Japan protests to US over Okinawa woman’s death
Rina Shimabukuro
Press TV – May 19, 2016
Japan has submitted an official letter of protest to the US diplomatic mission in Tokyo over the brutal murder of an Okinawan woman, which is suspected to have been carried out by an American.
On Thursday, Japanese Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida summoned US Ambassador Caroline Kennedy to the Foreign Ministry and handed over the letter after the police arrested the 32-year-old suspect.
The body of Rina Shimabukuro, who had been missing since late April, was recently found in a weed-covered area in southern Okinawa. Police have found DNA matching the dead woman’s in a car belonging to Kenneth Franklin Shinzato, a former US Marine, who lives in southern Okinawa and works at the US Air Force’s Kadena Air Base in Okinawa, Japan’s southernmost prefecture.
The police, accordingly, suspect the man of having murdered the victim and disposed of her body.
“It is extremely regrettable that the very cruel and atrocious case occurred,” Kishida told Kennedy, according to Nippon Television Network.
Okinawa has become known as the site of enduring tensions with the US forces deployed there, and hence a lasting source of conflict between Washington and Tokyo. Pacifist inclinations as well as security and safety concerns have prompted the Japanese to protest against the deployment.
Multiple cases of misconduct by US forces have raised anti-American feelings among the islanders.
Back in 2013, two American sailors admitted to raping a woman in Okinawa a year earlier in a case that sparked huge anti-US sentiments in Japan.
In 1995, the gang rape of a 12-year-old Okinawan girl by US servicemen also sparked mass protests.
Israel delivers demolition notices for EU-funded water tanks in Hebron
Ma’an – May 18, 2016
HEBRON – Israeli authorities delivered four demolition notices on Wednesday ordering several Palestinians to remove water tanks being used for irrigation in the northern and eastern areas of the town of Beit Ummar in the southern occupied West Bank district of Hebron, locals said.
The water tanks are used to irrigate lands in the areas of Beir Zaata, al-Furdeis and Thaghret al-Shabak, with an overall area of more than 30 dunams (7.4 acres) dependent on the tanks for irrigation, according to Muhammad Awad, a spokesperson for a local popular committee.
The tanks were set up earlier in 2016 under a UN-funded water development program, Awad said.
After Israeli authorities deliver a demolition order, the owners of the properties have seven days to remove the structures. If not, Israeli forces demolish the structures at the financial expense of the owners of the property.
Awad told Ma’an that the tanks belonged to Wahdi Hamdi Zamel Abu Maria, Jamil Muhammad Amer Abu Maria, Ghassan Muhammad Abed al-Aziz Brighith, and Khalid Youssef Abed al-Majd Brighith.
It remains unclear what legal pretext Israeli authorities used to issue the demolition orders.
Israel has come under international condemnation over repeated demolitions of EU-funded structures, with some accusing the Israeli government of demolishing Palestinian structures in retaliation for the EU’s decision in November to enforce labeling laws that would indicate if a product was produced in one of Israel’s 196 illegal settlements.
Since the start of 2016, Israeli forces have demolished 586 Palestinian-owned structures, leaving 800 Palestinians homeless in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, according to OCHA.
According to the Israeli Committee Against Housing Demolitions, Israeli forces have demolished over 48,000 Palestinian homes and structures since the start of the occupation of the West Bank and East Jerusalem in 1967.
Lieberman accepts post as minister of military affairs: Sources
Press TV – May 19, 2016
Hardline Israeli politician Avigdor Lieberman has reportedly accepted an offer by embattled Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to be the minister of military affairs.
Israeli sources said Lieberman accepted the post after Netanyahu agreed to his demands during a Wednesday afternoon meeting that lasted less than an hour.
The decision came after Netanyahu summoned current minister of military affairs Moshe Ya’alon and reportedly upbraided him for supporting an analogy between Israel’s situation and Nazi Germany.
Lieberman, who heads the far-right Yisrael Beiteinu party and previously served twice as foreign minister, convened a press conference earlier in the day to talk about his demands.
Among his priorities was introducing the death penalty for the Palestinians who are accused of carrying out attacks against Israelis.
“If it is true that we are being offered the defense portfolio, pension reforms and the death penalty bill, that is a respectful offer, it is serious, there is what to talk about,” Lieberman said.
“The offers must be official and on the table, without mediators and with full transparency. The prime minister has my phone number,” he added.
Lieberman has on many occasions drawn headlines by questioning the loyalty of Arab minorities in the Israeli-occupied Palestinian lands to the Tel Aviv regime.
He has also called on the Israeli regime to treat Palestinian resistance movement Hamas the same way as the United States treated “the Japanese in World War II.”
The notorious politician has also openly supported a soldier charged with murder for shooting dead an injured Palestinian.
Netanyahu’s ruling coalition has a shaky majority of one in the 120-member Israeli Knesset, making his administration vulnerable to any falling-out among his political allies.
His offer to far-right Lieberman has been interpreted as an attempt to add Yisrael Beitenu party, which has six Knesset seats, to the ruling coalition.
Ya’alon has been at loggerheads with Netanyahu ever since he said senior military officers should “speak their mind,” in apparent defense of earlier comments by Deputy Chief of Staff Major General Yair Golan.
Golan had stirred an uproar earlier this month by saying he was concerned by some of the extremist voices within the Israeli reigme, likening it to Germany under Nazi rule.
Golan, then the commander of the West Bank military division, purportedly said, “It is unimaginable that in an effort to ensure our soldiers’ safety, we can destroy whole apartment buildings.”
“Killing women, children, uninvolved civilians. Unacceptable. The use of force in civilian areas must always be kept under control, and restricted to the minimum necessary,” he was heard saying.
He was apparently referring to the Israeli practice of demolishing the houses of Palestinians suspected of involvement in attacks against Israelis. The destruction of the houses just displaces the families, including women and children, who live there and who have no links to the alleged attacks.
Following Golan’s remarks, Netanyahu’s office issued a statement, saying he “remains firm in his conviction that the comparison that was made to Nazi Germany was inappropriate and damaged Israel in the international arena.”
Netanyahu summoned Ya’alon late on Sunday, reportedly to reprimand him for his remarks in defense of Golan.
Meanwhile, Israeli forces have reportedly adopted a “shoot-to-kill” policy during clashes with Palestinians.
More than 200 Palestinians have been killed since last October, during heightened tensions over Israel’s move to deny Palestinians entry into the al-Aqsa Mosque.
Dozens died by a single shot to the head or chest, a clear indication of the shoot-to-kill policy.
The official brutalities against Palestinians, including the demolitions, have also emboldened extremist Israeli settlers to conduct attacks of their own against Palestinian families. One arson attack by Israeli extremists against a Palestinian house in August 2015 led to the killing of the entire family living there, including an 18-month-old boy.
In another testimony to the Israeli policy of allowing killings, a court ruled on Tuesday to have the chief arsonist in the August 2015 attack released.
28 Palestinian young women arrested over Facebook
Ma’an – May 19, 2016
JERUSALEM – At least 28 Palestinian women have been detained by Israel since October over alleged “incitement” on social media, with six of them still in prison, the Palestinian Prisoners’ Center for Studies (PPCS) said in a statement released on Wednesday.
PPCS spokesman Riyad al-Ashqar said that most of the women had been released hours or days after they were first detained, but that eight had been held in administrative detention — internment without trial or charges.
Al-Ashqar identified the six women still held over alleged social media incitement as Suad Abed al-Karim Irzeiqat, 28, from the city of Hebron; Dunia Ali Musleh, 19, from the town of Bethlehem; Sanaa Nayif Abbad from the town of Dura; Hanin Abd al-Qader Amr, 39, from the city of Tulkarem; Majd Yousif Atwan, 23, from the village of al-Khader; and Samah Dweik, 25, from occupied East Jerusalem.
Dweik, a journalist working for Shabakat al-Quds (The Jerusalem Network), was detained on April 10 in her home in the occupied East Jerusalem neighborhood of Ras al-Amud after writing a Facebook status and sharing an image in support of Palestinians recently killed by Israeli forces.
Meanwhile, Atwan was sentenced by an Israeli court earlier this month to 45 days in prison and a 3,000 shekel ($794) fine over charges of incitement on her Facebook account.
In recent months, Israel has detained scores of Palestinians for social media activity, alleging that a wave of unrest that swept the occupied Palestinian territory last October was encouraged largely by “incitement.”
Palestinians have instead pointed chiefly to the frustration and despair brought on by Israel’s nearly 50-year military occupation of the Palestinian territory and the absence of a political horizon.
Al-Ashqar claimed that Israel was detaining Palestinian women under different pretexts to discourage and prevent them from taking part in resistance against the Israeli occupation, as well as to exert pressure on relatives also detained by Israeli forces.
More than 200 Palestinians and almost 30 Israelis have been killed since October, although the number of Palestinian and Israeli deaths saw a dramatic drop over the last two months, with Israeli leadership suggesting its severe security measures were responsible for the emerging trend.
However, the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research found in a poll last month that support for stabbing attacks had seen a decline in the West Bank in recent months — “due, it seems, to a rising perception in its inefficacy.”
According to prisoners’ organization Addameer, 7,000 Palestinians are detained in Israeli custody.
Obama’s ‘Killer’ Policies May Be Carried On by His Political Twin
By Martin Berger | New Eastern Outlook | 18.05.2016
Those American citizens that have put their trust in Barack Obama back when he was running for president must be infinitely disappointed while reading countless articles about Obama’s actual policies. These are not just failures, but incredibly deadly ones.
For instance, Forbes would note that from 1999 to 2014 the suicide rate in the United States went up by 24%, while among certain ethnic and demographic sub-groups the situation looks even more surreal. For instance, over the same time period, Native American women saw an increase in suicide of 89%. America’s current level of suicide is abnormally high and it’s a huge change from the not too distant past. And Russia has nothing to do with it, even though the rule of thumb in Washington today is to push blame on it for every single thing that goes wrong. President Barack has even stated that global crises such as Ebola, ISIS and Russian aggression have made the world spin so fast, nobody is able to control it.
The The New York Post would note:
Middle-aged people laid off and unable to find work are taking another way out They’re killing themselves.. Especially in economically depressed states. People in need of work are twice as likely to take their own lives as employed people, and people fired in their 40s and 50s find it hardest to get hired again. That makes boosting economic growth a life-or-death issue for many. But you would not know it listening to President Obama and Hillary Clinton. President Obama whitewashes reality, claiming the “American economy is pretty darn good right now. “False. The Obama economy is stalled.
In his article for The Washington Post American historian David Mereniss underlined that President Obama came to office with the goal of changing “the trajectory of America”. However, he failed to keep his promises. In the end, this will be Obama’s enduring domestic legacy.
Obama’s rise to power was facilitated by the promise he made to stop US wars, but has he fulfilled this promise? The Atlantic reminds us than when Barack Obama first entered the White House, with George W. Bush’s long wars in Afghanistan and Iraq ongoing, he stated that “he was not seeking new dragons to slay.” Instead he elected to scale back America’s commitments overseas and shift responsibilities to allies. But you could be forgiven for thinking the dragons have stubbornly remained, and even multiplied, on Obama’s watch.
During Obama’s time in office the US military would have allocated more money to war-related initiatives than it did under Bush: 866 billion dollars under Obama. Obama has unleashed 372 drone strikes against suspected terrorists in Pakistan, according to data gathered by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, 112 strikes in Yemen and 19 in Somalia. In fiscal year 2014, US special-operations forces were deployed to 133 countries, or roughly 70 percent of the entire world. The size of SOCOM has expanded by almost 25 percent since Obama took office.
In turn, Hillary Clinton is eager to urge the US to carry on its militaristic policies, so it’s no wonder that Obama has recently made a joke at his final correspondents’ dinner that he can see Hillary Clinton in his seat.
In Obama’s term, the US national debt increased by 8.3 trillion dollars, according to a new report released by the US Treasury. The debt of the federal government increased by 8,314,529,850,339.07 dollars in President Barack Obama’s first seven years in office, according to official data published by the US Treasury. That 13,213,630,160,947.51 dollars increase in the debt during the Bush-Obama years equals 112,219.57 dollars for each of the 117,748,000 households that were in the country as of September. When Obama completed his seventh year in office, the federal debt was 18,941,406,899,252.15 dollars.
It’s therefore not surprising that The Huffington Post would note a bitter split within American society. It would note:
Republicans and Democrats may as well have been living in different countries for the past eight years. When President Barack Obama delivered his final State of the Union address, he was speaking to two very different countries. One of them he leaves happier and better off than it was when he started his tenure in the White House nearly eight years ago, with an improving economy and a dominant international position. The other is, by almost every measure, worse.
A majority of Democrats in a new HuffPost poll say that since Obama took office, their own lives have improved, the economy has gotten better and the United States has retained its role as the most powerful nation on Earth. Republicans disagree on all three points. The partisan divide over the president’s legacy, and the direction of the country as a whole, transcends all other demographic lines, far outstripping age, race, region or income level. the only real point of agreement between the parties, in fact, is the near-universal sentiment that partisanship has worsened over the past eight years.
Therefore, one shouldn’t view US elections as a new prime time reality show, as it is being presented to us by the establishment, since it remains eager to replace Barack Obama with Hillary Clinton. But we shouldn’t forget that the influential alternative media source the Global Research has described Hillary Clinton as Barack Obama’s political twin for a reason, since she’s devoted to the ideas of American expansionism and militarism.
The presidential elections should serve as an emergency brake for those Americans that have somehow survived Obama’s killer policies. Those who are still able to elect a true leader that would be able to mend American society and raise the international prestige of the US, instead of carrying on the irresponsible policies that may destroy America along with the better part of this world.
Nuland’s Visit to Moscow: Has the US Arch Neocon Lost Her Bearings?
Sputnik – 18.05.2016
US Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland has wrapped up her visit to Moscow. According to officials, Nuland came to the Russian capital to discuss the situation in east Ukraine. Adding his two cents about the real purpose of the visit, analyst Gevorg Mirzayan suggested that the secretary may have lost her bearings.
On Wednesday, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov explained the official reason for Nuland’s visit, saying that the two sides discussed the situation in the war-torn eastern Ukrainian region of Donbass, with the US sharing ‘first-hand information’ and looking “to establish a sort of working exchange mechanism” outside the Normandy format, which doesn’t include Washington.
In his own commentary on the visit, Expert Magazine columnist Gevorg Mirzayan clarified, saying that Nuland’s main official goal “is to spur the negotiating process on the Donbass and, in particular, on the holding of local elections in the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, one of the most important measures of the Minsk peace agreements.”
“At first glance, of course, it seems like Nuland came to the wrong city,” the analyst noted. “After all, it’s not Moscow that’s sabotaging the holding of elections in the Donbass, but Kiev. One of the key challenges for Ukrainian authorities is not to recognize the situation in the Donbass as a civil war. This is why Kiev comes out against the fulfillment of the political articles of the Minsk agreement, and its most important aspect: direct negotiations between Ukrainian authorities and the leaders of the breakaway republics.”
For now, Mirzayan writes, Kiev’s argument that the DPR and LPR leaders Alexander Zakharchenko and Igor Plotnitsky are not democratically elected, and therefore politically illegitimate, carries some weight. “However, after elections take place, Kiev will have to carry deal with the legitimate representatives of the Donbass,” and this is something Ukrainian authorities are desperately looking to avoid.
Speaking to Expert, former Ukrainian lawmaker Oleg Tsaryev emphasized that once elections are held, if the conflict between Kiev and the Donbass continues, “it will fall under the definition of a civil war, and Kiev’s actions will be treated as a war crime.” Therefore, he said, “if the Americans really wanted to ensure the implementation of the agreements, Victoria Nuland would be sitting in Kiev, and speaking in an unyielding tone to its lawmakers, faction heads and oligarchs. Washington has many tools at its disposal: the threat of prohibiting elites from entering the EU, the threat of halting foreign bank lending, the confiscation of property and the seizure of accounts abroad.”
Therefore, Mirzayan notes, “it’s entirely possible that Nuland came to Moscow to offer to exert such pressure on Kiev in exchange for some concessions from the Russian side – on Ukraine, Syria or some other issue. The US is attempting to convince the Kremlin that it must ensure Kiev’s complaisance; after all, the lifting of anti-Russian sanctions depends on the implementation of the Minsk agreements.”
“However, it’s also possible that Nuland will leave Moscow empty-handed, or with a minimum compensation. Because in reality, all she is offering is to ensure a vote in Ukraine’s parliament, while the parties have to not only negotiate on the adoption of the law, but also its contents.”The current bill submitted to the Ukrainian parliament is out of sync with the Minsk agreements, according to the analyst. “But Ukrainian authorities and their Western partners could make it so that further discussions were held about its passing, rather than further changes to the bill. And then, if Kiev gave way and accepted the current version of the bill, it would be perceived as a maximum concession, and the Kremlin would have a difficult time requesting corrections.”
The same thing might happen with the electoral law, the analyst warns. “Those familiar with the document say that it has rather sensible requirements.”
“There are four main positions in this law,” Opposition Bloc lawmaker Yuriy Boyko told Expert. “The election must be in accordance with Ukrainian legislation, Ukrainian media must be given access, electoral commissions must be formed and the elections must take place with the oversight of international observers.”
However, Mirzayan notes, “the real question is how these requirements would be implemented.” For their part, the analyst suggests, Ukrainian officials and analysts have openly said that the law would be deliberately designed to include a whole a series of nuances making it unacceptable to representatives from the breakaway regions.
This, according to Ukrainian political analyst Mikhail Pogrebinsky, “would enable Ukraine, at the Normandy format level, with the participation and support of the United States, to say that we are fulfilling our part of the agreement, but the Donbass is not, and therefore no elections will ever be held.”
For its part, Mirzayan notes, Moscow “does not find this scenario to be acceptable. If the Minsk agreement cannot be implemented in full, the Kremlin may find it advantageous to simply freeze the situation until a new, more pragmatic government emerges in Kiev. Right now, time is on Russia’s side, and the attitudes of the European and even American elites toward Ukraine are changing, and becoming more inclined to seek compromise with Russia.”
Furthermore, “the situation in Ukraine itself is also changing, and not just economically but politically as well. President Petro Poroshenko recently succeeded in consolidating his power, and now controls the cabinet of ministers, the parliament, the prosecutor general and the security forces. The Americans either could not or did not want to interfere, and in the short term this is his victory.””However, in the medium term, such a concentration can be problematic.” After all, “Poroshenko no longer has a lightning rod in the form of [former Prime Minister] Yatsenyuk, who could be blamed for all the country’s economic problems and dismissed. Poroshenko has become personally responsible for everything that happens in the country, while his opponents, removed from power and its privileges, have received a carte blanche to make a name for themselves by criticizing the government and the president.”
“And this is not even mentioning the fact that the population is very tired of the revolutionary enthusiasm of the authorities and the parliament. The majority of Ukrainians have not forgotten about Crimea. However, if they begin to perceive the Donbass as a real civil war, new authorities will be fully capable of resolving the conflict in the spirit of Minsk-2. This is the same thing that Russia seeks, and is something it can achieve without making significant concessions to Victoria Nuland.”
Naturally, Mirzayan emphasizes, “the Kremlin will also have to work very hard to ensure that the conflict remains frozen. The authorities in Donbass have long and persistently sought to hold local elections,” warning that if Brussels and Washington could not force Kiev to fulfill their obligations under the Minsk agreements, they would hold elections independently.
“And while formally such elections would not contradict the Minsk agreements (they simply wouldn’t be recognized), they would create a negative sentiment around the Russian position. This is exactly what Kiev wants, and what Moscow wants to avoid on the eve of a serious dialogue with the EU about the future of the anti-Russian sanctions,” the analyst concludes.
Read more:
Nuland Starts Moscow Visit by Meeting ‘Young Leaders’
Nuland Warns Donbas to Ensure Elections are Held Within Minsk Accord
OSCE: East Ukraine’s Donbass Showing Signs of ‘Frozen Conflict’
In Kerry’s Footsteps: What Saudi ‘Plan B’ Actually Means for Syria and Iran
Sputnik – May 18, 2016
Saudi Arabia has signaled it is ready to implement the much-talked-about ‘Plan B’ in Syria. What does Riyadh actually mean?
Following the International Syria Support Group (ISSG) meeting in Vienna Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister told journalists that it is time to shift the focus to the so-called ‘Plan B’ in Syria.
“We believe we should have moved to a ‘Plan B’ a long time ago,” Adel al-Jubeir told reporters, as quoted by Reuters.
“The choice about moving to an alternative plan, the choice about intensifying the military support (to the opposition) is entirely with the Bashar [Bashar al-Assad] regime. If they do not respond to the treaties of the international community… then we will have to see what else can be done,” he stressed.
What lies behind al-Jubeir’s statement?Saudi Arabia has long been calling for toppling the legitimate and democratically-elected Syrian President, Bashar al-Assad. It is no secret that the Gulf kingdom has poured millions of US dollars into anti-Assad Islamist radical groups.
The Saudi-backed High Negotiations Committee (HNC) includes such Syrian “opposition groups” as Ahrar ash-Sham and Jaish al-Islam groups which differ from Daesh and the al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front in name only.
In April, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov underscored that Ahrar ash-Sham and Jaish al-Islam shared the same ideology as Daesh, which is outlawed in Russia, the United States and many other countries.
However, the West still hesitates to recognize the brutal extremist groups as terrorists.
The possibility of Plan B’s implementation was voiced by US Secretary of State John Kerry immediately after the US and Russia announced an agreement on cessation of hostilities in Syria.
“There is a significant discussion taking place now about a Plan B in the event that we do not succeed at the [negotiating] table,” Kerry told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on February 23, 2016.
The plan envisages the partition of Syria and empowering the country’s “moderate opposition.” It should be noted that Washington is well aware that the so-called moderates have no scruples about intermingling with al-Nusra Front terrorists from time to time.As for Riyadh, it has repeatedly pledged its willingness to deploy Saudi boots on Syrian ground. In the eyes of Saudi Arabia, ‘Plan B’ will allow Riyadh to ultimately get rid of Bashar al-Assad, paving the way for undermining the Middle Eastern Shiite Crescent and “encircling” of Iran.
Actually, the roots of the US-Saudi ‘Plan B’ originated in the times of George W. Bush. After Iraq had been occupied by the US, Saudi Arabia urged Washington to shift its attention toward Iran and Syria, parts of the so-called Shiite Crescent in the Middle East.
“In testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in January [2007], Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that there is ‘a new strategic alignment in the Middle East,’ separating ‘reformers’ and ‘extremists’; she pointed to the Sunni states as centers of moderation, and said that Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah were ‘on the other side of that divide.’ (Syria’s Sunni majority is dominated by the Alawi sect.) Iran and Syria, she said, ‘have made their choice and their choice is to destabilize’,” Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist Seymour Hersh wrote in his 2007 article “The Redirection” for The New Yorker.
According to Kerry and al-Jubeir, Plan B would be implemented should the ceasefire in Syria collapse. As of yet the truce is holding despite numerous violations.
The recent 17-nation ISSG talks were devoted to discussing the stalled negotiations, suspended after the Saudi-backed opposition faction, the HNC, unilaterally withdrew from negotiations, demanding serious concessions from the Syrian government.
It seems that neither HNC, the Riyadh-sponsored “opposition” group, nor its Saudi masters are interested in further diplomatic efforts.
Read more: Kerry’s Ultimatum to Assad: Why US Plan Means ‘Capitulation to Al-Qaeda’
‘Saudi Arabia providing banned chemical munitions to Nusra Front’
Press TV – May 19, 2016
A senior European official says Saudi Arabia is providing members of the al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front with internationally-banned chemical weapons.
Secretary General of the European Department for Security and Information (DESI) Haitham Abu Said the terrorists regularly use the munitions in their attacks against Syrian civilians.
Abu Said said Wednesday that the ammunition are being supplied to the extremists monthly under a plan drawn up in Bulgaria, and sneaked into Syria through militant-held areas on the border with Jordan.
Abu Said further noted that Nusra Front terrorists have on a number of occasions used weapons containing chemical agents against Syrians, most recently in the strategic northwestern province of Aleppo.
He added that international organizations have recorded several such incidents in the past.
The remarks come as the Russian Defense Ministry said that several trucks, carrying improvised chemical weapons, have been transported to Aleppo from neighboring Idlib.
“The arms are said to contain chlorine-based toxins,” the ministry said in a statement.
On May 3, Director General of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) Ahmet Uzumcu said that the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group might have already used chemical weapons both in Iraq and Syria.
Uzumcu said fact-finding teams from The Hague-based watchdog had discovered evidence that suggest the use of sulfur mustard in attacks in the two crisis-hit Arab countries.
“Although they could not attribute this to Daesh… there are strong suspicions that they may have used” chemical weapons, Uzumcu said.
On April 7, 23 people were killed and over 100 others injured in a chemical attack by Daesh terrorists against members of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in the city of Aleppo.
Videos posted online purportedly show yellow gas rising over Sheikh Maqsood neighborhood in Aleppo, some 355 kilometers (220 miles) north of Damascus.
The development came only three days after al-Ikhbariyah Syria satellite television network reported that Daesh had fired a barrage of rockets, carrying mustard gas, at a Syrian military airport in the eastern city of Dayr al-Zawr.
According to a report by the Syrian-American Medical Society, Daesh has carried out more than 160 attacks involving “poisonous or asphyxiating agents, such as sarin, chlorine, and mustard gas” since the beginning of the Syrian conflict in 2011.
At least 1,491 people have been killed in the chemical attacks.
In August 2013, hundreds of people were also killed in a chemical attack in the Ghouta suburb of Damascus. According to reports, the rockets used in the assault were handmade and contained sarin.
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Book Review
Bamford’s “Spyfail” exposes corruption at center of Netanyahu “judicial reform” crisis that is tearing Israel apart
By Grant F. Smith | IRmep | March 30, 2023
James Bamford’s new book Spyfail: Foreign Spies, Moles, Saboteurs, and the Collapse of America’s Counterintelligence devotes nine chapters to the impunity of Israel, its spies and U.S. lobby.
Bamford is best known as America’s premiere chronicler of the ultra-secretive National Security Agency in his books The Puzzle Palace and The Shadow Factory.
Unlike most authors published through mainstream publishing houses, Bamford has not held back on exposing extremely damaging and behind the scenes exploits of Israel and its lobby in this damning look at U.S. counterintelligence. That was a shock to the second most prominent reader reviewer on Amazon.com who claimed, “I did not expect a full-throated anti-Israel screed completely devoid of nuance or historical context.” Most other reviewers were much more appreciative of Bamford’s honest take.
Among the most scandalous episodes chronicled in Spy Fail are stunning new details about Hollywood movie producer Arnon Milchan’s espionage and weapons smuggling operations targeting the United States. … continue
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