https://www.facebook.com/
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Comment from dear friend and fellow memo reader regarding Rabbi Lewis' sermon: "Thanks Dick. I know Rabbi Lewis from my days in Atlanta. This is the second time that one of his sermons will surely go viral. He says it exactly like it is. What a wonderful man. And now compare that with the multiple other sermons throughout our land this past week. Shameful! B---"
And
This from another dear friend and fellow memo reader responding to my solution for those who are nut cases, break the gun laws and kill people. "Your solution is pure genius!! J--"
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Opposing views on Iran Deal. (See 1 and 1a below.)
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Comment on Trump news coverage. (See 2 below.)
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Israel has no choice and/or alternative. It must prepare for war with Iran. (See 3 below.)
And
Egypt caves. (See 3a below.)
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Wednesday, Sec. Tillerson responded to, what he claims, are false news stories regarding his position within the Cabinet etc.
I recently mentioned, in a memo, I believe Tillerson would ultimately be replaced or no longer be Sec. of State. I continue to maintain this view because Tillerson has been ineffective in creating a Department that is in sync with what Trump seeks to achieve. There are too many in the Potomac Swamp, whose sole reason to exist is predicated on hatred and their desire to bring the objects of their hatred down and many still reside in The State Department.
Outside of government , former president Obama continues his massive effort, working through others, to protect his legacy and legislation, which stops at nothing in order to bring Trump down.. In this regard, the mass media remains as one of Obama and Democrat's most powerful allies. (See 4 below)
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Snopes is in deep trouble? I did not check this article through Snopes. (See 5 below.)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
As I have said before, the issue of Puerto Rico and the Trump Administration's handling is being used to beat him over the head once again by a mass media that simply despises him. This has been coroborated in a survey showing over 60% of the reports in the first 6 months were negative.
As for Puerto Rico, the Island is financially bankrupt. The politicians spent billions on, only God knows what. Islands are harder to respond to when trouble strikes but the Administration has responded and the basic problem is the rotten and aged infrastructure is an impediment to the solutions.
Our 5 year old Granddaughter, Dagny, saw the suffering on television and decided to do something. She asked her mother to help with a Lemonade stand and they also baked lemon squares and chocolate fudge and had a sale yesterday. Her mother also put a notice on Face Book. As of Sunday, Dagny will be sending a check for over $2400 to help in the relief of Puerto Rico Islanders because of the great response she received.
Obviously she does not quite understand what $2400 means but she did a little video thanking everyone who helped her. (See 6 below.)
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Just returned from GMOA Board meeting and visit to dear friends in North Carolina. Have a busy week so any memos will be inconsistent in terms of when I e mail them.
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Dick
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1)Defense Secretary Mattis defies Trump in call to preserve Iran deal
By MICHAEL WILNER
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US Defense Secretary James Mattis expressed faith in the nuke accord's importance despite the president's clear aversion to it, just as the world looks to the US to lead the policy on Tehran. WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump’s defense secretary told Congress on Wednesday that it is in America’s interests to preserve its nuclear accord with Iran, despite his boss’s assertion last month that the international accord is an “embarrassment” to the United States.
Speaking to a Senate panel, James Mattis said Iran is abiding by the technical terms of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
“The point I would make is that if we can confirm that Iran is living by the agreement, if we can determine that this is in our best interest, then clearly we should stay with it,” Mattis said. “I believe at this point in time, absent indications to the contrary, it is something that the president should consider staying with,” Mattis added.
Asked to answer “yes” or “no” whether it was in the US national security interest to remain in the deal, Mattis, a career hawk on Iran, answered bluntly: “Yes, I do.”
The hearing comes amid a debate within the administration as to whether Trump should “decertify” Iran’s compliance to the JCPOA under American law. That would prompt a 60-day review period and debate within Congress over whether to slap back sanctions on Iran, effectively ending its participation in the agreement.
Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, says that decertification is an “internal” US matter and that a Republican Congress may well decide to preserve the accord, regardless of the president’s actions.
Indeed, several Republican lawmakers have voiced skepticism over the president’s decertification strategy, including the GOP chairmen of the Senate and House Foreign Relations committees, Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee and Rep. Ed Royce of California.
Nevertheless, Trump told the UN General Assembly last month that the international community had not heard the last of his complaints over the nuclear deal, which he campaigned against in his race for the presidency.
The nuclear deal brokered by the Obama administration is “an embarrassment to the United States, and I don’t think you’ve heard the last of it, believe me,” Trump said in his first UN address. “We cannot abide by an agreement if it provides cover for the eventual construction of a nuclear program.
Speaking to a Senate panel, James Mattis said Iran is abiding by the technical terms of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
“The point I would make is that if we can confirm that Iran is living by the agreement, if we can determine that this is in our best interest, then clearly we should stay with it,” Mattis said. “I believe at this point in time, absent indications to the contrary, it is something that the president should consider staying with,” Mattis added.
Asked to answer “yes” or “no” whether it was in the US national security interest to remain in the deal, Mattis, a career hawk on Iran, answered bluntly: “Yes, I do.”
The hearing comes amid a debate within the administration as to whether Trump should “decertify” Iran’s compliance to the JCPOA under American law. That would prompt a 60-day review period and debate within Congress over whether to slap back sanctions on Iran, effectively ending its participation in the agreement.
Iran’s foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, says that decertification is an “internal” US matter and that a Republican Congress may well decide to preserve the accord, regardless of the president’s actions.
Indeed, several Republican lawmakers have voiced skepticism over the president’s decertification strategy, including the GOP chairmen of the Senate and House Foreign Relations committees, Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee and Rep. Ed Royce of California.
Nevertheless, Trump told the UN General Assembly last month that the international community had not heard the last of his complaints over the nuclear deal, which he campaigned against in his race for the presidency.
The nuclear deal brokered by the Obama administration is “an embarrassment to the United States, and I don’t think you’ve heard the last of it, believe me,” Trump said in his first UN address. “We cannot abide by an agreement if it provides cover for the eventual construction of a nuclear program.
1a) Thanks to the Nuclear Deal, Iran Is on Its Way to Making Atomic Weaponshttps://mosaicmagazine.com/picks/2017/10/thanks-to-the-nuclear-deal-iran-is-on-its-way-to-making-atomic-weapons/
By Ray Takeyh
President Trump recently called the 2015 agreement with the Islamic Republic “an embarrassment to the United States. Agreeing, Ray Takeyh argues that the deal all but guarantees that Tehran will have a fully operational nuclear-weapons program within ten years:
Salehi, a fluent English speaker with a PhD in nuclear engineering from MIT, realized the folly of his predecessors. He understood that merely adding primitive IR-1 centrifuges [used for enriching uranium] to Iran’s stock might marginally expand its nuclear capacity but could not be the foundation of a state-of-the-art atomic apparatus. For Iran to have a viable nuclear-energy program and a sneak-out weapons option, it had to phase out the clunky IR-1s and replace them with more advanced IR-8s. . . .The key architect of the [accord] was not Secretary of State John Kerry or his European counterparts but Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei's most reliable bomb maker, the head of [Iran's] Atomic Energy Organization, Ali Akbar Salehi, and his team of technicians and diplomats, for one simple reason: he knows more than we do about the program he has devoted his life to developing.
[As one] member of Iran's negotiating team, Hamid Baidinezhad, [explained] on August 23, 2015,we came to the conclusion that the transition period that would take us to the industrial stage would start at the beginning of eight years. . . After the completion of that transitional period, Iran's nuclear program would witness an industrial leap and Iran would enter the state of complete industrial enrichment [of uranium]. And this was precisely the research-and-development plan Iran negotiated: the agreement stipulates that Iran will continue to conduct enrichment [research and development] . . . including [of] IR-4, IR-6, and IR-8 centrifuges.An American negotiating team that was so concerned about stages of sanctions relief and inspections seems to have conceded this point as part of the negotiating trade-offs.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Salehi [himself] has touted this achievement [in the Iranian press]. . . . In a clever move, he preserved Iran's nuclear modernization efforts while trading away IR-1s that Iran would phase out even if the JCPOA had not come along.
2)
Compared to other recent presidents, news reports about President Trump have been more focused on his personality than his policy, and are more likely to carry negative assessments of his actions, according to a new study from the Pew Research Center's Journalism Project.
Researchers studied news stories from the early months of Trump's presidency, determining whether each story evaluated Trump overall in a positive or negative light. If a story had at least twice as many positive as negative statements, Pew said it had an overall positive assessment of the president. The reverse was also true for stories with a negative assessment.
Fully two-thirds of news stories about Trump from his first 60 days in office were negative by that definition — more than twice the negativity seen in stories from the first 60 days of Bill Clinton, George W. Bush or Barack Obama's presidencies.
Meanwhile, only 5 percent of stories about Trump were positive, compared to 42 percent for Obama.
While some may be tempted to read this as evidence of media bias, the leader of Pew's Journalism Project said that isn't a conclusion one can draw from the study.
"Our data show that outlets with left and more mixed audiences did cover more negatively assessed elements of Trump's early presidency, while media with right-leaning audiences covered more positively assessed," said Amy Mitchell, director of journalism research at Pew. "Whether one or all of these are in-line or out-of-line with reality is beyond the capacity of this research."
Rather, she said, the study is trying to measure what kinds of messages people are consuming when they get their daily news.
"It is speaking about, from the public's perspective, what is the overall evaluation of the particular event that is being discussed in this news story related to Trump and the administration?" Mitchell said.
So, for example, when a protester is quoted saying she doesn't like Trump's actions, that's a negative statement. When a policy expert says Trump has made a good decision, that's positive.
Likewise, there are some outlets where reporters openly express opinions in their news writing. Pew cited one quote from the right-leaning website Independent Journal Review, where a journalist praised national security adviser pick H.R. McMaster as "brilliant and capable."
Likewise, on Inauguration Day, a reporter from the left-leaning Huffington Post asked, "Can the public even hold to his word a president for whom truth appears to carry almost no weight?" (Note: This wasn't necessarily one of the articles that Pew coded.)
Mitchell said the researchers wanted to find out whether Americans' recent polarization would be reflected in the news they choose to consume. And indeed, the researchers found that news stories about Trump were more negative at news outlets with left-leaning audiences (56 percent negative) and mixed audiences (47 percent) than at outlets with right-leaning audiences (14 percent).
Importantly, that doesn't mean that the news outlets themselves have a particular lean; rather, it means that the audiences do. After all, Politico — generally not considered left-leaning in its coverage style — still is among Pew's outlets with a left-leaning audience. (NPR likewise was one of the outlets with a left-leaning audience.)
What this may signal, rather, is that right-leaning audiences in particular tend to flock to outlets that cite fewer criticisms of Trump, whereas mixed and left-leaning audiences are more comfortable with outlets that cite more criticisms.
In addition, the number of sources cited seems to be connected to a story's overall positive or negativity: "Stories with a greater mix of voices were more likely to have an overall negative sense of the president's actions or statements," the researchers wrote.
Stories containing a refutation of the president — a fact-check article finding him wrong, for example — likewise were much more likely to be negative. Outlets with mixed and left-leaning audiences were also more likely to refute the president than those with right-leaning audiences.
In addition to these findings, there are other potential factors in creating more negative coverage.
Thinking back to the early days of Trump's presidency, it's possible that events themselves drove negative assessments of the president. For example, a flurry of protests during his first weeks in office naturally may have led to more negative quotes about the president than there were for Clinton, George W. Bush and Obama, who did not face protests on such a massive scale during their first weeks in office. Stories about people protesting the president might reasonably be more negative than other news stories.
Also, Trump's White House has been notoriously leaky. Stories about leaks of damaging information likewise could have potentially driven some negative coverage.
Again, these are only possibilities — and not covered in the scope of Pew's study, but they could have played a part in why news coverage of Trump might have had a relatively large share of negative statements.
News coverage of Trump stands out in still another way: Fewer than one-third of stories about Trump's presidency were about his policy agenda. That's not much, compared to news coverage of past presidents. Half of stories at the start of Obama's presidency were about his policy agenda, and the total was even higher for Bush in 2001 and Clinton in 1993.
Once again, there's no way of knowing exactly why news coverage of Trump focuses on his persona and not his ideology, but one can again make some educated guesses. For example, it's possible that Trump's wildly unorthodox style — the way his Twitter usage stirs up controversy, his willingness to publicly battle members of his own party — upends so many norms about how a president "should" act that his policies get less attention.
And it's also true that many of the president's policies have been presented in broad terms: Plans on parental leave, infrastructure, apprenticeships and tax overhaul were all low on detail. In other words, at times, there has been little hard policy news to cover out of this administration.
This skewing of coverage happens to dovetail with what Trump's supporters like about him. According to an August poll from the Pew Research Center, a majority of people who approve of Trump — 54 percent — said his approach and personality are what they like most about him, compared to only 14 percent who said it was his policies and values.
Editor's note: Reporter Danielle Kurtzleben formerly worked for the Pew Research Center's Journalism Project.
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3)
Israel Prepares for War in Syria against Iran
by Jonathan Spyer Foreign Policy
Excerpts of article originally published under the title "Israel Is Going to War in Syria to Fight Iran."
Israel has struck pro-regime facilities and convoys in Syria dozens of times during its six-year civil war.
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JERUSALEM – Israeli officials believe that Iran is winning its bid for dominance in the Middle East, and they are mobilizing to counter the regional realignment that threatens to follow. The focus of Israel's military and diplomatic campaign is Syria. Israeli jets have struck Hezbollah and Syrian regime facilities and convoys dozens of times during Syria's civil war, with the goal of preventing the transfer of weapons systems from Iran to Hezbollah. In an apparent broadening of the scope of this air campaign, on Sept. 7 Israeli jets struck a Syrian weapons facility near Masyaf responsible for the production of chemical weapons and the storing of surface-to-surface missiles.
The strike came after a round of diplomacy in which Israeli officials concluded that their concerns regarding the developing situation in Syria were not being addressed with sufficient seriousness in either the United States or Russia. A senior delegation led by Mossad chief Yossi Cohen visited Washington in late August, reportedly to express Israel's dissatisfaction with the emerging U.S.-Russian understanding on Syria. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi to raise similar concerns with Moscow.
Iranian forces now maintain a presence close to or adjoining the Israeli-controlled portion of the Golan Heights and the Quneitra Crossing that separates it from the Syrian-controlled portion of the territory. Israel has throughout the Syrian war noted a desire on the part of the Iranians and their Hezbollah clients to establish this area as a second line of active confrontation against the Jewish state, in addition to south Lebanon.In both cases, the Israelis were disappointed with the response. Their overriding concern in Syria is the free rein that all the major players there seem willing to afford Iran and its various proxies in the country. And as long as nobody else addresses that concern in satisfactory, Israel is determined to continue addressing it on its own.
Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah recently declared "victory" in Syria, with only "scattered" battles remaining.
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"Syria," of course, hardly exists today. The regime is in the hands of its Iranian and Russian masters, and half of the country remains outside its control. But the Iran-led bloc and its clearly stated intention to eventually destroy Israel certainly do exist, and the de facto buffer against them may be disappearing. Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah recently declared "victory" in the Syrian war, adding that what remained was "scattered battles."
With the prospect of pro-Iranian forces reaching Bukamal on the Syrian-Iraqi border, this opens up the possibility of the much-reported Iranian "land corridor" stretching uninterrupted from Iran itself to a few kilometers from the Israeli-controlled Golan. Earlier this month, Israel shot down an Iranian drone over the Golan Heights. It was the latest evidence of Iran's activities on the border. Syrian opposition reports have noted an Iranian presence in Tal Al-Sha'ar area, Tal Al-Ahmar, and Division 90 headquarters, all in the vicinity of the border.
The Iraqi Shiite militia Hezbollah al-Nujaba has declared itself "ready to take action to liberate the Golan."
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Pro-Iran forces, meanwhile, are open in their ambitions. Hezbollah al-Nujaba, an Iraqi Shiite force supported by Iran, has formed a "Golan Liberation" unit and declared itself "ready to take action to liberate the Golan." Senior figures from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Basij have been photographed in areas close to the border.
Israel is concerned by Iran's overarching regional ambitions. Recent comments by Nasrallah, the Hezbollah leader, that a future war with Israel might involve additional pro-Iranian militia forces to the Lebanese groups have been well noted in Jerusalem. Israeli Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz recently told a security conference in Herzliya, as reported by Reuters, that in a future war between Israel and Hezbollah the latter may be able to make use of an Iranian naval port, bases for Iran's air and ground forces, and "tens of thousands of Shiite militiamen being brought in from various countries."
A recent report in the London-based Al-Quds al-Arabi described Iranian plans to thin out the Sunni Arab population between Damascus and the border with Lebanon, expelling Sunni residents and replacing them with pro-government Shiites from elsewhere in the country or outside it.
Jihad Mughniyeh (left), son of the late Hezbollah military chief Imad Mughniyeh, and Mohammad Allahdadi, a general in Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), were killed in an Israeli targeted strike in January 2015.
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Israeli strategic culture tends to emphasize addressing immediate threats, but these potential demographic developments are also being watched closely in Jerusalem.
From an Israeli point of view, we are back to the pre-2010 Middle East, when Israel and pro-western Sunni powers understood they were in a direct faceoff with the Iranians and their allies. But in 2017, there is the additional complicating factor of a direct Russian physical presence in the Levant, in alliance or at least in cooperation with Israel's enemies.
U.S. President Donald Trump's administration, which remains exclusively focused on the war against the Islamic State, has done little to assuage Israeli concerns.
The impression, however, is that the administration may well not be sufficiently focused or concerned to actually take measures necessary to halt the Iranian advance — both military and political — in Syria, Iraq, or Lebanon.Trump and those around him, of course, share the Israeli assessment regarding the challenge of Iranian regional ambitions.
Where does this leave Israel?
First, Israel's diplomatic avenues to the international power brokers in Syria remain open. When it comes to Washington, Israel's task is to locate or induce a more coherent American strategy to counter advance of the Iranians in the Levant.
Second, Israel will continue to rely on its military defenses, which remain without peer in the region. And as shown in Masyaf, they can be employed to halt and deter provocative actions by the Iran-led bloc where necessary. Nevertheless, as seen from Jerusalem, the shifting regional tectonic plates are producing a new situation in which the Iran-led alliance is once again directly facing Israel, consequently raising the possibility of direct confrontation. Masyaf was not the first shot in the fight between Israel and its proxies in the Levant — and it is unlikely to be the last.Its goal when it comes to Moscow is to ensure sufficient leeway from Putin, who has no ideological animus against Israel and no special sympathy for Tehran, so that Israel can take the measures it deems necessary to halt or deter the Iranians and their proxies.
Jonathan Spyer, a fellow at the Middle East Forum, is director of the Rubin Center for Research in International Affairs and author of The Transforming Fire: The Rise of the Israel-Islamist Conflict (Continuum, 2011).
3a) Palestinians: A State Within a State?
by Khaled Abu Toameh
- The "reconciliation" accord they reached in Cairo paves the way for creating a state within a state in the Gaza Strip. The Egyptian-sponsored deal does not require Hamas to dismantle its security forces and armed wing, Ezaddin Al-Qassam. Nor does the agreement require Hamas to lay down its weapons or stop amassing weapons and preparing for war.
- This is a very comfortable situation for Hamas, which has effectively been absolved of any responsibility toward the civilian population. Hamas could not have hoped for a better deal. Like Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Gaza Strip will be permitted to maintain its own security force, while Abbas's government oversees civilian affairs and pays salaries to civil servants.
- Offloading this responsibility frees up Hamas to fortify its military capabilities. Hamas is not being asked to recognize Israel's right to exist or accept any peace process.
The latest "reconciliation" deal between the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Hamas brings the Palestinians closer to creating a state-within-a-state in the Gaza Strip. The PA and Hamas will now have two separate mini-states of their own in the Gaza Strip.
This arrangement is similar to the situation in Lebanon, where Hezbollah maintains a separate mini-state of its own there.
In state-like fashion, Hezbollah in Lebanon has its own army and territory. This situation, which has gone on for decades, has enraged many Lebanese politicians.
Earlier this year, when dozens of masked Hezbollah militiamen launched a nighttime raid to arrest drug dealers in Beirut, Lebanese politicians accused their government of giving up its authority in favor of Hezbollah's "tiny state." The militiamen belonged to Hezbollah's "social security department," a police force that operates independently of the Lebanese security authorities.
"This is what a country that has given up its authority in favor of the 'tiny state' (of Hezbollah) looks like," said Ashraf Rifi, Lebanon's former justice minister. Rifi said that the pictures of the Hezbollah militiamen conducting the raid testify for the umpteenth time how the very existence of Hezbollah goes against the state and its institutions.
Hamas and Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority are now headed, willingly or unwillingly, towards plunging the Palestinians into a similar scenario as in Lebanon. The "reconciliation" accord they reached in Cairo paves the way for creating a mini-state within a mini-state in the Gaza Strip. These two "states" will be added to the mini-Palestinian Authority "state" that already exists in parts of the West Bank.
The Egyptian-sponsored deal does not require Hamas to dismantle its security forces and armed wing, Ezaddin Al-Qassam. Nor does the agreement require Hamas to lay down its weapons or stop amassing weapons or preparing for war.
All that is known thus far is that the agreement allows Abbas and his Palestinian Authority to resume civilian control over the Gaza Strip, while security remains in the hands of Hamas.
This is a very comfortable situation for Hamas, which has effectively been absolved of any responsibility toward the civilian population. Hamas could not have hoped for a better deal.
Like Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Gaza Strip will be permitted to maintain its own security establishment and security force in the Gaza Strip, while Abbas's government oversees civilian affairs and pays salaries to civil servants. It would be difficult in the extreme to imagine Hamas agreeing to relinquish security control or permit Abbas's security forces to return to the Gaza Strip.
The Lebanon case seems better than the one shaping up in Gaza for several reasons. There, the government at least has its own army and police force. In the Gaza Strip, however, Hamas is unlikely to return to the pre-2007 era, when the Palestinian Authority had multiple security forces that maintained a tight grip and kept Hamas on the defensive by regularly arresting its leaders and members.
And, despite the hugging and kissing on display during the visit of PA Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah and his delegation to the Gaza Strip on October 2 -- the first of its kind since the violent and bloody Hamas takeover in 2007 -- much bad blood remains between the two sides.
Hamas leaders and officials -- who have repeatedly charged Abbas and his leadership with being part of a US and Israeli "conspiracy" to strangle and punish the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip -- are approaching the "reconciliation" deal with utmost caution. Hamas is prepared to give the Palestinian Authority control over various government institutions and ministries -- but that is where things end, at this point. Security matters are a whole different ballgame.
The past decade of cut-throat rivalry between the two sides has seen Hamas and the PA arrest hundreds of each other's members and followers. The quest for revenge remains as strong as ever.
Abbas's recent sanctions against the Gaza Strip, which included cutting off salaries to thousands of civil servants, thereby forcing many of them into early retirement, and his refusal to pay for Israeli-supplied electricity as well as suspending medication shipments, only aggravated pre-existing tensions between the two sides. Things came to a head last April, when a Hamas official, Marwan Abu Ras, in a public square in the Gaza Strip, openly called for the execution of Abbas for high treason. Such fury between Hamas officials and Abbas can hardly have been assuaged in four months.
For now, however, Hamas seems prepared to swallow the bitter pill -- because the name of the game for Hamas is survival. Isolated and cash-stripped, Hamas will collude with anyone who offers it "oxygen".
Abbas, for his part, has agreed to serve as the savior of Hamas. Why? One simple reason: he does not wish to see a concord between Mohammed Dahlan and Hamas. In Abbas's view, the "reconciliation" deal is a victory not because Hamas has surrendered or relinquished security control over the Gaza Strip, but because he managed to foil Dahlan's return to Gaza and the political arena. Backed by the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and other Arab countries, Dahlan's return and rendezvous with Hamas would have been a severe blow to Abbas and his Palestinian Authority
.
A Dahlan-Hamas alliance would have undermined Abbas's claim to be the president of all Palestinians, including those in the Gaza Strip. Moreover, such an alliance would have emboldened Dahlan, who lives in exile in the United Arab Emirates, and would have enhanced his prospects of succeeding Abbas as president of the PA.
Hamas has every reason to be satisfied with the "reconciliation" deal with Abbas. Its only concession was to dismantle its "administrative committee," which served as a shadow government in the Gaza Strip. Hamas shed no tears in this move, which absolved it from managing civilian affairs and paying salaries. Offloading this responsibility frees up Hamas to fortify its military capabilities.
Notably, the Egyptian-engineered deal does not require Hamas to make any political concessions. This in itself is a huge achievement for Hamas. Hamas is not being asked to recognize Israel's right to exist or accept any peace process.
The Gaza Strip is now headed toward a new era where it will be divided between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas – one in charge of civilian issues while the second has full security control.
This situation, if it remains unresolved, will most likely lead to the renewal of tensions between the two sides. The Gaza Strip is headed towards a situation of a state within a state. As of now, it is safe to call their arrangement a three-state solution: one Palestinian state in the West Bank and two in the Gaza Strip. Hezbollah and Hamas must be laughing their heads off as, under weak and impotent governments, they see their power grow.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++This arrangement is similar to the situation in Lebanon, where Hezbollah maintains a separate mini-state of its own there.
In state-like fashion, Hezbollah in Lebanon has its own army and territory. This situation, which has gone on for decades, has enraged many Lebanese politicians.
Earlier this year, when dozens of masked Hezbollah militiamen launched a nighttime raid to arrest drug dealers in Beirut, Lebanese politicians accused their government of giving up its authority in favor of Hezbollah's "tiny state." The militiamen belonged to Hezbollah's "social security department," a police force that operates independently of the Lebanese security authorities.
"This is what a country that has given up its authority in favor of the 'tiny state' (of Hezbollah) looks like," said Ashraf Rifi, Lebanon's former justice minister. Rifi said that the pictures of the Hezbollah militiamen conducting the raid testify for the umpteenth time how the very existence of Hezbollah goes against the state and its institutions.
Hamas and Mahmoud Abbas's Palestinian Authority are now headed, willingly or unwillingly, towards plunging the Palestinians into a similar scenario as in Lebanon. The "reconciliation" accord they reached in Cairo paves the way for creating a mini-state within a mini-state in the Gaza Strip. These two "states" will be added to the mini-Palestinian Authority "state" that already exists in parts of the West Bank.
The Egyptian-sponsored deal does not require Hamas to dismantle its security forces and armed wing, Ezaddin Al-Qassam. Nor does the agreement require Hamas to lay down its weapons or stop amassing weapons or preparing for war.
All that is known thus far is that the agreement allows Abbas and his Palestinian Authority to resume civilian control over the Gaza Strip, while security remains in the hands of Hamas.
This is a very comfortable situation for Hamas, which has effectively been absolved of any responsibility toward the civilian population. Hamas could not have hoped for a better deal.
Like Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Gaza Strip will be permitted to maintain its own security establishment and security force in the Gaza Strip, while Abbas's government oversees civilian affairs and pays salaries to civil servants. It would be difficult in the extreme to imagine Hamas agreeing to relinquish security control or permit Abbas's security forces to return to the Gaza Strip.
The Lebanon case seems better than the one shaping up in Gaza for several reasons. There, the government at least has its own army and police force. In the Gaza Strip, however, Hamas is unlikely to return to the pre-2007 era, when the Palestinian Authority had multiple security forces that maintained a tight grip and kept Hamas on the defensive by regularly arresting its leaders and members.
And, despite the hugging and kissing on display during the visit of PA Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah and his delegation to the Gaza Strip on October 2 -- the first of its kind since the violent and bloody Hamas takeover in 2007 -- much bad blood remains between the two sides.
Hamas leaders and officials -- who have repeatedly charged Abbas and his leadership with being part of a US and Israeli "conspiracy" to strangle and punish the Palestinians of the Gaza Strip -- are approaching the "reconciliation" deal with utmost caution. Hamas is prepared to give the Palestinian Authority control over various government institutions and ministries -- but that is where things end, at this point. Security matters are a whole different ballgame.
The past decade of cut-throat rivalry between the two sides has seen Hamas and the PA arrest hundreds of each other's members and followers. The quest for revenge remains as strong as ever.
Abbas's recent sanctions against the Gaza Strip, which included cutting off salaries to thousands of civil servants, thereby forcing many of them into early retirement, and his refusal to pay for Israeli-supplied electricity as well as suspending medication shipments, only aggravated pre-existing tensions between the two sides. Things came to a head last April, when a Hamas official, Marwan Abu Ras, in a public square in the Gaza Strip, openly called for the execution of Abbas for high treason. Such fury between Hamas officials and Abbas can hardly have been assuaged in four months.
For now, however, Hamas seems prepared to swallow the bitter pill -- because the name of the game for Hamas is survival. Isolated and cash-stripped, Hamas will collude with anyone who offers it "oxygen".
Abbas, for his part, has agreed to serve as the savior of Hamas. Why? One simple reason: he does not wish to see a concord between Mohammed Dahlan and Hamas. In Abbas's view, the "reconciliation" deal is a victory not because Hamas has surrendered or relinquished security control over the Gaza Strip, but because he managed to foil Dahlan's return to Gaza and the political arena. Backed by the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and other Arab countries, Dahlan's return and rendezvous with Hamas would have been a severe blow to Abbas and his Palestinian Authority
.
A Dahlan-Hamas alliance would have undermined Abbas's claim to be the president of all Palestinians, including those in the Gaza Strip. Moreover, such an alliance would have emboldened Dahlan, who lives in exile in the United Arab Emirates, and would have enhanced his prospects of succeeding Abbas as president of the PA.
Hamas has every reason to be satisfied with the "reconciliation" deal with Abbas. Its only concession was to dismantle its "administrative committee," which served as a shadow government in the Gaza Strip. Hamas shed no tears in this move, which absolved it from managing civilian affairs and paying salaries. Offloading this responsibility frees up Hamas to fortify its military capabilities.
Notably, the Egyptian-engineered deal does not require Hamas to make any political concessions. This in itself is a huge achievement for Hamas. Hamas is not being asked to recognize Israel's right to exist or accept any peace process.
The Gaza Strip is now headed toward a new era where it will be divided between the Palestinian Authority and Hamas – one in charge of civilian issues while the second has full security control.
This situation, if it remains unresolved, will most likely lead to the renewal of tensions between the two sides. The Gaza Strip is headed towards a situation of a state within a state. As of now, it is safe to call their arrangement a three-state solution: one Palestinian state in the West Bank and two in the Gaza Strip. Hezbollah and Hamas must be laughing their heads off as, under weak and impotent governments, they see their power grow.
4)FINALLY SNOPES IS BEING EXPOSED FOR BEING FICTIONAL
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
SNOPES IN DANGER OF CREDIBILITY LOSS AND CLOSING UP SHOP: LIES, HOOKERS, FAKE TRANSPARENCY, INTERNAL FRAUD AND PHONY FINDINGS BY FLAKY POT-SMOKING STAFF
Founder still soliciting donations amid mounting accusations of embezzlement, wild spending and decades of no research guesswork by untrained, pot-smoking-on-the-job, investigatorsSo-called “fact-checking” website Snopes.com is still, after months of turmoil reportedly on the verge of financial and emotional collapse since one if its founders has been accused of using company cash to fund his contentious divorce and to pay for fancy vacations with his new wife, a former hooking escort and porn actress.The financial situation had apparently become so dire back in the early summer that Snopes owner David Mikkelson launched a crowd-funding website to solicit donations, according to London’s Daily Mail. Readers, mostly those duped or from the left, contributed more than $500,000 in just the first 24 hours.As WND has reported, Snopes.com, a website that’s been around since 1995, was once cited by other “fact-checking” sites to support their claims.Facebook has even indicated it plans to use Snopes as one of its arbiters of “fake news.” But WND revealed the site has been severely criticized by conservatives for 20 years for a constant hard-left-leaning bias and Snopes admits it has no standard research procedures at all or any trained investigators for fact-checking.Snopes.com’s founders, former husband and wife David and (Canadian) Barbara Mikkelson, have been embroiled in a loud and lengthy and bitter legal dispute in the wake of their divorce.At one point, Barbara accused the CEO, and presented over 300 documents, of using company money for prostitutes for 15-20 years.Barbara Mikkelson also accused her ex-husband of embezzling more than $300,000 in company funds. She urged the court to limit access to David’s bank account because she said she feared he would keep draining the company funds due to his wild spending habits.David claimed Barbara took millions from their joint accounts and bought property in Las Vegas.He has since remarried to a former hooker-escort and porn actress, Elyssa Young, who is one of the site’s staff members and a “writer and investigator.”Young, who was a Las Vegas escort until at least 2015, and charged $500 for her services before writing-up Snopes items for leftist causes. She also starred in porn films such as “Erin O’Bryn.”Now, the Daily Mail reports, Proper Media, an advertising and Internet services company, has filed a lawsuit against David in California. A court hearing was scheduled for August.In 2016, the owners of Proper Media bought 50 percent of Bardav Inc., a company launched by the Mikkelsons that owns Snopes.The owners took Barbara’s share of the company.But now Proper Media claims David, in the last year, “engaged in a lengthy scheme of criminal concealment and subterfuge to gain control of the company and to drain its profits.”The Daily Mail reported, “[David] Mikkelson counters that Proper Media – which Snopes also contracts for advertising work – has been holding the website ‘hostage’ by ‘withholding advertising revenue.'”David pleaded for financial donations again this week, saying Snopes.com “is still in danger of closing its doors” because Proper Media isn’t releasing ad revenue or giving up control of advertising on the website. Barbara states that his claim is false and he is pocketing the donated money like he did the first time.“Our legal team is fighting hard for us, but, having been cut off from all revenue, we are facing the prospect of having no financial means to continue operating the site and paying our staff (not to mention covering our legal fees) in the meanwhile,” David said.Proper Media argues that David’s crooked dealings and outrageous spending habits are the cause of Snopes’ financial troubles.“But while Snopes, has somehow built its public image entirely around the concepts of pure transparency and absolute truth, and somehow around the total falsehood that it is nothing but a little Mom and Pop business with a single telephone on their kitchen table, its founder, Defendant David Mikkelson, a lifelong con man … has engaged in a lengthy scheme of concealment and subterfuge to gain control of the quarter-billion dollar company and to drain its profits,” according to a legal document filed in San Diego Superior Court Friday, September 8.Proper Media accuses David of breaking his contract and rebuffed shareholders’ attempts to get him to control his spending. It claims David signed court documents in June claiming he is under financial duress, but he signed those papers while he was vacationing for two months in a lavish private villa in Orleans, France.“If Mikkelson is permitted to continue unabated as director of Bardav, he will irreversibly drain the company of all financial resources through personal and unnecessary expenditures,” claimed Proper Media, which also accuses David of “outrageous and pervasive fraud” at Snopes.Court documents from the Mikkelson divorce reveal David sought to be paid $1,720,000 a year, after all taxes.According to the accusations, he spent “hundreds of thousands of dollars” on vacations and a honeymoon to Japan and suites at Tokyo Disneyland with Young, his new wife.Young, now an administrative assistant at Snopes, still has a website online that says she’s “an elite courtesan who provides discreet companionship for those who appreciate the finer things in life.”Young describes herself to prospective clients: “I have an adult woman’s build and the soul of an indomitable force of nature burning within it.”As WND reported, the Snopes’ leading fact-checker is a sex-and-fetish blogger who describes her routine as smoking pot and posting to Snopes.com clients. Kim LaCapria is a self-disclosed sex-blogger who still calls herself “Vice Vixen.” She has blogged for years as "Vice Vixen" and offers tips online about sex toys.Her blog had “a specific focus on naughtiness, sin, carnal pursuits, and general hedonism and bonne vivante-ery.”LaCapria’s day-off activities, she said on another blog, were: “smoked pot, played scrabble, smoked pot, and posted to Snopes client requests.'”“That’s what I did on my day ‘on,’ too,” she added.David Mikkelson has told the Daily Mail that Snopes has never had a “standardized procedure” for fact-checking “since the nature of this material can vary widely, we can get 1,500 questions per day, it is a group-think process, motivated by our worldviews.”He said the process of fact-checking “involves multiple stages of ‘editorial oversight,’ so, often, the output is the result of a single person’s personal input or personal discretion.”“Snopes has no requirements for fact-checkers, formal or otherwise,” he told the London paper, “because the absolutely huge number of daily requests and the variety of the requests would be difficult to encompass in any single blanket set of standards.”Mikkelson has denied that Snopes takes any political position, but the Daily Mail noted his new wife ran for U.S. Congress in far-left Hawaii “as a left-leaning-Libertarian” in 2004.During the campaign, she handed out “Re-Defeat Bush” cards and condoms stamped with the slogan “Don’t get screwed again.”“Let’s face it, I am to the left and an unlikely candidate. I fully admit that I am an active courtesan,” she wrote on her campaign website.
5)
Puerto Rico posted by Judy Sidor From Charity Munoz in Puerto Rico: (From a Friend)
I got online for the first time in days and one of the very first
things I saw was an out and out lie about the government's response to
the crisis I am in the middle of. I don't care if you hate or love
Trump, using the crisis in Puerto Rico to spread political lies is
disgusting! I am literally across the street from the airport, and the
hotel I am in is where many of the first responders are staying, so
here is what is going on from someone who is actually here seeing it.
The government is here and has been here! Every single day plane after
plane full of FEMA, FBI, homeland security, army, Air Force, Marines,
and extra police officers from all over the country shows up. Cargo
plane after cargo plane and ship after ship full of supplies shows up.
There is a hospital ship off the coast that I can see from the beach.
The response was quick and it keeps coming! They are out every day
from sun up until sun down.
This isn't a political issue, it is a humanitarian one. The lies being
spread about the response aren't helping the people here, it is just
fueling hate based on lies! If you want to help Puerto Rico, donate
money or supplies and pray. If you want to play politics find
something else to argue about! Not like there aren't hundreds of
topics for you to choose from!
Edited to add this- Roads have been completely destroyed in many
areas, especially the remote one. The military and FEMA are going out
to these places on foot with 100 lbs + packs on their backs. It is
requiring them to cut their way through flooded areas to get there. It
will take time to reach everyone when conditions are as bad as they
are. President Trump dispatched 140 helicopters, 28 ships, 6 Army
field hospitals, 3 Navy Seabee Battalions, 5 US Army Combat Engineer
Battalions, 3 Civil Affairs battalions, 2 Nuclear Submarines capable
of generating 2.8 Gigawatts of Power, release 300,000 tons of food,
medical supplies, and water from Military stocks to Puerto Rico...
Please stop touting the party line of bashing our President when his
actions have been excellent for the island.
There's been a string of 4 horrendous Hurricanes, it's going take some++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
time. But your immature comments devoid of any facts don't help a
single person on the island. No President has had to face this level
of domestic disasters and done a better job. Trump is America's
President.
Texan by birth; American by the Grace of God!
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