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No return to 2015 agreement - Iran will probably completely scale down nuclear commitments by 2020

Elijah J. Magnier
ejmagnier.com
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 17:19 UTC
rouhani
French President Emmanuel Macron failed to promote successfully his Iranian initiative with the US administration despite the initial blessing of his US counterpart. This failure led Iran to make a third gradual withdrawal from its JCPOA nuclear deal commitment, raising two main issues. Iran has become a regional power to be reckoned with, so we can now scrap from reactions to its policies the words "submit," or "bow to the international community". Moreover, since Europe is apparently no longer in a position to fulfil its commitments, Iran will now be headed towards a total pull-out following further gradual withdrawal steps. Just before the US elections due in November 2020, Iran is expected to become a nuclear country with the full capability of producing uranium enriched to more than 20% uranium-235, weapons-usable and therefore in a position to manufacture dozens of nuclear bombs (for which uranium must be enriched to about 90%). However, this does not necessarily mean that this is Iran's ultimate objective.

Industry data shows that half of the effort goes into enriching from 0.7% to 4%. If Iran reaches the level of 20%, the journey towards 90% is almost done. A few thousand centrifuges are needed to reach 20% enrichment while a few hundred are enough to cross from 20% to the 90% needed for a nuclear bomb. When Iran announces it is reaching a level which is considered critical by the west, there is the possibility that Israel might act militarily against Iran's capability as it did in Iraq in 1981, in Syria in 2009, and in assassinating nuclear scientists. If this happens, the Middle East will be exposed to a mega earthquake whose outcome is unpredictable. But if Israel and the US are not in a position to react against Iran's total withdrawal from the JCPOA (nuclear deal), Iran will no longer accept a return to the 2015 deal. Its position will become much stronger and any deal would be difficult to reach.
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Pirates

Taliban vows jihad after Trump walks away from peace talks he dubs 'dead'


Sputnik
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 17:08 UTC
taliban
© AFP 2019 / FARIDULLAH AHMADZAI
The Taliban vowed on Tuesday to continue fighting against American forces in Afghanistan after the US president withdrew from peace talks with the group, Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said as quoted by AFP.

"We had two ways to end the occupation in Afghanistan, one was jihad and fighting, the other was talks and negotiations", Taliban spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid told AFP.

The spokesman added that as there's no further way of resolving the Afghan issue through negotiations, the Taliban will take the path of jihad - one the US will regret.

Trump said Monday, after calling off secret Camp David meetings with the Taliban and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani that the talks with the movement were "dead".


Comment: More from Trump's statement:
U.S. President Donald Trump, asked about the state of U.S.-Taliban peace talks, has said: "They're dead. As far as I'm concerned, they're dead."

Trump made the comments while addressing reporters at the White House on September 9, two days after he announced on Twitter that he had cancelled secret talks with Afghan and Taliban officials in the United States.

He reiterated earlier statements that he made the decision after the Taliban carried out a recent car bombing in Kabul that killed 12 people, including a U.S. soldier.

"They thought they had to kill people in order to put themselves in a little better negotiating position. When they did that they killed 12 people," Trump said.

"You can't do that can't do that with me," he added, saying that "we've hit the Taliban harder in the last four days that they've been hit in over 10 years. So that's the way it is."

Trump said that the plan to invite the Taliban, who have been involved in Afghan peace negotiations with the United States for months, to the U.S. presidential retreat Camp David "was my idea, and it was my idea to terminate it."
...
Trump, who has said he would like to reduce U.S. troop numbers to about 8,600, addressed promises made since his presidential campaign to leave Afghanistan.

"Yeah, we'd like to get out," he said. "But we'll get out at the right time."

Comment: As the Taliban made these threats, they followed them up by taking control over the Yangi Qala district in Afghanistan (the second district in 2 weeks, the first being Anar Darah). Local government troops retreated over fear of casualties, sent reinforcements, but lost the district after fighting.

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Chess

Turkey accuses US of stalling implementation of Syria 'safe zone' agreement


Sputnik
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 15:59 UTC
us soldier turkey syria
© Agence France-Presse/Delil Souleiman
A US soldier stands guard during a joint patrol with Turkish troops in the Syrian village of al-Hashisha on the outskirts of Tal Abyad town along the border with Turkey, on September 8, 2019.
On Sunday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said, as quoted by Reuters, that Ankara has disagreements with Washington "at every step" amid negotiations on the establishment of a safe zone in Syria.

According to Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, Ankara wants to work with the US on safe zones, but for now, Washington's approach to the issue is unsatisfactory.

"Since we started negotiations, the first step was made with the United States - the creation of a coordination centre [on the safe zone]... We see that they started dragging it out again," Cavusoglu told reporters.

Comment: Notice no one's bothered to ask Syria about the continuing encroachment on its sovereign territory.

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Airplane Paper

Another Israeli drone crashes - this time in Gaza


Sputnik
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 17:01 UTC
heron tp drone
© AP Photo / Ariel Schalit
According to the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), the UAV fell in the Gaza Strip last night. In the meantime, Hamas has claimed that it seized the aircraft.

"During the night the IDF drone fell in the southern Gaza Strip. The incident is being investigated", the tweet says.

The aircraft was downed amid a recent escalation of tensions in the region. The IDF struck positions of the Palestinian Hamas movement last week after a drone attack against an Israeli military vehicle.

The incident followed the reported deaths of two Palestinian teens in clashes with IDF soldiers along the border, where mass rallies have been held since March 2018. According to the local health ministry, another 46 protesters were injured.

The Hezbollah organisation earlier stated it had downed another Israeli unmanned aircraft over southern Lebanon near the settlement of Ramiyah. The IDF subsequently confirmed it had crashed, but didn't comment on the possible causes of the incident.

Comment: Like most politicians, Netanyahu is trying to ensure reelection by lighting as many fires as possible. Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine... Hezbollah and its allies are ready for war, and Netanyahu seems to be doing everything he can to make that a possibility. While he has been careful to push things only so far, avoiding all-out war, this kind of hubris is what leads to disasters. See also:

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Stock Up

JPMorgan launches 'Volfefe Index' tracking how Trump's tweets impact markets

Daniel Avery
Newsweek
Mon, 09 Sep 2019 16:53 UTC
trump tweets
© jpmorgan
PMorgan Chase has created a special index to track how President Donald Trump's tweets impact interest rates and other economic indicators.

The "Volfefe Index," as it's known, is a portmanteau of "volatility" and "covfefe," a term President Trump used in a 2017 tweet that soon became a viral sensation.

The firm's analysts found that Trump's Twitter activity has grown of late, as has its impact: Since taking office, the president has averaged more than 10 tweets a day, totally approximately 14,000 tweets since taking in January 2017.

"The subject of these tweets has increasingly turned toward market-moving topics, most prominently trade and monetary policy," JPMorgan Chase said in a statement. "And we find strong evidence that tweets have increasingly moved U.S. rates markets immediately after publication."

JPMorgan noted that Trump's "market-moving" tweets used similar keywords — China, billions, dollar, tariffs and trade — though they were less likely to be retweeted or liked.

"We can move toward a rough estimate of how much these market-moving tweets have pushed up volatility pricing in the swaptions market," JPMorgan said. "This index can explain a measurable fraction of moves in implieds, particularly in shorter tails (2-year rates, and 5-year rates, as opposed to 10-year rates)."
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Info

German FM's meeting with Hong Kong activist angers China


The Straits Times
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 16:43 UTC
wong haas
© AFP / Michael Kappeler
Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong (L) talks with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas as they attend the "Bild100" event organised by Germany's tabloid Bild on September 9, 2019 in Berlin.
China expressed anger on Tuesday (Sept 10) after German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas met prominent Hong Kong activist Joshua Wong, saying that no foreign country had a right to interfere in China's internal affairs.

Wong met Maas on Monday (Sept 9) in Berlin at an event hosted by the German newspaper BILD.

After being held for around 24 hours at the Hong Kong airport on Sunday for allegedly breaching the terms of his bail, Wong arrived in Berlin late on Monday evening, where he said he would "continue his battle for free elections".

The timing is especially awkward as German Chancellor Angela Merkel visited Beijing last week. Hong Kong has been gripped by weeks of protests, initially against a now-shelved extradition bill and now focused more on securing greater freedoms for Hong Kong.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said China was "extremely dissatisfied and resolutely opposed" to German allowing Wong to visit and to allow him to meet the German foreign minister.

"China has already lodged stern representations with the German side," Hua told a daily news briefing.

Comment: What's more, Maas met Wong in the company of White Helmets (aka Al Qaeda) leaders and Kiev coup leaders...

wong germany white helmets
Color revolutionaries of the world, unite!

See also:

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Star of David

Masks off: Netanyahu vows to annex all settlements, starting with Jordan Valley, if elected


The Jerusalem Post
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 16:32 UTC
netanyahu annex west bank election
© Avshalom Sassoni
Benjamin Netanyahu announces that if reelected, he will extend Israeli sovereignty over the Jordan Valley, September 10 2019.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced on Tuesday that if he is re-elected, he will express Israeli sovereignty over all the Jewish settlements in Judea and Samaria, starting with the Jordan Valley.

Netanyahu said the steps would be taken in coordination with the administration of US President Donald Trump. He revealed that Trump intends to announce his Middle East peace plan the day after the September 17 election.

"This is an historic opportunity that we may not have again," Netanyahu said in his statement that he delivered at Ramat Gan's Kfar Hamaccabiah Hotel.

Pointing to a map of the Jordan Valley, he said Israel could carry out the plan without annexing a single Palestinian and while ensuring that Palestinians maintain complete freedom of movement.

Comment: What a disgusting display of Zionist sycophancy.

RT reports:
The annexation of the Jordan Valley will be Netanyahu's first step if elected next week, the Prime Minister said, with further land claims to come after the publication of US President Donald Trump's long-awaited Israel-Palestine peace plan. Netanyahu called the plan a "historic opportunity" to negotiate the future of the region with Trump.

Though he did not address the matter directly, some observers took Netanyahu's bold pronouncement as evidence that the annexation had been coordinated with Trump. However, the Israeli leader instead asked voters for the mandate to make Israel's case to the US.

"Who will negotiate with Trump, who will conscript him on our side?" he asked, "me or Lapid and Gantz?" referring to opposition leaders Yair Lapid and Benny Gantz.



Some commenters, however, saw Tuesday's announcement as mere election bluster. The speech was "a clear play by Likud for right-wing votes," wrote Israeli journalist Neri Zilber.

"It's a meaningless policy/diversion tactic to wrest control of the agenda and take votes away from other right-wing parties," Haaretz journalist Anshel Pfeffer commented. "He hasn't got an annexation policy. Yet."


Speaking shortly before Netanyahu's announcement, Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh called his Israeli counterpart the "chief destroyer of the peace process," and warned that "any foolish move he makes will have negative consequences for him in the domestic and international arena."

Though it lies within Palestinian territory, the area concerned is currently under full Israeli control, and has been since the signing of the Oslo Accords by the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel in 1993 and 1995. The Jordan Valley makes up 60 percent of the West Bank's territory, but is sparsely populated.

Though "annexation" is a headline-grabbing word, Netanyahu had already ruled out an Israeli withdrawal from the area earlier this summer. Speaking with US National Security Advisor John Bolton in June, Netanyahu stated that any future peace plan with the Palestinians must guarantee Israel a presence in the Jordan Valley, which he said "guarantees stability and security for the entire region."

Before hanging on to power in April's election, Netanyahu also said he would move to annex the West Bank if elected, claiming "a Palestinian state will endanger our existence."


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Chess

Maduro convenes Defense Council to address Colombia's 'war-mongering' behavior


RT
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 16:26 UTC
marine
© REUTERS/Vitaly Nevar
Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro has convened a National Defense Council to discuss Colombia's alleged attempts to send terrorists and turncoat officers to Venezuela to disrupt its military infrastructure.

In a televised address on Monday, Maduro pulled no punches as he went on yet another verbal offensive against Colombia and its president, Ivan Duque, accusing his government of plotting attacks on public infrastructure, as well as on civilian and military sites.

"I have decided to convene, in accordance with Article 323, the Defense Council to address the issue of the warlike threat of the government of Colombia against our beloved homeland of Venezuela," the embattled Maduro said.

Maduro further insisted that he has evidence to support his claims about Colombia's nefarious plans to topple his government and impose Venezuela's opposition leader Juan Guaido.
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Satellite

US General Dunford warns Russia, China, North Korea, Iran are trying to 'contest' US space supremacy


Sputnik
Fri, 06 Sep 2019 13:20 UTC
space wars
© CC0
The remarks come a week after the Trump administration's reactivation of 'Space Command' - a DoD unit aimed at 'defending America's vital interests in space.' President Trump has called outer space "the next warfighting domain," possibly putting the US commitment to the 1967 Outer Space Treaty into question.

The United States has several major adversaries, including Russia, which challenge US supremacy in space, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford has indicated.

"In the 1990s, when we fielded a lot of capabilities in space, we assumed that space would be uncontested. And space today is contested," Dunford said, while speaking at a panel at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, DC on Thursday.

"Adversaries to include North Korea, to include Russia, to include China, to include in a developmental way Iran, have all developed capabilities that threaten our space capabilities," the general added.

Comment: The only reason that China, Russia, etc. are even considering the development of space-based militarization is because the US is so consumed with the goal of "full spectrum dominance" - and so willing to throw away previous treaties and agreements that have been in place for decades.

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Megaphone

'Pulp fiction': Kremlin says alleged CIA mole was a minor official with no access to Putin


RT
Tue, 10 Sep 2019 15:44 UTC
putin
© Sputnik/Alexei Druzhinin
A former official identified in media reports as a CIA asset in Russia worked in the presidential administration but never had access to Vladimir Putin, the Kremlin has claimed, adding that the man was fired several years ago.

US media reported on Monday that US intelligence carried out an operation in 2017 to extract a high-level Russian official who had worked as an informant for the CIA.


Comment: This story is partly about portraying Trump as Putin's stooge, which is just a sad and pathetic attempt at smearing Trump at this point. But, imagine if the situation were reversed - a Russian intelligence agent was found to be embedded in Trump's cabinet and hastily spirited back to Russia. The media would be crowing from the hills about "Russian aggression" and Putin's evil tactics to undermine the great holy American nation. Yet when the US does it, not an eye is batted and essentially the media pats the CIA on the head for doing a good job attempting to undermine the evil Russians. The hypocrisy of the West knows no bounds.


The incendiary claim has triggered a race to identify the alleged spy. Kommersant, a Russian daily, reported on Tuesday that the official may have been a man named Oleg Smolenkov.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Smolenkov worked in the government, but said he did not hold a senior position and was fired in 2016 or 2017.

Comment: This is a pathetic attempt by CIA to try to sow doubt in Russia. If they had someone sending 'secrets for decades' how come the US got its ass handed to it in Syria? How come they have been unable to do anything to stop Russia's rapid expansion on the world stage?

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