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Middle East Eye report: Saudi royals crackdown bigger in scale than reported, and violent

David Hearst
Middle Eastern Eye
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:16 UTC
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
© AFPCrown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has overseen arrest of hundreds of people, including senior royals, ministers and tycoons
Some senior figures detained in last Saturday's purge in Saudi Arabia were beaten and tortured so badly during their arrest or subsequent interrogations that they required hospital treatment, Middle East Eye can reveal.

People inside the royal court also told MEE that the scale of the crackdown, which has brought new arrests each day, is much bigger than Saudi authorities have admitted, with more than 500 people detained and double that number questioned.

Members of the royal family, government ministers and business tycoons were caught up in the sudden wave of arrests orchestrated by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, known as MBS, under the banner of an anti-corruption drive.

Comment: Take this report with a large handful of salt. From Middle East Eye's Wikipedia page:
The MEE is edited by David Hearst, the former chief foreign leader writer for the British daily The Guardian. MEE is wholly owned by Middle East Eye Ltd, a UK company that was incorporated in October 2015 which claims to employ about 20 full-time staff in its London offices. It also claims to have a network of freelance journalists. The sole director of M.E.E. Ltd is Jamal Bessasso (frequently published as Bassasso), a former director of planning and human resources at Al Jazeera.


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Rocket

Head of Russia's Federal Service for Military and Technical Cooperation Dmitry Shugayev: Russia, Saudi Arabia sign air defense contracts


TASS
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 19:47 UTC
S-400 missile systems
© Valeriy Sharifulin/TASSS-400 missile systems
Russia and Saudi Arabia have reached agreements on the supplies of S-400 missile systems

Russia and Saudi Arabia have signed contracts on air defense, Head of Russia's Federal Service for Military and Technical Cooperation Dmitry Shugayev told Rossiya 24 on Monday.

Comment: See also:

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Stop

EU sides with Lebanon, calls for unity and Hariri's return - warns against foreign interventions


Middle East Eye
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:41 UTC
Beirut Marathon
© ReutersParticipants at the annual Beirut Marathon, 12 November
The European Union on Monday urged Saad al-Hariri to return to Lebanon, calling on all political forces inside the country to focus on the domestic agenda and warning Saudi Arabia against meddling.

Hariri's resignation, announced from Riyadh, and its aftermath have put Lebanon at the forefront of regional rivalry between Iran and Saudi Arabia in recent days.

"We appeal first of all to the political forces to focus on Lebanon and what they can deliver to their citizens, Prime Minister Hariri to return to his country and the unity government ... to focus on domestic achievements," the bloc's top diplomat, Federica Mogherini, told reporters after hosting a meeting of all 28 EU foreign ministers in Brussels.

Hariri, who resigned saying he feared assassination in Lebanon, has criticised the Iran-backed Hezbollah and said he would rescind his resignation if the group agreed to stay out of regional conflicts.

But top Lebanese government officials and senior sources close to Hariri say Saudi Arabia coerced him into resigning and has put him under effective house arrest since he flew there more than a week ago

Comment: Hariri says he'll be back in Lebanon later this week. We'll see!

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Alarm Clock

U.S., Russia "thoroughly" discussing deployment of UN mission to Ukraine


TASS
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:34 UTC
ukraine soldier
© AP Photo/Max Black
Russia and the US have thoroughly discussed the possibility to deploy a UN mission to eastern Ukraine, Russian Presidential Aide Vladislav Surkov said following his meeting with US Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations Kurt Volker, held in Belgrade on November 13.

"We thoroughly discussed the Russian initiative on the deployment of a UN mission to Ukraine," he said.

During the meeting, the US representative presented proposals concerning the Russian-drafted resolution. "Our American friends presented their proposals concerning our Security Council draft resolution, which contained 29 paragraphs." "Our delegation came to the conclusion that three of them were acceptable," the Kremlin aide added. According to Surkov, the parties decided to continue the work to bring their positions closer.

Both Surkov and Volker were confident that "the Minsk Agreements should be implemented." "In order to do that, there is a need to accelerate the fulfillment of Kiev's political obligations and at the same time strengthen security in the conflict zone," Surkov said.

Comment: International law - what a novel idea! Thanks are due to the Russians for reminding Volker of its existence.

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Bad Guys

Mattis hints at long-term US military occupation of eastern Syria, 'in case ISIS comes back'


Times of India
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:24 UTC
Mattis
© Getty ImageUS Defense Secretary James Mattis
The US military will fight Islamic State in Syria "as long as they want to fight," Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Monday, describing a longer-term role for US troops long after the insurgents lose all of the territory they control.

As US-backed and Russian-backed forces battle to retake the remaining pockets of Islamic State-held terrain, Mattis said the US military's longer-term objective would be to prevent the return of an "ISIS 2.0."

"The enemy hasn't declared that they're done with the area yet, so we'll keep fighting as long as they want to fight," Mattis said, speaking to reporters at the Pentagon about the future of US operations in Syria.

He also stressed the importance of longer-term peace efforts, suggesting US forces aimed to help set the conditions of a diplomatic solution in Syria, now in its seventh year of civil war.

"We're not just going to walk away right now before the Geneva process has traction," he added.


Comment: Translation: "We're not to stay in Syria to ensure that peace doesn't break out."


Comment: That's new... The U.S. was never in Syria with the goal of setting up a diplomatic solution. While he hasn't made up his mind yet, Mattis is clearly considering keeping a U.S. military presence in the country illegally until the political process succeeds:
"We're not just going to walk away right now before the Geneva process has cracked. That doesn't mean everyone stays there. That doesn't mean for certain - certain troops are leaving. I'm just saying that we're going to condition - and I've honestly not made those decisions. We're going to make sure we set the conditions for a diplomatic solution... Not just, you know, fight the cop part of it and then say good luck on the rest of it. We did it for that - to support the diplomatic solution," Mattis said.
So Russia and Syria will take back all of ISIS's territory. Then, all the U.S. has to do is use the presence of some random jihadis in the "rebel"-held areas of Syria in order to justify spending eternity there - illegally. Mattis, you sure don't disappoint. What would the U.S. military be without brazen criminality?

Mattis' comments come as the Russians release more evidence - and their strongest condemnation yet - of direct US military support for 'ISIS' in Syria.

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Document

US House of Reps passes non-binding resolution criticizing Pentagon's 'imperial overstretch' in Yemen


RT
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:22 UTC
yemen destruction
© Khaled Abdullah / ReutersPeople stand at the site of an air strike in Sanaa, Yemen November 11, 2017
The US House of Representatives has passed a resolution which states Washington's support for the Saudi-led coalition in the Yemen war is unauthorized. However, the resolution does not call for an immediate halt to US assistance.

In a non-binding move, the lawmakers publicly acknowledged that the US military support for Saudi Arabia and its allies in Yemen, which involves sharing information and refueling warplanes, goes beyond what Congress has approved. It further explains that US forces are authorized to combat only Al-Qaeda or its affiliates as well as other terrorist groups in Yemen - but not the Houthi rebels that are targeted by the Saudis.

Congress "has not enacted specific legislation authorizing the use of military force against parties participating in the Yemeni civil war that are not otherwise subject to the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force [AUMF] or the 2003 AUMF in Iraq," the resolution says. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.), who co-sponsored the document with Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.), also drew attention to the fact that what the US military is doing goes beyond its authorized capacity.

Comment: The same 'debate' is going on in the UK and EU. It's all just phony indignation. They know there's no 'al Qaeda' independent of US/Western/Saudi-controlled mercenary forces fighting a proxy war against Iranian-backed Houthi rebels for control of the Middle East.

Notice that the Senate can't pass laws that rein in the Pentagon's warmongering, but it can do so for reining in Trump's peacemaking with Russia...

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Attention

Mother of Leigh Corfman, one of Roy Moore's accusers, has contradicted a key detail of her daughter's sexual misconduct story

Aaron Klein
Breitbart
Sun, 12 Nov 2017 00:00 UTC
Justice Roy Moore
© Wes Frazer/ Getty
The mother of Leigh Corfman, who says that Alabama Senatorial Candidate Roy Moore tried to engage in a sexual encounter with her when she was 14, has contradicted a key detail of Corfman's story.

Speaking by phone to Breitbart News on Saturday, Corfman's mother, Nancy Wells, 71, says that her daughter did not have a phone in her bedroom during the period that Moore is reported to have allegedly called Corfman - purportedly on Corfman's bedroom phone - to arrange at least one encounter.

Moore strongly denies Corfman's claims.

The Washington Post, which first published its newsmaking, on-the-record interview with Corfman last week, cited Corfman as remembering that she provided Moore with her number when she was 14. She said that she spoke to Moore from what she described as the phone in her bedroom.

Comment: This 'scandal' has all the earmarks of a political hit-job to sink Moore's campaign; the Democrat's will do anything necessary to smear a potential Trump ally in the Senate.

Roy Moore's accusers: One worked as Hillary campaign worker, another has history of false allegations

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Propaganda

WaPo calls Drudge "Russian operative", downplays the fact that he delivers 37% of their own referral traffic

Alex Christoforou
The Duran
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 18:04 UTC
drudge
The recent Washington Post article calling out Matt Drudge and his massive traffic engine, "Drudge Report" as a "Russian operative" is the definition of dumb...given the fact that Drudge delivers 37% of the WaPo's referral traffic.

The Jeff Bezos, CIA funded Washington Post ran an article suggesting Matt Drudge is a Russian operative for linking to RT, Sputnik News and InfoWars.

Drudge had to remind the stooges at the WaPo that he delivers a boatload of traffic, via curated links, to the Jeff Bezos, CIA fake news site.
drudge
Drudge tweeted to his 550k Twitter followers that Drudge Report gives Washington Post a massive 37% of its referral traffic.

In true liberal left, cry-baby fashion, instead of thanking the Drudge Report, The Washington Post runs this headline...

Comment: Just when you thought they couldn't get any dumber. But have a heart, it's a tough job being a presstitute. Since the first commandment is "Thou shalt blame they neighbor, Russia", presstitutes everywhere are forced to scrape the bottom of the barrel, searching for that one, tenuous connection, after which they can relax for the evening, when the news cycle starts up again, and they must dive even deeper in search of more fake news. Hug a journalist; they need it. (Give them a bath first, though: they're filthy.) In their write-up on KGB asset codename DRUDGE, WaPo also wrote (warning: that's a link to RT):
The Washington Post report said that Drudge repeatedly linked stories directly to RT and Sputnik. "There are probably two reasons that the Drudge Report linked to these sites with regularity," it said. "The first is that Drudge's taste in news often tends toward the more exotic; he clearly understands the sorts of things that people like to read. The other is that Drudge himself seems to share some of the same sense of impending apocalypse and systemic collapse that undergirds a lot of the reports from these sites," the Washington Post added.
Translation: because people like RT, and because their reports are objective.

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Bulb

Nigel Farage calls for Soros' Open Society to be investigated over political collusion and subversion


RT
Tue, 14 Nov 2017 17:51 UTC
Nigel Farage
© Stefan Wermuth / ReutersNigel Farage
Nigel Farage says while Russia is accused of funding Britain's 'Leave' campaign, financier George Soros' recent $18 billion donation to pro-EU charity Open Society has escaped scrutiny. "This is where the real international political collusion is," Farage says.

Speaking to the European Parliament in Strasbourg on Tuesday, Farage told fellow MEPs he believes that when it comes to international collusion, "we are looking in the wrong place." He says Soros' influence in Brussels is "truly extraordinary," adding: "I fear we could be looking at the biggest level of international, political collusion in history."

Farage, the leader of the Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy Group, believes Soros has spent billions in the EU to undermine the nation state. "When we are talking about offshore money, when we are talking about political subversion, when we are talking about collusion, I wonder if we are looking in the wrong place.
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Cell Phone

President Trump just hinted at something YUGE upon his return to the White House

@realDonaldTrump
Twitter
Mon, 13 Nov 2017 17:47 UTC
Donald Trump
© REUTERS/Thomas PeterU.S. President Donald Trump and China's Premier Li Keqiang (not pictured) meet at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China, November 9, 2017.

Comment: Uranium One? Hillary investigation? Pedogate? Podesta indictments? Wall prototype unveiling? Nuclear war? (We jest.) We'll just have to wait and see.

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