Category Archives: Department of Homeland Security

Example: Depths of Chinese Hacking the U.S.

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Former Top FBI Lawyer and Counterintelligence Official Admits Chinese Hacked His Home Computer

September 8, 2015

China Allegedly Hacked Top Former FBI Lawyer 

Jeff Stein, Newsweek

Marion “Spike” Bowman, a top former FBI lawyer and U.S. counterintelligence official who heads an influential organization of retired American spies, says a hacker from China penetrated his home computer, beginning with an innocent-looking email last spring.

“It was an email supposedly from a woman in China, and I exchanged correspondence with her a couple of times,” says Bowman, who was deputy general counsel to three FBI directors between 1995 and 2006. “She sent me a document that a friend of hers had supposedly written, in English, and wanted my opinion on it,” he tells Newsweek. She also sent him her picture.

“I never got around to replying, so I never heard from her again,” says Bowman, who went on to become deputy director of the National Counterintelligence Executive, which is tasked with developing policies to thwart foreign spies and terrorists.

But then, a week ago, he says, he got another message from China via his email account at George Washington University, where he has lectured on national security law since 2003.

“It was apparently from a university in China asking me come to speak at a conference on the environment”—not even remotely one of his areas of expertise, Bowman says. He called the FBI.

After a forensic examination of his machine, the FBI told him “they had found a malware type that’s designed to find out what’s on my computer,” Bowman says. “It wasn’t anything to infect it.” Still, just being able to read the contents of a target’s computer can reveal lots of valuable information like emails and documents, contact files with phone numbers and other personal data, like home addresses.

“Somebody who really knows what they’re doing” can wreak havoc, he says.

The FBI didn’t tell him exactly who was behind the hack, he says, “but they think they identified the woman” in a picture she sent along with one of her emails last spring. “It was somebody that they knew,” Bowman says. “I didn’t inquire any further.”

Before joining the FBI, Bowman was a Navy lawyer assigned to advise SEAL teams on clandestine operations, among other sensitive matters. His portfolio at the FBI gave him intimate knowledge of the details of operations to counter threats from foreign spy agencies.

“I still carry lots of deep Cold War secrets in my head,” he says, although not on his computer. But he is still very active in national security circles as chairman of the board of directors of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers, an organization with several thousand members nationwide, about half of them former CIA personnel.

Bowman’s revelation follows several months of bad news about the vulnerability of government computers to foreign hackers, the latest being a report published Monday saying that Chinese and Russian intelligence agencies are “aggressively aggregating and cross-indexing hacked U.S. computer databases” to catch American spies working overseas. China-based hackers breached about 22 million files held by the federal Office of Personnel Management, officials say.

“At least one clandestine network of American engineers and scientists who provide technical assistance to U.S. undercover operatives and agents overseas has been compromised as a result” of the Russian and Chinese exploitation of the files, the Los Angeles Times reported, citing two U.S. officials.

The story, Bowman says, was “pretty much on target.”

*** It obviously is much worse than we know for the Obama administration to sign off on a sanction and or other consequence ahead of the Xi’s visit to the United States next week.

U.S. may punish Chinese hacking before Xi’s visit

Imposing sanctions before this month’s summit could derail other priorities.

Top government officials are floating the idea of retaliating within the next week to Chinese cyberattacks, possibly by imposing targeted sanctions on some officials and firms, people familiar with the discussions say. But outside experts say it would be wiser to wait until after this month’s White House summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

“I heard from one person that it could be as early as next week,” Jim Lewis, director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies’ Strategic Technologies Program, told POLITICO. He added, “I still think it would be best to wait for the summit.”

Calls for U.S. retalation to Chinese hacking have risen to a furor since the China-linked breach of highly sensitive security clearance forms from 21.5 million current and former federal employees, disclosed in June.

But imposing sanctions before the late-September summit would risk derailing a serious conversation on cyber issues along with myriad other topics, including China’s economic troubles, Chinese belligerence in the South China Sea and cooperation on climate change.

Some China watchers even suspect that the White House is trying to improve its bargaining position in advance of the summit by floating the possibility of sanctions in a serious way.

“My sense is that they’re floating the idea to try to create some kind of leverage in the meetings,” said Adam Segal, a China scholar and director of the Digital and Cyberspace Policy Program at the Council on Foreign Relations.

If the White House did impose sanctions before the meeting, it would be deeply embarrassing to the Chinese and to Xi personally and risk the Chinese doing something to downgrade the summit’s importance, Segal said. “I think if they’re going to do it before the summit, they’ve got to be prepared for the summit to really take a downward turn,” he said.

Business leaders are also dubious about imposing sanctions before Xi’s visit.

The White House should use the summit “as an opportunity to engage in effective dialogue on the cyber issue. If sanctions jeopardize that opportunity, we’d rather see them put it off,” the leader of a major industry organization said in an interview, speaking without attribution because he was speculating about government policy.

If the White House ultimately imposes targeted sanctions, the association leader added, the sanctions should be “based on transparent, credible evidence that’s legally sound.” They should also be designed with a clear path forward that, ultimately, leads to fewer China-linked cyberattacks, he said.

“Most business executives we’ve spoke with felt the indictments against Chinese PLA officers didn’t meet that test,” he added, referring to the May 2014 U.S. indictments of five hackers employed by China’s People’s Liberation Army. That was the Obama administration’s most significant diplomatic strike against Chinese hacking to date.

“[The indictments] didn’t seem to advance anything and they seemed to increase tension rather than reduce it around the issue,” the official said.

In the wake of the OPM hacks, some political leaders have called for much more belligerent responses to Chinese hacking. They include GOP White House contenders Mike Huckabee, who has urged the U.S. to hack back against the communist nation, and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, who has suggested canceling the Obama-Xi summit entirely.

But even cyber hawks warned that aggressive action could backfire in advance of the summit.

“I think everything is going to basically be on hold until the Iran deal goes through and until after President Xi comes to meet with [President Obama],” said Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.), who was formerly ranking member on the House Intelligence Committee.

Ruppersberger added that “we have to eventually draw a line on cyberattacks,” and that the U.S. bargaining position relative to China may be improved now because of the tailspin in the Chinese stock market and other financial difficulties.

The White House has routinely declined to speak publicly about the possibility of sanctioning China for cyberattacks or any more forceful follow-up to the PLA indictments. Press secretary Josh Earnest has said several times that Obama plans to raise cyber concerns with Xi during their summit.

“There’s no doubt that the president will certainly raise, as he has in every previous meeting with his Chinese counterpart, concerns about China’s behavior in cyberspace,” Earnest said during an Aug. 26 news conference.

White House officials have determined they must respond to China’s hacking of OPM, but have been debating for months what the appropriate response should be and when to impose it, Lewis said.

The option of targeted cyber sanctions, which Obama created by executive order in April, has long been on the table along with additional indictments or some form of diplomatic protest, he said.

White House officials have fingered China for the OPM hack anonymously but have not done so, thus far, on the record.

A forceful response to the OPM hack and to Chinese theft of U.S. companies’ intellectual property and trade secrets has also been delayed by more pressing diplomatic priorities, Lewis said, including securing Chinese cooperation for a deal to halt Iran’s nuclear weapons program

“This administration has done more than any other on cybersecurity, but, in a lot of cases, it ends up being No. 2 because of the need to get agreement on other things,” Lewis said. “Cyber always ends up coming in second place, particularly when it comes to China.”

 

 

 

 

 

Pope Francis is Breaking the Catholic Doctrine, Revolt at Vatican

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On the very same day that the Kentucky clerk, Kim Davis is ordered released from jail by a local judge for adhering to her inalienable rights to her belief system, a religious debate is underway throughout America.

Anyone remember the Obama administration suing the Little Sisters of the Poor due to Obamacare and birth-control?

Inalienable rights, cannot be surrendered, sold, suspended or transferred at the behest of any government and Kim Davis stood stern.

Meanwhile, while so many issues challenge America, one place to normally seek stability, sense or morality is church, but such is not the case with the Catholic Church or the Vatican.

Due to Pope Francis and what most of the media is not saying, the Papacy and the Vatican is in crisis, in Rome and honestly across the globe.

The edge of a movement is underway at home and worldwide, the rise of the moral and religious compass.

A Conservative revolt is brewing in the Vatican as Pope Francis introduces more inclusive measures

VATICAN CITY — On a sunny morning earlier this year, a camera crew entered a well-appointed apartment just outside the 9th-century gates of Vatican City. Pristinely dressed in the black robes and scarlet sash of the princes of the Roman Catholic Church, the Wisconsin-born Cardinal Raymond Burke sat in his elaborately upholstered armchair and appeared to issue a warning to Pope Francis.

A staunch conservative and Vatican bureaucrat, Burke had been demoted by the pope a few months earlier, but it did not take the fight out of him. Francis had been backing a more inclusive era, giving space to progressive voices on divorced Catholics as well as gays and lesbians. In front of the camera, Burke said he would “resist” liberal changes — and seemed to caution Francis about the limits of his authority. “One must be very attentive regarding the power of the pope,” Burke told the French news crew.

Papal power, Burke warned, “is not absolute.” He added, “The pope does not have the power to change teaching (or) doctrine.”

Burke’s words belied a growing sense of alarm among strict conservatives, exposing what is fast emerging as a culture war over Francis’s papacy and the powerful hierarchy that governs the Roman Catholic Church.

This month, Francis makes his first trip to the United States at a time when his progressive allies are heralding him as a revolutionary, a man who only last week broadened the power of priests to forgive women who commit what Catholic teachings call the “mortal sin” of abortion during his newly declared “year of mercy” starting in December. On Sunday, he called for “every” Catholic parish in Europe to offer shelter to one refugee family from the thousands of asylum-seekers risking all to escape war-torn Syria and other pockets of conflict and poverty.

Yet as he upends church convention, Francis also is grappling with a conservative backlash to the liberal momentum building inside the church. In more than a dozen interviews, including with seven senior church officials, insiders say the change has left the hierarchy more polarized over the direction of the church than at any point since the great papal reformers of the 1960s.

The conservative rebellion is taking on many guises, in public comments, yes, but also in the rising popularity of conservative Catholic websites promoting Francis dissenters; books and promotional materials backed by conservative clerics seeking to counter the liberal trend; and leaks to the news media, aimed at Vatican reformers.

In his recent comments, Burke was also merely stating fact. Despite the vast powers of the pope, church doctrine serves as a kind of constitution. And for liberal reformers, the bruising theological pushback by conservatives is complicating efforts to translate the pope’s transformative style into tangible changes.

“At least we aren’t poisoning each other’s chalices anymore,” said the Rev. Timothy Radcliffe, a liberal British priest and Francis ally appointed to an influential Vatican post in May. Radcliffe said he welcomed open debate, even critical dissent within the church. But he professed himself as being “afraid” of “some of what we’re seeing”

Rather than stake out clear stances, the pope is more subtly, often implicitly, backing liberal church leaders who are pressing for radical change, while dramatically opening the parameters of the debate over how far reforms can go. For instance, during the opening of a meeting of senior bishops last year, Francis told those gathered, “Let no one say, ‘This you cannot say.’ ”

We have a serious issue right now, a very alarming situation where Catholic priests and bishops are saying and doing things that are against what the church teaches

Since then, liberals have tested the boundaries of their new freedom, with one Belgian bishop going as far as calling for the Catholic Church to formally recognize same-sex couples.

Conservatives counter that in the climate of rising liberal thought, they have been thrust unfairly into a position in which “defending the real teachings of the church makes you look like an enemy of the pope,” a senior Vatican official said on the condition of anonymity in order to speak freely.

“We have a serious issue right now, a very alarming situation where Catholic priests and bishops are saying and doing things that are against what the church teaches, talking about same-sex unions, about Communion for those who are living in adultery,” the official said. “And yet the pope does nothing to silence them. So the inference is that this is what the pope wants.”

A measure of the church’s long history of intrigue has spilled into the Francis papacy, particularly as the pope has ordered radical overhauls of murky Vatican finances. Under Francis, the top leadership of the Vatican Bank was ousted, as was the all-Italian board of its financial watchdog agency.

One method of pushback has been to give damaging leaks to the Italian news media. Vatican officials are now convinced that the biggest leak to date — of the papal encyclical on the environment in June — was driven by greed (it was sold to the media) rather than vengeance. But other disclosures have targeted key figures in the papal cleanup — including the conservative chosen to lead the pope’s financial reforms, the Australian Cardinal George Pell, who in March was the subject of a leak about his allegedly lavish personal tastes.

More often, dissent unfolds on ideological grounds. Criticism of a sitting pope is hardly unusual — liberal bishops on occasion challenged Benedict. But in an institution cloaked in traditional fealty to the pope, what shocks many is just how public the criticism of Francis has become.

In an open letter to his diocese, Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence, Rhode Island, wrote: “In trying to accommodate the needs of the age, as Pope Francis suggests, the Church risks the danger of losing its courageous, countercultural, prophetic voice, one that the world needs to hear.” For his part, Burke, the cardinal from Wisconsin, has called the church under Francis “a ship without a rudder.”

Even Pell appeared to undermine him on theological grounds. Commenting on the pope’s call for dramatic action on climate change, Pell told the Financial Times in July, “The church has got no mandate from the Lord to pronounce on scientific matters.”

In conservative circles, the word “confusion” also has become a euphemism for censuring the papacy without mentioning the pope. In one instance, 500 Catholic priests in Britain drafted an open letter this year that cited “much confusion” in “Catholic moral teaching” following the bishops’ conference on the family last year in which Francis threw open the floodgates of debate, resulting in proposed language offering an embraceable, new stance for divorced or gay Catholics.

That language ultimately was watered down in a vote that showed the still-ample power of conservatives. It set up another showdown for next month, when senior church leaders will meet in a follow-up conference that observers predict will turn into another theological slugfest. The pope himself will have the final word on any changes next year.

Conservatives have launched a campaign against a possible policy change that would grant divorced and remarried Catholics the right to take Communion at Mass. Last year, five senior leaders including Burke and the conservative Cardinal Carlo Caffarra of Bologna, Italy, drafted what has become known as “the manifesto” against such a change. In July, a DVD distributed to hundreds of dioceses in Europe and Australia, and backed by conservative Catholic clergy members, made the same point. In it, Burke, who has made similar arguments at Catholic conferences, issued dire warnings of a world in which traditional teachings are ignored.

The pope does not have the power to change teaching (or) doctrine

But this is still the Catholic Church, where hierarchical respect is as much tradition as anything else. Rather than targeting the pope, conservative bishops and cardinals more often take aim at their liberal peers. They include the German Cardinal Walter Kasper, who has suggested that he has become a proxy for clergy members who are not brave enough to criticize the pope directly.

Yet conservatives counter that liberals are overstepping their bounds, putting their own spin on the pronouncements of a pope who has been more ambiguous than Kasper and his allies are willing to admit.

“I was born a papist, I have lived as a papist, and I will die a papist,” Caffarra said. “The pope has never said that divorced and remarried Catholics should be able to take Holy Communion, and yet, his words are being twisted to give them false meaning.”

Some of the pope’s allies insist that debate is precisely what Francis wants.

“I think that people are speaking their mind because they feel very strongly and passionately in their position, and I don’t think the Holy Father sees it as a personal attack on him,” said Chicago Archbishop Blase Cupich, considered a close ally of the pope. “The Holy Father has opened the possibility for these matters to be discussed openly; he has not predetermined where this is going.”

Stefano Pitrelli contributed to this report.

Obama and Kerry Have Vertigo Over this Iran Deal

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Both Barack Obama and John Kerry are suffering from all the symptoms of vertigo, the spinning of lies, the dizziness of power and the imbalance of a lopsided deal with Iran over the nuclear program.

On September 8, 2015, Former Vice President Dick Cheney spoke at the American Enterprise Institute on the notable terror history and chilling consequences of an Iran deal.

Let us examine some facts with regard to Iran and how the negotiation table was a long flawed dialogue from the start.

During the uprising and war in Yemen last March, the Houthis, an Iranian terror proxy took at least 4 Americans hostage. The State Department chose to keep this a secret during the Iranian talks. It is rumored that 1 hostage has been released, while the conditions of the remaining hostages is unknown. Couple this basis with the 4 Americans jailed in Iran. Yet, no efforts have been forthcoming to ensure Iran releases any of them.

Jeddah, Sana’a and Riyadh, Asharq Al-Awsat—The Iranian embassy in Yemen’s capital Sana’a is offering financial, strategic, and military advisory support to the Houthi rebels in country, Yemen’s Foreign Minister Riyadh Yassin said on Sunday.  

Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, Yassin said Iran’s embassy in Sana’a had become a “Houthi operations room” and that Iranian intelligence and military experts at the embassy were helping the Houthis plan attacks against government loyalists and forces from the Saudi-led coalition targeting the group.  

He added that the embassy is “equipped with resources not even the Yemeni government is in possession of” and that it was also being used to distribute financial support to the Houthi militias currently stationed in different parts of the country.  

The Shi’ite Houthis, backed by Iran and Yemen’s ousted former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, occupied Sana’a in September 2014. They then launched a coup the following February deposing Yemen’s internationally recognized President Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and his government.  

Yemeni government loyalist forces and a coalition of Arab counties led by Saudi Arabia are currently engaged in a ground and air offensive against the Houthis, seeking to reinstate Hadi and the government.  

On Sunday coalition warplanes bombed several targets in the capital, according to eyewitnesses speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat.  

They said over 15 individual strikes were carried out, including several targeting the headquarters of Yemen’s Special Security Forces, who are loyal to ex-president Saleh. The sources said most of the HQ’s compound has now been destroyed following the air raids.  

The coalition has announced a plan to retake Sana’a with the aid of government loyalists on the ground, known as the Popular Resistance, to follow gains made in the country’s south which have seen the southern port city of Aden and almost all southern provinces liberated from Houthi control.  

The coalition is now closing in on the Houthis in Sana’a and also in the group’s northern stronghold of Saada. The group last month declared a state of emergency in both areas.  

Local sources told Asharq Al-Awsat on Sunday the Houthis now have a plan in place in anticipation of the impending attack on the capital.  

They said the Houthis plan to “spread a wave of chaos” prior to the entry into the capital of coalition forces and those from the Popular Resistance, which will include assassinations of any figures they deem may cooperate with the latter against them—such as political activists and university professors.  

Meanwhile, on Sunday Saudi hospitals received 852 Yemenis injured as a result of the conflict, in a joint initiative between the King Salman Center for Relief and Humanitarian Works and the Ministry of Health.  

This comes as the King Salman Center on Saturday launched the second phase of a joint humanitarian relief project with the United Nations, delivering aid worth some 22 million US dollars to help Yemenis caught up in the conflict.  

In May Saudi Arabia’s King Salman Bin Abdulaziz increased Saudi Arabia’s aid commitment to Yemen to over half a billion dollars.

 

Meanwhile, ask any sailor deployed in the region about the daily confrontations with Iran.

Iranian warships confront U.S. Navy on ‘daily basis’

U.S. naval forces operating in and around the Strait of Hormuz, a critical shipping lane, are “routinely approached by Iranian warships and aircraft” on a “nearly daily basis,” according to a Pentagon official familiar with operations in the region.

During these interactions between U.S. and Iranian forces, American aircraft and ships are routinely photographed by the Iranians for intelligence purposes, according to the official, who said that most confrontations between the sides are “conducted in a safe and professional manner.”

The disclosure of these daily run-ins comes following the release of footage by the Iranian military purporting to show a reconnaissance mission over a U.S. aircraft carrier station in the Strait of Hormuz. More here from JihadWatch.

Then comes the Iranian Parchin nuclear plant which has been a historical military dimension location going back as far as the Nazi regime that used it for the production of chemical weapons. Today, Iran has declared this location will never be subject to any inspections. Related information on Parchin and images taken from space, click here.

Iran says its construction work at the Parchin military facility, southeast of Tehran, is normal and it will not allow any inspection of the “conventional” site, Press TV reports.  

“Parchin is a conventional military site. The construction there is normal and even it was indeed confirmed by some officials from the United States that Parchin site and the activities there are something normal and it doesn’t have any relevance to the IAEA work,” Iran’s Ambassador to IAEA Reza Najafi said.  

“Of course, this is a military site and Iran will not let any inspector go there,” he added.  

​Najafi’s remarks came after IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano repeated his claims about construction work at Iran’s Parchin military site whose inspection some world powers demand.  

“These activities could undermine the capability of the IAEA on verification but as we do not have inspectors there and by way of observing through satellite imagery, we do not have further insight of these recent activities,” the IAEA chief said.  

 

He added that “much work needs to be done” to finish the probe, but reiterated that the investigations will be complete by mid-December, as agreed in a roadmap between Iran and the IAEA.   

On July 14, Iran and the IAEA signed a roadmap for “the clarification of past and present issues” regarding Iran’s nuclear program in Vienna, Austria.  

Iran provided some additional information on Parchin by August 15, further proving that it was complying with the mutual agreement with the UN agency.  

On August 27, the US Department of State acknowledged that Iran’s Parchin site is a “conventional” military facility. “I think it’s important to remember that when you’re talking about a site like Parchin, you’re talking about a conventional military site, not a nuclear site,” US State Department spokesman John Kirby said.  

“So there wouldn’t be any IAEA or other restrictions on new construction at that site were they to occur,” he added.  

Kirby’s remarks mark a deviation from past claims in the US about Parchin. Iran has repeatedly denied Western allegations about nuclear activity at the site. The comments came after the IAEA voiced reservation about the construction of “a small extension to an existing building” at Parchin.  

“Since (our) previous report (in May), at a particular location at the Parchin site, the agency has continued to observe, through satellite imagery, the presence of vehicles, equipment, and probable construction materials. In addition, a small extension to an existing building appears to have been constructed,” the IAEA report said.  

Following the report, Tehran criticized the agency’s statement about Parchin, saying construction work on the site “does not concern” the nuclear agency.

 

 

Released Guantanamo Back in the Battlefield

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U.S. suspects more freed Guantanamo inmates returned to battlefield

Reuters: The number of detainees freed from the U.S. Guantanamo detention camp who are suspected of “re-engaging” with militant groups overseas increased over the first six months of 2015, the Obama administration said on Thursday.

Figures released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence showed that, as of July this year, of 121 detainees released since President Barack Obama took office in 2009, six were confirmed to have gone back to the battlefield and a further six were suspected of having done so.

Figures released in January had shown that Obama had released a total of 115 Guantanamo inmates, six of whom had returned to the battlefield, but only one of whom was then “suspected of re-engaging.”

Between January and July this year the administration released six detainees.

The data did not identify any individual detainees. The detention facility for terrorism suspects at the U.S. Naval base at Guantanamo, Cuba, which opened after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, now holds 116 prisoners.

The administration of Obama, a Democrat, has said the number of those who returned to fight after being transferred out of Guantanamo under his presidency is lower than under his Republican predecessor George W. Bush, who set up the facility.

Obama has vowed to close Guantanamo before he leaves office in January 2017 but he is hampered by a slow bureaucratic process and by laws passed by Republicans in Congress barring the transfer of detainees to prisons on U.S. soil.

Obama is due to submit a report to Congress soon outlining a new plan for closing the facility.

Gitmo detainee doc

 

 

 

 

 

The full 2 page document is located here.

TWS: In 2014, the report included: The semi-annual report on “Re-engagement of Detainees Formerly Held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba” was released on Wednesday by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI). Out of a total of 614 former prisoners (up from 603 six months ago), intelligence has confirmed that 104 (up from 100) have re-engaged in terrorism/insurgent activities while another 74 are suspected of doing so. The latest report nudged the recidivism rate up to an even 29 percent from 28.9 percent last September.

If there is good news to be found in the report, it is that 3 of the 4 detainees confirmed to have reengaged are now deceased.  Only one of the newly confirmed relapsed terrorist is still at large, joining the 56 other previously confirmed and 48 other suspected of reengaging presently not in custody.

Furthermore, it appears that the Secretary of the Defense Department, Ash Carter has some issues with the movement of Gitmo detainees. His signature has to be applied for approval of transfer. Carter is assuming the same posture as the Secretary of Defense Hagel, before him, this is a problem.

DOD Sec. Says Gitmo Terrorists Need Indefinite Lockup as Obama Tries Closing Prison

SEPTEMBER 04, 2015

While President Obama works to deliver on his longtime promise to close the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba his Defense Secretary offers a jolt of reality; around half of the detainees—the world’s most dangerous terrorists—need to be locked up “indefinitely.”

So what are the commander-in-chief’s plans for the radical Islamic jihadists currently incarcerated in the top-security compound at the U.S. Naval base in southeast Cuba? The all-star terrorist roster includes 9/11 masterminds Khalid Sheikh Mohammed (KSM), Ramzi Binalshibh, Ali Abdul Aziz Ali and Mustafa Ahmed Adam al Hawsawi as well as Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri, the Al-Qaeda terrorist charged with orchestrating the 2000 attack on the Navy destroyer USS Cole. Where will the U.S. government take these terrorists if the president goes through with his plan, which started out as a campaign promise to restore America’s position as a global leader on human rights.

In all the years that Obama has talked of closing the Gitmo prison, he has never touched on what would happen to the terrorists held there. The president has tried emptying out the compound by releasing dozens of prisoners—many of them have rejoined terrorist causes—to foreign countries, but at least half of the remaining 116 are too dangerous to free. Obama’s own Defense Secretary, Ashton Carter, confirmed that recently, saying that “some of the people who are there at Guantanamo Bay have to be detained indefinitely, they’ve just got to be locked up.” This evidently applies to many of those who have been released over the years. For instance, an al Qaeda operative (Saudi Ibrahim al-Rubaysh) released from Gitmo appears on the U.S. government’s global terrorist list and Uncle Sam is offering a $5 million reward for information on his whereabouts.

The administration has considered relocating the captives to military facilities in the U.S., including Ft. Leavenworth in Kansas and the Navy Brig in Charleston, South Carolina. This has ignited outrage among officials in both states. Kansas Senator Pat Roberts was quick to say “not on my watch will any terrorists be placed in Kansas.” Roberts also co-authored a mainstream newspaper op-ed with South Carolina Senator Tim Scott vehemently rejecting the idea. “The notion that Kansas, South Carolina or any other state would be an ideal home for terrorist detainees is preposterous,” the piece reads. “Transferring these prisoners to the mainland puts the well-being of states in danger, posing security risks to the public and wasting taxpayer dollars. The detention facilities at Guantanamo are doing a fantastic job of holding these terrorists.”

The governors of both states—Nikki Haley of South Carolina and Sam Brownback of Kansas—have also vowed to take any action in their power to stop the transfers, including suing the federal government. A South Carolina newspaper editorial points out that the state is already taking a hit for the team by serving as the “de facto permanent home” to high-level nuclear waste associated with the nation’s weapons programs. “Fearing South Carolina is again about to become the home that no other state wants to be has leaders rightly standing up against federal plans to transfer terrorist detainees from the U.S. prison facility at Guantanamo Bay near Cuba to military prisons in South Carolina and Kansas,” the editorial states. “This goes beyond the states’ collective call of duty as there is no agreement on a plan for what to do with the detainees in the long term.”

Judicial Watch has covered Guantanamo extensively and has repeatedly traveled there to monitor the U.S. military commission proceedings against the world’s most dangerous terrorists. JW has witnessed a deep commitment to justice by military and civilian lawyers defending the captives and has reported on many of the perks that the incarcerated terrorists receive from American taxpayers. For instance, they get laptops and computer lessons, “Islamically permissible” halal meals and better medical care than U.S. veterans. Last year the Obama administration let Gitmo inmates operate a “Business School Behind Bars” with an accused Al Qaeda financier as the self-appointed “dean of students.” Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was also permitted to dispatch propaganda from his Guantanamo jail cell (undoubtedly aiding and abetting more terrorism) and a fighter in Osama bin Laden’s 55th Arab Brigade was allowed to published a sob letter in an international media outlet describing the “humiliating and brutal treatments” he suffers at the U.S. military prison.

 

 

 

Post Iran Deal, the Implications for Israel and Middle East

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Netanyahu says will not allow Israel to be ‘submerged’ by refugees

Jerusalem (AFP) – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday said he would not allow Israel to be “submerged” by refugees after calls for the Jewish state to take in those fleeing Syria’s war.

Speaking at the weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu also announced the start of construction of a fence along Israel’s border with Jordan, according to his office.

“We will not allow Israel to be submerged by a wave of illegal migrants and terrorist activists,” Netanyahu said.

“Israel is not indifferent to the human tragedy of Syrian and African refugees… but Israel is a small country — very small — without demographic or geographic depth. That is why we must control our borders.”

Opposition leader Isaac Herzog on Saturday said Israel should take in Syrian refugees, recalling the plight of Jews who sought refuge from past conflicts.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas also called for Israel to allow Palestinians from refugee camps in Syria to travel to the Palestinian territories, whose external borders are controlled by the Jewish state.

There is already hostility in Israel toward asylum-seekers from Africa and a concerted government effort to repatriate them.

Rights groups say thousands of African asylum seekers have been coerced into “voluntary” departures.

Official figures show 45,000 illegal immigrants are in Israel, almost all from Eritrea and Sudan. Most of those not in detention live in poor areas of southern Tel Aviv, where there have been several protests against them.

– ‘To the Golan heights’ –

The start of construction of the 30-kilometre (19-mile) fence announced by Netanyahu involves extension of a security barrier to part of its eastern border with Jordan in a bid to keep out militants and illegal migrants.

Netanyahu said when it was approved in June that the new fence was a continuation of a 240-kilometre barrier built along the Egyptian border which “blocked the entry of illegal migrants into Israel and the various terrorist movements”.

In its first stage, the new fence is being built along Israel’s eastern border between Eilat and where a new airport will be built in the Timna Valley.

“We will continue the fence up to the Golan Heights,” Netanyahu said.

That would take it into the Israeli-occupied West Bank along the Jordan Valley, an area which is already under Israeli military control but is claimed by the Palestinians as part of their state.

Israel has insisted on maintaining troops in the area in any final peace agreement, a stance completely rejected by the Palestinians who say it would be a violation of their sovereignty and merely perpetuate the occupation.

Israel also has a fence that runs along the Syrian frontier through the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Those fences are in addition to a barrier that runs through the West Bank, which Israel began building during the second Palestinian intifada, or uprising, which lasted from 2000-2005.

Israel seized 1,200 square kilometres (460 square miles) of the Golan from Syria in the 1967 Six Day War and annexed it 14 years later, in a move never recognised by the international community.

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When it comes to the implications in the Middle East due to unrest, terrorism and war, the threat matrix festers. Israel knows this well as describes by experts below with regard to a post Iran deal at the hands and consequence of Barack Obama and those other P5+1 members.

The Middle East After the Iran Nuclear Deal

Negotiations between Iran and major powers were narrow in scope, focused on limiting Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for relief from nuclear-related sanctions.  Nevertheless, the deal they yielded has broader implications for a region strewn with local conflicts that have been exacerbated by the interventions of regional powers. Five experts weigh in on how Middle Eastern states and nonstate actors are calibrating their policies, and what the new regional landscape might portend for conflicts from the Levant to Yemen.

HezbollahLebanese supporters of Hezboollah celebrate in May 2014. (Photo: Ali Hashisho/Reuters)

Farideh Farhi

The Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) does not announce Iran’s arrival as a regional hegemon, something few among Tehran’s decision-making elite believe Iran has either the ideological or military capacity to achieve. Iranian leaders also know that there is little appetite for such an aggressive posture among a population weary of war with neighbors and hostile relations with world powers. Yet the agreement’s Iranian proponents argue that despite limitations placed on the country’s nuclear program, the deal enhances Iran’s security and consolidates its regional clout.

Major powers learned they must resolve their differences with Iran via diplomatic channels.

Foreign Minister Mohamad Javad Zarif, for example, argues before Iranian audiences that in foreign capitals worldwide in recent years, “Iranophobia” had taken root. He blames the broad-based international sanctions that had been imposed on Iran on a widely held belief that Iran is an aggressive or irrational actor that poses a danger to regional and international security.

But since Iran negotiated on rather than gave up its nuclear program, it demonstrated to major powers that it would not be bullied with military threats and economic sanctions, Zarif and like-minded advocates of the deal argue. The two-year-long nuclear negotiations undermined Iranophobia in many foreign capitals as major powers learned they can—and, indeed, must—resolve their differences with Iran via diplomatic channels rather than by coercion.

There is consensus among the Iranian foreign policy and security establishment that its warnings regarding the destabilization of Syria have proven prescient. They also share the belief that Iran’s domestic politics are the most stable in the region and its foreign policy the most consistent: Iran, they say, pursues systemic stability against antisystemic forces of global terror. The spread of Islamic extremism in the form of the self-proclaimed Islamic State, combined with the election of a government in Iran that ran on a platform of Islamic moderation, has helped advance Iran’s argument that regional issues can only be resolved if it has a seat at the table.

Yet despite a consensus that Iran’s position in the region has been enhanced, the JCPOA is not without its critics in Iran. It allows an inspection regime that violates Iran’s sovereignty and places too much trust in the United States, some argue. Others have slammed the negotiators for concealing the extent of Iran’s concessions and challenged the very notion of compromise with the United States, which, they believe, has not abandoned its ambition of regime change in Tehran, only its coercive tactics. A few even foresee the eventual comeback of coercion, noting that after Libyan dictator Muammar al-Qaddafi gave up his nuclear program, the West intervened militarily.

But the JCPOA’s Iranian proponents scoff at the comparison of the Islamic Republic to one-man dictatorships and insist that the resolution of the nuclear standoff strengthens Iran’s position, gradually opening the way for diplomatic progress on logjams like Syria. Only time—and the adjustments of other significant players in the region—will prove whether this optimistic and benign assessment of Iran’s ascent in the region is correct.

Sarah Birke

The negotiations deliberately focused solely on Iran’s nuclear program. Now that a deal has been concluded, many are wondering what it might mean for the Middle East, where Iran is involved in many of the region’s conflicts.

A richer Iran is likely to double down on its support for the Assad regime.

Chief among them is Syria. The war there has already killed 250,000 people and displaced nine million. Along with Russia, Iran is Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s main backer; the United States, Europe, and Gulf states support his opponents. A Syrian peace deal wouldn’t be viable without Iran’s participation. Hence the flurry of diplomatic activity in the past weeks, as countries have tested the waters after the Iran deal.

Iran is pragmatic. Iranian officials have in the past indicated they aren’t wedded to Assad.

Yet while the nuclear deal might, in theory, lead to more open discussions among the many powers with a stake in Syria, in practice Iran shows no sign of ending its support for the regime. Assad himself certainly views it that way: he called the agreement a “victory” for Iran—and, by unspoken extension, for himself.

Even under sanctions and with domestic troubles, Iran has dedicated billions of dollars to the regime’s survival, funding and training pro-regime militias, including the paramilitary National Defense Force and Shia fighters. As sanctions are lifted and Iran has more money, it is likely to spend more to keep the regime afloat.

Although Iran and its adversaries agree that the self-proclaimed Islamic State is a problem, they are divided over what to do about it. Iran sees the group’s expansion as reinforcing its view that the Syrian regime must stay, backing Assad’s claim to be the only party capable of defeating “terrorism” in Syria. Opponents argue that Assad is a cause of Islamic State—by letting extremists out of prison and killing Muslims—and until he goes, it won’t abate.

Any agreement would require assuring Iran that its interests in Syria will remain intact. Iran says it wants stability and the end of Islamic State, but its main interests lie elsewhere: It likes to assert its power, especially vis-a-vis the United States and its allies. And more important to Iran is that it has a route to send weapons to Lebanon, where Hezbollah acts as a strategic deterrent to Israel, a far greater military power than Iran. The United States, Europe, and Gulf powers are not going to agree to that.

Yet Iran’s hegemony in Syria is not assured. Its influence there is more tenuous than it is in Iraq, where Iran backs the government and some militias. Without the large Shia constituency it has in Iraq, Iran’s influence on Syria relies far more on money and pragmatic alliances than natural affinity. A richer Iran is more likely to double down on its support for the regime than promote a reasonable negotiated settlement.

Matthew Levitt

Iran is Hezbollah’s primary benefactor, giving the Lebanese political party and militant group some $200 million a year in addition to weapons, training, intelligence, and logistical assistance. Over the past eighteen months, however, Iran has cut back its financial support to Hezbollah—a collateral benefit of the unprecedented international sanctions regime targeting Iran’s nuclear program, as well as the fall in oil prices.

A newly enriched Hezbollah would be more aggressive at home and abroad.

The cutback has mostly curtailed Hezbollah’s political, social, and military activities inside Lebanon. Its social-service institutions have cut costs, employees have received paychecks late or been laid off, and funding for civilian organizations, such as the group’s satellite television station, al-Manar, has been reduced. By contrast, Hezbollah’s Syria command, which has been a priority for Tehran given its commitment to defending Bashar al-Assad’s regime, has shown no sign of financial hardship.

If nuclear-related sanctions are lifted in whole or in part, an influx of Iranian money will enable Hezbollah to push back against Lebanese political and social movements that are uncomfortable with its intervention in Syria. Lebanon’s political crises, from its inability to select a president to its failure to collect garbage, is a result of this deep sectarian division. An influx of radicalized Sunnis from Syria could bring further instability to Lebanon.

Increased Iranian spending will also benefit Hezbollah’s regional and international operations. The group is no longer limited to jockeying for political power in Lebanon and fighting Israel. With more money, it could step up its aid to Shia militias in Iraq and Yemen in cooperation with Iran, sending small numbers of skilled trainers to bolster local forces and, in some cases, fight alongside them. In Iraq, Hezbollah is training and fighting with Shia militias. Though they are fighting on behalf of the government, their tactics exacerbate sectarian tensions. Its footprint in Yemen is small, but it could expand with additional resources. Hezbollah is already trying to find long-term support for these operations. In Iraq, for example, it is investing in commercial front organizations.

Finally, increased funding could help Hezbollah reconstitute its capabilities beyond the Middle East. The group has expanded its terrorist operations in countries as disparate as Cyprus, Peru, and Thailand.

Hezbollah is busier than ever, especially in Syria, where it is engaged in expensive militant operations and support activities. Meanwhile, the group has expanded its regional activities further afield, straining its coffers even as it has had to cut back its activities in Lebanon. A newly enriched Hezbollah would be more aggressive at home and abroad, challenging less-militant parties across the Lebanese political spectrum and boosting its destabilizing activities outside of Lebanon.

Hussein Ibish

Despite the heterogeneity of interests and perspectives among the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), they share a broad consensus on the nuclear deal agreed to by major powers and Iran. This common position was expressed in the joint statement issued by GCC foreign ministers and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry after their August 3 summit in Qatar.

Riyadh has undertaken a major initiative to unite Sunni states in an anti-Iran alliance.

The statement endorses the nuclear agreement, partly because Gulf states hope that the accord could eventually ease regional tensions. Their endorsement is also a recognition that the deal will go forward no matter what they say, and that they see no benefit in joining Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as the lone international naysayers. Instead, the Gulf states are seeking to maximize the benefits they will accrue by consenting to the arrangement, to which they are not a party even though it will affect their security (whether for good or ill remains to be seen).

The GCC response also insists that Iran cease employing subversive means to extend its influence in the Arab world. The nuclear deal comes as tensions between Iran and major Gulf states, such as Saudi Arabia and the UAE, have reached a historic high.

A newly hawkish Saudi Arabia has demonstrated it is willing to use military force to try to roll back Iran’s influence in the Gulf. The Saudi-led Arab intervention in Yemen has brought GCC forces into direct conflict with the Iran-backed Houthi militia. Riyadh has also undertaken a major initiative to unite Sunni states in an anti-Iran alliance. To this end, Saudi Arabia has reached out to its former antagonists, such as the regional Muslim Brotherhood movement, including Hamas; forged an alliance with Sudan; and strengthened its relations with Turkey.

The Gulf states are hoping that a successful nuclear agreement will strengthen Iranian moderates and eventually make Iran a more responsible regional actor. But they are not counting on that, nor are they relying as much on U.S. leadership as they have in the past.

Gulf countries are moving to strengthen military cooperation with the United States. They are buying new weapons and have received promises of security coordination but are pressing for even stronger commitments. But they are also seeking closer ties to other powers, such as China, France, and Russia, and are developing an independent approach to secure their vital interests.

These interests include preventing Iran from further destabilizing the Arab world by promoting sectarian conflicts and backing armed Shiite groups, including those within Gulf Arab states, as well as ensuring that Iran does not expand its influence in the region at the expense of Arab interests.

If these new tensions come to define the Gulf relationship with Iran and no significant diplomatic steps are taken to create other means of resolving regional crises, the nuclear deal might actually contribute to a more unstable and violent Middle East.

Chuck Freilich

The nuclear agreement is a done deal. Israel must now decide how best to position itself for this new reality in which Iran’s nuclear aspirations have hopefully been postponed, though not eliminated; its regional and international stature has been strengthened by the resolution of the nuclear issue; and its financial ability to carry out its regional ambitions has been increased.

Israel may not be able to continue its policy of noninvolvement in Syria for long.

Many Israeli security experts believe that Israel’s first priority should be to restore strategic cooperation and intimacy with the United States. An important dimension of that would be for Israel to acquiesce to the agreement and use its intelligence capabilities to help ensure that the nuclear inspections regime is implemented.

Assuming the agreement holds, Israel’s biggest strategic concerns will be Iran’s regional ambitions, the rise of the Islamic State and other radical Islamists on its Syrian border and in nearby Iraq, and threats to the stability of Egypt and Jordan. The civil war in Syria has already resulted in attacks on Israel and holds the greatest potential for escalation.

Emboldened by its recent diplomatic success, Iran is likely to pursue its regional objectives with greater intensity and fewer constraints.

Israel may not be able to continue its policy of noninvolvement in Syria for long. The domination of a Syrian rump state by Iran and its Lebanese client, Hezbollah, which has a significant presence along the Golan Heights, would extend the already explosive confrontation with them from Lebanon to Syria and would present an unacceptable danger for Israel; indeed, it has already begun to do so. Hezbollah appears too stretched in Syria to want a confrontation with Israel soon, but this may change.

A takeover of Syria by the self-proclaimed Islamic State or Syrian rebel groups would also prove dangerous. Heinous as it is, Bashar al-Assad’s regime still has many assets to lose in a confrontation with Israel and can thus be deterred. It will take time for non-state actors to develop similar assets.

The borders with Gaza and Egypt remain combustible. After three major conflicts in recent years, Gazans do not appear to want renewed hostilities. Renewed rocket fire is nevertheless likely and will increase Israeli public pressure for Israeli forces “to finish the work” left undone in 2014. Escalation will be especially likely if Iran strengthens its cooperation with Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad. The growing strength of Islamist extremists in the Sinai makes further border incidents with Egypt more likely as well.

Given their fundamental hostility toward Israel, the current confluence of interests with Saudi Arabia and other Gulf Arab states is unlikely to yield significant practical cooperation, media speculation notwithstanding. Turkey will not upgrade relations as long as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is in power and seeks closer ties with Iran.

The prospects of an agreement with the Palestinians, already bleak, will diminish in a situation of Iranian regional ascendency. Any attempt to restart talks is destined to fail. It would squander U.S. diplomatic capital, which will be needed when more propitious circumstances arise.