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Bad Guys

Senior Iranian military adviser warns of wide response - from Med to Red Sea to Indian Ocean - if US attacks


Reuters
Fri, 20 Sep 2019 18:33 UTC
IRGC General Soleimani
© AFP 2019 / HO / KHAMENEI.IR
Iran maintained its defiant stance against the United States in the wake of attacks on Saudi oil infrastructure claimed by a Tehran ally, saying on Friday it would resist any U.S. plots against it "from the Mediterranean, to the Red Sea and to the Indian Ocean".

The latest volley in a stream of rhetoric from Iranian officials came from General Yahya Rahim-Safavi, a senior adviser to Iran's supreme leader, as President Hassan Rouhani prepared to leave for the United Nations General Assembly in New York next week.

Both sides have said they wish to avoid a full-out war over the fraught situation in the Gulf region but have adopted tough postures. The United States has been trying to create an international maritime security alliance since attacks on oil tankers in the Gulf.


Comment: Which means that for now, the resistance axis (Iran, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Iraqi PMU, etc.) have the upper hand. The Houthis are already engaged in a war with Saudi Arabia - with the tacit and somewhat operational support of Iran and her allies. Since neither Iran nor her enemies want an even larger war, the rag-tag Houthis are relatively free to retaliate against their Saudi aggressors. Iran will get the blame, but how much is Saudi Arabia willing to bleed before it does something stupid or simply calls it quits in Yemen?


The Iran-aligned Houthi movement, which is battling a Saudi-led military coalition in Yemen, claimed responsibility for the assault on two Saudi oil plants on Sept. 14, including the world's largest processing facility.

Comment: Hezbollah's leader Nasrallah also warned of the consequences facing Saudi Arabia and the UAE if they do anything stupid:
"Don't bet on a war against Iran because they will destroy you. Your house is made of glass and your economy is made of glass. Like the glass cities in the UAE. [...] You have already begun to pay the price of the war against Yemen", Nasrallah said.

The movement's leader also called on Saudi Arabia and its allies to end their military campaign in Yemen against the Houthi militants, arguing that it would be better for them to do so than buy more air defences to fend off Houthi aerial attacks.


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Bizarro Earth

SOTT Focus: Beneath Contempt: Saudi Arabia And Its Western Backers

Craig Murray
Craigmurray.org.uk
Fri, 20 Sep 2019 20:43 UTC
Trump Saudi
The ruling caste of Saudi Arabia present the most striking example in world history of the extreme combination of avarice and personal cowardice. They are gagging for a war with Iran so long as somebody else fights it for them.

Due to a dispute over who ought to have been Caliph 1400 years ago they are absolutely chomping at the bit for somebody to massacre the Shia in the Shia heartland, provided they don't have to do the massacring. It is not that they object to blood on their pure white robes, they often get that when executing a bound prisoner or raping the housemaid. But the thought of their own blood being spilled is an abomination. Let some helpful young Israelis or Americans risk fighting the Iranians, while the Saudi rulers sniff cocaine in their London penthouses.

It is not that Saudi does not have its own military - bombing civilian Shia Houthis from a great height with no chance of retaliation is great sport. And there were some actual Saudis in some of the tanks sent in to massacre the unarmed democracy demonstrators of Bahrain. But the world's greatest spender per capita on weapons systems has no intention that its own elite should do any fighting.
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Yoda

Best of the Web: The good soldier: Tulsi Gabbard shooting straight on the Middle East

Seraphim Hanisch
The Duran
Fri, 20 Sep 2019 18:00 UTC
Tulsi Gabbard
© Fox NewsTulsi Gabbard
Most of the Democrat "leaders" and presidential candidates on offer of late are useful for little more than comedy television, if one considers hyper-political snipery (all done with proper parliamentary procedures) as comedy. It may be so, but we often find that some antacids are probably necessary after watching Jerrold Nadler's Incredibly Contrived Compleat Impeachment Fairy Tale. And, yes, my sarcasm is showing. But Tulsi Gabbard is a completely different story. She found favor with Tucker Carlson on Fox, and she has been on with Fox time and again to talk about very significant matters regarding Middle East policy, and she appears to be at least somewhat correct. She was correct enough to chagrin her interviewer in this video:

Tulsi drew two extremely significant points, one which makes a lot of sense and one which smacks of liberal progressivism. The sensible one is is that the notion that the US should commit its forces to yet another Middle East war, this one with Iran, is absolutely correct.

While it is extremely unlikely that her interpretation of President Trump's tweet is accurate, here is what she actually reacted to. Read for yourself:
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Question

Best of the Web: Will Russia be driven from the West?

Stephen F. Cohen
The Nation
Wed, 18 Sep 2019 18:00 UTC
moscow flag day
© REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov
American opponents of readmitting Moscow to the former G8 fail to understand the consequences.

Two years ago, I asked, "Will Russia Leave the West?" The world's largest territorial country — sprawling from its major European city St. Petersburg to its vast Far Eastern territories and long border with China — Russia cannot, of course, depart the West geographically. But it can do so politically, economically, and strategically. Indeed, where Russia belongs, where it should seek its identity, security, and future — in the East or in the West — has divided the nation's policymakers and intellectual elites for centuries.

In our times, as I also pointed out two years ago, a Russia departed, or driven, from the West would likely mean "a Russia — with its vast territories, immense natural resources, world-class sciences, formidable military and nuclear power, and UN Security Council veto — allied solidly with all the other emerging powers that are not part the US-NATO Western 'world order' and even opposed to it. And, of course, it would drive Russia increasingly afar from the West's liberalizing influences, back toward its more authoritarian traditions."
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Snakes in Suits

Not a free speech platform: Facebook declares it's a 'publisher' & can censor whomever it wants, walking into legal trap


RT
Fri, 20 Sep 2019 17:55 UTC
zuckerberg
© Reuters / Aaron P. Bernstein
Facebook has invoked its free speech right as a publisher, insisting its ability to smear users as extremists is protected, but its legal immunity thus far has rested on a law which protects platforms, not publishers. Which is it?

Facebook has declared it has the right, as a publisher, to exercise its own free speech and bar conservative political performance artist Laura Loomer from its platform. Even calling her a dangerous extremist is allowed under the First Amendment, because it's merely an opinion, Facebook claims in its motion to dismiss the lawsuit filed by Loomer.

But Facebook has always defined itself as a tech company providing a platform for users' speech in the past, a definition that has come to appear increasingly ridiculous in the era of widespread politically-motivated censorship. Now, the not-so-neutral content platform has redefined itself as a publisher equipped with a whole new set of rights, but bereft of the protections that have kept it safe from legal repercussions in the past.
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Snakes in Suits

Fmr Sec of State Rex Tillerson details his frustrations on Israel, Russia and his old boss

Christina Pazzanese
The Harvard Gazette
Wed, 18 Sep 2019 17:34 UTC
tillerson
© Tom Fitzsimmons
Rex Tillerson had seen and learned much in his 41-year career at ExxonMobil Corp., and some of it proved useful in his 13 months as U.S. secretary of state. But in the end, most of the thorniest challenges the former chairman of the multinational oil giant faced had more to do with his relationship with his boss, President Donald Trump, than with the complexities of geopolitics.

That was the overarching message from Tillerson who visited Harvard Tuesday for a private talk about his time as the nation's top diplomat, a probing 90-minute discussion in which he spoke fluently on issues in global hotspots from North Korea, Syria, and Iran to the negotiating styles of world leaders, including Trump.

In panel interview with Professors Nicholas Burns, who runs the Future of Diplomacy Project at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS), Robert Mnookin, faculty chair emeritus of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School (HLS), and James Sebenius, who heads the Harvard Negotiation Roundtable at Harvard Business School (HBS), Tillerson's daylong visit was organized by the American Secretaries of State Project, a joint initiative run by Burns, Mnookin, and Sebenius, who each lead programs on diplomacy and negotiation at all three Schools.
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Handcuffs

Best of the Web: Paying the piper: Netanyahu election loss means he will now face corruption charges

Saphora Smith
NBC News
Thu, 19 Sep 2019 17:28 UTC

Comment: Something to drink to this Friday evening...


netanyahu
Benjamin Netanyahu, ex-Prime Minister of Israel
As this week's election results and exit polls continue to make grim reading for Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel's longest-serving prime minister not only faces the possible end of his political career but also a probable court appearance and potentially even jail due to allegations of corruption.

Netanyahu had hoped to pass legislation that would prevent him from being indicted on multiple allegations of corruption — but he can only do so if he remains prime minister. Netanyahu denies any wrongdoing and has said he is the victim of a politically orchestrated "witch-hunt" by the media and the left. But he may have to make that case in court.

With 97 percent of the votes counted as of Thursday afternoon, both Netanyahu's right-wing bloc in the Knesset and the centrist and left-wing bloc led by the Blue and White party fell short of the 61 seats needed to form a government in the 120-seat Parliament.
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Chess

Center-2019: 128,000 troops participate in massive Russia, China & India drill


RT
Fri, 20 Sep 2019 17:13 UTC
cannons
© Sputnik / Vladimir Astapkovich
Moscow has launched a large-scale military exercise alongside China and India, with maneuvers spanning from the Caspian Sea to Central Asia.

The Tsentr-2019 (Center-2019) drill, which kicked off on Monday, amasses around 128,000 troops, with more than 20,000 pieces of hardware, conducting maneuvers in southern Russia and Central Asia.

Russian servicemen are joined by fellow soldiers from China, India, and Pakistan, along with personnel from four Central Asian countries, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan.

The T-72 main battle tanks and various APCs, as well as Mi-24 attack helicopters were deployed to practice countering enemy assaults. The military also test-fired Iskander short-range ballistic missiles, designed for bunker-busting and destroying terrorist hideouts. The targets were spotted by Russia's new Orlan-10 surveillance UAVs.
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Eye 1

New photos show Juan Guaido in car with 'drug cartel gangster'


RT
Fri, 20 Sep 2019 16:52 UTC
Guaido
© REUTERS / Luisa GonzalezJuan Guaido during a news conference in Cucuta, Colombia February 23, 2019.
A Venezuelan official has published photos that he says are further proof of ties between the country's self-proclaimed 'interim president' Juan Guaido and a drug cartel member, who allegedly helped him sneak into Colombia.

In January, Guaido declared himself the rightful head of state in Venezuela and has since made several failed attempts to actually seize power in the Latin American nation, with Washington backing the effort. During one of them in February, he traveled to neighboring Colombia to attend a concert and lead a column of trucks containing US-provided 'humanitarian aid,' which was ultimately stopped by Venezuelan border guards.

Last week, a Colombian NGO published photos showing the would-be president and two other people, who were identified as members of Los Rastrojos, a paramilitary criminal organization operating on the border between Venezuela and Colombia. It was alleged that Guaido had crossed the border with the help of the gangsters.
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Star of David

Best of the Web: The Middle East's only Jewish ghetto

Gilad Atzmon
gilad.online
Wed, 18 Sep 2019 16:50 UTC
israel gaza border wall ghetto
© Enzo Apicella (RIP)Separation Wall (A to Zion-the Definitive Israeli Lexicon)
The results from Tuesday's Israeli elections have confirmed what many of us have known for a long while. The Jewish state is an ultra-nationalist right-wing swamp. Israel is more hawkish than ever. There is not a single Jewish Israeli Left wing party. The Democratic Party is led and mentored by a war criminal. What is left of Israel's Labour Party has very little to do with peace, harmony and reconciliation. In fact, that Party is also led by a person wanted for war crimes.

As things now stand, although Bibi's right/religious block has shrunk, Israel is more right-wing than ever. The longest-serving Israeli PM cannot form his natural right/religious coalition. Most Israeli commentators agree that the only way out of the current political stalemate is with a wide ultranationalist government led by Likud, Blue and White and others. Such a coalition will be brokered in the coming days by the rabid nationalist zealot Avigdor Lieberman who has skillfully made himself into Israel's king-maker.

Comment: Since this was written, Netanyahu was defeated and Benny Gantz of the Blue and White party will need to form a coalition to take power in Israel. Sadly, nothing Gilad has said above will change.

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