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US State Department outraged over Hungary's new 'foreign supported' NGO bill

Hungary flag
The US Department of State has warned the Hungarian government against adopting the law requiring that NGOs receiving more than $26,000 in donations from abroad be registered as "foreign-supported organizations."

Hungary will take another step away from NATO and EU principles if it signs a measure which imposes limitations on foreign-funded non-governmental organizations, the US Department of State said in a press release.

Comment: The State Department sees any movement toward sovereignty as an attack on the "principles and values central to the EU and NATO". It's perfectly reasonable for foreign funded NGO's to register as being foreign funded. Of course that blows the cover of one of the US' primary tools for control, and that is why Russia made the same move.


Bad Guys

Birds of a feather: US awards Saudi Arabia war-criminals with $185 million contract for support services to fighter-bomber fleet

saudi fighter jets
The Al Raha Group for Technical Services based in Riyadh has received a more than $185 million US Air Force contract to provide support services for Saudi Arabia's air fleet of US-supplied F-15 Eagle fighter bombers, the Department of Defense said in a press release.

"Al Raha Group for Technical Services (RGTS), Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, has been awarded a $185.7 million... contract for F-15 Saudi Arabia depot prime vendor support services," the announcement said on Monday.

Under the contract, the company will obtain procurement services, warehousing, and bench stocking of consumables and spares for the Royal Saudi Air Force F-15 program over the next three and a half months until October 4, 2017, the Defense Department said in a press release. The Saudi Air Force F-15 force has been heavily involved in the bombing campaign of rebel-held areas in Yemen in which an estimated 10,000 civilians have so far been killed.

Star of David

Jerusalem, Nicosia and WW3: What is Israel up to in Cyprus?

Israel-Europe gas pipeline map
Cypriot Press reported last week on a large joint Israeli-Cypriot military drill.

The following Israeli video publicizes an elite Israeli commando brigade engaged in aggressive military routines around Cyprus' Troodos Mountain range.

Stop

World remains silent: Yemeni general vows to respond to deadly Saudi airstrikes

Yemen house destroyed by Suadi Arabia
© AP Photo/ Hani Mohammed
Dozens of people were killed in the north of Yemen during an airstrike, carried out by the Saudi-led coalition on June 18. In an interview with Sputnik Arabic, a representative of the Yemeni army, Brigadier General Aziz Rashid, said that the attack was not an accident.

The UN Security Council has recently issued a resolution calling on Yemeni forces to cease attacks against the Saudi army.
According to Rashid, the resolution has given a green light to the Arab coalition to continue airtrikes against Yemeni citizens.

"The world is silent about the crimes committed against Yemen by the international coalition and terrorist organizations financed by certain countries," Rashid said.

"But we, the Yemeni army, tell our compatriots that these crimes will not remain unpunished. The response to the committed crimes will be an attack on military infrastructure in the center of Saudi Arabia. We will choose the right time to respond to this aggression," he added.

Network

Obama administration ignored Russia's proposal for a cyber war treaty

putin obama
© Sputnik/Kremlin/Alexei DruzhininNo love lost.
Much of the legal turmoil that has swept through Washington in recent months can be traced back to one major thing: Russia's alleged hacking of the 2016 presidential election in US president Donald Trump's favor.

Now, Russian president Vladimir Putin (who denies any Russian part in the hacking) claims the Obama administration ignored a proposal in 2015 that might have avoided all of this. His administration suggested working out a cyber treaty with the US but was ignored by Obama officials, Putin told film director Oliver Stone in Showtime's four-part series broadcast this week.

"A year and a half ago, in fall 2015, we made proposal to our American partners that we work through these issues and conclude a treaty on the rules of behavior in this sphere," he said in Stone's documentary The Putin Interviews. "The American side was silent, they didn't reply to us."

Comment: Putin is entirely correct when he says Russia had nothing to do with the DNC's email debacle or the election's outcome. Killary's own hubris in thinking she could flout basic data security protocols with a home-brewed, unsecure server, plus her complete disdain for her staff did the trick just fine.


Eye 1

Google says will do more to suppress terrorist propaganda

Google logo
© Baz Ratner / Reuters
Alphabet Inc.'s Google says it is creating new policies and practices to suppress terrorism-related videos, a response to U.K. lawmakers who have said the internet is a petri dish for radical ideology.
Google will increase its use of technology to identify extremist and terrorism-related videos across its sites, which include YouTube, and will boost the number of people who screen for terrorism-related content, Google's General Counsel Kent Walker wrote in an editorial in the Financial Times Sunday. The company will also be more aggressive in putting warnings on and limiting the reach of content that, while not officially forbidden, is still inflammatory.

"While we and others have worked for years to identify and remove content that violates our policies, the uncomfortable truth is that we, as an industry, must acknowledge that more needs to be done," Walker wrote.

Bad Guys

Theresa May's 'Bedfellow from Hell': The History of the Democratic Unionist Party

Democratic Unionist Party DUP
Following Theresa May's loss of majority the Democratic Unionist Party, DUP, from Northern Ireland has suddenly come to international prominence. Who are they, what do they want, and what does their propping up of a UK government mean for that country and all the others who have to deal with it?

Very few people in mainland UK could answer these questions. Everyone has a vague idea about Northern Ireland being divided into Protestant and Catholic, Loyalist and Republican, but few want to know any more because everyone of voting age has lived through The Troubles and their aftermath.

For most people living in the UK Northern Ireland equals violence, terrorism, extremism and intractable political differences. But few nowadays want to think about Northern Ireland, because it is too complicated to understand and too unpleasant to try to understand. However now they are being forced to, as their futures are bound up with whether the DUP reaches an agreement with the Conservatives, and if so, what these Northern Ireland people will want in return from a country already long sick of them.

Comment: Further reading: Meet the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP), Britain's loyal fundamentalists in Ireland


USA

Will Trump make America last?

Trump
Will Trump Set a Record for the History Books?

In its own inside-out, upside-down way, it's almost wondrous to behold. As befits our president's wildest dreams, it may even prove to be a record for the ages, one for the history books. He was, after all, the candidate who sensed it first. When those he was running against, like the rest of Washington's politicians, were still insisting that the United States remained at the top of its game, not an -- but the -- "indispensable nation," the only truly "exceptional" one on the face of the Earth, he said nothing of the sort. He campaigned on America's decline, on this country's increasing lack of exceptionality, its potential dispensability. He ran on the single word "again" -- as in "make America great again" -- because (the implication was) it just isn't anymore. And he swore that he and he alone was the best shot Americans, or at least non-immigrant white Americans, had at ever seeing the best of days again.

In that sense, he was our first declinist candidate for president and if that didn't tell you something during the election season, it should have. No question about it, he hit a chord, rang a bell, because out in the heartland it was possible to sense a deepening reality that wasn't evident in Washington. The wealthiest country on the planet, the most militarily powerful in the history of... well, anybody, anywhere, anytime (or so we were repeatedly told)... couldn't win a war, not even with the investment of trillions of taxpayer dollars, couldn't do anything but spread chaos by force of arms.

Snakes in Suits

Brexit: Negotiations begin as a weakened May struggles with DUP deal

important pink men
© Francois Lenoir / ReutersThe European Union's chief Brexit negotiator Michael Barnier (R) welcomes Britain's Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union David Davis.
Formal Brexit negotiations began on Monday morning, but Prime Minister Theresa May still finds herself scrambling to shore up support in the House of Commons.

The PM would love to have commanded a strong Tory majority to pursue her hard-Brexit ambitions. Instead, after a disastrous General Election showing, she finds herself chasing a damaging deal with controversial allies, the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP). The elusive deal may not be in place in time for Wednesday's state opening of Parliament.

Meeting in Brussels on Monday morning, Brexit Secretary David Davis and his European Union counterpart, Michel Barnier, agreed to meet every four weeks over the next 16 to 18 months to discuss the future settlement between Brussels and Westminster. Negotiations will include topics such as the rights of EU citizens in Britain, British citizens living in the EU, Britain's relationship with the customs union and the single market. The UK's full withdrawal from the bloc should be formalized in 2019.


Comment: "Mayday! Mayday!" Britain's ruling impression reads like a blustery squall, even more so in uncharted Brexit waters.


Target

The West contends Muslims represent a major threat, or do they?

Trump Muslims
© Reuters/Rick Wilking/Alessandro Garofalo/SalonAmerica has changed, at least in the minds and opinions of outsiders.
Upon witnessing what looks like an unending stream of terrorist attacks in Europe that was preceded by a major influx of refugees attempting to escape war and destruction that the West created across the Middle East and North Africa, it's safe to say that Islamophobia is here to stay, at least among political circles in the EU and US. Earlier this year, US President Donald Trump went as far as to prohibit citizens of a total of seven Muslim-majority nations from entering the United States.


Comment: ...until a proper and upgraded review of security protocol and procedures were in place. This was never meant to be a permanent ban. Many terror attacks, suspiciously perpetrated to prod the public towards Islamophobia, are suspected of being false flags utilizing compromised individuals or agency actors to further a propagandized agenda and political advantage.


One cannot ignore the possibility of new terrorist attacks being committed in the future, so the fear that most Europeans share these days cannot be discarded as groundless. But those attacks don't represent a major threat either to the EU or the US. It should be remembered that back in 2016 terrorist attacks resulted in in the death of a total of 150 Europeans. However, in the same region a total of 26,000 perished in car accidents, while another 400,000 died from extreme levels of air pollution. Yet, European politicians and media sources are inclined to present the string of terrorist attacks that hit the EU as both evil and as an existential threat.

Comment: Every perceived threat needs a perceived enemy. Create the threat and Western nature, with some calculated guidance, will do the rest. Like smoke to fire, all it takes is someone fanning the flame.