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Perhaps you didn’t hear about Israel’s alleged air strike on a Syrian military installation last week, but the incident has significant global ramifications about which you should be aware.In Israel, it’s always reported that incidents like these are “allegedly” carried out by Israel because in most cases, Israel neither officially confirms nor denies responsibility.  This is part of a culture where all military items go through a censor. Overtly stating that Israel did something like this is typically not allowed.  Ambiguity also allows Israel’s enemies the wiggle room that, though they may know full well that something might have Israeli...

In the early morning hours of Thursday, Syria’s al-Tala’i military research facility located in Masyaf was reduced to ash and flames. The Jerusalem Post reports that contemporaneous with the strike on al-Tala’I, a Hezbollah weapons convoy in the vicinity was also hit and destroyed. According to Western intelligence sources, al-Tala’i is a center for the production of chemical weapons. Syria blamed Israel and claimed that at least two regime soldiers were killed in the attack. The regime issued a banal and somewhat hypocritical warning of the “dangerous repercussions of this aggressive action to the security and stability of the region.”...

Israeli jets have reportedly targeted a suspected chemical weapons factory in western Syria. The Syrian National Army said four IAF warplanes hit a military site in Hama province, near Masyaf, in the early hours of Thursday morning, killing two soldiers and causing massive damage. It is believed the site was linked to the sarin gas attack in April, which UN investigators said was the work of the Syrian government. The UN confirmed the chemical attacks in Khan Sheikhoun, which resulted in the deaths of dozens of civilians and prompted a US missile attack, were perpetrated by Assad regime forces. Israel...

Interesting theory

The international chemical weapons watchdog confirmed Friday that sarin gas was used in the deadly April attack on a Syria town that left more than 80 people dead. The Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons said it deployed a team within 24 hours to collect samples, attend autopsies and interview witnesses. Due to security risks, the team was not able to be on the ground in the Khan Shaykhun area where the attack took place, but traveled to a "neighboring country" to conduct its work.

1735 HRs Local, Sunday, June 7, 1981. Al-Tuwaythah Nuclear Research Facility, outside Baghdad, Iraq. Iraqi Colonel Fakhri Hussein Jaber is in shock. His jaw drops, mouth gaping open as a strained moan leaves his throat. Despite the hot desert temperature his limbs feel cold. He cannot believe what he is seeing. Eight F-16s painted sand-colored desert camouflage flying in a single-file attack formation at rooftop level hurtles over the outskirts of Baghdad from the southwest. They bank hard left, slicing white tendrils of vapor from their missile-clad wingtips in the evening air. One at a time they light their afterburners...

A former commander of U.S. nuclear forces is leading a call for taking U.S. and Russian nuclear missiles off high alert, arguing that keeping them less ready for prompt launch would reduce the risk of miscalculation in a crisis. It also could keep a possible cyberattack from starting a nuclear war, he said, although neither Washington nor Moscow appears interested in negotiating an agreement to end the practice of keeping nuclear missiles on high alert. Retired Gen. James Cartwright said in an interview that “de-alerting” nuclear arsenals could foil cyber intruders by reducing the chance of firing a weapon in...

On the day after Earth Day's "March for Science," it seems appropriate to point to a column by University of Michigan History Professor Juan Cole in The Nation, a far-far-left publication considered a credible and authoritative go-to-source by the liberal intelligentsia. On April 18, Cole, echoing statements made during their final years by Barack Obama and his administration's officials with establishment press acquiescence, nonsensically claimed that Syria's biggest problem during the past decade has been ... carbon dioxide. Hardly. According to Cole, CO2 is "a far more deadly gas" than what was used in "the gas attack in Syria on...

An Iraqi outpost with US and Australian military advisers in western Mosul was hit with an ineffective “low grade” mustard agent by Islamic State forces on Sunday, according to CBS News. At least six Iraqis were treated for breathing issues at a field clinic, while none of the advisers were believed to have been injured. The Pentagon released a statement saying that the ineffective attack “further displays the desperation of ISIS as they seek to hold an untenable position in Mosul,” ABC Australia reported. “My advice right at the moment is no Australian troops were affected but Australian forces did...

Joseph D. Jones, also known as “Yusuf Abdulhaqq,” 35, and Edward Schimenti, also known as “Abdul Wali,” 35, both of Zion, Illinois, were arrested today on a federal complaint charging them with conspiring and attempting to provide material support and resources to the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). Jones and Schimenti were arrested this morning. They are scheduled to make an initial appearance at on April 12 at 3:00 p.m. CDT (4:00 p.m. EDT) before U.S. Magistrate Judge M. David Weisman in Chicago, Illinois. Authorities also executed a search warrant at Jones’ residence in Zion today.

An Iraqi military officer says Islamic State militants have launched a gas attack in a newly-liberated area in western Mosul.

A British nuclear expert has fallen to his death from the 17th floor of the United Nations offices in Vienna. The 47-year-old man died after falling more than 120ft to the bottom of a stairwell. He has not been named. He worked for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization, an international agency charged with uncovering illicit nuclear tests. A UN spokesman in the Austrian capital said there were no "suspicious circumstances" surrounding the man's death. Police said no other person was believed to have been involved. No suicide note has been found. Four months ago another UN worker also believed to...

Update 2:  The Pentgaon has admitted to mistakenly killing 18 Syrians in an airstrike on April 11th... U.S.-LED COALITION AIR STRIKE IN SYRIA MISTAKENLY KILLED 18 SYRIAN DEMOCRATIC FORCES PERSONNEL ON APRIL 11 -PENTAGON - CENTCOM says strike near Taqbah accidentally killed 18 Syrian Democratic Forces fighters on April 11. Had been identified as ISIS position. pic.twitter.com/vUXC8ueek7— Erin Cunningham (@erinmcunningham) April 13, 2017   Update 1: Russia has reportedly dispatched drones to the area to confirm Syria's reports. The Russian military said that it has no information confirming the reports of death as a result of the US-led coalition's...

Okay, folks, you won’t be able to know who’s who in this Syrian War without a program! So, without further ado, enjoy! First off, there’s several different factions over there and not all of them willingly get along. Syria has: Shi’ite Muslims, Sunni Muslims, Syrian Orthodox Christians, a small number of Catholics, Kurds, Alawite Muslims, Druze, Yazidis, and the current imported Wahhabis called ISIS and al-Nusra. The surrounding nations do not all appreciate this mix of diversity. See, Assad is an Alawite Muslim, which is how he could walk the tightrope between these various factions, since the Alawite are a...

The command centre for the two countries and allied groups released a joint statement today saying they would ‘respond to future breaches of red lines with force’ RUSSIA and Iran have said they will respond to further American military actions following the air strike in Syria last week. In a joint statement the command centre for the two countries and allied groups said: “We will respond to any aggression.” The statement read: “What America waged in an aggression on Syria is a crossing of red lines. From now on we will respond with force to any aggressor or any breach...

On Aug. 21, 2013, I woke up in the dark around 4:45 a.m., struggling to breathe. My eyes were burning, my head was throbbing, and my throat was blocked. I was suffocating. I tried to inhale but all I heard was a horrible rasping sound as my throat closed up. An unbearable pain drummed in my head. The world began to blur. I pounded my chest but couldn’t breathe. My heart seemed about to explode. Suddenly, my windpipe opened. A gust of air pierced my lungs. Needles seemed to stab my eyes. A searing pain clawed at my stomach. I...

The chemical weapon attack by the Syrian government of Bashar al-Assad on the rebel-held town Khan Sheikhoun in Idlib Province on April 4 once again underscores what a foreign policy failure President Obama was and what a serial liar Susan Rice is. On January 16, 2017, Rice, who served as U.N. Ambassador during Obama’s first term and was rewarded for her Benghazi lies with the post of National Security Advisor, where she could be compelled to testify before Congress, Gave what amounted to an exit interview with NPR. During the interview she crowed about the Obama administration’s success in eliminating...

<p>Back in July 2014, then-Secretary of State John Kerry announced that his department “got 100 percent of the chemical weapons out” of Syria.</p> <p>Following Tuesday's horrific chemical attack on the Syrian city of Khan Sheikhoun — which reportedly left over 80 people, including scores of children, dead — those claims have come under close national scrutiny.</p>

Sean Keeley of The American Interest noticed a curious statement from National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster when he briefed reporters on the Syrian strike. And the one thing that I will tell you though, there was an effort to minimize – to minimize risk to third-country nationals at that airport – I think you read Russians from that – but that – and we took great pains to try to avoid that. […] And then there were also measures put in place to avoid hitting what we believe is a storage of sarin gas, so that that would not be ignited...

PolitiFact has pulled a 2014 fact-check on remarks about Syria by former Secretary of State John Kerry after the claim the Obama administration “got ‘100 percent’ of chemical weapons out of Syria” turned out to be false. “Kerry said in a television interview that in Syria, ‘we got 100 percent of the chemical weapons out.’ Syria had agreed in 2013 to an ambitious program to destroy its chemical stockpiles under international supervision, as part of a deal brokered by Russia,” they explained. “When Kerry spoke in July 2014, the process seemed far along. Based on reports from the Organization for...