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Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud is King of Saudi Arabia He is 84 years old and said to be in ill health. Social media mill grinding out the rumours he is in critical condition. https://twitter.com/AliAlAhmed_en/status/1307847955639083008

U.S. Africa Command says that at least two MiG-29 Fulcrum fighter jets, possibly piloted by shadowy Russian mercenaries, have crashed in Libya. Jared Szuba, the Pentagon correspondent for AI-Monitor, Tweeted out that one of the jets was apparently lost on June 28, while the other went down on September 7, 2020. This information had come in a statement from Rear Admiral Heidi Berg, U.S. Africa Command's (AFRICOM) director of intelligence. Another tweet indicates that Berg believes that "Russian fighter aircraft," presumably MiG-29s too, but potentially also Su-24 Fencer strike aircraft, have conducted airstrikes in Libya. AI-Monitor's Szuba follows that up...

For decades, foreign policy experts—the blob—assumed much about the Middle East that has turned out to be completely wrong. It’s been remarkable to watch the mainstream press and official Washington try to downplay the significance of the peace deal the Trump administration brokered between Israel and two Arab states this week.The signing of the Abraham Accords on Tuesday between Israel, the United Arab Emirates, and Bahrain at the White House, which for the first time normalized relations between Israel and the two Persian Gulf states, is by any measure historic. It’s been 26 years since any Arab state recognized Israel,...

Two weeks ago, during a routine excavation work at the mastaba of the Sixth-Dynasty lector-priest Sennedjem, archaeologists from the SCA stumbled upon what is believed to be a cache of mummies of the 26th Dynasty... inside an 11- metre deep burial shaft excavated inside the Sennedjem mastaba. Although the mastaba dates from a much earlier period, the shaft is intrusive... One of the newly-discovered, 2,600- year-old wooden coffins was still sealed... From the finely carved inscription on the coffin, Hawass was able to determine that the mummy belonged to a man named Padi-Heri, the son of Djehuty-Sesh-Nub and the grandson...

A team of archeologists recently found 13 Egyptian coffins that have been sealed for over 2,500 years. Egypt's Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities recently shared some news on their Facebook page, explaining that archaeologists uncovered an unexpected cache -- or more specifically, a well -- of more than 13 sealed wooden coffins that are believed to be as old as 2,500 years in the Saqqara Necropolis in Egypt. They report that, according to preliminary studies, these coffins are sealed off and haven't been opened since their initial burial a couple of millennia ago. It is important to mention that this...

The US is cutting aid to Ethiopia over a controversial mega dam being built on a tributary of the River Nile. The move was triggered by Ethiopia's move to start filling the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam before reaching agreement with Egypt and Sudan. Egypt has long been opposed to any development on the Nile that could reduce the amount of water it receives. Ethiopia says it needs the dam to provide a reliable electricity supply. Once fully operational, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (Gerd) will be the largest hydro-electric plant in Africa and provide power to up to 65 million...

Rejecting peace for an entire century. Israel’s legendary Foreign Minister Abba Eban had famously quipped that “the Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” It is the most fitting attribute for the Palestinians. Historically, they have said no to the British Peel Commission of 1937, which promised them a state on 75% of mandatory Palestine. The Yishuv, Palestine’s Jews, who were originally called Palestinians during the British Mandate (1920-1948) said yes, despite of being offered a small piece of the second partition of Palestine. In the first partition of Mandatory Palestine, in 1922, Winston Churchill, then British Colonial Secretary, sliced off...

The normalization agreement between the UAE and Israel has effectively ended the racist BDS movement. A Palestinian man walks by a grafitti sign calling to boycott Israel seen on a street in the West Bank city of Bethlehem on February 11, 2015. (photo credit: MIRIAM ALSTER/FLASH90) With the recent developments between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, it’s become clearer than ever that there’s no future for the discriminatory and racist Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. From its inception, the movement was rooted in a desire to destroy the State of Israel as we know it. While cleverly presenting itself...

Hamas spokesperson Mushir al-Masri has said that the terror organization has decided to "remove the siege" in any way possible, Arab media reported. Al-Masri added that "if the negotiation efforts fail, it will mean that the Zionist enemy will experience a siege in the heart of the bomb shelters." "Since we have nothing to lose, we will not accept the continuation of the siege, the force, and the enemy's attempt to use the coronavirus plague to renew the siege on the Palestinian nation. All options are open." Meanwhile, the Qatari emissary to Gaza confirmed the continuation of negotiations to restore...

Around 2000 B.C., a baker in the ancient Egyptian city of Thebes captured yeast from the air and kneaded it into a triangle of dough. Once baked, the bread was buried in a dedication ceremony beneath the temple of Pharaoh Mentuhotep II on the west bank of the Nile. There the yeast slept like a microbial mummy for four millennia, until 2019. That’s when Seamus Blackley—a physicist and game designer best known for creating the Xbox—suctioned it up with a syringe and revived it in a sourdough starter. Blackley, an amateur Egyptologist, often thinks about this ancient baker as he...

President Trump and his administration facilitated a historic, world-changing peace treaty between Israel and the United Arab Emirates. The “Abraham Accord” is the first peace treaty since the Israel-Jordan treaty signed 26 years ago. This was a stroke of diplomatic genius and I applaud the hard work of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the countless others. I remember Egyptian President Anwar El Sadat’s courageous visit to Israel in 1977 and the resulting peace between the two countries. I was nearly 30 at the time, and even though I had left Egypt many years earlier, I was thrilled at the...

Ancient Romans and Egyptians imported monkeys from India as household pets, Polish archaeologists have discovered. By examining the skeletons of monkeys buried in the animal cemetery in the Red Sea port of Berenice researchers found that the primates were rhesus macaques endemic to India, rather than some local species. Archaeologists from the Warsaw University's Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology were in the process of excavating a vast animal cemetery when they came across the monkey skeletons. For years they assumed they belonged to guenon species, quite common in this area. It was only by using 3D scanners and comparing the bones...

Speaking to Anadolu Agency, Gen. Abdulhadi Dirah, the spokesman for the army's Sirte-Jufra Joint Operations Unit, said that carrying military ammunition, Ilyushin-type planes conducted five flights to Sirte and Jufra provinces on Saturday. Carrying Bashar al-Assad regime's soldiers, two more flights were made from Syria to Benghazi, the second biggest Libyan city, which is the center of the Haftar's forces, Dirah said. Libya has been torn by civil war since the ouster of late ruler Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The government was founded in 2015 under a UN-led agreement, but efforts for a long-term political settlement failed due to a...

“in an apparent accident, while preparing explosives.” Four terrorists from Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s Saraya al Quds brigade died in an explosion at their facility in Sajaiya, in eastern Gaza City. They were killed “in an apparent accident, while preparing explosives.” This is what commonly is referred to as a “work accident,” a topic we have covered many times: Four terrorists from Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s Saraya al Quds brigade died in an explosion at their facility in Sajaiya, in eastern Gaza City. They were killed “in an apparent accident, while preparing explosives.” This is what commonly is referred to as a...

An Egyptian government-appointed village mayor has just ruled that a Christian family must sell its home and leave their village, in what is being described as a strange and unprecedented incident for that village. This happened during a traditional “reconciliation session.”  In Egypt, local authorities and involved parties of a dispute often meet outside of courtrooms in an effort to resolve matters and restore peace before getting the law involved. The case revolves around a Christian youth who accidentally hit and killed a Muslim girl with his motorcycle in the narrow streets of the village of Hawarat al-Maqta.  Despite the...

Speaker Nancy Pelosi called Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's Republican National Convention address from Jerusalem "appalling" on Tuesday.  The House Speaker told MSNBC's "Andrea Mitchell Reports" that Pompeo's convention speech, which was pre-recorded in Israel during official diplomatic travel, violated State Department rules for employees not to participate in partisan activities

(IsraelNN.com) Hamas spokesman Mahmoud Zahar issued a demand Sunday evening that Israel remove the stripes from its flag. "Israel must remove the two blue stripes from its national flag", Zahar said. "The stripes are symbols of occupation – they signify Israel's borders, stretching from the River Euphrates to the River Nile." The Hamas official's comments followed Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz's assessment at the weekly Cabinet meeting that the newly elected terror group was "acting responsibly so far." Zahar also told CNN's Late Edition that the world should not be asking Hamas to recognize Israel, but rather demanding that the Jewish...

Sudan hosted the landmark Arab conference after the 1967 Mideast war where eight Arab countries approved the "three no's": no peace with Israel, no recognition of Israel and no negotiations. In 1993, the U.S. designated Sudan a state sponsor of terrorism in part for its support of a number of anti-Israel militant groups, including Hamas and Hezbollah. But in recent years those hostilities have softened, and both countries have expressed readiness to normalize relations. Sky News Arabia quoted a Sudanese Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying his government looked forward to a peace agreement "based on equality and Sudanese interests." "There...

Despite being hailed as a "peace deal," the UAE-Israel agreement will more likely prolong ongoing regional wars. It will intensify conflict in those contested zones of the Middle East where the two blocs back rival actors -- primarily Yemen, Libya, and Syria. The insurgent bloc is winning in all three conflicts. The UAE has proved that its main strategy in these conflicts is to control the policymaking of its allies. Emirati leaders have leveraged their relationships in Riyadh and Washington over the last three years to give them or their proxies a free hand to fight in these contested zones....

Folks, Secretary Mike Pompeo gave a talk in Israel alongside Prime Minister Netanyahu. The Fake News and Search Engines are doing everything in their power from having the public hear/see the wonderful praise Netanyahu gave the Trump Administration today. Netanyahu laid all the cards on the table. He crushed Obama's Iran policy and gave a stirring endorsement of President Trump. I could not find his speech on Youtube or any outlet, but here's the transcript of his remarks from the State Department directly.