Q: are we not MENA? A: we are the rolling middle east, north africa and other geopolitical hot spots thread 2016!

holy shit

I wish you'd carry water, on foot, across the desert of your choice.

Please spend the next 9 months trying to come up with substantial differences between this pig and her potential November opponents, warwise.

http://thehill.com/policy/national-security/266622-clinton-goes-on-offense-against-sanders-on-iran

warwise gamgee

Clinton's stance is not in the least surprising.

lol what a dumbfuck http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/22/world/middleeast/saudi-arabias-top-cleric-forbids-chess-but-players-maneuver.html?_r=0

May be his most controversial clerical opinion since the '09 Pokemon fatwa.

The more silly edicts they proffer that people just ignore, the better though.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/us-backed-rebels-lose-a-key-town-to-russian-airstrikes-in-syria/2016/01/26/8c577ed8-c455-11e5-b933-31c93021392a_story.html

After a month-long offensive backed by Russian warplanes, government forces and allied ­militias reclaimed control of the town of Sheikh Miskeen, strategically located at a crossroads commanding a southern supply route between the Jordanian border and the Syrian capital, Damascus.

....

“By continuing to support the regime in its bombardment of the moderate opposition, Russia risks damaging the already fragile process of intra-Syrian negotiations,” Gareth Bayley, the British special representative for Syria, said in a statement.

News of the fall of the town cast a cloud over a meeting of the Syrian opposition in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, to decide on whether to participate in the peace talks, scheduled to begin Friday in Geneva. The United Nations issued invitations to the talks Tuesday, after days of squabbling over the guest list between Washington and Moscow had delayed the original start date of Jan. 25.

i thought this was an interesting story from last Nov about how the Kurds bypassed their oil agreements w/ Baghdad to sell their oil on the open market:
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-iraq-kurdistan-oil-idUSKCN0T61HH20151117

Savage Mules, as Perrin puts it

from the New York Times:

Worried about a growing threat from the Islamic State in Libya, the United States and its allies are increasing reconnaissance flights and intelligence collecting there and preparing for possible airstrikes and commando raids, senior American policy makers, commanders and intelligence officials said this week. … “It’s fair to say that we’re looking to take decisive military action against ISIL in conjunction with the political process” in Libya, [Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman General Joseph] Dunford said. “The president has made clear that we have the authority to use military force.”

Greenwald:

Just as there was no al Qaeda or ISIS to attack in Iraq until the U.S. bombed its government, there was no ISIS in Libya until NATO bombed it. Now the U.S. is about to seize on the effects of its own bombing campaign in Libya to justify an entirely new bombing campaign in that same country. The New York Times editorial page, which supported the original bombing of Libya, yesterday labeled plans for the new bombing campaign “deeply troubling,” explaining: “A new military intervention in Libya would represent a significant progression of a war that could easily spread to other countries on the continent.” In particular, “this significant escalation is being planned without a meaningful debate in Congress about the merits and risks of a military campaign that is expected to include airstrikes and raids by elite American troops” (the original Libya bombing not only took place without Congressional approval, but was ordered by Obama after Congress rejected such authorization).

https://theintercept.com/2016/01/27/the-u-s-intervention-in-libya-was-such-a-smashing-success-that-a-sequel-is-coming/

there hasn't been significant debate in congress about a war in 100 years why start now

or anywhere else, except TV and the internetz

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-01-24/saudi-aramco-may-open-ipo-to-foreigners-as-it-keeps-output-high

valued at at least $1 trillion dollars acc to NPR

https://sensday.wordpress.com/2016/01/26/24-bahais-in-gorgan-sentenced-to-a-total-of-193-years-in-prison/

+ more holocaust denial from khameini

i'll be pretty happy when that shitlord dies. shouldn't be too much longer i think.

fun fact most ppl don't know: abbas's CandSC dissertation was comprised of holocaust denial too

In his 1983 book The Other Side: the Secret Relationship Between Nazism and Zionism based on the dissertation, Abbas denied that six million Jews had died in the Holocaust; dismissing it as a "myth" and a "fantastic lie".[81] At most, he wrote, "890,000" Jews were killed by the Germans. Abbas claimed that the number of deaths has been exaggerated for political purposes. "It seems that the interest of the Zionist movement, however, is to inflate this figure [of Holocaust deaths] so that their gains will be greater. This led them to emphasize this figure [six million] in order to gain the solidarity of international public opinion with Zionism. Many scholars have debated the figure of six million and reached stunning conclusions—fixing the number of Jewish victims at only a few hundred thousand."

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/29/world/middleeast/more-is-needed-to-beat-isis-us-military-concludes.html?rref=politics&module=Ribbon&version=context®ion=Header&action=click&contentCollection=Politics&pgtype=Blogs

800 more US advisory military personnel to be gradually deployed in Iraq and Syria....

The United States already has about 3,700 troops in Iraq, counting a small handful of Special Operations forces on the ground in Syria. One official said that he did not anticipate that number increasing to more than 4,500 over time, and even that increase, the official said, could come incrementally, much as the deployment of the 3,700 American troops occurred over the period of a year and a half. During that time, the White House and the Pentagon have taken pains to avoid describing the deployments as combat troops, instead calling them special operators, trainers and advisers.

Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter, in an interview last week with CNN in Davos, Switzerland, emphasized the limited role he anticipated American forces to play. “We’re looking for opportunities to do more,” Mr. Carter said, but added, “We’re not looking to substitute for local forces in terms of governing the place and policing the place.”

....
With the liberation of the Iraqi city of Ramadi last month, coupled with recent gains in northern Syria, senior military leaders say that the war effort can now focus on isolating — and then liberating — the Islamic State-held cities of Mosul in Iraq, and Raqqa in Syria. “The reason we need new trainers or additional trainers is because that’s really the next step in generating the amount of combat power needed to liberate Mosul,” Col. Steve Warren, the spokesman for the American military in Baghdad, said last week. “We know we will need more brigades to be trained, we’ll need more troops trained in more specialties.”

Meanwhile, as Kerry tries to get negotiations in Geneva going...

https://www.rt.com/news/330764-damascus-bomb-attack-isis/

A series of blasts have struck the outskirts of Syria's capital, Damascus. At least 45 people were killed in the mainly Shiite neighbourhood, Syria's Interior Ministry reported. The Islamic State terrorist group has taken responsibility for the attacks.
According to the ministry, “more than 45 people were killed and dozens were injured.” Police say that the death toll is set to rise because “some of those injured are in a critical condition.”

More than 20 militia fighters, who have been fighting alongside government forces in Syria, are among those killed, TASS reported.

According to the television station of Lebanon's militant Shiite Hezbollah group, the attacks took place in the Sayeda Zeinab district, where Syria's major Shiite shrine is located.

Haaretz posits that the fact that there was no embarrassing or surprising information in the Snowden US spy leak was because Russia has control of the files and is protecting Israel's reputation. The evidence? Mostly that it hasn't appeared until now and only 3 weeks ago did it become disclosed that the Israeli Heron TP drone carried missiles (one of the few 'revelations' from the leak).

Russia appears to have agreed to Jaish Al-Islam being included in the Syrian peace talks, despite their designated status as a terrorist organisation, under pressure from KSA and Qatar. I don't know how much impact that's likely to have though.

Yeah, I'm very cynical about these peace talks. I was pretty cynical about the Iran deal too and it seems to have gone off, but that was negotiations between 2 parties. I don't see how they can possibly reconcile all of the impacted interests satisfactorily.

wait you're okay with the iran deal now?

maybe I missed something

I have problems/concerns with it but in addition to those I was v skeptical that they would even come to an agreement. I thought that Khamenei was not going to be willing to make the concessions the US would need to sell the deal to Congress.

who thinks israel solved the tunnel question? that's 4 in 8 days.

http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/syriasource/syria-what-next#.VrUEg9JLAch.twitter

http://www.interpretermag.com/as-pressure-mounts-on-aleppo-russia-conducts-air-strikes-across-syria/#12328 also worth reading imo.

the idea is that if the russian airstrike backed assad military is able to retake aleppo this weekend that'll break the non-ISIS revolution

and then what

the world isn't going to ask for a diplomatic solution if the only parties left are assad and ISIS. idk what the long, long term plan is tho - occupy the country indefinitely? the US in Iraq demonstrated that you can win all the cities and the situation just turns into an insurgency and once you leave these groups reconstitute in new ways.

maybe putin and assad think there just hasn't been enough force yet. putin does have some history w/ successfully suppressing separatists w/ overwhelming violence

Samantha Power: Russian bombardment arnd Aleppo has plainly undermined Geneva talks & dealt a significant setback to UN Syria peace efforts

have to say I'm kind of okay with Putin+Assad and ISIS all trying to kill each other, save us the trouble of getting involved.

also now KSA is offering to send troops to Iraq ostensibly to help fight ISIS

http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/02/05/obamas-disastrous-betrayal-of-the-syrian-rebels/

The encirclement of Aleppo would also create a humanitarian disaster of such magnitude that it would eclipse the horrific sieges of Madaya and other stricken regions that have received the world’s (short-lived) attention. Tens of thousands of Aleppo residents are already fleeing toward Kilis, the Turkish town that sits across the border from Azaz. The humanitarian crisis, lest anyone still had any doubt, is a deliberate regime and Russian strategy to clear important areas of problematic residents — while paralyzing rebels, neighboring countries, Western states, and the United Nations.

Assad all along pursued a strategy of gradual escalation and desensitization that, sadly, worked well. Syrians already compare the international outcry and response to the IS’ siege of Kobane in 2014 to the world’s indifference to the current tragedy.

To complicate the situation even more, the regime’s advances could allow the Kurdish-dominated, American-favored Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) to conquer the area currently held by the Free Syrian Army and Islamist militias between the Turkish border and the new regime front line north of the Shiite towns of Nubl and Zahra. This would pit the SDF against IS on two fronts: from the west, if the Kurds of Afrin canton seize Tal Rifaat, Azaz and surrounding areas, and from the east, where the YPG is toying with the idea of crossing the Euphrates River. An IS defeat there would seal the border with Turkey, meeting an important American objective.

Another MSF bombing:

BREAKING: Airstrikes have hit an MSF-supported hospital in Dara’a, southern Syria, killing 3 people & wounding at least 6 including a nurse

holy shit

about the ceasefire that is

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/kerry-searches-for-common-ground-on-the-syrian-conflict/2016/02/11/1bc6482c-d042-11e5-90d3-34c2c42653ac_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-banner-main_ussyria-505pm%3Ahomepage%2Fstory

er "cessation of hostilities"

“I can’t stop Putin,” he said of Russian President Vladimir Putin. “Can you say no to Putin?” he said, referring to the United States and its allies.

looooooool

I know rite. Def seems like Assad/Russia are holding all the cards - achieved enough recent victories that negotiating a deal looks like an acceptable outcome. Humanitarian aid being opened up is definitely a plus though, come on.

No, for sure. But I don't get if this is just a glorified surrender of moderate rebel groups to Assad, or just a temporary humanitarian ceasefire and they'll start again afterward.

The goal is to ensure that charges of violations would be directed to the committee, rather than responded to in kind. Any fighting group that signed on to and complied with a cease-fire would be exempt from airstrikes. It presumes that the Islamic State and Jabhat al-Nusra, considered by all parties to be terrorist groups, would not participate. Opposition groups embedded with al-Nusra in the anti-Assad fight would have to decide whether to sever those links and separate themselves geographically from the militants.

it seems like a good idea but only makes sense if you think this is just FSA giving up, right?

kerry says despite assad gains near aleppo in recent weeks, that difference does not end the war, does not mean assad secure in long run - so temporary. it'll be interesting to see if this lasts.

Have we mentioned that Saudi Arabia committed to sending troops (to fight ISIS, of course!).

Seems proxy wasn't enough.

i've been thinking a lot recently about how there hadn't been revised numbers for syria casualties in quite a while - i kept only seeing ones from 2014. Syrian Center for Policy Research says the toll is now 470,000.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2016/02/john_kerry_s_syria_deal_may_only_lock_in_gains_for_bashar_al_assad_and_russia.html

Secretary of State John Kerry said at a press conference in Munich that the “cessation of hostilities,” which will begin in a week, does not apply to the fight against ISIS and the other main jihadist group, al-Nusra Front. But that is not quite what the document says. The document says that the pause in fighting—and the signatories’ support for “the agreement and implementation of a nationwide ceasefire”—does not apply to ISIS, al-Nusra Front, "or other groups designated as terrorist organizations by the United Nations Security Council.” (Italics added.)

Here’s the thing: The Security Council’s members are still divided on which groups in Syria to tag as “terrorist.” In line with Kerry’s remarks, the United States defines the term to include ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra. But Russia broadens its coverage to any group fighting on the ground in Syria, other than the Syrian army and its allies.

In other words, Russia (and Iran and Syria, among others) could properly read the document as allowing the fight to continue not only against ISIS and al-Nusra Front, but also against the Kurds, the various U.S.-supported rebels—any armed group that opposes the Syrian military or threatens Bashar al-Assad’s regime.

That is the same wording as the resolution against ISIS, Al-Nusra, etc the UN brought in after the Paris attacks. The ISSG designates the groups and the SC ratifies that designation. It looks like Kaplan thinks that means any group a member of the SC thinks is a terror organisation but it doesn't.

Egypt apparently feeling bold enough to extend state murder to Italians:

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/italy-mourns-premier-matteo-renzi-demands-truth-from-egypt-in-slaying-of-italian-student-giulio/

The car accident theory might have been more convincing had they not burned him with cigarettes and pulled his fingernails out first.

If this Iraqi dam collapses, half a million people could die