[IsraelTimes] Claims are at heart of insanity defense, as trial commences for attempted murder of 3 men who grew up and became friends as schoolmates in Ramallah before moving to US for college
Jason Eaton insisted he was acting on orders from the CIA and Mosssd ...sees all, knows all, gets 'em all in the end... when he shot three Paleostinian college students who were walking past his home a few days after Thanksgiving. He said the US and Israeli intelligence agencies transmitted the messages to him via FM radio and that God was commanding him to protect his Jewish neighbors. Well, at least it wasn't NPR
Eaton’s claims were at the heart of his insanity defense as he went on trial Monday on attempted murder charges in a case that shook Burlington, Vermont, and reverberated in the West Bank, where the three maimed men grew up and became friends as schoolmates in Ramallah before moving to the US for college.
The November 2023 shooting, weeks after the start of the Israel-Hamas ..a regional Iranian catspaw,... war, spawned calls for a hate crime investigation. But no hate crime charges were filed as questions persisted about whether anti-Paleostinian animus, an altered mental state or something else had compelled Eaton to open fire on Hisham Awartani, Tahseen Aliahmad and Kinnan Abdalhamid, who were all 20 at the time.
The men testified one after another as Eaton, now 51, watched stoically from the defense table in a Burlington courtroom. He has pleaded not guilty "Wudn't me." but doesn’t dispute that he was the shooter. If convicted, he faces up to life in prison. If found not guilty by reason of insanity, he could be ordered to undergo mental health treatment.
Defense lawyer Joshua O’Hara, previewing testimony from a defense psychiatrist, told jurors in an opening statement that Eaton was suffering from a delusional, psychotic disorder after losing his job at a credit union two weeks before the shooting.
While listening to a local NPR affiliate, Eaton believed he was hearing messages that he attributed to the CIA, O’Hara said. At first, the messages were encouraging and validating, the lawyer said, but subsequent messages turned dark, insisting that Eaton "has to go out and shoot somebody." Oh...well
Prosecutor Sally Adams told jurors that a state psychiatrist who is slated to testify concluded that Eaton did not have a mental disease or defect. Evidence will show he intended to kill the men, was not legally justified in shooting them, and does not meet the test of legal insanity, Adams said.
Authorities found three shotguns in Eaton’s apartment and a Ruger .380-caliber handgun that crime lab testing concluded was the gun used in the shooting, Adams said. Eaton had purchased the gun seven months earlier from a Vermont gun store.
"If the defense tries to focus on the story that Mr. Eaton tells about why he intended to kill these three young men, that story is only part of the whole picture," said Adams, the chief administrative deputy at the Chittenden County State’s Attorney’s Office.
Awartani, Aliahmad and Abdalhamid, all of whom are now 23, told jurors of their holiday weekend visit to Awartani’s grandmother’s house, a trip to a bowling alley to celebrate his twin cousins’ birthday, and the walk they took near the University of Vermont campus after dusk that ended in bloodshed.
Awartani, who was studying at Brown University in Rhode Island at the time, said they were smoking cigarettes and speaking a mix of English and Arabic. Two of them said they were wearing traditional Paleostinian scarves known as keffiyehs. Awartani said he first noticed Eaton standing on a porch as they approached the apartment house where he lived.
Within seconds, Awartani said, Eaton was off the porch and walking toward them. His face was expressionless and he didn’t say anything. As Eaton got to about five to 10 feet (1.5 to 3 meters) away, "he pulled out a handgun and started shooting at us," said Awartani, who was paralyzed from the waist down in the shooting and now uses a wheelchair.
Jacob Pyne, who lived in a different apartment in the same house as Eaton, testified that he heard four to six gunshots, followed by footsteps going up the stairs of the apartment house. He said he ran outside and heard two men speaking, one of whom was more vocal and yelling, "I’ve been shot, help me." He then brought the men blankets and called 911.
Abdalhamid, a student at Haverford College near Philadelphia, said he fled and hid behind another home after seeing Aliahmad fall to the ground. He said he only realized later when he sat down that he had also been maimed. Awartani was shot in the chest and the bullet ricocheted off his scapula, causing paraplegia in his spinal cord. Aliahmad, who was a student at Trinity College in Connecticut, was struck in the collarbone, and Abdalhamid was shot in the right buttock.
O’Hara, the supervising attorney at the Chittenden County Public Defender Office, told jurors that Eaton was confused by the messages he said he was receiving, and became convinced that the CIA and Mossad were enlisting him into "overwatch duty" to protect a Jewish family living across the street.
"These were delusions," O’Hara said. "He believed in the moment that he was doing something that was right. He had been commanded to do this. And that he did not have the ability to appreciate the wrongfulness of his conduct in the moment because he believed he’d been instructed to do this by a government agency or God."
[ToloNews] Officials at the Omari Temporary Camp in Torkham say that between 100 and 150 Afghan refugee families are currently returning to Afghanistan from Pakistan through the Torkham crossing each day.
According to camp officials, around four months ago, between 500 and 700 families were returning through Torkham daily. The number later dropped to between 300 and 400 families and has now declined further to between 100 and 150 families per day.
Mohammad Hashim Maiwandwal, an official at the Omari Temporary Camp in Torkham, says the level of pressure on Afghan refugees in Pakistan directly affects the number of returnees.
Maiwandwal said: “Around four months ago, between 500 and 700 refugee families were returning to Afghanistan through Torkham every day. The number later dropped to between 300 and 400 families, and now between 100 and 150 families return daily. Pakistan itself is the reason for the decline in the number of returnees. When the government increases pressure on Afghan refugees, the number of returnees rises, and when restrictions are eased, the number declines.”
Several recently returned refugees say they faced arrests, police raids and restrictions on employment in Pakistan, particularly in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.
Zabihullah, a recent returnee, said: “The situation for Afghan refugees in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has become very difficult these days. People are staying inside their homes for fear of being arrested by Pakistani police, and no one can go outside.”
Khushal, another returnee, voiced similar concerns: “Pakistani police conduct raids in markets, prevent people from doing business and working in shops, and even raid people’s homes.”
Saifullah said these difficulties eventually prompted him to return to Afghanistan with his family.
He said: “We faced many hardships in Pakistan. Police would raid homes and arrest people in markets, and they would not allow people to work. Eventually, we packed our belongings and returned to our homeland. Now we are very happy to be back in our country.”
However, returning to Afghanistan has not brought an end to the challenges facing these families. Some returnees are calling for shelter, employment and basic living facilities.
Bakhtiar, who recently returned from Pakistan, said: “We ask the Islamic Emirate to provide us with housing and permanent employment so that we can stand on our own feet. We do not have any land for a home, so land should be provided for us to live on.”
Officials at the Omari Temporary Camp in Torkham say various committees provide returnee families with basic services and necessary assistance before they are transferred to their respective provinces.
According to the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), nearly six million Afghans have returned to Afghanistan from Iran and Pakistan over the past three years.
Although families returning after years of displacement hope to start a new life in their homeland, the lack of shelter, permanent employment and economic stability remains among the major challenges facing many returnees.
[ToloNews] The spokesperson for the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan says that no foreign groups are operating in Afghanistan and that the country’s territory is not being used against any other country.
Taqqiya.
Zabihullah Mujahid told TOLOnews that reports about al-Qaeda’s presence in Afghanistan are propaganda against the current government, adding that there is no evidence of such groups being present in the country.
Zabihullah Mujahid, spokesperson for the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, said: "These claims and propaganda may come from certain biased circles and intelligence groups that seek to fuel tensions and create scenarios of regional insecurity. They may be behind such propaganda. The reality is that the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan does not allow this, and the facts on the ground show that there is no need for foreign groups to be present."
Recently, The Washington Post, citing U.S. and other Western intelligence officials as well as a United Nations ...an idea whose time has gone... body responsible for monitoring terrorist groups, reported that al-Qaeda has once again established training camps in Afghanistan, 25 years after the September 11 attacks.
The report claimed that the group has opened at least eight training centers in Afghanistan over the past three years.
Yousuf Amin Zazai, a military analyst, said: "In my view, this is an exaggeration by the United States for political purposes, aimed at portraying the situation as sensitive once again and creating a justification for its presence in the region, while in reality this is not the case."
Although the Islamic Emirate has repeatedly assured the international community that Afghanistan’s territory will not pose a threat to other countries, it appears that these assurances have not convinced some countries and organizations.
A quarter century after 9/11, al-Qaeda and other terror groups are regrouping in Afghanistan following the US withdrawal and the return of the Taliban to power in 2021, The Washington Post reported Saturday, citing US and Western security officials and a United Nations organization.
Al-Qaeda and its offshoots have established at least eight bases in Afghanistan over the past three years, while Islamic State, al-Qaeda’s main rival, has also opened training sites in Afghanistan in recent years, The Post said.
According to the report, the groups have successfully established a presence in at least 14 of the country’s 34 provinces.
A UN report cited by The Post said the Taliban has reintroduced “a permissive environment” that has allowed al-Qaeda “to consolidate, with the presence of safe houses and training camps across Afghanistan.”
Nonetheless, terror groups gaining a foothold in Afghanistan appear to focus more on regional conflict than worldwide jihad, and seem to be constrained by the Taliban’s reticence to invite new international intervention in the country, according to officials and counterterrorism experts cited by The Post.
Al-Qaeda’s Afghan training camps played a central role in the run-up to the September 11, 2001, attacks. According to the US 9/11 Commission, the idea of hijacking planes was introduced at an al-Qaeda complex in Tora Bora in 1996, while then-leader Osama Bin Laden later approved the 9/11 plot at a site near Kandahar.
A UN report cited by The Post said the Taliban has reintroduced “a permissive environment” that has allowed al-Qaeda “to consolidate, with the presence of safe houses and training camps across Afghanistan.”
Nonetheless, terror groups gaining a foothold in Afghanistan appear to focus more on regional conflict than worldwide jihad, and seem to be constrained by the Taliban’s reticence to invite new international intervention in the country, according to officials and counterterrorism experts cited by The Post.
According to the report, UN and other security officials recently investigated claims that al-Qaeda was seeking to re-establish itself at Tarnak Farms, a former bin Laden compound near Kandahar Airport, though a Washington Post review of satellite imagery found no visible signs of renewed activity.
Officials said the new camps teach weapons, explosives and guerrilla tactics alongside newer technologies such as encryption, artificial intelligence and drones. Colin Smith, who coordinates a UN team monitoring terror groups, estimated that core al-Qaeda has no more than around 100 militants in Afghanistan.
Smith told The Post that al-Qaeda has taken more of a “consulting service” role for other terror organizations, such as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), “giving them advice and training on things like covert operations and information security.”
A 2024 UN report cited by The Post said al-Qaeda operatives in Afghanistan were “conducting suicide bomber training for TTP.”
Meanwhile, Islamic State-Khorasan, an Islamic State offshoot for the Afghan region of Khorasan, has been using the country’s north as a “main hub” for training and planning operations, recruiting some 2,000 members, The Post reported, citing officials and UN reports.
Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State remain bitter rivals for dominance of the jihadist movement, officials said, but both now recruit primarily from Afghanistan and neighboring countries, unlike the thousands of foreign fighters al-Qaeda drew from Saudi Arabia and elsewhere in the Middle East in the 1990s.
Monitoring the new camps has been hindered by the loss of intelligence capabilities following the United States’ 2021 withdrawal from Afghanistan and the diversion of resources to Iran and other priorities, US and other security officials said. Still, the 2022 drone strike that killed al-Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri in Kabul demonstrated Washington’s enduring intelligence and strike capabilities.
Al-Qaeda is now led by Egyptian Saif al-Adel, a veteran of its Afghan training camps who is believed to be hiding in Iran, officials said.
Meanwhile, post-9/11 travel surveillance and other measures have made sending recruits to Afghan camps riskier, prompting al-Qaeda and the Islamic State to increasingly recruit online and encourage Western sympathizers to carry out “lone wolf” attacks at home.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited by Vadim Trukhachev
[Regnum] On September 13, Sweden held parliamentary elections, during which migration was a central issue. Two parliamentary parties were led by people from the Middle East.
However, the lion's share of political forces, to varying degrees, advocated for a stricter immigration and integration policy, and they won a clear majority of votes. The question is whether the Swedes have realized too late: their multiculturalism has gone too far.
Today, the situation for immigrants from the Middle East and Africa in Sweden is one of the most dire in Europe. The country's third-largest city, Malmö, where immigrants make up more than half the population, has become one of Europe's crime capitals. The Stockholm district of Rinkeby is more reminiscent of a combination of Syria and Somalia than Scandinavia, and the police rarely venture there.
We did say that No Go zones are a real thing.
According to official statistics, 28% of the kingdom's population originates from other countries. Approximately half of the immigrants came from countries such as Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Eritrea. Over 8% of Sweden's population is Muslim.
According to official statistics, 28% of the kingdom's population originates from other countries. About two-thirds have acquired citizenship.
About two-thirds of immigrants have acquired citizenship, so we are now talking about approximately one and a half million voters, of which up to half are immigrants from the Middle East and Africa, as well as their descendants.
Immigration issues over the past 20 years have led to a reshaping of the Swedish political landscape. The rise of support for the right-wing, anti-immigrant Sweden Democrats party best illustrates this process.
In 2006, she received 2% of the vote, four years later 6%, and formed her first faction in the Riksdag (parliament). In 2014, she received 12%, and in 2018, 18%. Finally, in 2022, she finished second with 21% of the vote and participated in the ruling coalition (though she did not join the government).
On the other hand, the "new Swedes" themselves have become actively involved in local politics. The Unity Party, which directly advocates for the interests of migrants, ran in these elections for the first time, although it is still far from clearing the 4% threshold. It is led by Lebanese Jamal El Hadj.
Members of parliament with immigrant roots sit in almost all parliamentary parties. The Left Party is led by Iranian Noushi Dadgostar, while the Liberal Party was led by Palestinian Simone Mohamsson, who changed her name to a Swedish-sounding one.
Naturally, under these circumstances, the topic of migration and integration became a central issue in the elections. All the country's leading parties expressed their opinions on the issue. And the range of opinions was quite significant.
The Green Party remains perhaps the most migrant-friendly political force. Its platform stated the following: "Democracy in Sweden is being challenged from many directions. When <…> racism and extremism grow, our open society is weakened. The government's deportation measures are creating divisions in society. Children and young people who grew up here, as well as adults who have established their lives here, must not be expelled." The party received 6.1% of the vote and 22 of the 349 seats in the Riksdag.
The Left Party can rightfully be considered a pro-immigrant force, with its platform stating: "The ruling coalition deliberately divides society into 'us' and 'them,' portraying immigrants as the cause of real social problems... But Sweden will not be safer if people living their lives here are deported... Our response is a humane policy that protects the right to asylum." This political force received 8.2% of the vote and will take 29 seats.
The left-liberal Center Party expressed a similarly pro-immigrant stance, ostensibly advocating for a "migration policy that combines humanity with order and discipline." However, it also demands "protecting the right to asylum and the right of children to be reunited with their parents" and "strengthening integration by focusing on the fastest possible employment." The party received 7.1% of the vote and will hold 25 seats in parliament.
But the largest opposition Social Democratic Party, once a pioneer of the open door policy and multiculturalism, has shifted significantly to the right. It intends to combat immigrant ghettos and more closely monitor language proficiency.
"There should be no socially disadvantaged areas in Sweden... Everyone who lives in Sweden should be able to speak Swedish – therefore, language policy will be tightened... Social workers who have direct contact with people are required to speak Swedish," the Social Democrats stated.
At the same time, they believe that there's no need to deport all immigrants. "Common sense must prevail, with a clearer distinction between a strict immigration regime and those who have already settled, worked, and made a decent living. Deportations of well-integrated children and young people with ties to the country must cease." The party took first place with 28.1% of the vote and 100 seats in the Riksdag. It will likely form the new government.
The liberal-conservative Moderate Coalition Party (UKP), led by current Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson, has a similar approach. It wants to "explore the introduction of an accelerated process for obtaining Swedish citizenship for individuals who have integrated particularly well into Swedish society, which would mean reducing the required period of residence for passport applications to less than eight years."
On the other hand, the UKP wants to deny or revoke citizenship for many categories of migrants who have committed violent crimes. "The party is running in the elections with a proposal to make it impossible for those convicted of violence in close relationships to obtain Swedish citizenship <…>, demanding that domestic violence always result in deportation." It took second place with 19.9% of the vote and 70 seats in the Riksdag. This will most likely lead to the loss of its status as the ruling party.
The Liberal Party, while believing that "there should be no place for hatred and prejudice in Sweden," takes a rather harsh stance on immigrant ghettos. "Sweden and the EU must implement a strict asylum policy... No to parallel communities! Today, Islamism, clan structures, and oppression based on a 'culture of honor' restrict people's freedom in many parts of Sweden. We will never accept this." It received 5.4% of the vote and 19 seats in the Riksdag.
The conservative Christian Democrats are even more determined. Their platform states: "When values that contradict the Swedish view of human rights begin to dominate certain neighborhoods, parallel communities emerge. A society striving for equality cannot tolerate the emergence of a 'burkacracy.'" The party unequivocally calls for a ban on the wearing of the burqa and niqab.
The Conservatives are not calling for the mass revocation of Swedish passports or the deportation of migrants, but they are proposing a number of measures, including "strengthening protections for those married against their will, banning 'honor culture,' and prohibiting governments and NGOs associated with extremists from funding religious communities, parishes, foundations, and associations." This approach, according to the vote results, was supported by 6.2% of voters and allowed them to fill 22 parliamentary seats.
The most radical party, as expected, was the Sweden Democrats. This party was the only one to make migration a key issue in its election campaign. It includes provisions not found in other political parties: "Naturalized Swedish citizens must lose their passports if they commit crimes... Mosques and places where Islamist values, anti-Semitism, or the romanticization of terror are preached must be demolished."
They set extremely strict requirements for applicants for a Swedish passport: "Asylum legislation must be at the minimum level permitted in the EU... To be eligible to remain here, a person must lead a decent life, provide for themselves, and also master the Swedish language and acquire a proper knowledge of Swedish society." This time, the party took third place, with 17.6% of the vote and 62 seats in the Riksdag.
Thus, it can be concluded that the Swedish political scene's attitude toward immigrants has worsened. Influenced by a wave of high-profile crimes linked to migrants and the success of the Sweden Democrats, other parties have also begun to discuss reforming immigration policy and combating Islamism. Today, most of them have recognized the existence of immigrant ghettos as a threat to Sweden's security and are insisting on stricter requirements for applicants for Swedish passports.
The Greens, the Left Party, and the Center Party, who oppose the tightening of immigration rules, received 22% between them. This suggests that, overall, multiculturalism has lost its former popularity in Swedish society.
However, compared to the elections four years ago, their overall result increased by almost 3%. Thanks to whom? The answer is obvious. Naturalized migrants have become a stable base for these parties. It's no coincidence that they received the highest percentage of votes in areas with large African and Middle Eastern populations.
The majority of Swedes currently favor the moderately restrictive approach proposed by the Social Democrats, the Liberals, and the Moderate Coalition Party. Between them, they received 53%. It's highly likely that the Social Democrats, now returning to power, will try to maintain this approach, but they will have to overcome resistance from their partners in the three pro-immigrant parties, which will likely join them in coalition.
The Sweden Democrats and, to a certain extent, the Christian Democrats can be considered clear hardliners. Together, these two parties garnered 24% of the vote.
But the fact is that decades of left-liberal politics have openly neglected the problem, and despite clear public demand to improve the situation with immigrants, the measures being taken may prove belated and insufficient.
[FoxNews] CodePink disruption offers a real-time glimpse of the ‘Trojan horse’ influence operations House hearing will examine
Last Tuesday, at the corner of Church Street and 16th Street NW, blocks from the White House, Christine Balling, a former advisor to U.S. Special Operations Command South, led a panel discussion on the national security threat that communist-run Cuba poses to the U.S.
Suddenly, a fresh-faced former college basketball star, Olivia DiNucci, stood up to steal the stage at the Institute of World Politics, yelling as she clutched a hand-painted banner: "SANCTIONS KILL IN CUBA."
"There is global solidarity with Gaza and Cuba and ICE here," DiNucci shouted breathlessly, as security officials grabbed her banner and pushed her out a side door as she kept yelling, "because the liberation of our people is rooted in our neighbors!"
In small print, the banner had DiNucci's organizational and ideological affiliation: "CODEPINK."
DiNucci is a D.C.-based political organizer with CodePink, a left-wing political agitation group, spending her days and evenings as a professional protester and a regular gadfly, disrupting dinners, hearings and conferences as a sidekick to CodePink co-founder Susan Medea Benjamin. Their group supports the Communist Party of Cuba and has led caravans to the island nation, as Treasury Department officials investigate whether they violated any laws barring Americans from doing business with the communist regime.
For Balling and her co-panelist, Michael Gonzalez, a senior fellow at the Heritage Foundation and a Cuban American firmly opposed to the communist government of Cuba, DiNucci's political theater wasn't the benign act of an "anti-war" group, as CodePink describes itself.
"CodePink – and other organizations like it – essentially act like Trojan horses. They burst in onto the scene, and they're meant to disrupt and destroy from within," Balling told Fox News Digital.
"They're really interested in dividing America and, in doing so, weakening it," she continued, "and increasing the friction between Americans by convincing some Americans that the American idea, the American dream, the freedoms we enjoy, all that sort of thing, that they are lies and they're not worth fighting for, and that our enemies are our victims."
The confrontation comes as House lawmakers convene a hearing on Tuesday, titled "Trojan Horses: Covert Foreign Malign Influence Operations in America," to examine a broad question: how do American activists, nonprofit organizations, media operations and social media influencers, like Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, advance the interests of adversarial nations, including China, Iran and Cuba, inside the United States?
Piker joined CodePink's delegation to Cuba earlier this year, posing for a photo in Havana with CodePink cofounder, Jodie Evans, both of them also drawing Treasury Department scrutiny.
"Adversarial nations like China, Russia, and Cuba conduct malign influence operations here in the United States by utilizing social media influencers such as Hasan Piker as proxies to promote communism and push their false propaganda," Rep. Bill Huizenga, R-Mich., chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on South and Central Asia, told Fox News Digital.
"My goal is to raise the curtain to expose these operations and stop them from undermining our national security, capitalism and the American Dream," Huizenga said.
The hearing will bring together several strands of alleged foreign influence that Fox News Digital has documented over the past year through investigations into money, political organizing, overseas travel, media operations and relationships between American activists and foreign entities and interests. Most of the groups fall into the "red-green alliance" of socialist and communist groups, symbolized by the color red, working closely with Islamist groups, such as the anti-Israel organization Students for Justice in Palestine, reflected by the color green, a symbol of Islam.
The largest financial network examined in Fox News Digital's reporting centers on Neville Roy Singham, an American-born tech tycoon who lives in Shanghai, late last year standing on a stage at the Golden Tulip Hotel during a conference on the "Global South," delivering a speech supporting the Chinese Communist Party, China's leader, Xi Jinping and China's "new world order."
A five-part Fox News Digital investigation published earlier this year examined 223 transactions totaling $591 million across five continents between 2017 and 2025, tracing the flow of money through multiple layers of organizations and into a transnational network estimated at approximately 2,000 organizations.
Huizenga and the hearing's witnesses say Congress must examine whether adversarial governments are influencing American political discourse through domestic messengers while keeping the foreign power itself at arm's length.
Fox News Digital's reporting followed the money to the six nonprofits:
Huizenga and the hearing's witnesses say Congress must examine whether adversarial governments are influencing American political discourse through domestic messengers while keeping the foreign power itself at arm's length.
Fox News Digital's reporting followed the money to the six nonprofits:
$167.5 million to People's Support Foundation Ltd., a nonprofit based in Chicago, with CodePink's Evans on the board, funneling money to overseas projects;
$68.7 million to Justice and Education Fund Inc., a New York City-based nonprofit that funnels grants to far-left causes domestically and overseas;
$22.44 million to the People's Forum, a hub for pro-communist organizing in New York City;
$16.76 million to Tricontinental Ltd., a Massachusetts-based think tank led by a friend of Singham's, Vijay Prashad, who led a session on the future of Marxism at Singham's wedding to Evans.
$1.33 million to CodePink, a California-based far-left, pro-Cuba, pro-China group that has supported the Islamic Republic of Iran and anti-Israel campaigns;
$1.098 million to BreakThrough BT Media, a New York-based propaganda arm of the network that runs BreakThrough News, a media outfit that is often the first to broadcast images and videos of anti-America protests.
[IsraelTimes] Iranian sources tell NYT Pezeshkian raged at IRGC chief, who denied authorizing July strikes; official probe traced them to powerful former Guards spymaster Hossein Taeb
A rogue group of Iranian hardliners sank the June truce deal between Washington and Tehran in July by attacking ships in the Strait of Hormuz behind the backs of the president, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and Supreme National Security Council, The New York Times
...which still proudly claims Walter Duranty's Pulitzer prize... reported Sunday, citing multiple unnamed Iranian and IRGC officials.
The attacks, which took place overnight July 6-7, damaged three commercial vessels, including a 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... i gas tanker, and triggered renewed US strikes and sanctions against 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... and tit-for-tat attacks, effectively ending the Memorandum of Understanding that the US and Iran had signed on June 17.
The rogue assault in Hormuz reportedly infuriated Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, who was in Iraq at the time as part of the weeklong funeral of Iran’s slain supreme leader, Ali Khamenei ...the very aged actual dictator of Iran, successor to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini...> Pezeshkian rushed back to Tehran and angrily called IRGC chief Ahmad Vahidi to demand answers, but Vahidi denied authorizing the attack or knowing about it ahead of time, sources told The Times.
Iran, which never confirmed striking the vessels, relayed to the US that rogue operators were behind the attack, according to US and Iranian officials cited by The Times.
The Iranian attacks led to one of the most turbulent episodes of political infighting within Iran’s leadership in recent memory, The Times said, citing bigwigs.
According to the Times, the hardliners’ success in derailing the interim deal with the US was partially due to the seclusion of Mojtaba Khamenei, who became supreme leader after his father Ali was killed in the opening strikes of the US-Israeli bombing campaign in Iran on February 28.
The younger Khamenei has not been seen in public since the opening strikes, which are thought to have left him badly maimed.
State media has circulated several written statements attributed to him, including criticism of the deal with the US, but The Times said some Iranian officials, including Pezeshkian himself, have expressed doubt about the veracity of those messages.
Pezeshkian demanded proof from generals who privately claimed Khamenei had approved the strikes that scuttled the deal with the US, The Times reported. It added that the president does not stand behind the official Iranian narrative, which blames the collapse of the June agreement on alleged US violations including the failure to rein in Israel in Leb ...The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else?... According to the newspaper, official Iranian investigations pinned the attack that led to the truce talks’ collapse on the holy man Hossein Taeb, an influential opponent of the deal who had helped get Mojtaba Khamenei elected supreme leader in March.
Taeb led the IRGC’s intelligence arm for nearly 15 years until Ali Khamenei removed him over failures including Israeli infiltration.
Mojtaba Khamenei recently appointed Taeb head of the Basij militia, responsible for quashing internal dissent. The appointment was seen as signaling authorities’ willingness to repeat January’s deadly crackdown on anti-regime protesters should demonstrations renew.
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.
...sees all, knows all, gets 'em all in the end...
...The Lebs maintain a precarious sectarian balance among Shiites, Sunnis, and about a dozen flavors of Christians, plus Armenians, Georgians, and who knows what else?...
