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hina will lend Venezuela around $10 billion in coming months, half as part of a bilateral financing deal and the other half for the development of oil fields, a senior official at state oil company PDVSA said on Thursday. Fresh funds are a boon for financially squeezed Venezuela and will likely increase market confidence over the OPEC country's ability to meet major debt payments and arbitration awards. Venezuelan bonds rose on Thursday following the news. However, relief may be tempered as the loans appear largely earmarked and will only go so far in countering the steep tumble in oil prices...

These guys are not kidding. And the media is also going ballistics (see Washington Post, The Jerusalem Post and Turkish Today’s Zaman, also here). The media explosion started when the head of a provincial branch of Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has stirred the pot by tweeting that the country should “get ready for the caliphate” of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. A caliph is a spiritual leader of Islam who claims succession from Prophet Muhammad. The word, stemming from the Arabic khalifa meaning “successor,” has been the focus of much debate since being claimed by the Islamic State...

Day after Obama urges Iran to seize ‘historic opportunity,’ supreme leader says US seeks to create insecurity. Iran’s Supreme leader Ali Khamenei called for “Death to America” on Saturday, a day after President Barack Obama appealed to Iran to seize a “historic opportunity” for a nuclear deal and a better future, and as US Secretary of State John Kerry claimed substantial progress toward an accord. Khamenei told a crowd in Tehran that Iran would not capitulate to Western demands. When the crowd started shouting, “Death to America,” the ayatollah responded: “Of course yes, death to America, because America is the...

A group affiliated with the Islamic State published a list of addresses purportedly belonging to about 100 U.S. service members late Friday night, calling for their beheadings. The self-identified “Islamic State Hacking Division” claimed to have obtained the information by hacking into military servers, databases and emails, The Blaze reported Saturday. The online document contains names and photos along with some of the addresses.

NEW YORK (AP) — The U.S. must release photographs showing abuse of detainees in Iraq and Afghanistan, a federal judge has ruled in a long-running clash over letting the world see potentially disturbing images of how the military treated prisoners. U.S. District Judge Alvin Hellerstein's ruling Friday gives the government, which has fought the case for over a decade, two months to decide whether to appeal before the photos could be released. The American Civil Liberties Union has been seeking to make them public in the name of holding government accountable.

The Army’s Fort Hood Disgrace No one who supervised the shooter has been held to account, but the victims are denied pay and benefits. By Kathy Platoni March 19, 2015 7:08 p.m. ET 257 COMMENTS It was more than five years ago that the gunshots rang out, but those of us who survived can still hear their echoes. On Nov. 5, 2009, an Army psychiatrist named Nidal Hasan—an American radicalized by extremist Islamic beliefs—opened fire on his fellow soldiers in Fort Hood, Texas, killing 14 people, including an unborn child, and wounding 32. I was there. A beloved friend, Capt....

In an opinion piece for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Sen. Tom Cotton defended his stance on wanting to keep nuclear weapons out of Iran, saying "a nuclear Iran presents too great of a threat to accept." Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Tom-Cotton-letter-op-ed-stop-Iran/2015/03/19/id/631321/#ixzz3Uuy1e0zP Urgent: Rate Obama on His Job Performance. Vote Here Now!

One senator wants to know if former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton deleted her emails regarding the very delayed designation of Boko Haram as a terrorist organization — and if a very well-heeled donor influenced that policy.The query is not new for Sen. David Vitter (R-La.), but it’s now reflected in some additional disturbing lights: the admission by Clinton that she used personal email while the nation’s top diplomat and screened which ones to keep or discard, and the ascension of Boko Haram to an ISIS affiliate.In June of last year, Vitter questioned why the State Department, under former...

The US National Intelligence has removed Iran and the Lebanese resistance movement, Hezbollah, from its list of "terrorist threats." US Director of National Intelligence James Clapper scrapped Iran and Hezbollah from the list in an annual report recently delivered to the US Senate, citing their efforts in fighting terrorists, including the ISIL Takfiri group, Press TV reported. The unclassified version of the report titled “Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Communities,” which was released on February 26, 2015, noted Iran’s efforts to battle extremists, including those of the ISIL terrorist group, who were perceived to constitute the greatest terrorist...

In the spring of 2010, Afghan officials struck a deal to free an Afghan diplomat held hostage by Al Qaeda. But the price was steep — $5 million — and senior security officials were scrambling to come up with the money. They first turned to a secret fund that the Central Intelligence Agency bankrolled with monthly cash deliveries to the presidential palace in Kabul, according to several Afghan officials involved in the episode. The Afghan government, they said, had already squirreled away about $1 million from that fund. Within weeks, that money and $4 million more provided from other countries...

All the pieces have obviously not been revealed, but there is clearly some sort of evil plan afoot in regards to ISIS.  I don't know who is for what, and how much is purposeful and how much is apathy, but how can you not see troubling signs here? 1. Pakistan interrogates ISIS prisoner who reveals he has been funded "$600 a recruit" by the United States: http://shoebat.com/2015/02/20/isis-leader-admits-funded-obama-administration/ 2. Turkish operation deep into ISIS-controlled Syrian territory draws no fire from ISIS: http://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/Why-didnt-the-recent-Turkish-incursion-into-Syria-draw-IS-fire-391914 3. ISIS now controls almost the entire Libyan coast and the Pentagon has openly condemned Egypt and UAE for airstrikes against...

Last fall, Patrick Maxwell, a 29-year-old Iraq war veteran now selling real estate in this bustling city, saw something in news footage of Islamic fighters in Iraq that he never saw as an infantry Marine there: the enemy. “We patrolled every day, got shot at, mortared, hit by I.E.D.s, one of my friends was killed,” said Mr. Maxwell, a former sergeant who deployed in 2006 to Anbar Province. “But I never saw the enemy, never fired a shot.” With the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, hoisting its black flag above many Iraqi cities that United States troops...

WASHINGTON — More than 100 prisoners released from Guantanamo Bay went right back to being terrorists when they got out, according to a new report. Out of 647 detainees who were released, 116 — or 18 percent — have been confirmed as “re-engaging” in terrorism, according to the report by the Director of National Intelligence. Of those, 25 are dead and 23 are back behind bars. Another 11 percent of those released are “suspected” of re-engaging in their jihadi ways, according to the annual summary that is required by Congress. The trend is likely to continue, even as President Obama...

First Lady Michelle Obama will unveil a proposal Monday that she hopes will ease tensions and work to counteract an ever growing Islamophobia gripping the nation. In an effort to strengthen relations and help build mutual trust with our two million Muslim Americans citizens, Michelle Obama is set to propose national “Hug a Muslim Day”. The proposed new federal holiday would eliminate and replace Columbus Day, first observed as a state holiday in 1906, and became federal in 1937. From now on, every second Monday in October would be recognized and observed as national, “Hug a Muslim Day.” The proposed...

Lockheed Martin turned up the heat on its laser weapon technology and destroyed a truck from one mile away. The Maryland-based company’s test of the ATHENA laser weapon was the highest power ever recorded of a laser weapon of its type. The Advanced Test High Energy Asset’s March 3 test destroyed its target in a “matter of seconds,” the company said in a statement. An image of the smoking vehicle accompanied its announcement. “This test represents the next step to providing lightweight and rugged laser weapon systems for military aircraft, helicopters, ships and trucks,” said Keoki Jackson, chief technology officer...

Who really is Mark W. Lippert? OBAMA used Senate Office to influence Kenyan Presidential Elections...

U.S. envoy to Seoul Mark Lippert was seriously injured Thursday morning after being attacked by an armed assailant, official sources said. The envoy was on his way to attend a morning lecture in central Seoul when the attack took place. Lippert, bleeding heavily, was rushed to a nearby hospital, the sources said, adding that the suspect was immediately arrested although his or her identity is still not known.Image source

Sen. Barack Obama designated a personal aide (who is now the Ambassador who was slashed in S. Korea, Mark Lippert) as his direct contact for the 2007 Kenyan presidential campaign of Raila Odinga, who later was appointed prime minister after his election loss was followed by widespread, deadly violence that destroyed or damaged 800 Christian churches, according to e-mails obtained by WND senior staff writer Jerry Corsi during a trip to Kenya...

Norway recently made the controversial decision to deport a large amount of Muslims with ties to radical groups.

When a black homeless man was shot dead by police on Skid Row on Sunday, the shooting was seen as yet another example of white policemen in the United States being too quick to reach for their guns. But the full story behind the man's death – and his remarkable life – has emerged as something far more complex. The 39-year-old identified by police after his death as Charley Saturmin Robinet was actually using a fake identity, stolen from a Frenchman, to try and make a career in Hollywood.