Russia uses white phosphorus in Idlib, say activists

NOW reports: Russia has bombed the outskirts of small village in the Idlib province with highly toxic white phosphorus incendiaries that cause severe burns, according to Syrian activists.

On Thursday night, videos emerged on social media showing the extremely flammable munition—which has been controversially used by Israel in Gaza and the US in Iraq—igniting in mid-air as it fell over the Baynayn area 25 kilometers south of the provincial capital of Idlib.

“The Baynayn area was [targeted] yesterday with phosphorous bombs, after several overflights by Russian warplanes,” media activist Khaled Nour told All4Syria in an article published Friday morning. [Continue reading…]

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U.S. steps up its attacks on ISIS-controlled oil fields in Syria

The New York Times reports: The United States and its allies have sharply increased their airstrikes against the sprawling oil fields that the Islamic State controls in eastern Syria in an effort to disrupt one of the terrorist group’s main sources of revenue, American officials said this week.

For months, the United States has been frustrated by the Islamic State’s ability to keep producing and exporting oil — what Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter recently called “a critical pillar of the financial infrastructure” of the group — which generates about $40 million a month, or nearly $500 million a year, according to Treasury Department estimates.

While the American-led air campaign has conducted periodic airstrikes against oil refineries and other production facilities in eastern Syria that the group controls, the organization’s engineers have been able to quickly repair damage, and keep the oil flowing, American officials said. The Obama administration has also balked at attacking the Islamic State’s fleet of tanker trucks — its main distribution network — fearing civilian casualties.

But now the administration has decided to increase the attacks and focus on inflicting damage that takes longer to fix or requires specially ordered parts, American officials said.

The first evidence of the new strategy came on Oct. 21, when B-1 bombers and other allied warplanes hit 26 targets in the Omar oil field, one of the two largest oil-production sites in all of Syria. American military analysts estimate the Omar field generates $1.7 million to $5.1 million per month for the Islamic State. French warplanes struck another oil field nearby earlier this week.

The goal of the operation over the next several weeks is to cripple eight major oil fields, about two-thirds of the refineries and other oil-production sites controlled by the Islamic State, also called ISIS or ISIL. [Continue reading…]

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The life of ‘Jihadi John’: How one man became the symbol of ISIS

By Scott Lucas, University of Birmingham

Dubbed “Jihadi John” by the British media after video footage of his murderous exploits was seen around the world, Mohammed Emwazi became a symbol of a complex conflict – a shorthand for the evil threatening the West as well as those in Syria and Iraq.

On Friday the Pentagon announced that US warplanes carried out an operation in northern Syria targeting the British Islamic State fighter. In London, the UK government said there was a “high degree of certainty” that Emwazi was killed. If confirmed, Emwazi’s death marks the end to a 15-month story of a man who became the face of the barbaric cruelty of IS after his part in the beheading of eight hostages.

Emwazi first became headline news in August 2014, when IS released its first video of a foreign hostage being beheaded – the American journalist James Foley. Beside the kneeling victim stood his executioner, a man shrouded in black, holding a large sword. He addressed US officials in a British accent, stating:

As a government, you have been at the forefront of the aggression towards the Islamic State. You have plotted against us and have gone far out of your way to find reasons to interfere in our affairs. Today, your military air force is attacking us daily in Iraq, your strikes have caused casualties among Muslims.

Sequels quickly followed. American-Israeli journalist Steven Sotloff and British aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning were killed in a similar fashion.

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U.S. made huge effort to kill ‘Jihadi John’ but couldn’t make half that effort to save his victims, says James Foley’s mother

The Daily Beast reports: ISIS’s most famous executioner, Mohammed Emwazi — best known as “Jihadi John” — was targeted in a U.S. airstrike in Syria early Friday morning, according to a senior U.S. administration official.

Emwazi was suspected of carrying out dozens of executions for the so-called Islamic State, including the beheading of American journalist James Foley and other American hostages.

The results of the strike are still being assessed, so Emwazi’s death cannot yet be confirmed, the senior administration official told The Daily Beast.

“This isn’t about avenging deaths but removing a despicable individual who committed brutal murders under the false pretense of a bankrupt and hijacked ideology,” the official said.

A U.S. defense official told The Daily Beast that the U.S. military followed Emwazi for the better part of a day leading up to the strike, which happened as he left a building. While officials cannot officially say he is dead — and won’t be able to for some time — they are all but certain.

“We are pretty damn sure he is dead,” the defense official said. [Continue reading…]

ABC News reports: Diane Foley, mother of James Foley, told ABC News after hearing of Emwazi’s possible demise that it was “small solace” to the family.

“This huge effort to go after this deranged man filled with hate when they can’t make half that effort to save the hostages while those young Americans were still alive,” said Foley, who has been a vocal critic of American hostage policy. “It’s unfortunate that the government doesn’t get it. They think it gives us solace, but it doesn’t.”

The family of Steven Sotloff, who was also shown beheaded in one of Emwazi’s videos, was similarly somber about the news.

“This development doesn’t change anything for us; it’s too little too late,” the family said in a statement provided to ABC News. [Continue reading…]

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ISIS says it carried out Beirut suicide bombings that killed dozens

The Washington Post reports: Twin suicide bombings claimed by the Islamic State killed dozens of people and wounded more than 200 in Beirut on Thursday, raising fears of intensified attempts by the radical Sunni group to undermine Lebanon’s fragile stability.

In the worst attack to hit the Lebanese capital in years, assailants targeted a southern suburb where many loyalists of the powerful Shiite Hezbollah militia live. The explosions killed at least 43 people, officials said, and left little doubt that the attackers struck with the intent of stirring up Lebanon’s volatile sectarian divisions.

Hezbollah is fighting alongside Syrian government forces against the Sunni-led rebellion in Syria, drawing the ire of such militantly anti-Shiite groups as the Islamic State. Lebanon faced a string of similar bombings more than a year ago that also targeted the largely Shiite areas of Beirut. [Continue reading…]

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Turkey haunted by its ghosts

Roger Cohen writes: “We don’t want Turkey to become Syria or Diyarbakir to become Aleppo.”

Those were the words of Tahir Elci, the president of the Diyarbakir Bar Association when I spoke to him after the recent Turkish election here in this troubled city of strong Kurdish national sentiment. On the night of the vote tires smoldered and the tear-gas-heavy air stung. In the center of the old city, rubble and walls pockmarked with bullet holes attest to the violence as police confront restive Kurds.

Elci was detained last month for a day and a half after saying in a television interview that the Kurdistan Workers Party, or P.K.K., was not a “terrorist organization” but “an armed political organization which has large local support.” An indictment has been brought against him that seeks a prison sentence of more than seven years. The P.K.K. is designated a terrorist organization by Turkey, the European Union and the United States.

“For a few words about the P.K.K., in which I said some of its operations were terrorist but it was not itself a terrorist organization, there is a lynching campaign against me,” Elci told me. “Yet there is no strategy among the Turkish security forces against the Islamic State, no real mobilization. If ISIS were treated like the P.K.K., it would be very different.” [Continue reading…]

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Egypt ‘growing more unstable by the day’

Middle East Eye reports: After a series of crises over the past few weeks, Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi’s government has come under deep domestic and international criticism for repression and inadequacy.

As widespread flooding in Alexandria has brought pressure upon Sisi domestically, his government has drawn global condemnation for its repression of journalists, so soon after his visit to the UK.

At the same time, and only a few weeks after a group of eight Mexican tourists were killed in the Egyptian desert, a Russian plane crashed in Sharm el-Sheikh killing all 224 passengers on board. The incident, suspected to be the result of a terrorist act, has raised questions about Egypt’s ability to maintain domestic security and provide the West a dependable regional partner.

This series of calamities has led to speculation among observers about whether President Sisi’s time in power may be slowly coming to an end.

Political analysts and observers have commented on the increasing instability in the country, saying that the crises highlight the government’s inability to deal with a wave of issues.

“Egypt, which was already unstable, is growing more unstable by the day,” said Shadi Hamid, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. “This isn’t surprising.”

“It’s one crisis after another and the Sisi regime has only one response: maximise state power, deny responsibility, and force the media to stay quiet.” [Continue reading…]

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Rouhani says U.S. needs to apologize to the Iranian people before diplomatic relations can be restored

EA Worldview reports: Amid in-fighting among Iran’s regime over US-supported “sedition”, President Rouhani has called on Washington to apologize again to Tehran for past actions.

In an interview with the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera in Tehran, Rouhani said that the apology was necessary if the US wants to restore diplomatic relations with Iran:

One day these embassies will re-open but what counts is behavior and the Americans hold the key to this.

If they modify their policies, correct errors committed in these 37 years and apologize to the Iranian people, the situation will change and good things can happen.

In 2000, discussing grievances on both sides, Secretary of State Madeline Albright acknowledged the US “significant role” in the 1953 overthrow of Iran’s elected government and the American support of the Shah as he “brutally repressed political dissent”. She continued:

As President Clinton has said, the United States must bear its fair share of responsibility for the problems that have arisen in U.S.-Iranian relations. Even in more recent years, aspects of U.S. policy towards Iraq, during its conflict with Iran appear now to have been regrettably shortsighted, especially in light of our subsequent experiences with Saddam Hussein.

The President said the July 14 nuclear deal between Iran and the 5+1 Powers was a good starting point, but cautioned that the US must adhere to the terms: [Continue reading…]

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U.S. State Dept: EU product labeling is not a boycott of Israel

The Jerusalem Post reports: The European Union’s guidelines on consumer labels for Israeli products produced over the pre-1967 lines is not tantamount to a boycott of Israel, Edgar Vasquez, a State Department spokesman, told The Jerusalem Post.

“We do not believe that labeling the origin of products is equivalent to a boycott. And as you know, we do not consider settlements to be part of Israel. We do not view labeling the origin of products being from the settlements as a boycott of Israel,” Vasquez said.

The EU has also insisted that the measure is not a boycott of Israel and that their concern is the consumer’s right to know as well as compliance with EU legislation. [Continue reading…]

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Report: Fossil fuel industry benefits from $20 billion in subsidies in the U.S.

Desmog reports: A new joint investigative report by Oil Change International and the Overseas Development Institute reveals that, in the United States alone, the fossil fuel industry has benefited from over $20 billion per year in government subsidies between 2008-2015.

The percentage of subsidies has skyrocketed during the two terms of the Obama Administration, growing by 35 percent since President Barack Obama took office in 2009. The findings are part of a broader report on subsidies given to G20 countries ahead of the forthcoming G20 Leaders Summit in Antalya, Turkey, set to take place November 15-16.

“Since the initial G20 commitment in Pittsburgh six years ago, US subsidies have increased dramatically in [the Obama] Administration, in line with the increase in US oil and gas production,” said Steve Kretzmann, executive director of Oil Change International. “The President can and must do more to eliminate subsidies at home and to keep carbon in the ground in the time he has left.” [Continue reading…]

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How policing in the U.S. is relentlessly being militarized

GQ reports: Last month, the local press in New York confirmed what civil rights advocates had been saying for years: the NYPD has been driving around in unmarked vans chock full of X-ray equipment and scanning for… something.

It was a major story, mostly because not much is known about “Z Backscatter” vans other than that they cost somewhere between $729,000 and $825,000. Yet, there’s no way to know for sure what they’re capable of because the NYPD refuses to talk about them, even though the ACLU won a lawsuit that required the department to reveal records about the vans (including their potential health impacts on people who might be exposed to X-rays without knowing it). “The devices we have, the vehicles if you will, are all used lawfully and if the ACLU and others don’t think that’s the case, we’ll see them in court — where they’ll lose!” Commissioner Bill Bratton told the New York Post.

The X-ray vans bring up all kinds of concerns about privacy, health, and general ickiness — no one wants to walk around New York wondering whether some bored cop in a van is checking out your skivvies — but by today’s police tech standards, the vans are actually relatively low-tech and benign. Departments large and small are using a host of new gadgets — from laser light weapons that can induce vomiting to surveillance systems that can predict crimes before they happen.

And what’s scariest of all is the majority of these technologies are being funneled down from the U.S. Military, down into neighborhoods that are most definitely not war zones. “After 15 years of war, there’s a demand for all these companies to find new markets for all these technologies,” said Joel Pruce a professor of human rights at the University of Dayton who studies police technology. “So it trickles down from the military to police.” The revelations about the backscatter vans were just one more sign that the future of policing is here, and it’s terrifying. [Continue reading…]

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The new protest movements are paying a high price for their anti-institutional ethos

Ivan Krastev writes: Shortly after Louis Napoleon’s 1851 coup in Paris, five of the greatest political minds in Europe hustled to their writing desks to capture the meaning of the events.

The five were very different people. Karl Marx was a Communist. Pierre Joseph Proudhon an anarchist. Victor Hugo, the most popular French poet of his time, a romantic. And Alexis de Tocqueville and Walter Bagehot were liberals. Their interpretations of the coup were as different as their philosophies. But in the manner of the man who mistook his wife for a hat, they all mistook the end of Europe’s three-year revolutionary wave for its beginning.

Has the Western media made the same mistake in recent years? Are its interpretations of the global wave of popular protests — spontaneous, leaderless, nonviolent, which Thomas Friedman memorably described as the rise of the “square people” — similarly off-base? It seems so: Just take the stunning and unexpected victory of the governing Justice and Development Party, or A.K.P., in Turkey’s parliamentary elections last week. [Continue reading…]

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Sinai’s stubborn insurgency: Why Egypt can’t win

Omar Ashour writes: The story of the Sinai insurgency goes back to the Israeli withdrawal from the territory in 1982. Since then, Egypt has mostly treated the area as a threat rather than an opportunity; Sinaians are potential informants, potential terrorists, potential spies, and potential smugglers, rather than full Egyptian citizens. According to a cable published by WikiLeaks, a senior Egyptian police official in Sinai once told a visiting American official delegation that “the only good Bedouin in Sinai was the dead Bedouin.”

Cairo’s official policies were designed to control and disempower Sinaians. They included preventing Sinaians from owning land, subjecting them to invasive scrutiny, and limiting any developmental projects. Such policies were ramped up after the second Palestinian intifada in 2000. Back then, several Egyptian security bureaucracies — principally the State Security Investigations (SSI, now renamed the National Security Apparatus) and the General Intelligence Service — believed that northeast Sinai was sending direct logistic support to Palestinian militant groups in Gaza. Since then, repression and attempted co-optation of selected tribal leaders has ruled the day.

Things escalated further after the simultaneous bombings of Taba and Nuweiba, where Israeli tourists used to spend vacation, in October 2004. The SSI had almost no information about the terrorists responsible and therefore conducted a wide crackdown in northeast Sinai. With the help of the Central Security Forces (CSF), the SSI arrested around 3,000 and held women and children hostage until other suspects surrendered. “They electrocuted us in the genitals for hours before asking any questions,” one of the former detainees told me in 2012. “Then the torture continues during and after the interrogations. Many of the young men swore revenge.” [Continue reading…]

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ISIS is not competing in a war of ideas

J.M. Berger writes: “The United States is engaged in a war of ideas — and it’s losing.”

This refrain feels modern, but it has echoed through most of American history. The argument that the U.S. is losing a war of ideas or narratives to ISIS is only the latest iteration. As Scott Atran recently wrote at The Daily Beast, the various military campaigns against the Islamic State obscure “a central and potentially determining fact about the fight” — namely that it “is, fundamentally, a war of ideas that the West has virtually no idea how to wage, and that is a major reason anti-ISIS policies have been such abysmal failures.”

The myth that America’s narrative is losing to ISIS’s persists despite the fact that millions of people are fleeing ISIS territories, while mere thousands have traveled to join the group. It persists despite the fact that the Islamic State’s ideological sympathizers make up less than 1 percent of the world’s population, even using the most hysterically alarmist estimates, and the fact that active, voluntary participants in its caliphate project certainly make up less than a tenth of a percent.

In the United States, the notion of a “war of ideas” dates almost as far back as the Revolutionary War, according to Google Ngrams , which searches the text of English-language books that have been digitized. The phrase appeared during the Civil War, in the context of slavery, and returned during World War I. References soared as the United States entered World War II, and became a fixture of American political discourse during the Cold War. The Korean War was a war of ideas; so was Vietnam.

And in every era, the same alarm bell has sounded. [Continue reading…]

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Russia’s brazen lying about Syrian refugees

Scott Lucas writes: With the approach of a second round of international talks about Syria’s crisis, Russia has stepped up its deceptive propaganda in support of the Assad regime.

Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Meshkov brazenly lied on Wednesday with the declaration, “Since the beginning of Russian operations, according to UN structures, more than one million people have returned to their homes in Syria.”

Meshkov gave no support for his claim, which was featured by Russian State outlet Sputnik News.

The UN has reported that more Syrians have fled their homes because of Russian bombing and the Syrian military’s offensives that Moscow is supporting. On October 26, the number was put at more than 120,000 since the start of the month, including at least 80,000 from Idlib and Hama Province and at least 44,000 from southern Aleppo Province.

The UN later revised the southern Aleppo figure to more than 75,000. The Syrian opposition and activists say the number from Aleppo and other areas is far higher than the UN’s totals. [Continue reading…]

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A Russian dirty bomb? Or more dezinformatsiya?

The Daily Beast reports: A stray camera at a meeting of top Russian military leaders has allegedly captured a glimpse of the Kremlin’s possible plan for a bewildering and frightening new weapon — a radiation-scattering “dirty bomb.” One delivered by a drone submarine, which itself rides piggyback on another submarine.

The problem is: We have no way of knowing for sure if this is in fact an existing weapon or simply a media provocation designed to make us think that Russian President Vladimir Putin has got a dangerous new toy in his arsenal. If it’s real, then Russia is the first country we know about to come into possession of a weapon that, while not nearly as destructive as an atomic bomb, could spread lethal radiation over a wide area, rendering it uninhabitable. If the segment is a fake, it’s the latest in a long list of Kremlin media hoaxes.

“It’s true some secret data got into the shot, and it was subsequently deleted,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Wednesday about the mysterious footage. “We hope that this won’t repeat.”

The technical aspects of such a device aren’t all that complicated. A dirty bomb is simply any munition containing conventional explosives wrapped in radioactive material. It explodes like any normal munition, but the fragments it scatters are irradiated and thus more dangerous for far longer periods of time than the debris from any standard bomb.

Compared to nuclear weapons, dirty bombs are easy to make — and their use, while highly provocative, is less likely to spark global Armageddon. But they’re still nasty enough that, back in the 1970s, the United States and Russia came pretty close to banning them. [Continue reading…]

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