dollars to the IRGC and Leb ...The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers... ’s Hezbollah.
The central bank bought more than $500 million of tether via Tron between November 2024 and June 2025, according to a report in January by blockchain analysis company Elliptic and the two Iran specialists. In the first six months of last year, around $347 million of the total was sent to Nobitex using Tron, Elliptic told Rooters.
The central bank also converted the tether to different coins and used other blockchains — including BNB Chain — to cover its tracks, the Iran specialists said. Some of that crypto was converted back to tether and routed to Nobitex and other exchanges, Sanders and the other Iran specialist added.
Since its founding in 2018, Nobitex has processed between tens of millions and hundreds of millions of dollars in transactions linked to sanctioned groups including Iran’s central bank and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, according to estimates by crypto analysts looking at sanctioned wallets.
It is unclear whether Tron and BNB Chain were aware their networks were used by the central bank and Nobitex, which has not been specifically sanctioned. Doing business with Iranian entities falls under general Western sanctions. Rooters could not determine why the United States has not sanctioned Nobitex.
Tether, the company that issues the stablecoin by the same name, said it had frozen multiple wallet addresses associated with Nobitex at the request of Israel. Israel’s National Bureau for Counter Terror Financing did not respond to a request for comment.
Tether said crypto exchanges and platforms are responsible for compliance in trading on secondary markets.
CRYPTO-FRIENDLY WHITE HOUSE
Trump’s return to the White House in January 2025 — and his embrace of crypto — shaped the fortunes of the president’s family, Sun and Zhao.
Members of the Trump family have launched a string of crypto businesses, including World Liberty, that generated hundreds of millions of dollars in income in 2025, Rooters reported last year.
As World Liberty struggled to attract investors after its launch in October 2024, Sun, the founder of Tron, invested tens of millions of dollars in World Liberty’s WLFI tokens, lending momentum to the fledgling company.
In early 2025, an Abu Dhabi investment firm, MGX, bought a $2 billion stake in Binance. Soon after, World Liberty announced the purchase would be made in its USD1 stablecoin.
Binance’s acceptance of the World Liberty Financial stablecoin gave credibility to the newly launched token and was cited by World Liberty as evidence of "extraordinary, worldwide demand" for USD1. MGX’s acquisition could also yield millions of dollars annually for the Trumps, according to the Rooters report last year.
MGX has said it chose USD1 after evaluating several stablecoins, and that Binance had requested the use of crypto in the transaction.
In October 2025, Trump pardoned Zhao, the founder and former CEO of Binance, wiping away his federal conviction for failing to maintain an effective anti-money-laundering program. Lawyers for Binance and Zhao, who has retained his majority stake in the company, have said there was no connection between the use of USD1 and the pardon.
Since taking office, Trump has launched a suite of crypto-friendly policies and US regulators have paused enforcement actions against crypto companies and moguls. The Securities and Exchange Commission settled a lawsuit against Sun for alleged fraud in March for $10 million without Sun admitting any wrongdoing.
Sun’s current portfolio of 4 billion WLFI tokens is worth roughly $266 million, according to Rooters calculations based on the latest WLFI price. Sun has also invested in Trump’s meme coin and has used his crypto platforms to boost USD1, World Liberty’s second cryptocurrency.
For its part, Binance has continued to support USD1, enabling the token’s trading with other crypto coins and incentivizing users to hold it. Arkham data shows Binance now holds $3.8 billion of the Trump token.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited
[Regnum] On May 19, the US Senate approved a bill limiting President Donald Trump's war powers against Iran.
The document was supported by 50 lawmakers, with 47 opposed. The initiative was sponsored by Democrats and supported by four Republicans, with one Democratic lawmaker voting against it.
This bill was approved on the seventh attempt. Under US law, the president must consult with Congress before sending troops abroad. "Under law". Regnum doesn't understand it's not constitutional
Israel and the United States attacked Iran on February 28. The Islamic Republic responded by striking its adversaries' targets in several Middle Eastern countries. Tehran and Washington began talks in early April, but no agreement has yet been reached. Trump has repeatedly threatened Tehran with renewed attacks.
Israel and the United States explained their aggression against Iran, among other things, by claiming that the Islamic Republic was attempting to develop nuclear weapons under the guise of a uranium enrichment program for nuclear power plants. However, Iranian authorities have repeatedly denied any intention of acquiring nuclear weapons, and the IAEA has noted that the agency has not found any nuclear weapons in Iran. Russian President Vladimir Putin noted that Russia had done much to find a compromise on the Iranian nuclear program, but unprovoked attacks by the US and Israel thwarted all efforts.
The US Senate advanced a war powers resolution on Tuesday that would end the Iran war unless President Donald Trump obtains Congress’s authorization, a rare rebuke of the Republican leader 80 days after US and Israeli forces began striking the Islamic Republic.
Since Trump ordered the attack on Iran at the end of February, Democrats have forced repeated votes on such resolutions. Republicans had previously been able to muster the votes to reject those proposals, but Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy — fresh off a primary election loss in which Trump endorsed his opponent — switched sides.
The 50-47 vote tally showed that a small but growing number of Republicans are willing to challenge Trump on the Iran war, even though the effort may not advance much further. Three Republicans were absent Tuesday and their votes would be enough to defeat the measure, if they maintain their stance on the war.
Still, the vote showed how Republicans are increasingly uneasy with a conflict that shows no signs of ending, is locked in a fragile ceasefire, and is causing rising gas prices in the US.
“Republicans are starting to crack, and momentum is building to check him,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement after the vote. “We are not letting up.”
Republican Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska had all previously voted for similar war powers resolutions and did so again Tuesday. Cassidy supported the legislation for the first time, while Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania was again the only Democrat to vote against it.
#2
The powers the legislative branch has are 1) the power of the purse in funding and 2) not give the executive the means, aka armed forces, to use. See - Jefferson and the Barbary Pirates.
[IsraelTimes] Jewish leaders in New York City say they are not attending Mayor Mamdani’s event marking Jewish American Heritage Month tonight.
Mamdani’s office describes the event as a “Pre-Shavuot Celebration in Honor of Jewish American Heritage Month.”
The UJA-Federation of New York and the head of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York — the two leading Jewish groups in the city — say they are not attending the event.
“We will not be attending the Jewish American Heritage Month celebration at Gracie Mansion being hosted by a mayor who denies a core pillar of our heritage — the State of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people,” the federation tells The New York Post.
Rabbi Joseph Potasnik of the New York Board of Rabbis, a prominent Jewish leader in the city, also says he’s not going.
Rabbi David Niederman, a prominent figure in the Satmar Hasidic community, tells The Post he will attend.
The Satmars are theologically non-Zionist, but are not aligned with Mamdani’s political anti-Zionism, and have a warmer relationship to Mamdani’s City Hall than mainstream Jewish groups in the city.
Mamdani’s event comes after his office released a Nakba Day video on Friday that stoked outrage among mainstream Jewish groups due to its one-sided narrative about Israel’s War of Independence and its implication that Israel’s existence is an ongoing “catastrophe.”
Mamdani, who has refused to recognize Israel’s existence as a Jewish state, did not recognize Israel’s Independence Day last month and will not be marching in the Jewish community’s annual pro-Israel parade, called Israel Day on Fifth, later this month.
Mamdani has consistently said he seeks to protect and “cherish” Jewish New Yorkers.
Gets hit with an egg while “praying” on the sidewalk outside of an all girls Jewish school. Important context you missed
[IsraelTimes] New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani doubles down on a video he posted for Nakba Day as national Jewish organizations joined a chorus of condemnation.
On Friday, Mamdani posted a video, produced by City Hall, with a “Nakba survivor” who said the “catastrophe” associated with Israel’s founding “continues to this day.”
Nakba is Arabic for “catastrophe,” and refers to the displacement of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians in Israel’s 1948 War of Independence. The Nakba narrative and the associated “right of return” for the refugees’ millions of descendants are seen by many as demands for Israel’s demise as a majority Jewish state.
New York Jewish leaders have condemned the video for presenting a one-sided view of Israel’s War of Independence, saying the narrative contributes to discrimination and threats against Jews, and national Jewish groups now join the outrage.
“In his post sharing a one-sided video about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the mayor of New York City fueled real world harm,” the American Jewish Committee says. “At a time when Jews are being attacked in the streets of New York and worldwide because of antizionist narratives, amplifying misleading content doesn’t just distort public understanding, it puts the Jewish community at further risk.”
The statement reflects the pro-Israel US Jewish community increasingly viewing anti-Zionism as discrimination and a threat in itself, and not as legitimate political discourse.
The Anti-Defamation League says the “one-sided video” is “propaganda.”
“Releasing it right before Shabbat isn’t leadership. It’s provocation. Especially when Nakba Day ‘commemorations’ in this city featured open support for US-designated terror organizations, veneration of their leaders, and calls for Israel’s destruction. New Yorkers deserve a mayor with the moral clarity to call that out,” the ADL says.
Nakba Day marches in the city on Friday and Saturday saw protesters waving Hezbollah and Hamas flags, including on a truck carrying children.
There was a lot of chaos at today’s Pal-Awda Bay Ridge Nakba Day 78 protest, but this moment deserves special attention.
Children are being led in a chant while, directly behind them, you can clearly see a flag with the emblem of Hamas’s Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades. pic.twitter.com/Epme3IZSPk
— Stu Smith (@thestustustudio) May 17, 2026
Mamdani doubles down on the video at a press conference.
“I was proud to commemorate Nakba Day, which is an annual day on May 15th that commemorates the expulsion of more than 700,000 Palestinians from 1947 to 1945 during the creation of the State of Israel and for the year that followed,” Mamdani says, misstating the year of Israel’s founding.
“We wanted to ensure that the focus of this is just to hear from a New Yorker herself, on her own memories, of what it means to be expelled, what her life has been like, and she has found home in New York City,” Mamdani says.
He adds that he had planned to appear in the video himself, but he “did fall sick” and did not want to “create any kind of complications” for the subject of the video.
Mamdani is also asked about leading Jewish organizations boycotting an event he is hosting tonight for American Jewish Heritage Month and Shavuot.
“My message to Jewish leaders across this city is that my door is always open,” he says.
#2
Often times a repressive government will try to gain control of influential religious figures. The Soviets infiltrated the Russian Orthodox hierarchy. The CCP negotiated a settlement through Theodore McCarrick so that they controlled the Chinese Catholic bishops. I think Mamdani will try coerce and lie about Christians and Jews. My thinking is based on what I think Obama would try to do. I don’t think Mamdani will pull it off.
Posted by: Super Hose ||
05/20/2026 16:32 Comments ||
Top||
#3
At Zohran Mamdani’s Jewish event for Shavuot he separated himself from the audience using barriers and keeping the Jews cordoned off. A stark difference from when he hosted the Muslims for an Iftar event. As a Jew, I’m not really feeling the warmth of collectivism right now. pic.twitter.com/efzwWQ1Dau
— Manhattan Mingle (@ManhattanMingle) May 19, 2026
I imagine that so long as they are not plotting terror attacks or bloody revolution, the Trump Justice Department couldn’t care less — we have serious problems to fix involving proper bad guys who are not cosplaying the thing. Separately, the San Diego mocque killing Day 1 can be seen here; Day 2 can be seen here.
[Will2Rise] The new youth are done with White Guilt. They don’t care that their ancestors may have owned slaves (everyone did),
(no, most people didn’t, either because they couldn’t afford to or because they refused to own other people)
they don’t care if your great grandfather or grandfather was alchemically transmuted into a shoe by the "nazis", and they’re not going to buy your fucking book. They make memes and edits of Mosley, Mussolini, Franco, Hitler
…all of whom lost in the end, so how powerful could they have been, really?
because what matters, after years and years of tip-toe politics, is what has the power to light a changing fire in a stagnant world that has traded young and unborn futures for short-term political and financial advantages.
Parallels are often drawn between the ACN
…Active Club Network. White supremacist work out groups…
and the fictional story and film Fight Club, by both our supporters and detractors, and we find that amusing because WN 3.0 is essentially the inverse of Tyler Durden’s
…the fictional protagonist of Fight Club…
methodological approach in as such that he advocates an anti self-improvement model to deprogram people, whereas we advocate a pro self-improvement model to deprogram people. Furthermore, he also imparts a nihilistic and overly cynical apprehension of the world and our place in it, while we impart an optimistic and measured apprehension that is both idealistic and rational. The one thing we do both agree on though, is that "without pain and sacrifice we would have nothing". Thus, we — like Tyler — in another regard, challenge men to heal themselves through the therapy of voluntary fighting so that they may exorcise the global-homo demons that have come to possess them and find renewed purpose and place among those of their own kind. This is pure white Christian nationalism.
This has no more to do with Christianity than those who follow the prosperity cult, trading rituals for an improved standard of living. “Christianity” is used here as a mere group label, like Chinese or Rotarian, not a statement of personal faith in Jesus Christ as their saviour.
To be perfectly candid, provided we all remain clean-cut, stylish and active (with the trademark attitude to boot)
…translation: their objective is to be pretty, not to be able to support a family…
we will continue to win the propaganda war no matter the hand-wringing narratives of adversarial boomers, generation X bugmen
…slang for Untermensch…
and millennial soyboys. The funny thing is we’re not even trying to win the propaganda war, we’re just being ourselves... Bad boys with good habits.
Cain Clark, 17, attacked the Islamic Center of San Diego alongside Caleb Vazquez, 18, around 11.40am on Monday, after apparently stealing guns and a car from his home.
Hours before the attack, Clark's mother reported to police that her son was suicidal and potentially armed with weapons, and officers were already searching for the teenager when he opened fire.
After killing three, the teenagers were found in a car near the mosque with self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Police said one of the weapons in their vehicle had 'hate speech' written on it, sources told the LA Times.
Sources told the outlet that when officers searched Clark's home around two miles from the mosque, they discovered a suicide note 'writing about racial pride.' A gas canister emblazoned with a Nazi SS sticker on its side was seen next to the BMW X1, where the suspects were found dead, with a shotgun nearby.
Clark was enrolled in a virtual learning academy at the San Diego Unified School District
…school districts offer this for students who are troubled or disruptive, and cannot handle the pressure and pace of normal classrooms. Generally the courses provide the bare minimum necessary to meet the requirements of the state curriculum. For many it is the last chance for the district to drag them over the line for graduation…
and was set to graduate from high school this semester, officials said. He was previously a star wrestler at Madison High School, but had only been attending classes online for some time, as officials said he had spiraled into 'hate speech.'
Clark's grandparents, David and Deborah Clark, told CNN they have been left stunned and heartbroken by the tragedy, saying they were 'trying to process this' and were 'very sorry for what happened.'
San Diego police said on Monday that hours before the tragedy, his department got a call from the teenager's mom, who was concerned he was suicidal. The parent, who has not been named, said she realized several of her guns were missing, and said she saw him and a companion wearing 'camouflage outfits', Chief Scott Wahl said.
He added that although Clark's mother warned cops that her weapons were missing, she did not indicate any kind of planned attack on the mosque.
'There was no specific threat, especially no specific threat to the Islamic Center,' the police chief said.
'It was just general hate kind of speech that I think covered a wide gamut.' "We get calls like that every day!"
Police said they arrived at the Islamic Center within minutes of the shooting and found three people deceased in front of the building, including security guard Amin Abdullah, who was hailed as a hero as he saved lives during the chaos.
Several blocks away, a landscaper was also shot at but was not hit, and minutes later, police received a call about shots being fired down the street.
Clark and Vazquez were found dead inside a vehicle on Salerno Street, several streets away from the Islamic Center. While authorities and police sources have revealed some details of Clark, little is known about Vazquez.
When the teenagers opened fire, witness Vanessa Chavez told The New York Times she watched in horror as the security guard was struck by at least two gunshots while children playing outside were herded into the building.
As many as 100 officers then combed the mosque for any signs of the shooters, breaking down doors as they evacuated the Al Rashid school on campus, which serves students in kindergarten through third grade. But the teenagers had already fled the scene, also shooting at a landscaper working on a nearby home as they made their escape.
As authorities now probe the shooting as a hate crime, they are looking into reported anti-Islamic writings that were found inside the vehicle where the boys were found dead.
The shooting at the San Diego Islamic Center came at the beginning of Dhu’l-Hijja, one of the holiest months on the Muslim calendar. It translates to 'month of the pilgrimage' and marks a time when millions of Muslims across the world embark on the Hajj, an annual pilgrimage to Mecca in Saudi Arabia.
The Islamic Center of San Diego is the largest mosque in San Diego County, with around 5,000 members.
According to officials the writings are filled with anti-Islamic, antisemitic and anti-LGBTQ views. Nazi images, misogyny and racist statements about black people and other minorities were also found inside the 75-page manifesto that was shared online.
The authors specifically blamed the Jewish population for what they saw as the problems with the world today.
It’s a popular excuse for those who fail to become what they believe they deserve.
Both express beliefs that white people are being eliminated, and one writes about mental health struggles and being rejected by women. The pair 'didn't discriminate on who they hated,' Mark Remily, the lead FBI agent in San Diego, said on Tuesday.
It also contained hostile views on President Donald Trump, with the authors describing themselves as anti-MAGA.
Brenton Tarrant, a man who carried out a 2019 shooting on mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, was listed as one of their heroes. He killed 51 people.
After killing three, the teenagers were found in a car near the mosque with self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Police said one of the weapons in their vehicle had 'hate speech' written on it, sources told the LA Times. Sources told the outlet that when officers searched Clark's home around two miles from the mosque, they discovered a suicide note 'writing about racial pride.'
A gas canister emblazoned with a Nazi SS sticker on its side was seen next to the BMW X1, where the suspects were found dead, with a shotgun nearby.
Police said Amin Abdullah, who was working as a security guard at the mosque, bravely leapt into action when the shooting unfolded. Abdullah, a father of eight, was hailed as a hero by San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl, who said he 'minimized the situation' and rescued many inside before he was killed. Police said the security guard opened fire when the shooters arrived at the Islamic Center and tried to barge inside.
As the shooters made their way into the lobby, Abdullah who kept firing at them, forcing them back outside where the attackers fatally shot him, Police Chief Scott Wahl said.
Faith leaders identified the other victims as Nader Awad, 57, and mosque worker Mansoor Kaziha. Awad was at home across the street from the mosque when he heard gunfire and heroically 'ran toward it' to try and prevent the tragedy, according to a fundraiser set up for his family. Kaziha, who was known as Abu El Ezz, was described in a separate fundraiser as a devoted staff member at the Islamic center who worked at the facility's store ever since it had been established in 1989.
The teenage San Diego mosque gunmen appear to have left behind a shocking, hate-filled manifesto, which praised Adolf Hitler and a slew of mass murderers, before the attack, The California Post has learned.
Authorities are investigating whether 17-year-old Cain Clark and 19-year-old Caleb Vasquez wrote the nihilistic missive before killing three people and then each other, according to law enforcement sources. The document espouses a desire to spark a race war and bring about the end of civilization.
The 75-page document is laden with the same Nazi iconography that Clark was seen wearing during a horrifying livestream video of the attack, including the Black Sun, which is associated with Nazi SS head Heinrich Himmler, and Atomwaffen, which is tied to a violent neo-Nazi group.
The opinions therein are a nonsensical collection of anti-Trump, anti-liberal, antisemitic, homophobic and mysoginst bile — tied together only by the authors’ fury that they were not given more in life. Sources said investigators have a copy of the purported manifesto and believe it to be authentic.
Jennifer Du, who lives across the street from Clark’s $750,000 SoCal home, recalled seeing the 17-year-old a day before they opened fire inside the Islamic Center.
“It’s been unreal. I saw him literally the day before. He just stood there,” Du, 30, told The California Post.
“I didn’t know if he was watching me or something, but he just got food delivery and went back in.”
Clark’s next door neighbor in San Diego described his family as normal, noting that the teen practiced martial arts and recalled seeing him in a karate outfit.
“As far as we knew he was very nice. They were a nice family,” said the neighbor, Marne, 85, who declined to provide her last name.
A section, believed to have been written by Clark, describes his views as neither left- nor right-wing, and voiced seething disdain for both sides. He claimed to align ideologically with Hitler, and said he drew inspiration from for the horrific assault on the mosque from ideologically driven mass murderers including Ted Kaczynski, Timothy McVeigh and Norwegian terrorist Anders Breivik. Clark describes the 2019 New Zealand Christchurch mosque shooter as the blueprint for livestreaming the terror attack, which they hoped would be widely shared and serve to motivate others to carry out similar deadly strikes. He referred to the gunman as “Saint Terrant.”
The unhinged dispatch contains a scattershot of derogatory and racist views targeting a number of groups — including Muslims, Jews, and gay people, among others, describing himself as an “accelerationist” who hoped to instigate an “all-out race war” to bring about the collapse of society.
In Vasquez’s portion he lamented being short, which he said caused him great pain and humiliation.
Clark also chillingly stated that he felt no remorse for his actions and wrote that, had he survived, he would have allowed his lawyers to handle everything afterward. He also denied carrying out the attack for fame, admitting he personally hated the victims and other cultures, and said he did not intend to survive the shooting.
Online profiles linked to Clark featured multiple Nazi slogans, and images of Hitler and German soldiers in formation during World War II.
After the shooting, the livestream appeared to show Clark shoot Vazquez twice in the head before taking his own life.
Posted by: Uninens Thromonter9996 ||
05/20/2026 00:00 ||
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[1875 views]
Top|| File under: Nut Jobs
#1
“Curiouser and curiouser!” said Alice - usually neo Nazis and Muslims are allies.
#2
Well, the real Nazis were racists believing in the superiority of the Aryan race. Duh. The Socialist here have similar positions as they believe certain racial groups are totally incapable of obtaining IDs or achieving academic standards.
https://t.co/VkZ7CWkr8z here it is, all 75 pages. He’s a Jew-hating, gay-hating, Muslim-hating, Trump-hating incel who admired Hitler and the Santa Barbara killer Elliott Rodgers, “king of the incels.”
Based on this manifesto, it seems entirely possible the San Diego shooters intended to target a Jewish synagogue and ended up at a mosque because they’re idiots. https://t.co/KbBNcT7UdZ
— Trinity Votes 🇮🇱🇺🇦 (@TrinityMustache) May 20, 2026
#7
What kind of psych meds were they taking? Who helped them write their manifesto? Who was whispering in their ears? Why didn't the mother secure those weapons? I guess the media are too busy telling us what a hero the security guard was to ask questions like that.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
05/20/2026 14:42 Comments ||
Top||
[IsraelTimes] Document obtained by ToI acknowledges ‘gap’ between the $17B pledged to reconstruct Strip and actual donations; Smotrich nixes US request to transfer withheld PA funds to US-led body
The Board of Peace is warning that efforts to rebuild the war-ravaged 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... Strip are in jeopardy if countries do not follow through on their financial pledges to the US-led body tasked with overseeing the postwar management of the enclave.
Over half a dozen countries announced major donations to the Board of Peace during a February fundraising conference in Washington. The United Arab Emirates, Qatar ...an emirate on the east coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It sits on some really productive gas and oil deposits, which produces the highest per capita income in the world. They piss it all away on religion, financing the Moslem Brotherhood and several al-Qaeda affiliates. Home of nutbag holy manYusuf al-Qaradawi... , Saudi Arabia ...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start... and Kuwait each pledged at least $1 billion, with US President Donald Trump ...So far he's been unkillable, and they've tried.... announcing Washington would tack on another $10 billion.
But as of this week, just around one percent of the $17 billion that the US said was pledged to the Board of Peace has actually been transferred, according to two officials familiar with the matter.
After denying money problems last month, the Board of Peace acknowledged them in a May 15 report it submitted to the UN Security Council, which was obtained by The Times of Israel.
"The Board of Peace underscores that the gap between commitment and disbursement must be closed with urgency. Funds committed but not yet disbursed represent the difference between a framework that exists on paper and one that delivers on the ground for the people of Gaza," the report states. Parts of the letter were first published by Rooters.
The fundraising call in the letter also includes a separate Gaza relief initiative headed by the UN, which "estimates total recovery and reconstruction needs in Gaza at $71.4 billion over the next decade."
To try and close the fundraising gap, the US asked Israel to allow a portion of the $5 billion in Paleostinian tax revenues that Jerusalem is withholding from the Paleostinian Authority to be transferred instead to the Board of Peace.
A Paleostinian official told The Times of Israel that the PA offered to donate to the Board of Peace, but is conditioning its contribution on Israel releasing the clearance revenues, which Jerusalem is supposed to collect on Ramallah’s behalf and transfer to the PA each month. Smotrich has refused to sign off on the transfers so for over a year, a violation of the Oslo Accords that has risked collapsing the PA entirely as the tax funds make up the majority of its budget.
The Paleostinian official said Ramallah is hoping the US could coax Israel to release a significant portion of the withheld funds that would then be handed over to the Board of Peace, while an identical portion would be transferred to the PA.
The US raised the idea with Israel, but Smotrich — who has advocated for the PA’s collapse — rejected it, arguing that it could allow Ramallah to gain a foothold in Gaza, his office told The Times of Israel, confirming a report on the Ynet news site.
The UAE is one of the very few countries to transfer at least a portion of the funds it pledged, recently sending the Board of Peace $100 million to cover much of the cost of training a new Gaza police force, a US official and a Middle Eastern diplomat told The Times of Israel last week.
While tens of thousands of Paleostinians applied join the force, and the Board of Peace has made progress vetting candidates, they have yet to depart Egypt for training, in part owing to the lack of assurance from Israel that those who leave Gaza will be allowed to return, two Arab diplomats told The Times of Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office did not respond to a request for comment on the matter.
In addition to funding concerns, the Board of Peace report updated the Security Council on the progress it has made in implementing Trump’s 20-point plan for ending the Gaza war.
While Netanyahu publicly accepted the plan in September, the actual document that Israel and Hamas ..the well-beloved offspring of the Moslem Brotherhood,... signed to end the war a month later only pertained to Israel’s initial pull-back from parts of Gaza, a ceasefire, a hostage-prisoner swap and humanitarian aid provisions.
While the 20-point plan also includes provisions pertaining to the reconstruction of Gaza and Hamas’s disarmament, the Gaza terror group has yet to agree to that second phase, and talks between the Gaza ceasefire’s mediators — the US, Egypt, Qatar and The Sick Man of Europe Turkey ...the decaying remnant of the Ottoman Empire... — and Hamas have repeatedly stalled over the past four months.
"At this stage, the principal obstacle to full implementation (of the 20-point plan) remains Hamas’s refusal to accept verified decommissioning, relinquish coercive control, and permit a genuine civilian transition in Gaza," says the Board of Peace update to the Security Council.
Pushing back on calls to disarm, Hamas has argued that Israel should first be held to the terms While Netanyahu publicly accepted the plan in September, the actual document that Israel and Hamas signed to end the war a month later only pertained to Israel’s initial pull-back from parts of Gaza, a ceasefire, a hostage-prisoner swap and humanitarian aid provisions.
While the 20-point plan also includes provisions pertaining to the reconstruction of Gaza and Hamas’s disarmament, the Gaza terror group has yet to agree to that second phase, and talks between the Gaza ceasefire’s mediators — the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey — and Hamas have repeatedly stalled over the past four months.
"At this stage, the principal obstacle to full implementation (of the 20-point plan) remains Hamas’s refusal of the first phase, saying it has repeatedly violated clauses pertaining to strikes on its side of the armistice line, humanitarian aid benchmarks and the operation of the Rafah Crossing.
The Board of Peace report acknowledged those violations, but did not call out Israel by name as it did Hamas.
"Violations continue to occur on a near-daily basis, some of which are serious, and their human consequences — civilians killed, families living in fear, and continued impediments to humanitarian access — cannot be minimized. The Board of Peace and the guarantors have actively engaged all parties to reduce violations and ensure the protection of civilians," the letter to the Security Council states.
The Board of Peace’s top envoys revealed in a letter obtained by The Times of Israel earlier this month that they do not intend to hold Israel to the terms of the 20-point plan if Hamas does not accept the board’s framework for the Islamist group to disarm.
"Failure by Hamas to accept the framework within a reasonable timeframe, as determined by the Board of Peace and after consultation with the parties, shall render such commitments null and void," Board of Peace Gaza envoy Nickolay Mladenov and senior US official Aryeh Lightstone wrote in a letter to the head of the Paleostinian technocratic government that is meant to replace Hamas in Gaza.
The May 15 Board of Peace report was submitted to the Security Council ahead of Mladenov’s scheduled briefing to the body on Thursday, though with little progress to report, he may not end up traveling to UN headquarters in New York, a source familiar with the matter said.
.
If the jews owned Trump, this deal would be much more favorable to them: the actual document that Israel and Hamas signed to end the war a month later only pertained to Israel’s initial pull-back from parts of Gaza, a ceasefire, a hostage-prisoner swap and humanitarian aid provisions.
One of the outcomes of the 1948 war was that Jordan illegally took control of the Old City of Jerusalem, evicting all the Jewish residents and confiscating their properties without compensation, which they subsequently gave or sold to Arabs who now call themselves Palestinians. Israel has been working through the legalities of returning the properties to their original owners for three quarters of a century.
[IsraelTimes] The government has decided to establish an inter-ministerial team to assess the possibility of confiscating properties in a sensitive area of the Old City of Jerusalem, putting Arab residents at risk of eviction.
The team will gauge how to expropriate dozens of properties along Chain Gate Street, which in Hebrew is called HaShalshelet Street. The alley serves as the Jewish Quarter’s northern perimeter and ultimately leads to the Temple Mount/Al-Aqsa compound.
The government decision comes at the initiative of the Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage Ministry, currently headed by Likud lawmaker Yariv Levin. It is one of several resolutions pegged to Jerusalem Day, celebrated last week from Thursday to Friday evening.
The inter-ministerial team, which will be led by the director general of the Jerusalem Affairs and Heritage Ministry, has a year to submit an actionable plan to the government, Channel 12 reports.
The decision is meant to further the “development and strengthening of the Israeli capital” and “exercise control over the [Jewish] Quarter in its entirety,” Levin’s ministry says in a statement.
According to Channel 12, the step could lead to the confiscation of roughly 50 buildings and the eventual eviction of the Muslim families residing there to make way for Jewish tenants.
The report notes that the prospect of seizing properties on Chain Gate Street — a sensitive area due to its proximity to the Temple Mount — encountered resistance from officials in the Finance Ministry, who argued the move could spark international opposition.
Aviv Tatarsky, a researcher for Ir Amim, an NGO that advocates for Palestinian Jerusalemites, says that the prospective confiscation of property on the street would be “an aggressive step.”
“On one hand, nothing is going to happen at the present moment, but on the other hand, it attests that this is what the government wants,” he tells The Times of Israel. “It basically means that wherever the government wants, it can take and expropriate Palestinian property.”
A source in the Jerusalem Ministry tells Channel 12 that the territory belongs to the State of Israel “on paper” after Israel issued expropriation notices upon capturing the Old City in the Six-Day War. The notices were reportedly based on the British Mandate-era Land Ordinance of 1943, which regulates the expropriation of land for public purposes.
The street, in addition to leading to the Temple Mount, is home to several well-known Palestinian institutions including the Khalidi Library, founded as a public library under Ottoman rule in 1900, as well as several Muslim mausoleums. During the late Ottoman period, a mix of Jewish and Muslim families lived on the street.
[IsraelTimes] Hundreds of couples marry across Tehran; more than 100 arrive at capital’s Imam Hossein Square in military jeeps with mounted machine guns, are married on stage by cleric.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited by Kirill Semenov
[REGNUM] On May 18, Donald Trump publicly stated that Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the UAE had successfully dissuaded him from striking Iran. Behind these words lay a coordinated stance by the Gulf monarchies, acting as a unified persuasive force: their main argument was that coercive diplomacy could still soften Iran's negotiating positions, while direct military escalation would only freeze dialogue.
Regional sources are reporting renewed momentum for the deal. Intermediaries are actively working to take advantage of the narrowing window of opportunity and put mutual commitments on paper.
However, at this critical moment, Israel is trying to influence Washington by deliberately shaping the information field in a way that favors the concept of a “small war” – limited but intense forceful pressure designed to break diplomatic inertia.
ISRAEL: FROM DILEMMA TO PRESSURE
The dilemma for Israelis today is a fundamental shift in the balance of risks: the costs of further escalation are rapidly rising, while the chances of returning to full-scale conflict are shrinking.
The Israeli leadership faces a choice between pursuing a "decisive victory" and a policy of "conflict management." It is precisely the realization that the military campaign has failed to resolve the "Iranian issue" that is pushing the Israeli side to pressure the US to continue military operations.
Tehran, though weakened, has not been defeated; its ability to withstand unprecedented pressure has only strengthened the perception of its own strategic effectiveness. This poses an existential threat to Israel in the long term, as the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, the rapid restoration of its missile potential, the maintenance of the nuclear threshold, and the activity of the Islamic Republic's regional allies create an environment in which any diplomatic pause is perceived as a strategic defeat.
The factors shaping this position are rooted in the results of the spring 2026 campaign. Despite the damage inflicted, the operation demonstrated that the Islamic Republic not only endured but also transformed military challenges into strategic assets. Tehran successfully transformed control of the Strait of Hormuz into a lever of global influence, effectively establishing a toll regime that allows it to selectively influence international actors.
Within Iran, there are assessments that the importance of the Strait for its negotiating position outweighs the value of nuclear weapons, and the events of the spring of 2026 confirmed this. Moreover, despite the strikes, Tehran retained residual nuclear potential: stockpiles of uranium enriched to 60%, scientific personnel, and infrastructure capable of rapidly achieving a breakthrough to military use. The Islamic Republic views the nuclear issue not as a bargaining chip, but as a guarantee of sovereignty.
The ballistic missile arsenal, which proved its effectiveness during the campaign, is rapidly being restored. Iran has not only resumed production but also implemented the lessons learned: decentralized command and control, protecting launchers in tunnels, and using cluster munitions to overload air defenses. Israeli military experts have been forced to admit that Tehran is capable of quickly rebuilding an arsenal of several thousand missiles.
Tehran's regional network of allies also demonstrated a new level of coordination: the entry of Hezbollah, the Houthis, and Iraqi militias into the conflict after February 2026 demonstrated Iran's ability to mobilize the entire "Axis of Resistance" at a critical moment, although it was previously considered defeated and dismantled.
This demonstrates the presence of strategic depth, limiting the freedom of action of its opponents. Domestic political dynamics also serve to consolidate the ruling regime in Iran.
The protests of late 2025 and early 2026 did not escalate into a systemic crisis. The external threat united society, igniting patriotic sentiments even among government critics. The damage, amounting to hundreds of billions of dollars, is significant, but the potential lifting of sanctions and the unfreezing of assets could jump-start post-war recovery.
In turn, the transition to the formal leadership of Mojtaba Khamenei, coupled with the de facto strengthening of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), opens up opportunities for a more assertive and consistent foreign policy. The IRGC's dominance in decision-making reduces the risk of internal discord and ensures the continuity of the containment strategy.
At the global level, partnerships with Russia and China, despite their caution, guarantee Tehran access to technology, intelligence, and military-industrial components. The transfer of rocket fuel components, air defense systems, and advanced drone components creates an alternative security architecture independent of the West. It is precisely these factors combined that compel Israel to maintain pressure, fearing that any diplomatic pause will allow Iran to permanently consolidate these advantages.
FRAGMENTATION OF THE GULF
In this situation, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) plays a special, yet controversial, role. Abu Dhabi advocates continuing the war, but its limited strikes are not effective in dismantling Iran's military potential and merely provoke massive retaliatory attacks on the Emirates, which remain vulnerable. Therefore, the UAE also called on Trump to abandon the limited strike.
At the same time, Qatar and Saudi Arabia have consistently opposed escalation. The UAE's attempt to persuade its neighbors to launch joint military action against Tehran failed. Immediately after the February attacks, Emirati President Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan held a series of talks with Gulf leaders, calling for a coordinated attack, but the proposal was rejected.
As a result, the war did not unite the monarchies, but rather increased tensions between Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.
Both countries retaliated, but acted independently: Saudi Arabia's strikes were targeted and quickly gave way to support for diplomatic mediation efforts, while the UAE chose a confrontational course, striking an oil refinery on the Iranian island of Lavan in early April. The attack caused a major fire and disabled equipment for months, marking an escalation precisely at a time when Washington was advocating for a ceasefire.
The UAE's vulnerability proved greater: unlike Saudi Arabia, which has an oil export pipeline through the Red Sea, the Emirates is critically dependent on the stability of the Strait of Hormuz, although it can export some oil through Fujairah. The conflict also undermined the UAE's status as a tourism and financial hub.
Therefore, Abu Dhabi actively lobbied for the continuation of the war and submitted a failed proposal to the UN authorizing the use of force if Iran seized control of the strait. Criticism of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) for its "weak" response and dissatisfaction with its neighbors culminated in the UAE's withdrawal from OPEC in May.
Amid growing isolation, the Emirates have stepped up cooperation with Israel, which has sent them air defense batteries and support personnel, a move described as a manifestation of a "special relationship." Abu Dhabi, however, is cautious about publicly displaying this closeness, officially denying reports of a secret visit by the Israeli prime minister to the UAE during the fighting, although Benjamin Netanyahu's office confirmed the fact.
Thus, the war with Iran exposed the growing strategic gap between Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The conflict drew the Arab monarchies into a deeper, largely hidden, role in the regional standoff.
In addition to the attack on Lavan, the UAE reportedly carried out other covert strikes against Iranian targets, some of which were coordinated with Israel. This included sharing intelligence, coordinating intercepts, and working together on target selection.
Furthermore, according to British Middle East expert Andreas Krieg, several high-ranking sources from various GCC countries have reported that there is compelling evidence that the attacks on Saudi Arabia were carried out from UAE territory using drones similar to the Shahed. Their theory is that these were Israeli "false flag" attacks.
The deployment of Israeli air defense systems and operators in the Emirates signals a shift in relations from political normalization to operational military coordination and a military alliance. Specifically, the UAE and Israel have already established a fund for joint arms procurement.
The emerging partnership puts the Emirates at odds not only with Iran but also with GCC members.
For Tehran, this reinforced the UAE's image as an element of the US-Israeli security architecture and an aggressor. Iran's counterstrategy was aimed not only at military retaliation: by attacking airports, ports, and energy facilities, the Islamic Republic sought to undermine trust in the Emirati economic model. Digital infrastructure also became a battlefield: the Iranian side accused local cloud platforms of supporting Western operations.
Therefore, a "small war" is unacceptable to Abu Dhabi, as it would unleash swarms of drones and missiles on the country, causing further damage, while still leaving the Iranian threat unmitigated. Therefore, the Emirates' position is not anti-war, but, on the contrary, demands the complete destruction of Iran's military potential, which can only be achieved through a full-scale, months-long campaign.
Saudi Arabia is acting with much more restraint, maintaining diplomatic channels with Tehran and seeking de-escalation. These differences also reflect deeper divisions within the GCC regarding Israel: Abu Dhabi is moving closer to it in the face of the Persian threat, while Riyadh views it as a destabilizing force far more dangerous than the Iranians.
The Gulf states' positions are at opposite ends of the spectrum, with Oman on one side and the UAE on the other, making it extremely difficult to develop a unified position. The war hasn't created a united front; rather, it has reinforced the fragmentation of approaches to security. The Emirates has demonstrated a willingness to be a selective but active participant in regional operations through intelligence, air defense coordination, and covert strikes, while other monarchies are emphasizing diplomacy and restraint.
STRATEGIC EXIT
The American-Israeli campaign has left the Persian Gulf states in a bind: American forces stationed on their soil have become the primary source of Iranian attacks on civilian and energy infrastructure. Despite significant losses, Tehran retains the ability to retaliate and control key sea lanes.
Washington, regardless of the chosen scenario, will be guided by its own strategic interests, not those of the monarchies. Therefore, the GCC is increasingly inclined to believe that the only rational solution is to abandon the view of security as a commodity purchased from an external patron and begin building it independently through a direct agreement with Iran.
The Arab monarchies believe the settlement should take the form of a multilateral agreement, the cornerstone of which will be the phased withdrawal of American troops from key regional bases (including Al Udeid, the 5th Fleet headquarters, Al Dhafra, Ali al-Salem, Camp Arifjan, and the Prince Sultan base). The withdrawal should not appear as a forced retreat, but as a calculated step addressing the structural cause of instability. This will also allow the American administration to save face.
In exchange for what Tehran has sought for decades—the lifting of sanctions and a non-aggression pact—Iran must provide verifiable concessions: restoration of cooperation with the IAEA under stricter conditions than before, limitations on the range and payload of ballistic missiles, an end to support for proxy groups, and steps toward diplomatic normalization with its neighbors. Sanctions relief and the pace of US troop withdrawal must be directly linked to the phased fulfillment of obligations, creating a mechanism of mutual deterrence.
As analysts in the GCC countries note, historical experience confirms the unreliability of external guarantors. From colonial agreements in the early 20th century to the ignoring of attacks on energy infrastructure in recent years, external powers have repeatedly abandoned regional partners at critical moments.
Relying on patronage, monarchies have for decades invested in “signal” military capabilities optimized for demonstrating partnership rather than for real defense: a lack of indigenous mine countermeasures, dependence on foreign air defense operators, and fragmented coordination remain systemic problems.
At the same time, individual operations demonstrate that regional armed forces are capable of solving complex problems without the need for an external contractor. In particular, Arab THAAD and Patriot air defense crews performed just as well, and often even better, than Israeli ones. The problem was the lack of short-range precision air defense systems and anti-drone capabilities, while the vast majority of Iranian ballistic missiles were shot down.p
The key to success for the Gulf states is not their full integration into a military bloc, but the creation of functional coalitions in specific areas, including joint shipping protection, early warning data sharing, refinery defense exercises, interception of drone swarms, and mine clearance.
Western and Arab analysts also point out that Iran, despite its ideological motivations, has historically demonstrated strategic flexibility, engaging in periods of détente and abiding by agreements when they serve its interests. Therefore, the issue is not trusting Tehran, but creating incentives that make agreement compliance a rational choice.
The proposed architecture—massive sanctions relief plus the removal of the existential threat of foreign military presence—offers the Islamic Republic what decades of confrontation have denied it: economic recovery and recognition of its status without loss of face.
For Washington, this scenario means a dignified exit, a reduced fiscal burden, and a response to domestic demand for an end to protracted conflicts. For the Gulf monarchies, it means a transition from the role of passive beneficiaries to actors in the regional security architecture.
The United States will ultimately leave the region—regardless of the preferences of local elites. The only question is whether these elites will determine the terms of their exit themselves or become hostage to others' strategic calculations.
Posted by: badanov ||
05/20/2026 00:00 ||
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[1796 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Iran
[EtanaSyria] Despite continued setbacks and signs of local resistance, the last month saw tangible steps towards incorporating Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) units into the Syrian army. One of the most concrete areas of progress has been the near-final resolution of the detainee file in the north-east: multiple large-scale prisoner exchanges took place throughout April, combined with the transfer of detention facilities and joint administration of key prisons. Despite tangible signs of progress, overt resistance to the integration roadmap has grown louder within some rejectionist factions of the SDF, overwhelmingly centered in Hasakeh province. The widening gap between developments on the ground and political acceptance of these changes raises the risk of serious political rifts within the SDF or even conflict between the interim government and Kurdish splinter groups, although any future conflagration is likely to be limited and highly local.
DAMASCUS-SDF SECURITY INTEGRATION
A significant milestone has been reached in recent weeks with the formal incorporation of Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) units into Syrian military structures, overcoming months of tense and longstanding resistance from factions on both sides. So far, the roadmap has yielded the establishment of integrated brigades under the 60th and 72nd Divisions, with reports that at least four brigades have been merged into the Syrian army. Additionally, joint trainings of brigades in Damacus and the initiation of salary payments through the interim Ministry of Defense underscore this shift from conceptual integration to concrete progress. While new thresholds have clearly been crossed, the process is now transitioning into a more complex phase of restructuring and resolving stickier finer details.
Progress on the detainee file remains one of the most hopeful areas of the integration roadmap, with multiple large-scale prisoner exchanges conducted in April that culminated in the near-complete transfer of SDF detention facilities to the interim Ministry of Interior by late April. Joint or transitional administration of key facilities—including the Ghuweiran and Alaya prisons—alongside high-level inspections by interim judicial authorities, reflects progress towards standardizing detention systems in Syria under state control and demonstrating cooperation with partner-states on counter-terrorism. Despite vaguely contradictory statements by Hasakeh governor Noureddine Ahmad last month, in which he described plans for a partially integrated, hybrid prison management model, more recent developments suggest convergence toward a unified model, marking the closure of a major security integration file.
In addition to progress at the level of military structural reform, a series of coordinated handovers has also significantly expanded the interim government’s operational presence across north-east Syria. Parallel developments—such as the SDF’s dismantling of barriers around former government buildings in Hasakeh and agreements to transfer judicial and administrative facilities—indicate a broad-based effort to reestablish physical state authority across both military and civilian domains.
Despite measurable progress in formal integration, recurring disputes over state symbolism—particularly the raising and removal of Syrian state flags in Hasakeh and Qamishli—illustrate enduring resistance at the local level among activists and large swathes of the public. These incidents, often followed by partial reversals through Asayish intervention, highlight the palpable mistrust and sensitivity around questions of sovereignty and Kurdish identity. Additionally, reports of ongoing drone interceptions, cross-border fire incidents involving Turkish forces and aerial attacks originating from Iraqi territory are some of the external pressures shaping the environment within which negotiations are taking place. Simultaneously, longstanding security risks from the conflict, including landmines and unexploded ordinances, continue to menace large swathes of the north-east, resulting in regular casualties among civilians and troops alike.
More at the link
Posted by: badanov ||
05/20/2026 00:00 ||
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[1788 views]
Top|| File under: Govt of Syria/HTS
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.
..not a terrorist organization, even though it kidnaps people, holds hostages, and tries to negotiate by executing them,...
...The Lebs have the curious habit of periodically murdering their heads of state or prime ministers...
...a kingdom taking up the bulk of the Arabian peninsula, largely made up of sand and oil rigs. Its primary economic activity involves exporting oil and soaking Islamic rubes on the annual haj pilgrimage. The country supports a large number of princes in whatcha might call princely splendor. Formerly dictatorial and steeped in Olde Tyme Religion, deferring to Salafist holy men on all issues, it has now done a 180 and is making a serious effort to modernize, so as not to be left in the sand by its Gulf Arab neighbors. The holy men have been shoved to the background and the nation is now still dictatorial but somewhat rational. That doesn't make them trustworthy, but it's a start...
