IAEA Just Gave up on Iran Nuclear Verification

Posted on December 5, 2015December 5, 2015 by Denise Simon

Oh my, Barack Obama lied…..not only in verbal form but in written form. Now other world leaders, Saudi Arabia, United Kingdom, France, Israel and more will indeed have some forceful response to Barack Obama.

Then there is the issue of releasing the billions in frozen funds back to Iran and the further lifting of sanctions. But the biggest questions are still not answered: Exactly where is Iran with their nuclear weapons program, does it continue unimpeded and what with other threatened countries do now?

this deal provides the best possible defense against Iran’s ability to pursue a nuclear weapon covertly — that is, in secret. International inspectors will have unprecedented access not only to Iranian nuclear facilities, but to the entire supply chain that supports Iran’s nuclear program — from uranium mills that provide the raw materials, to the centrifuge production and storage facilities that support the program. If Iran cheats, the world will know it. If we see something suspicious, we will inspect it. Iran’s past efforts to weaponize its program will be addressed. With this deal, Iran will face more inspections than any other country in the world. (the full Barack Obama statement here as posted on the White House website)

President Obama sold his nuclear deal with Iran with promises that the accord would be based on “unprecedented verification,” and this week we were reminded of how much that promise was worth. Witness the latest report on Iran’s nuclear program from the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The IAEA is the U.N. outfit that is supposed to monitor Iran’s compliance with the agreement, which requires Tehran to answer the agency’s questions on its past nuclear work in order to obtain sanctions relief. On Wednesday the agency produced its “final assessment”—the finality here having mostly to do with the U.N. nuclear watchdog giving up hope of ever getting straight answers.

Hence we learn that “Iran did not provide any clarification” regarding experiments the agency believes it conducted on testing components of nuclear components at its military facility at Parchin. “The information available to the Agency, including the results of the sampling analysis and the satellite imagery, does not support Iran’s statements on the purpose of the building,” says the report. “The Agency assesses that the extensive activities undertaken by Iran since February 2012 at the particular location of interest to the Agency seriously undermined the Agency’s ability to conduct effective verification.”

This seems to be A-OK with the Obama Administration, which made clear it’s prepared to accept any amount of Iranian stonewalling in order to move ahead with sanctions relief. “We had not expected a full confession, nor did we need one,” an unnamed senior Administration official told the Journal. One wonders why they even bothered with the charade.

Still, the report is illuminating on several points, above all its conclusion that Tehran continued to work on nuclear weapons research until 2009. That further discredits the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate, which claimed Iran’s weapons program had ceased in 2003, and which effectively ended any chance that the Bush Administration would use military force against Iran’s nuclear sites.

It should also inspire some humility about the quality of Western intelligence regarding closed and hostile regimes such as Iran’s. A 2014 report from the Pentagon’s Defense Science Board noted that at “levels associated with small or nascent [nuclear] programs, key observables are easily masked.” Yet the Administration keeps insisting that Iran’s nondisclosures don’t matter because the U.S. has “perfect knowledge” of what the mullahs are up to, as John Kerry claimed last summer.

The larger point is that the nuclear deal has already become a case of Iran pretending not to cheat while the West pretends not to notice. That may succeed in bringing the agreement into force, but it offers no confidence that Iran won’t eventually build its weapon.

Operation Choke Point Overlord

Posted on November 10, 2015November 10, 2015 by Denise Simon

A disgusting program concocted by Eric Holder, former Attorney General was launched called Operation Choke Point. Several Federal agencies are part of this program where government intimidates private business where agency deem them high risk. Banks then are told to no longer do business with them.

Freedom and liberty is threatened.

The current Attorney General, Loretta Lynch is still operating the program and private businesses across the country continue to be squeezed. Across a spectrum of industries, they include ammunition and weapons companies, fireworks manufacturers and payday lenders. The FDIC and the Securities and Exchange Commission are part of the operation.

Senate Judiciary Committee Considers Nomination of Operation Choke Point Overlord

Fairfax, VA -(AmmoLand.com)- On Wednesday; Nov. 4, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on the nomination of Stuart F. Delery for the position of associate attorney general of the United States.

If confirmed, Delery would become the third-ranking official in the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), behind the attorney general and the deputy attorney general. Delery has been serving as “acting” associate attorney general since September 2014.

The NRA is seriously troubled by Delery’s nomination because of his supervisory role over DOJ’s scandalous Operation Choke Point (OPC). Fortunately, committee members had some tough questions for him on this point. Delery’s unconvincing denials and platitudes in response demonstrate that he does not take seriously the harm OPC, whether intentionally or not, caused to legitimate businesses. The fact that the Obama administration continues to push his nomination shows that it is more interested in rewarding ideological and political fidelity than performance in the pursuit of justice.

The functions of DOJ, however, are far too important, and the department’s powers too great, to make politics its main function.

Delery himself had key oversight responsibility for OPC. He approved the operation and its tactics. He also individually approved the investigative subpoenas that resulted in various banks ceasing business with certain industries wholesale, rather than trying to separate good actors from bad within those industries. Attached to the subpoenas that Delery approved were FDIC guidance materials that included a list of supposedly “high risk” merchants and activities. These included sales of ammunition and firearms. This same list appeared in a PowerPoint presentation given in September 2013 to bank examiners at a workshop conducted by officials from the FDIC, Department of Justice, and Office of Comptroller of the Treasury.

Whatever the true intent of OPC (and DOJ has done nothing to earn the benefit of the doubt on that score), the effect of the government’s tactics was clear: banks were interpreting DOJ’s actions as directives not to deal with certain types of legal businesses. As a result, numerous gun shops and manufacturers lost long-established banking relationships or were refused those relationships in the first place.

Questioners at Wednesday’s hearings pressed Delery hard on these facts. In his opening statement, Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) called OPC a “stunning and dangerous” use of government power.

He noted that the operation was “sold to the public as merely an initiative to protect consumers from predatory payday lending practices.” Nevertheless, he continued, “we now know based on internal DOJ documents that from the outset it was specifically designed to prey on the banking industry`s fear of civil and criminal liability, with the stated goal of shutting down legal businesses” disfavored by the Obama Administration.

He also criticized the broad net the program cast over the banking industry: “three prosecutions out of 60 subpoenas is hardly a justification for the scattergun approach the Department undertook.”

Sen. Grassley went on to confront Delery with documentation that Delery was aware of the negative affect OPC had on lawful industries. DOJ’s response to these developments was to rationalize that if individual businesses were operating lawfully, they should be able to establish that fact with the banks. Yet the banks themselves had in many cases already made the decision that case-by-case determinations invited more scrutiny and pressure from DOJ than they were worth to the bank.

The toughest questioning, however, came from Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX). Cruz offered a blistering summary of the program and confronted Delery with examples of actual businesses that had lost banking relationships, not because of poor performance, but because the banks had decided to sever all relationships with the firearm industry. Delery insisted that no firearm businesses had even been investigated or prosecuted.

“Choke Point,” Cruz shot back, “was all about using government power to intimidate banks to cut off their money even though they weren’t violating the laws.” “The program as it pertained to firearm businesses,” Cruz continued, “was not targeted on evidence of fraud but based on an antipathy of the Obama Justice Department to the exercise of the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms by American citizens.”

Delery uniformly denied any intention to use DOJ’s authority to target lawful businesses. In essence, he blamed the banks themselves for misunderstanding DOJ’s intentions. Yet when bank after bank came to the same supposedly unintended conclusion, DOJ did not change course. Only when Congress itself stepped in to investigate DOJ’s tactics did the department issue public “clarifications” of its objectives to target specific fraudulent actors and not entire industries per se.

By that time, however, the damage to lawful industries had been done. Reports from the field, moreover, indicate that these industries continue to suffer the residual suspicion of financial service providers, notwithstanding DOJ’s more recent guidance on the professed scope of the program. For many banks, once burned means twice shy.

One of the more ridiculous aspects of Wednesday’s hearing was the repeated insistence of Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) that NRA “agrees” that OPC did not intend to target lawful businesses. To “substantiate” this point, he quoted from an alert we issued on May 2, 2014, as rumors were swirling about OPC in the media.

We stated at that point that we had “not substantiated … an overarching federal conspiracy to suppress lawful commerce in firearms and ammunition, or that the federal government has an official policy of using financial regulators to drive firearm or ammunition companies out of business.”

We cautioned, however, that “NRA will continue to monitor developments concerning Operation Choke Point and report on any significant activity of concern to gun owners.”

We also noted, “The Obama administration’s record … certainly provides no reason for confidence.”

Three weeks later, we posted an update to that story in which we specifically stated, “At the time of the [May 2] report, we were unaware of a ‘smoking gun’ to tie [banks’ decisions to drop or refuse firearms industry business] back to pressure from regulatory authorities,” and noted, “That may be changing.”

That second report went on to detail additional evidence on OPC that had since come to light, as well ongoing investigative efforts.

Since that time, NRA has reported on OPC extensively, including here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

Anyone who read these reports could not fail to understand that NRA has been gravely concerned about OPC for well over a year and that whatever OPC’s original justification might have been, DOJ was willing to accept or even embrace its negative affect on the firearm and ammunition industries. Yet Sen. Franken cherry-picked one phrase from an early report to falsely portray NRA’s current position and view of the matter. Certainly, this sort of duplicity does not serve the senator’s integrity or the cause of Delery’s nomination well.

Delery’s nomination has not yet been scheduled for a vote. Based on his unconvincing performance at the hearing, however, and continued unanswered questions about the true origins, design, and scope of OPC, NRA remains deeply troubled by this nomination. America deserves better than senior DOJ officials who are merely tools for the political views and schemes of an ideologically-driven administration.

To reward such officials for this behavior with promotions is clearly beyond the pale.

About the NRA-ILA:

Established in 1975, the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) is the “lobbying” arm of the National Rifle Association of America. ILA is responsible for preserving the right of all law-abiding individuals in the legislative, political, and legal arenas, to purchase, possess and use firearms for legitimate purposes as guaranteed by the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

Why is Rocket Kitten Important?

Posted on November 10, 2015November 10, 2015 by Denise Simon

Security firm says it shut down extensive Iranian cyber spy program

A security firm with headquarters in Israel and the United States says it detected and neutralized an extensive cyber espionage program with direct ties to the government of Iran. The firm, called Check Point Software, which has offices in Tel Aviv and California, says it dubbed the cyber espionage program ROCKET KITTEN. In a media statement published on its website on Monday, Check Point claims that the hacker group maintained a high-profile target list of 1,600 individuals. The list reportedly includes members of the Saudi royal family and government, American and European officials, North Atlantic Treaty Organization officers and nuclear scientists working for the government of Israel. The list is said to include even the names of spouses of senior military officials from numerous nations.

News agency Reuters quoted Check Point Software’s research group manager Shahar Tal, who said that his team was able to compromise the ROCKET KITTEN databases and acquire the list of espionage targets maintained by the group. Most targets were from Saudi Arabia, Israel, and the United States, he said, although countries like Turkey and Venezuela were also on the list. Tal told Reuters that the hackers had compromised servers in the United Kingdom, Germany and the Netherlands, and that they were using these and other facilities in Europe to launch attacks on their unsuspecting targets. According to Check Point, the hacker group was under the command of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards Corps, a branch of the Iranian military that is ideologically committed to the defense of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Reuters said it contacted the US Federal Bureau of Investigation and Europol, but that both agencies refused comment, as did the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. However, an unnamed official representing the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic security agency, said that ROCKET KITTEN “is familiar to us and is being attended to”. The official declined to provide further details. Meanwhile, Check Point said it would issue a detailed report on the subject late on Monday.

*** In part from SCMagazine:

The researchers uncovered more thorough indicators of compromise, along with new malware strains, including a Remote Access Trojan (RAT) the group apparently favored.

Further down the Rocket Kitten rabbit hole, the researchers appeared to identify the mastermind behind the operation, who goes by “Wool3n.H4t,” as Yaser Balaghi.

The company found references to his alias and real name on various developer forums, within the server itself, and eventually, in an online tutorial he posted on SQL injection.

Additionally, a reported resume for Balaghi has listed “designing a phishing system” as ordered by a “cyber-organization.”

Saying technical evidence can be forged, or information be planted, Tal said he backs his company’s findings because of “overwhelming evidence.”

“All evidence fits the same story and same narrative,” he said. “The probability that this is a false lead is extremely nonexistent in my opinion.”

Given that Balaghi resides in Iran, there will likely not be any repercussions or extradition. However, Tal said the findings have been passed along to European and U.S. search bodies, as well as service providers who hosted the malicious servers.

Most infrastructure has been taken down since then, Tal said, and continued, “don’t expect to see them attacking any time soon.”

No Govt Agency Exempt from Fleecing Taxpayer Dollars

Posted on November 7, 2015November 7, 2015 by Denise Simon

We don’t even know what we don’t know and further what we think we know, we don’t really know either.

There is not a government agency throughout the entire Federal system that is not teeming with waste, fraud or abuse of our taxpayer dollars. One would easily be in the constant state of shuttering when it comes to contemplating the billions that go unaccounted for.

The mission of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee headed previously by Darryl Issa and presently with Jason Chaffetz attempts in earnest to uncover and investigate and perhaps refer for prosecution those in government guilty of malfeasance, yet the co-chair of the committee, Elijah Cummings leads his side to obstruct the duty of the committee at every turn. In fact Cummings and his crowd never find any dereliction of duty, corruption or fraud.

Just consider, Fast and Furious, Secret Service prostitution scandal, Benghazi, Planned Parenthood, EPA, IRS and Operation Choke Point for some examples.

The job of accountability goes to a particular division at the Department of Justice where all the Inspector Generals are deployed to investigate and determine money success of programs. Inspector Generals also work outside the scope of the DoJ, with not much more comprehensive success.

The IG’s are the watchdogs and while most do stellar work, others not so much and still others are completely stonewalled when it comes to gaining access to receipts, contracts, agreements and so on.

DailyCaller:Federal watchdogs are urging Congress to make sure all inspectors general, not just those at Department of Justice, have unfettered access to all official documents their respective agencies produce.

The Council of Inspectors General for Integrity and Efficiency fired off a letter to top members of Congress Thursday encouraging Congress to reiterate through new legislation that the 1978 Inspector General Act already entitles IGs to all agency records.

The letter comes two days after the Justice Department’s Office of Legislative Affairs asked Congress to pass legislation specifying that only the DOJ IG is entitled to all department records. Previously, the DOJ Office of Legal Counsel denied the department’s IG access to wiretapped communications or grand jury testimony.

But the proposed fix is too little, too late, for an IG community where other federal watchdogs are facing similar access problems.

As yet another example where dollars add up, most recently is a report on FEMA.

FEMA can’t account for up to $4.56M Sandy fuel funds

FNC: The Federal Emergency Management Agency can’t adequately account for more than 70 percent of the money spent on fuel for New York in the aftermath of superstorm Sandy, a federal audit released on Friday found.

FEMA spent $6.37 million for 1.7 million gallons of fuel as a gasoline shortage crippled the New York City area after the October 2012 storm, according to the audit from the Office of Inspector General at the Department of Homeland Security.

But the audit found “incomplete and questionable” documentation for $4.56 million of that spending. Additionally, $1.81 million worth of fuel went to recipients outside the scope of work that FEMA established for the crisis, the audit found. As a result, FEMA can’t be sure any of that fuel went to approved power restoration or emergency public transportation work in New York, the audit said.

Officials at FEMA agreed with all of the report’s recommendations, which include recovering lost funds and devising new procedures, according to the audit.

A spokeswoman for FEMA said: “FEMA concurred with all of the OIG recommendations for rectifying the issues identified in their recent report and improving mission assignment effectiveness going forward. FEMA takes seriously its duty to ensure fiscal responsibility during disaster relief operations, and has been reimbursed by New York for more than $2.1 million.”

New York state collected the $1.8 million, plus interest, from the retail gas stations that were the wrongful recipients of the fuel and reimbursed FEMA, the Dept. of Homeland Security said. Sandy, one of the most powerful Atlantic storms on record, knocked out power to gas stations, caused widespread flooding and cut gasoline-supply lines from ports.

Gasoline shortages emerged as one of the biggest problems for the region after the storm passed. At the time, the federal government estimated that only one-third of gas stations in the metropolitan area had fuel for sale, based on a survey that found more than half were shut down.

FEMA stepped up to provide fuel for urgent power restoration and transportation needs.

The unaccounted fuel deliveries occurred because FEMA didn’t comply with federal regulations requiring the agency provide proper documentation accounting for its work, the audit found.

Click for more from The Wall Street Journal

Profile of Palestinian Terrorists Who Carried Out Attacks in Israel

Posted on November 3, 2015November 3, 2015 by Denise Simon

Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center

The contagious effect of stabbing attacks: a notice posted to the Palestinian social networks, some of them affiliated with Hamas, reading “If you don’t stand up for Jerusalem, who will?” It features recent postings written by terrorist operatives Muhannad Shafiq and Fadi Aloun, who were killed carrying out stabbing attacks in Jerusalem and became role models for terrorists who followed in their footsteps.

Overview

1. The wave of Palestinian violence and terrorism currently plaguing Israel began during the most recent Jewish High Holidays. In retrospect, the ITIC has concluded it began with the stones thrown at the vehicle of Alexander Levlowitz near the Armon Hanatziv neighborhood of Jerusalem on September 14, 2015. Initially the wave of violence and terrorism focused on the Temple Mount and east Jerusalem and later spread throughout Jerusalem and to other sites inside Israel and various hotspots in Judea and Samaria (especially the region around Hebron). So far 12 Israelis and more than 70 Palestinians have been killed.^[1]

2. The current wave of violence and terrorism is part of the overall “popular resistance” strategy adopted by the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Fatah at the Sixth Fatah Conference in August 2009.^[2] It is manifested by rising and falling levels of popular terrorism. The current wave (which is unique in some aspects) is one of the most serious. Its popular terrorism includes riots, throwing stones and Molotov cocktails, and stabbing and vehicular attacks which are supported and condoned by the PA. The current wave of Palestinian terrorism, like those before it, has included several shooting attacks, which are not included in the modus operandi of the “popular resistance,” but the PA does not condemn them, and in effect supports them.

3. This study examines the profiles 35 Palestinian terrorists who carried out attacks in Israeli territory (Jerusalem and other locations inside Israel) during the current wave of terrorism. Twenty-four of them were killed while carrying out the attacks and 11 were injured. They carried out a total of 29 terrorist attacks, most of them in greater Jerusalem and some in other locations inside Israel. Their personal attributes were different, but based on the initial examination a general profile can be drawn.

4. The Palestinian who most commonly carries out a terrorist attack in Israel, especially a stabbing attack, is generally male, young, between the ages of 17 and 19, unmarried, unknown to Israeli security, not affiliated with a terrorist organization, and lives in one of the neighborhoods of east Jerusalem (especially Jabel Mukaber and Sur Bahr in southeast Jerusalem) and in several instances also in the Hebron region. In most instances he carries out the attack by himself following a spontaneous personal decision without instructions from any organization or leadership. He does not follow an Islamist ideology (some of the terrorists lived fairly secular lives) and does not belong to a terrorist organization, although he feeds off the incitement to terrorism and anti-Israel hatred disseminated by the various terrorist organizations.

5. The Palestinian terrorist who carries out an attack in Israel is motivated by Palestinian nationalism, and for the past six years he has been deeply influenced by reports of popular terrorism. He has also been influenced by events on the Temple Mount and by the false slogan “Al-Aqsa mosque is in danger.” He is personally and socially frustrated and feeds off the anti-Israel hatred and incitement on the social networks (mainly Facebook). He is willing to risk his life and aspires to follow in the footsteps of Palestinians who died initiating the current wave of terrorist attacks (the deaths of some of them and their glorification in the Palestinian media has become contagious, and copying them has become a challenge and “fashionable”).

6. An initial conclusion of this study is that the attributes of the terrorists who have carried out terrorist attacks inside Israeli territory during the current wave of terrorism are different in some respects from those who carry them out in Judea and Samaria. The main difference would appear to be the areas they come from: many terrorists in Judea and Samaria have come from the Hebron region, while most of the terrorists who carry out the attacks in Israel have come from east Jerusalem (for reasons that will be discussed below). Another difference is their ages: the terrorists who carry out attacks in Israel are younger (average age of 18) while those from Judea and Samaria are slightly older (average age of 20).^[3] As far as their level of education, the percentage of students in Judea and Samaria who carry out terrorist attacks (and participate in riots) seems higher.

7. The current wave of terrorist attacks has witnessed young, lone Palestinians carrying out terrorist attacks. They have made a personal decision to carry out attacks with high personal risks that are likely to cost them their lives. On the other hand, stabbing attacks have no dramatic or spectacular results (like the suicide bombing attacks of the second intifada). That has become more and more obvious as the current wave of violence and terrorism continues.

8. That characteristic seems to indicate the depth of the frustration and desperation felt by the younger generation of Palestinians at the forefront of the wave of attacks. Their generation did not experience the second intifada, but rather was raised in the shadow of the violent characteristics of the “popular resistance.” They are frustrated by what seems to them as the ongoing Israeli occupation, disappointed by the PA and apparently also by the Palestinian terrorist organizations. They regard the violent struggle as the only path to bring change to Palestinian national prospects and to their own personal futures. The intense incitement around the Temple Mount and the difficult conditions in the Palestinian neighborhoods and east Jerusalem are unique additional incentives motivating young Palestinians from the eastern part of the city to stand at the forefront of the current wave of terrorism (which did not happen in the past). The result is that the strong anti-Israel incitement spread by the Palestinian media, especially by the social networks, falls on willing ears and contributes to their motivation to carry out terrorist attacks.

Methodological Remarks

9. This study is primary and partial. It deals only with profiles of the Palestinian terrorists who carried out attacks in Israeli territory (and not Judea and Samaria). The ITIC considers them two separate categories because they have unique attributes not shared by those who have carried out attacks in Judea and Samaria. For that reason, and because of the primary nature of the information, general conclusions cannot be drawn about the Palestinians who carry out “popular resistance” terrorist attacks or about the deep-seated motivations of young Palestinians (such as the importance of nationalist vs. religious motives; the influence of socio-economic factors; and the role of personal, family or regional considerations).

10. The study is based on primary Palestinian and Israeli open sources. A great deal of material was taken from the Palestinian media, especially websites and the social networks (including sites dedicated to the memories of Palestinians who were killed, sites of various towns and villages, personal Facebook pages, statements from relatives). Israeli sources included Israeli Police Force reports, indictments handed down against terrorists who carried out attacks and the website of the Israel Security Agency, and the Israeli media, which closely follow the various events, and its reports contain much important information (even if it is primary and partial) about the terrorists who carry out attacks.

11. The study is time-defined: it refers to the period that began on September 14, 2015, when Palestinians threw stones at the vehicle of Alexander Levlowitz near the Jerusalem neighborhood of Armon Hanatziv, killing him (which the ITIC considers the beginning of the current wave of terrorism). Thus the current wave of terrorism has so far lasted for about a month and a half (it is dated by others as beginning on October 1, 2015, with the killing of the Henkins on the road between Alon Moreh and Itamar). The study is updated to October 25, 2015, although the wave of terrorism continues and it will be necessary to update it further in the future, in view of the daily terrorist attacks being carried out.

12. The study has three appendices. The first presents the main findings of the primary examination of the attributes the terrorists. The other two include a short, initial summary of the attacks carried out in Israel and individually examine each of the terrorists who carried them out. The parameters examined include the modus operandi of attack, its geographical location, where the terrorist came from, his motivation, age, organizational affiliation (if it exists), family status, education, profession, the involvement of women in terrorist attacks and various other aspects unique to each individual terrorist.