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Betzalel Smotrich, Deputy Speaker of the Knesset, has written a letter to US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro that is worth reading in full: [Emphasis below mine, SB] His Excellency Mr. Daniel B. Shapiro Ambassador of the United States of America to the State of Israel Honorable Sir: Re: The Position of the State Department of the United States regarding the issue of the illegal Arab encampment adjacent to the town of Susiya Last week, a statement was issued by the State Department of the United States (Mr. Kirby) relating to the issue of an illegal Arab encampment near the...

Only an hour ago we had been lamenting yet another incredibly bad road. Here in the Ugandan outback, it is as pointless to complain about the roads as it is to complain about politicians in America, but railing against the unchangeable can lighten the mood. But on the way out of a small village in the Bukedea region of Uganda, we didn’t feel the bumps. That was when our team’s defenses failed, and when the gravity of the assault on women—perpetrated by the champions of “women’s health” and “empowerment”—really hit home. It may have been just me, but my guess...

Just days after the Obama White House accused House Speaker John Boehner of “breaking protocol” by inviting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to address a joint session of Congress, a team of up to five Obama campaign operatives has reportedly arrived in Israel to lead a campaign to defeat the Israeli Prime Minister in upcoming national elections scheduled for March 17. The anti-Netanyahu, left wing Israeli newspaper Haaretz reports a group called “One Voice,” reportedly funded by American donors, is paying for the Obama campaign team. That group is reportedly being lead by Obama’s 2012 field director Jeremy Bird. As...

The US President vowed to “ratchet up pressure on Russia” amid fears the fighting in eastern Europe is worsening by the day. Barack Obama today threatened to use all measures - short of military action - to force Vladimir Putin to back down over the Ukraine crisis. He vowed to “ratchet up pressure on Russia” amid fears the fighting in eastern Europe is worsening by the day. He also warned Putin was “hell-bent on engaging in military conflicts” regardless of the damage it caused to Russians with its sanctions-hit economy nosediving into recession. The US leader spoke out in India...

While Western newspapers were debating whether or not to reprint the Mohammed cartoons, in Nigeria as many as 2,000 people were massacred by the Islamic State in Nigeria, also known as Boko Haram, in what is being called the deadliest attack by the Muslim group to date. Survivors described the Islamic State setting up efficient killing teams and massacring everyone while shouting “Allahu Akbar”. “For five kilometers (three miles), I kept stepping on dead bodies until I reached Malam Karanti village, which was also deserted and burnt,” one survivor said. There’s a word for that. It’s genocide. The Islamic State...

Kiev (AFP) - Ukraine took a historic step toward NATO on Tuesday in a parliamentary vote that stoked Russia's anger ahead of talks on ending the ex-Soviet state's separatist war. Lawmakers in the government-controlled chamber overwhelmingly adopted a bill dropping Ukraine's non-aligned status -- a classification given to states such as Switzerland that refuse to join military alliances and thus play no part in wars. President Petro Poroshenko had vowed to put Ukraine under Western military protection after winning an election called in the wake of the February ouster in Kiev of a Moscow-backed president. "Ukraine's fight for its independence,...

As working people in Missouri gather for days of action demanding justice for Michael Brown, the labor movement and the AFL-CIO are joining them and supporting the groundwork being laid for racial and economic justice for the people of Ferguson and all over the country. See updates from Ferguson October (Oct. 10–13) by following the hashtag on Twitter: #FergusonOctoberIn the meantime, check out AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka's speech on confronting racism. 

Ferguson Braces for Lynch Mob RevivalPosted By Matthew Vadum On October 10, 2014 @ 12:28 am In Daily Mailer,FrontPage | 10 Comments Police in Ferguson, Mo. are preparing for the mayhem and deadly violence that radical activists are promising if a grand jury declines to indict police officer Darren Wilson in the shooting of Michael Brown two months ago.A grand jury is expected to determine next month if Wilson, a decorated white policeman, will face criminal charges for killing Brown, an 18-year-old black man who reportedly attacked him minutes after robbing a convenience store. The St. Louis suburb has been...

BERLIN--A close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin praised German diplomacy on Thursday while railing against the U.S. in the latest effort by Moscow to highlight western divisions over the Ukraine crisis. Vladimir Yakunin, president of the Russian Railways and one of the Russian officials on the U.S. sanctions list, lavished praise on Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany's foreign minister, who visited Ukraine this week to endorse the government's planned dialogue with its critics at home. "I know Mr. Steinmeier a little bit myself. I know he is very balanced and a very objective politician," Mr. Yakunin told reporters. "To my mind,...

It's not Russia that's pushed Ukraine to the brink of war The attempt to lever Kiev into the western camp by ousting an elected leader made conflict certain. It could be a threat to us all The threat of war in Ukraine is growing. As the unelected government in Kiev declares itself unable to control the rebellion in the country's east, John Kerry brands Russia a rogue state. The US and the European Union step up sanctions against the Kremlin, accusing it of destabilising Ukraine. The White House is reported to be set on a new cold war policy with...

Land Management: A Chinese solar farm that fries birds is OK, as is redrawing tortoise habitat boundaries to benefit political donors. But an American rancher grazing his cattle brings feds with sniper rifles. It appears Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy has, at least temporarily, wonhis "range war" with the paramilitary wing of the Bureau of Land Management. Fearing another Waco, BLM has announced it will no longer enforce a court order and stop stealing Bundy's cows, called "trespass cattle" by the feds, accused of grazing free on part of the 84% of Nevada that is federal property.

The profound and pervasive crisis in Ukraine is a matter of grave concern for Russia. We understand perfectly well the position of a country which became independent just over 20 years ago and still faces complex tasks in constructing a sovereign state. Among them is the search for a balance of interests among its various regions, the peoples of which have different historical and cultural roots, speak different languages and have different perspectives on their past and present, and their country's future place in the world. Given these circumstances, the role of external forces should have been to help Ukrainians...

Vladimir Putin took part in an expanded meeting of the Federal Security Service board. PRESIDENT OF RUSSIA VLADIMIR PUTIN: Good afternoon, At this expanded meeting today, we will discuss the Federal Security Service’s results over the recent period and outline the priorities ahead (SNIP) Russia’s laws today give us the conditions we need for non-governmental and public organisations to work freely and transparently. But we will never accept for them to be used for destructive purposes. We will not accept a situation such as happened in Ukraine, when in many cases it was through non-governmental organizations that the nationalist and...

Former Rep. Ron Paul says that America’s reaction to Crimea’s vote to secede from Ukraine should be,“so what?” “Why does the U.S. care which flag will be hoisted on a small piece of land thousands of miles away?” the Texas Republican and libertarian icon wrote in a USA Today op-ed Monday. ...Over the weekend, Crimeans voted to secede from Ukraine and join Russia,which the Russian government has moved to approve. American politicians have called the vote a sham and the administration has said it does not recognize the results of the vote,placing sanctions on some Russian officials in response. Ron...

Ukraine’s leading political party has said that the international financier George Soros has been preparing a “Lybian scenario” for the country. ­The head of the Party of Regions parliamentary faction Aleksandr Yefremov said in a televised comment on Wednesday that he had information that George Soros had allocated funds for the overthrow of the Ukrainian political authorities. “I even have information that Soros has allocated certain funds in order to prepare a certain group of young boys here in Ukraine who could launch any existing projects based on the North Africa examples,” Yefremov said. He also added that he hoped...

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni appealed a bill declaring donations to anti-Israel non-governmental organizations from foreign governments no longer exempt from tax, after it was approved by the Ministerial Committee for Legislation on Sunday. Eight ministers from Likud, Yisrael Beytenu and Bayit Yehudi approved the bill in the ministerial committee, while Hatnua and Yesh Atid ministers voted against it. The legislation proposed by Bayit Yehudi faction chairwoman Ayelet Shaked and MK Robert Ilatov (Likud Beytenu) amends the Income Tax Law so that NGOs will have to pay 45 percent tax on donations from foreign governments if the organization or members of...

The Spanish government provided funding between 2009 and 2011 to political NGOs leading the campaigns to delegitimize Israel through demonization, boycotts, lawfare and other forms of political attacks, according to an NGO Monitor report issued on Tuesday. The report provides comprehensive and detailed evidence of the use and/or misuse of official Spanish funds, including regional governments. The analysis, entitled "Assessing Transparency, Accountability, and Impact on Israel", issued in Spanish and English, was written by Soeren Kern and Prof. Gerald M. Steinberg. Kern is an analyst at the Madrid-based Grupo de Estudios Estratégicos / Strategic Studies Group; Steinberg is President of...

Soon will be able to enforce Obama gun laws without sheriffs' help A bill is heading to Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper’s desk that Republican lawmakers say would give members of the Secret Service broad arrest powers in the state and could provide a framework for federal agents eventually to enforce gun restrictions. “This is absolutely insane,” Rep. Lori Saine, R-Dacono, said. “In theory if a Secret Service agent is in a county where the sheriff has refused to enforce some of the recent unenforceable gun laws, the agent could arrest an individual if he believes the law has been broken.”...

This, of course, was a much more sophisticated theory than you’d get from lunatics like Michele Bachmann. Sit down for this, because I know it’s hard to believe anyone could spout such nutter stuff, but Bachmann actually opposed U.S. intervention in Libya. She claimed — stop cackling! — that many of McCain’s heroes might actually be jihadists ideologically hostile to the U.S. and linked to groups such as al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the terror enterprise’s North African franchise. She even thought — yeah, I know, crazy — that if Qaddafi were deposed, the heroes would get their hands...

Another LINK to Fox New's breaking Benghazi CIA story. Report: CIA Refused Request for Back-up in Benghazi Terror AttackLISTEN to the very end; ALL 5:37 of Jennifer Griffin's report.