Will Putin Prevail in Syria – Iraq Operations?

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

Is it incompetence or willful that Russia is operating with impunity in the skies above Turkey and Syria? It is also likely Russia may include Iraq in air strike operations. So, who is going to stop Russia and with what cause exactly?

Allies Respond to Russia’s Violations of Turkish and NATO Airspace

The North Atlantic Council met today to hold consultations on the potential implications of the recent dangerous military actions of the Russian Federation in and around Syria.

Allies expressed their deep concern with regard to the Russian military build-up in Syria and especially the attacks by the Russian Air Force on Hama, Homs, and Idlib which led to civilian casualties and did not target Da’esh. Allies call on the Russian Federation to immediately cease its attacks on the Syrian opposition and civilians, to focus its efforts on fighting ISIL, and to promote a solution to the conflict through a political transition.

Russian military actions have reached a more dangerous level with the recent violations of Turkish airspace on 3 October and 4 October by Russian Air Force SU-30 and SU-24 aircraft in the Hatay region. The aircraft in question entered Turkish airspace despite Turkish authorities’ clear, timely and repeated warnings. In accordance with NATO practice, Turkish fighter aircraft responded to these incursions by closing to identify the intruder, after which the Russian planes departed Turkish airspace.

Allies strongly protest these violations of Turkish sovereign airspace, and condemn these incursions into and violations of NATO airspace. Allies also note the extreme danger of such irresponsible behaviour. They call on the Russian Federation to cease and desist, and immediately explain these violations.

Meanwhile, late last week due to the aggressions of Russia in the region, the Obama White House and National Security Council decided to dust off the solutions, the battle plans and strategies offered by the Pentagon but ignored. It is alleged that the White House may go forward with protections of a 90 mile border region of Syria and Iraq as well as supporting the Kurds, an ally the White House has refused to acknowledge.

As the Defense Department Secretary, Ash Carter and the White House are telegraphing that Russian operations in Syria is a losing proposition, when it comes to Putin seeking and gaining power, that model is working.

Another interesting twist to Russian operations in Syria is the terror factions on the ground.

Nusra Front Bounty ISIS Syria Russia

Al-Qaeda Affiliate Issues Bounty for Capture of Russian Soldiers in Syria

A prominent spiritual leader and financier of Al-Qaeda’s official branch in Syria, the Nusra Front, issued a bounty worth three million Syrian pounds ($15,900) for the capture of a Russian soldier in Syria on Thursday, a day after Russia carried out its first airstrikes against rebel groups in the country.

A poster shared on social media offers one million Syrian pounds ($5,300) paid to the fighter who captures a Russian soldier and two million ($10,600) paid to the fighter’s faction.

“To the heroic Mujahideen brothers, a prize of a million [Syrian pounds] to anyone who takes hostage a Russian soldier,” wrote Abu Hassan al-Kuwaiti, a spiritual leader of the Nusra Front, in a tweet that has been retweeted more than 150 times and shared widely among online jihadi sympathizers on Twitter.
Although Newsweek could not independently verify that the account was owned by al-Kuwaiti, Aymenn Jawad al-Tamimi, an expert in the monitoring of online extremists and a fellow at the U.S.-based think tank The Middle East Forum, told Newsweek by email that the bounty had been publicized by al-Kuwaiti, describing him as an “important figure” in the terror group’s structure.

The two bounty posters appeared on social media for the capture of a Russian soldier after al-Kuwaiti’s announcement. One poster shows pictures of al-Kuwaiti, a Kuwaiti citizen whose real name is Ali bin Hamad al-Arjani, as well as Nusra Front’s top military commander, Maysar al-Jubouri, who is known by the nom de guerre Abu Maria al-Qahtani. A third man, who has not been identified, appears in the picture.

According to Laith Alkhouri, co-founder and Middle East and North Africa director of research and analysis at U.S.-based Internet monitoring group Flashpoint Intel, al-Kuwaiti is believed to act as both a spiritual figure and a financier to the Nusra Front. Alkhouri, who tracks online extremists, also confirmed that al-Kuwaiti posted the bounty from his official account, which is widely followed by other jihadi accounts vetted by Flashpoint. While the bounty is in the low thousands, Alkhouri says that it would provide vital funds for Nusra’s factions in rural areas of northern Syria.

“The motivation to capture a Russian soldier is not necessarily going to be the financial reward,” he says. “It’s not a massive amount of money, but that kind of money can really facilitate the movement and operations for a lot of soldiers and it actually is significant for Syrians themselves.”

Abu Hassan Al-Kuwaiti
While little is known about al-Kuwaiti, he has been quoted in the Kuwaiti media previously and regularly posts tweets about radical Islam and blog posts criticizing ISIS. In one post uploaded in July he complains that the rival group attempts to “sow strife in the ranks” of the Nusra Front.

The Nusra Front has been energized by Russia’s entry into the Syrian civil war and is likely using the offer of a bounty as a tool to attract jihadis from the former Soviet republics, says Michael Horowitz, security analyst at the Tel Aviv-based geopolitical risk consultancy The Levantine Group.

“The bounty is meant as a PR campaign to attract more jihadists,” he says. “For the Nusra Front, Russia’s intervention is a good opportunity to bolster its recruitment and to start unifying the mosaic of foreign fighters that are fighting the regime. The fact that Al-Qaeda, via its official branch in Syria, is once again fighting Russian forces, decades after the USSR was defeated in Afghanistan, is also a powerful image that could serve to unify jihadist groups in northern Syria. Nusra will most certainly try to use this image and any operation against Russian forcesincluding the kidnapping of a Russian soldierto gain momentum in the deadly competition with Islamic State [ISIS].”

Another prominent jihadi cleric linked to the Nusra Front also recalled Russia’s war in Afghanistan on Friday, warning that Syria will become a “graveyard for invaders,” the Associated Press reported.

“Oh Russian people, did you forget the Afghan quagmire? Do you want to enter a new quagmire? The people of the Levant will stand up to you,” Abdullah al-Muhaysini, a Saudi militant based in Syria, said in a video statement.

At least two radical Islamist groups from the former Soviet republics operating in northern Syria—one from Uzbekistan and one led by Chechens—officially joined Al-Qaeda in recent weeks, amid increasing signs of a Russian military build-up in Syria.

Al-Kuwaiti tweeted to his 3,000-plus followers on Friday, ordering them to follow Abu Jaber Dagestani, a prominent Russian-born member of the radical Caucasus Emirate group, which has previously received funding from Al-Qaeda. The pledges of allegiance and tweets highlight the close links between Al-Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate and the radical fighters from the Caucasus that Moscow considers to be a domestic security risk.

The Caucasus Emirate group is banned in Russia and considered a terrorist organization by the U.K., U.S. and U.N. A number of the group’s warlords declared their allegiance to ISIS in June, according to Russia’s federal security services (FSB). However, Dagestani tweeted at the time: “Do not believe everything you hear, not all jihadists of Caucasus swore allegiance to the Islamic State,” he wrote. “Those who declared allegiance have nothing to do with Sharia laws at all.”

USA Loses Identity due to Obama’s Policy

Posted on October 4, 2015October 4, 2015 by Denise Simon

Does Minneapolis, Minnesota look like it did 5 years ago? How about Lewiston, Maine or Cape Coral, Florida?

Forget Miami, Los Angeles and New York–America’s newest immigrant capitals are the country’s recent boom towns.

Top of the list: Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla., with a 122% increase in its foreign-born population from 2000 to 2007, according to a Brookings Institution analysis of U.S. Census Bureau information. Also ranking high are the metro areas of Nashville, Tenn., (74% increase), Indianapolis (71%), Orlando, Fla., (64%) and Raleigh, N.C. (62%).

It makes sense. Like everyone else, immigrants are drawn to places with jobs. These towns offer a relatively low cost of living, compared with their big-city brethren and, in recent years, ample opportunities for work in various fields. Raleigh is a hub of North Carolina’s “Research Triangle,” and in 2007, about 15% of its working immigrant population worked in professional, scientific and administrative occupations, according to the Census Bureau. Orlando, a major tourist destination, is a hub for service-sector jobs.

From Breitbart:

The following chart and background have been provided to Breitbart News exclusively from the Senate Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest, which is chaired by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL). The chart shows that for every 1 net American born to today’s population—births minus deaths—the federal government will add 7 more people to the country through future immigration.

1-7-immigration

The Senate Subcommittee told Breitbart News:

October 3rd marked the 50th anniversary of the Immigration and Nationality Act. According to Pew Research, in the five decades since the Act’s adoption, 59 million immigrants have entered the United States. Pew further estimates that, including the descendants of those new arrivals, immigration policy added 72 million people to the population of the United States. In 1970, fewer than 1 in 21 Americans were foreign-born; today, nearly 1 in 7 are foreign-born. The United States has taken in four times more worldwide immigrants than any other nation on Earth. Over the next five decades, Pew projects that new immigration, including the descendants of those new immigrants, will add 103 million to the current U.S. population. The net addition of 103 million new persons is exclusively the result of new immigration of persons not currently in the U.S. The 103 million figure does not include any immigrants currently in the U.S. or their future children. (As a side note: Pew data shows that new foreign-born arrivals will not lower today’s median U.S. age of 38; Pew estimates the median age of the foreign-born in 2065 will approach 53.)

Pew also found that, by more than a 3-1 margin, Americans wished to see immigration rates reduced – not raised. Unless such reductions are enacted, the foreign-born share of the U.S. population will soon eclipse the highest levels ever recorded in U.S. history and will keep climbing to new all-time records every decade of the 21st century. Pew projects that by 2065, more than 1 in 3 U.S. residents will either be foreign-born or have foreign-born parents, assuming no law is passed to reduce immigration rates. By contrast, in the 20th century, after the foreign-born population share peak reached in 1910, immigration was reduced for the next six consecutive decades.

Lower-income workers, including millions of prior immigrants, are among those most severely impacted by the vast inflow of new workers competing for the same jobs at lower wages. Across the economy, average hourly wages are lower today than in 1973, while the share of people not working is at nearly a four-decade high. Yet the Senate’s Gang of Eight bill would have tripled green card issuances over the next decade (issuing more new green cards than the entire population of Texas) and the industry-backed I-squared bill would triple admission of new H-1B foreign workers provided to technology corporations as low-wage substitutes for their existing workers.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the chairman of the subcommittee, responded to the startling data his committee uncovered by telling Breitbart News there should be immigration controls put in place immediately.

“We should not admit people in larger numbers than we can reasonably expect to vet, assimilate, and absorb into our schools, communities, and labor markets,” Sessions said. “It is not compassionate but uncaring to bring in so many people that there are not enough jobs for them or the people already here. Over the last four decades, immigration levels have quadrupled. The Census Bureau projects that we will add another 14 million immigrants over the next decade. It is not mainstream, but extreme, to continue surging immigration beyond all historical precedent. It is time for moderation to prevail, and for us to focus on improving the jobs, wages, and security of the 300 million people already living inside our borders.”

The subcommittee also pointed to polling data that proves Americans are united entirely behind what Sessions wants to do.

“Polling from Kellyanne Conway shows that, by nearly a 10-1 margin, Americans of all backgrounds are united in their belief that companies should raise wages and improve working conditions for people already living in the United States – instead of bringing in new labor from abroad,” the subcommittee noted.

Sen. Sessions is appearing on Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot Channel 125 with Breitbart News Executive Chairman Stephen K. Bannon on Sunday evening to discuss this and more right at 7 p.m.

*** The same goes for Europe:

Tip of the iceberg: No end in sight to migrant wave

ZAGREB, Croatia (AP) — One month after the body of 3-year-old Aylan Kurdi washed up on a Turkish beach — and a week after the European Union agreed to secure its borders — the migrant crisis has largely fallen off the front pages and reporters are going home.

But the human tide keeps rolling northward and westward, and aid agencies are preparing for it to continue through the winter, when temperatures along the migrant trail will drop below freezing. They fear the crisis may get worse.

“One thing is clear, the movement is not going to die down,” said Babar Baloch, the U.N. refugee agency’s representative in the Balkans. “What we are seeing right now … it’s just the tip of the iceberg.”

While over a half million people have crossed the Mediterranean to Europe this year, more than double the figure for all of 2014, that is only a fraction of the people who are on the move. Some 4 million have fled Syria after more than four years of civil war, and 8 million have been displaced inside the country. And it’s not just Syrians. It’s Iraqis and Iranians, Afghans and Eritreans.

The EU acknowledged the scale of the problem last week, even after it approved a plan to toughen border controls and provide at least 1 billion euros ($1.1 billion) to help Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan care for refugees living in their countries. The first new border measures won’t take effect until November, and a proposal for strengthening the EU border agency is due in December.

“Recently I visited refugee camps in Turkey and Jordan and I heard only one message — we are determined to get to Europe,” European Council President Donald Tusk said after the agreement was announced. “It is clear that the greatest tide of refugees and migrants is yet to come.”

While the UN High Commissioner for Refugees on Friday reported a “noticeable drop” in migrants entering Greece by sea — as weather conditions deteriorated this week — agency spokesman Adrian Edwards said “any improvement in the weather is likely to bring another surge in arrivals.”

About 1,500 people arrived in Greece on Thursday, down from 5,000 a day in recent weeks, UNHCR said.

The EU was spurred to act after photos of Aylan lying face down on a Turkish beach were published around the world, triggering outrage over the suffering of migrants fleeing war and poverty. Aylan drowned, along with his mother and brother, when their boat capsized on the journey from Turkey to the Greek island of Kos.

Before the EU can stop the influx, it must convince the world that it has regained control of its borders after months of news coverage showing the virtually unimpeded flow of people traveling from Turkey to Greece, then north through the Balkans to Austria, Germany and Sweden.

The surge came as donors cut back on funding for groups supporting Syrian refugees. The World Food Program in August said funding shortfalls forced it to cut food aid by 50 percent for 1.5 million refugees living in Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey, Iraq and Egypt. EU members pledged to restore funding for the WFP as part of their agreement last week.

The aid is important. Most refugees are unable to build new lives in their Middle Eastern host countries because they are barred from working. And as they watch their resources vanish, even people who hadn’t planned to go to Europe are now considering it.

“There’s no hope at all, so moving on seems the only option,” Baloch said. “It could be an exodus in the making.”

Take, for example, Zafer, a Syrian refugee who spoke on condition that his last name not be used for fear of reprisals. Zafer, 43, fled his country three years ago for Istanbul and is now contemplating Europe, encouraged by a friend who made the illegal crossing to Greece and is now in Germany.

“I don’t have a future here, it is very hard. I had a budget but it is running out,” he told The Associated Press. “I am worried about my children’s education. Now they are young, but what will happen later when they are older? I am worried.”

He isn’t alone.

With a migrant path clearly established, complete with signposts on how to get to Europe, aid groups say it’s almost as if a message has gone out: This is your chance. Now or never.

“In normal conditions, you will think twice about crossing the Mediterranean with your children because it is dangerous,” said Gianluca Rocco, western Balkans coordinator for the International Organization for Migration. “But now you go with the flow. The flow is there and it is moving very quickly.”

Macedonia, the main corridor for people traveling north from Greece, is preparing for the flood to continue through the winter.

Authorities are installing floors and heating in tents at the Gevgelija refugee camp, and aid agencies will provide warm clothes and blankets for the migrants, said Aleksandra Kraus, a spokeswoman for the UNHCR in Macedonia.

The Macedonian parliament in September extended the state of emergency on the country’s borders until June 2016. The country of 2 million people is spending about 1 million euros a month on migrants.

“Conditions and capacities for migrants depend on the budget,” said Ivo Kotevski, a police spokesman. “We appeal for assistance.”

All over the region, groups are already struggling to keep pace with arrivals, especially with winter drawing close.

“It will get much colder still, and the provision of adequate shelter is not even close to matching the number of people crossing into Serbia every day,” Doctors Without Borders President Meinie Nicolai told The Associated Press.

It’s unclear whether the EU actions will stem the flow, particularly in the short term.

Social media savvy asylum seekers are now aware the new border measures may take effect in November; and that effectively gives potential migrants a deadline that could spur them to make a dash for Europe, making the events of recent weeks a mere prelude to an even larger flood of humanity.

The EU is moving in the right direction, but the new programs will take time to implement, and the conditions that have pushed the refugees toward Europe haven’t changed, said Maurizio Albahari, author of “Crimes of Peace: Mediterranean Migrations at the World’s Deadliest Border,” and a social anthropologist at the University of Notre Dame.

“People in Turkey and in Libya are on top of the news. This includes both smugglers and refugees,” he said by email. “The winter months and the promise/threat of additional border control/patrols at the EU’s external borders might motivate them to move earlier than they would.”

Doctor Without Borders, Not What you Think

Posted on October 4, 2015October 4, 2015 by Denise Simon

Doctors Without Borders, known internationally by Médecins Sans Frontières, is a wing of consultation for the United Nations. The medical and humanitarian organization is not without its own controversy. It was expelled from Myanmar.

As written previously on this site in March of 2015, Kayla Mueller from Arizona was working with Doctors Without Borders while both were supporting the International Solidarity Movement currently behind the fresh hostilities in the West Bank, Jerusalem and Gaza. After relocating to Syria, Kayla was in Raqqah, taken as a sex slave by ISIS and later killed.

Defense Secretary Ash Carter is in Spain and was asked about a hospital facility hit by a U.S. airstrike, leaving several dead and others wounded along with a burning building. His responses are here.

A senior defense official said US special operations forces in an “advise and assist” role in Kunduz had been taking fire and called in air support from an AC-130. The plane opened fire but the military wasn’t “positively certain” it hit the hospital, the official said.

Several facts need to be noted. Kunduz is a region where the Taliban had not previously been in control until that is the new leader of the Taliban Mullah Mansour, who rose to power after the secret was telegraphed that Mullah Omar had been dead for two years.

Mullah Mansour is an opportunist and takes the inch of a given order beyond the mile and he has something to prove and did so by taking over the Kunduz region which the Afghan forces with the assistance of the NATO forces took back in a matter of 2 days, yet it remains contested.

From the LWJ in part: While fighting for control of the provincial capital of Kunduz, the Taliban launched a wider offensive in the Afghan north aimed at seizing control of districts in four provinces: Badakhshan, Baghlan, Kunduz, and Takhar. Since Sept. 28, the Taliban has taken control of nine districts in these four provinces and another in the western province of Farah. “Control” means the Taliban is openly administering a province, providing services and security, and also running the local courts. Often, the district centers are under Taliban occupation or have been destroyed entirely. The Taliban does not always hold the districts it takes. It occasionally will seize a district or the district center, occupy it and fly the flag, leave after a few days, then return at a later date. These districts are considered contested at best.

Mansour has a nasty and long history with the Taliban, the Haqqani and the Pakistan intelligence wing known as the ISI. The ISI allowed much of the Taliban and Mansour himself to live and operate with impunity. He is the terror list but travels freely to Dubai where he owns a home as he also does in a Taliban enclave in Pakistan.

Further, when it comes to U.S. air operations in Afghanistan, there are no ground controllers, meaning any coordinates or airstrikes are called in by Afghan forces. Doctors Without Borders tells the story that they provided exact location coordinates to NATO and to Centcom to keep them from being bombed. Logical decision except were those coordinates accurate, later distorted or altered by the Taliban or moles in the Afghan forces in the area? Further, the pilot in not culpable and in a region of hostilities, the U.S. is immune from hitting wrong targets due to responsibility placed on home military unites because of insecure data, insecure Afghan personnel and because the Taliban follow the same terror model of placing weapons, people and sensitive material in hospitals, schools, mosques as other terror networks.

When the investigation is complete, it may omit these details posted below.

It’s Time to Treat Doctors Without Borders as a Terrorist Organization

End non-profit status for them and for any organization that funds them

“Doctors Without Borders has a long history of collaborating with and defending terrorists. And even being terrorists. The issue came up just last month in relation to Hamas.

Its current attacks on America and collaboration with the Taliban are completely unacceptable. Doctors Without Borders’ personnel are once again lying through their teeth, denying the facts put forward by US and Afghan personnel and covering up the use of medical facilities by the Taliban Jihadists as human shields.

This is the same tactic that we’ve seen with Hamas.

It’s time to deal with Doctors Without Borders, a cynical name for an organization in bed with Islamic terrorists.

The acting governor of Afghanistan’s northern Kunduz province said Sunday that Taliban fighters had been routinely firing “small and heavy” weapons from the grounds of a local hospital before it was apparently hit by a U.S. airstrike over the weekend.

In an interview, Hamdullah Danishi said the Doctors Without Borders compound was “a Taliban base” that was being used to plot and carry out attacks across the provincial capital, Kunduz city.

“The hospital campus was 100 percent used by the Taliban,” Danishi said. “The hospital has a vast garden, and the Taliban were there. We tolerated their firing for some time” before responding.

Doctors Without Borders is lying and denying everything. The media is predictably taking the side of the extremist left-wing group. But the solution is obvious.

1. Treat Doctors Without Borders members just like ISIS recruits when it comes to international travel. At no point in time should they be allowed to travel to conflict zones since it is manifestly clear that they do so to aid terrorists. If they lie about their travel plans, they should go to jail.

2. End non-profit status for them and for any organization that funds them.

3. End any special status that they have when operating in conflict zones since they aren’t medical personnel, just terrorist auxiliaries who were aiding the Taliban takeover of Kunduz.”

Justice Dept Helps Erase our Sovereignty via UN

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

Just some of the text from the website: A global network of local authorities united in building resilience to prevent violent extremism. The Strong Cities Network aims to connect cities and other local authorities on an international basis, to enhance local level approaches to prevent violent extremism; including facilitating information sharing, mutual learning and creation of new and innovative local practices. Find out more about the Strong Cities Network strategic objectives below.

The ‘Strong Cities Network’ (SCN) has been created to achieve a focused and rapid exchange of ideas and methods to strengthen the safety, security and cohesion of communities and cities. The Strong Cities Network will connect cities and local authority practitioners through practical workshops, training seminars and sustained city partnerships.

Strong Cities Network member cities will also contribute to, and benefit from, an ‘Online Information Hub’ of municipal-level good practices and web-based training modules, as well as ‘City-to-City Exchanges’. Strong Cities Network member cities will be eligible for grants supporting new innovative pilot projects. Click here to learn more and then start asking some hard questions.

Why be concerned? The U.S, Attorney General, Loretta Lynch joined Vice President Joe Biden at the United Nations this week to introduce this global objective. There has been such chatter and fear about United Nations interference into American culture especially with regard to an outside power and authority where America’s sovereignty continues to fade away. Now we could have real cause for that concern. Read on…none of this is in our best interest.

The United States has hundreds of thousands of people in powerful positions and advanced technology where profiling must be considered and to cure ‘violent extremism’ we go global for solutions? Heck global is part of the cause.

Department of Justice

Office of Public Affairs

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Monday, September 28, 2015

Launch of Strong Cities Network to Strengthen Community Resilience Against Violent Extremism

Cities are vital partners in international efforts to build social cohesion and resilience to violent extremism. Local communities and authorities are the most credible and persuasive voices to challenge violent extremism in all of its forms and manifestations in their local contexts. While many cities and local authorities are developing innovative responses to address this challenge, no systematic efforts are in place to share experiences, pool resources and build a community of cities to inspire local action on a global scale.

“The Strong Cities Network will serve as a vital tool to strengthen capacity-building and improve collaboration,” said Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch. “As we continue to counter a range of domestic and global terror threats, this innovative platform will enable cities to learn from one another, to develop best practices and to build social cohesion and community resilience here at home and around the world.”

The Strong Cities Network (SCN) – which launches September 29^th at the United Nations – will empower municipal bodies to fill this gap while working with civil society and safeguarding the rights of local citizens and communities.

The SCN will strengthen strategic planning and practices to address violent extremism in all its forms by fostering collaboration among cities, municipalities and other sub-national authorities.

“To counter violent extremism we need determined action at all levels of governance,” said Governing Mayor Stian Berger Røsland of Oslo while commenting on their participation in the SCN. “To succeed, we must coordinate our efforts and cooperate across borders. The Strong Cities Network will enable cities across the globe pool our resources, knowledge and best practices together and thus leave us standing stronger in the fight against one of the greatest threats to modern society.”

The SCN will connect cities, city-level practitioners and the communities they represent through a series of workshops, trainings and sustained city partnerships. Network participants will also contribute to and benefit from an online repository of municipal-level good practices and web-based training modules and will be eligible for grants supporting innovative, local initiatives and strategies that will contribute to building social cohesion and resilience to violent extremism.

The SCN will include an International Steering Committee of approximately 25 cities and other sub-national entities from different regions that will provide the SCN with its strategic direction. The SCN will also convene an International Advisory Board, which includes representatives from relevant city-focused networks, to help ensure SCN builds upon their work. It will be run by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), a leading international “think-and-do” tank with a long-standing track record of working to prevent violent extremism:

“The SCN provides a unique new opportunity to apply our collective lessons in preventing violent extremism in support of local communities and authorities around the world”, said CEO Sasha Havlicek of ISD. “We look forward to developing this international platform for joint innovation to impact this pressing challenge.”

“It is with great conviction that Montréal has agreed to join the Strong Cities Network founders,” said the Honorable Mayor Denis Coderre of Montreal. “This global network is designed to build on community-based approaches to address violent extremism, promote openness and vigilance and expand upon local initiatives like Montréal’s Mayors’ International Observatory on Living Together. I am delighted that through the Strong Cities Network, the City of Montréal will more actively share information and best practices with a global network of leaders on critical issues facing our communities.”

The Strong Cities Network will launch on Sept. 29^, from 4:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. EDT, following the Leaders’ Summit on Countering ISIL and Violent Extremism. Welcoming remarks will be offered by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein and Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York City, who will also introduce a Keynote address by U.S. Attorney General Lynch. Following this event, the Strong Cities International Steering Committee, consisting of approximately 25 mayors and other leaders from cities and other sub-national entities from around the globe, will hold its inaugural meeting on Sept. 30, 2015, from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. EDT.

United States Becoming Refugee’stan

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

There is 1…ONE champion in Washington DC that is leading the charge to stop the reckless Obama/Kerry refugee program threatening our national security at least for two years, Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions:

WASHINGTON— Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), Chairman of the Senate Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest, delivered the following remarks at the Subcommittee’s hearing to investigate the Administration’s controversial plan to admit nearly 200,000 refugees over the next two fiscal years, including a large increase in Syrian refugees, on top of the existing annual admittance of 1 million permanent residents.

In the last five decades, 59 million immigrants have entered the United States.
Immigration, including the children of post-1965 immigrants, added 72 million people to the U.S. population.
One-fifth of the world’s immigrants live in the United States. No other country has taken in more than 1 in 20. We have taken in 6 times more immigrants than all of Latin America, and 10 million more immigrants than the European Union.
We have permanently resettled 1.5 million immigrants from Muslim countries in the United States since 9/11.
In 1970, fewer than 1 in 21 Americans was foreign-born, today it is approaching 1 in 7 and will soon eclipse the highest levels ever recorded.
Pew projects new immigrants and their children will add another 103 million individuals to our resident population over the next five decades. That means for every one new resident produced by our existing population, immigration will add another 7 new residents.
Six of the ten decades of the 20th century witnessed immigration declines. Every decade of the 21st century will see rapidly-rising immigration, with each decade setting a new all-time record.
After four decades of large-scale immigration, Pew shows that – by more than a 3:1 margin – the public would like to see immigration reduced, not increased. According to Rasmussen, only 7% of Americans support resettling 100,000 Middle Eastern refugees in the United States.
Meanwhile, recent studies from Georgetown Professor Eric Gould and Harvard Professor George Borjas, have linked this huge increase in the foreign labor supply to the crippling wage stagnation and joblessness afflicting our workers.

With that context in mind, we must consider what our economic, social and security infrastructure can responsibly handle. Let us not also forget that we are presently dealing with our hemisphere’s immigration crisis.

The situation in Syria and throughout the Middle East is not a problem that can be solved with immigration. While the United States may have a role to play – such as establishing “safe zones” in Syria, as recommended by General Petraeus – it would be more cost-effective to support refugees in locations closer to their homes with the long-term goal of returning them home instead of permanent resettlement elsewhere in the world. That is why Middle Eastern nations must take the lead in resettling their region’s refugees. It is not a sound policy to respond to the myriad problems in the region by encouraging millions to abandon their home. Resettling the region’s refugees within the region is the course likeliest to produce long-term political reforms and stabilization. More here.

How bad can it really be?

U.S. Refugee Chief Didn’t Know Boston Bombers Were Refugees