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General Dempsey Clues to Europe Refugee Crisis

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A criminal network is behind the refugee insurgency and NATO is working to contain, control and stop the crisis.

Implications:

Austrian Federal Railways says train service has been suspended between the main border crossing point to Hungary and Vienna. That appears to have prompted thousands of asylum-seekers to begin trekking on foot toward the Austrian capital.

The railways press department says the move was prompted due to lack of capacity to deal with the thousands of people at the Nickelsdorf crossing wanting to board trains daily to the Austrian capital. Once in Vienna, most have traveled on to Germany and other Western EU nations.

Railway officials are meeting Friday to try to resolve the issue. Meanwhile, thousands of migrants and refugees are trying to cover the 60 kilometers (40 miles) to Vienna on foot.

Austrian police official Hans Peter Doskozil says 7,500 people crossed into Austria at Nickelsdorf on Thursday. More here.

From the Department of Defense:

Dempsey: Refugee Crisis ‘Very Complex’

BERLIN, September 10, 2015 — The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and his German counterpart met here today, with the refugee crisis in Europe a focus of the discussions.

After today’s talks with Gen. Volker Wieker, the chief of staff of the German armed forces, U.S. Army Gen. Martin E. Dempsey noted that the “very complex” issue also will be a subject of NATO meetings later this week in Istanbul.

The chairman said he and Wieker discussed whether NATO should have a role in addressing the cause of the crisis.

Dempsey, who spoke to reporters after his meeting today, said the refugee crisis stems from instability in the Middle East, Afghanistan and North Africa, and economic conditions in the Balkans.

A Deluge of Refugees

Earlier this week, Germany said it expects to take in 800,000 refugees this year from Africa, Afghanistan, Syria and the Balkans.

The trickle of refugees suddenly became a deluge, Dempsey said, noting that many of the refugees were young men. The sudden flow, he added, possibly indicates a network of criminal activity is behind the influx.

“Somebody, somewhere in a very deliberate fashion has established a network for profit to enable these young men to escape their current conditions and into Europe,” the chairman said.

The young men looking for a better life and economic opportunities could be vulnerable to “those who would potentially seek to radicalize them,” he said. “We all have to be alert to that possibility,” Dempsey added.

NATO Meetings in Turkey

There are multiple, complex threats facing the alliance, he said. One goal of the day of NATO talks Saturday is to have a conversation about what each nation will do both unilaterally and as a member of the alliance in response to issues such as Russia, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, and the refugee crisis, the chairman said.

While Turkey might not feel threatened by Russia, it is important that each member of the alliance accept and concede there are multiple threats facing NATO, Dempsey said.

“We’ve had many conversations with them about the threat from violent extremist organizations and radical ideologies and their vulnerability on their southern flank, which happens to be NATO’s southeastern flank,” he noted.

Turkey, as the only Muslim country in NATO, can provide valuable input to the alliance on issues evolving in the Middle East and North Africa, Dempsey said.

Chairman Honored

During his visit to the German Ministry of Defense, Dempsey laid a wreath in honor of fallen German soldiers and received the Knight Commander’s Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany.

In presenting the decoration, Wieker hailed Dempsey as a close ally and friend who “enjoys the highest recognition around the world” as the top U.S. military officer.

“The Federal Republic of Germany is grateful for your outstanding contribution to the American-German friendship and your dedication to all bilateral and transatlantic partnership,” he told Dempsey.

The chairman said it was “quite a remarkable honor and privilege” to receive the decoration.

“I accept it on behalf of the many, many, many soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines who have served here in your wonderful country,” he said, noting he began his career as a young Army officer stationed in Germany.

“I found it fitting and appropriate that I would end my career where I began it,” Dempsey said, who retires at the end of this month after more than four decades of service.

*** Could it be the Syrian Muslim Brotherhood is behind this criminal network moving the refugees? Personally, this is my best guess at this time, but could it also be a nefarious component States?

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The Islamic State group is extending its reach in Saudi Arabia, expanding the scope of its attacks and drawing in new recruits with its radical ideology. Its determination to bring down the U.S.-allied royal family has raised concerns it could threaten the annual Muslim hajj pilgrimage later this month.

So far, the extremist group’s presence in the kingdom appears to be in a low-level stage, but it has claimed four significant bombings since May, one of them in neighboring Kuwait. And it has rapidly ramped up its rhetoric, aiming to undermine the Al Saud royal family’s legitimacy, which is rooted in part in its claim to implement Islamic Shariah law and to be the protectors of Islam’s most sacred sites in Mecca and Medina that are at the center of hajj.

“Daesh and its followers have made it very clear that Saudi Arabia is their ultimate target,” Saudi analyst Fahad Nazer said, referring to the Islamic State group by its Arabic acronym. “Because of Mecca and Medina … That’s their ultimate prize.”

An attack last month in which IS claimed responsibility appeared to mark a significant spread in the group’s reach. Militants claiming loyalty to the group had already carried out three major bombings — two in eastern Saudi Arabia in May and one in Kuwait City in June, all targeting Shiite mosques and killing 53 people.

But on Aug. 6, a suicide bomber attacked in western Saudi Arabia, hitting a mosque inside a police compound in Abha, 350 miles south of Mecca, killing 15 people in the deadliest attack on the kingdom’s security forces in years. Eleven of the dead belonged to an elite counterterrorism unit whose tasks include protecting the hajj pilgrimage.

The alleged affiliate that claimed responsibility for the August attack called itself the “Hijaz Province” of the Islamic State, its first claim of a branch in the Hijaz, the traditional name for the western stretch of the Arabian Peninsula where the holy cities are located. The previous attacks were claimed by the group’s “Najd Province,” the traditional name for the central heartland of the peninsula and the homeland of the Al Saud family.

Lori Boghardt, Gulf security analyst at the Washington Institute, said it would not be surprising if IS militants tried to take advantage of the hajj to stage an attack, particularly since the group has encouraged lone wolf operations. This year, the hajj begins Sept. 21 and is expected to draw some 3 million Muslims from around the world.

“The kingdom is a holy grail of sorts as a target from the perspective of ISIS because of its significance to Muslims,” she said, referring to the group by its longer acronym.

A direct attack on pilgrims carrying out the hajj rites — potentially causing large casualties or damaging holy sites — may be a risky move for IS, bringing a backlash from shocked Muslims worldwide. Still, the group “has made it very clear they have no red lines,” said Nazer, a senior analyst at the Virginia-based consultancy and security firm JTG Inc.

But there are other potential targets, including security forces in or around Mecca. The group could attempt to hit pilgrims from Shiite-majority nations like Iran, who would stand out since pilgrims generally move in groups by country. IS and other Sunni radicals consider Shiites heretics.

Justin Mahshouf, a 30 year-old American Shiite planning to perform the hajj this year, said friends and family are telling him to be careful. “There seems to be a really bad vibe right now in the Shiite community.”

Little is known about the structure of the Islamic State group in Saudi Arabia. It is not known if the militants in the kingdom have direct operational ties with the group’s leadership based in its self-declared “caliphate” in Iraq and Syria — or if they simply operate independently in the group’s name.

In all four attacks claimed by the branches in the kingdom, the bombers were young Saudis, suggesting the group’s ranks are largely homegrown as opposed to foreign militants. The bomber in the August attack was identified as Yousef Suleiman, a 21-year-old Saudi with no record of ever having travelled abroad, pointing to the group’s ability to radicalize even youth who have not gone to join fighting in Syria.

“If you are looking at IS as a state, the territory it controls is not going to vastly expand, but the ideology it espouses is expanding,” said Hani Sabra, head of Middle East practice at Eurasia Group.

Since Syria’s civil war escalated over the past four years, Saudi Arabia’s ultraconservative clerics urged young men to go fight alongside Sunni rebels in Iraq and Syria. Concerned about possible radicalization, the late King Abdullah last year banned fighting abroad or encouraging it. But by then, some 2,500 Saudis had already gone to Syria. The Interior Ministry says around 650 have since returned and that they left disillusioned with the fighting.

This year, Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries joined the U.S.-led campaign of airstrikes against IS in Syria.

In an Aug. 24 audiotape, an IS supporter denounced the royal family as “tyrants” ruling Islam’s heartland without implementing what IS calls its true teachings.

“Pledge allegiance to the Islamic State,” the audio urged Saudis. “Stand up against the tyrants and liberate the peninsula of Muhammad … from their filth.”

A prominent radical Saudi cleric, Nasr al-Fahd, who has been imprisoned since 2003 for connections to militancy, recently declared support for IS in a message smuggled from his prison. In the letter carried by IS supporters online, he advised others to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State group, which he said had “destroyed the idols” and is implementing Shariah, not “man-made laws.”

Saudi Arabia is already run by one of the most ultraconservative interpretations of Shariah, known as Wahhabism. Some of its clerics view Shiites as heretics, are virulently opposed to monuments or tombs they see as encouraging idolatry, believe in a strict segregation of the sexes and support the use of religious police to enforce Shariah rules — all teachings not far from the Islamic State group’s ideology.

But Wahhabi clerics make a crucial distinction, preaching that the recognized ruler — in this case, the Al Sauds — must be obeyed. They condemn protests or violence that could lead to instability. The kingdom’s highest religious authority, Grand Mufti Sheikh Abdulaziz Al Sheikh, denounced IS and al-Qaida as Islam’s number one enemy.

When asked by The Associated Press by email about possible threats of attacks on the hajj, Interior Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Mansour al-Turki replied that “that security forces will act swiftly and decisively with any violations of laws and instructions related to hajj.”

He said the holy sites are protected by a force specifically dedicated to the task and a large number of additional security forces will be deployed during hajj to ensure pilgrims’ “security and safety” and manage the traffic of the large crowds. He also pointed to the elaborate security system of surveillance cameras and helicopters that the kingdom implements each year. He could not give exact figures or specify whether the deployment would be larger this year.

The kingdom has also arrested hundreds of suspected militants this year. Overseeing that effort is Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, who is also interior minister and led the battle that eventually crushed al-Qaida’s branch in the kingdom in 2006.

Sabra of Eurasia Group said despite a strengthening presence, IS does not currently represent a direct threat to Saudi political stability. He pointed to the crown prince’s experience in counterterrorism. “Mohammed bin Nayef has proven that this is a job that he takes very seriously.”

Iran, al Qaeda, Obama and Death of Americans

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How Many US Troops Were Killed By Iranian IEDs in Iraq?

DefenseOne: Explosively formed penetrators — a particularly deadly form of roadside bomb — killed 196 American soldiers in Iraq over a five-and-a-half-year period, according to recently declassified Pentagon documents.

That’s about half as many deaths as lawmakers have attributed to the bombs, which U.S. officials say were largely supplied by Iran’s elite Quds Force.

The carnage wrought by EFPs returned to the news over the summer, as opponents of the nuclear deal with Iran cited Tehran’s behind-the-scenes actions against U.S. troops during Operation Iraqi Freedom as a reason to scuttle the agreement. Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican who is also running for president, and others in Congress have said that EFPs had killed more than 500 troops.

“I understand that the Joint Personnel Recovery Agency has a classified list of roughly 500 American soldiers who were murdered by Iranian IEDs,” Cruz said at a July 29 Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.

But data from U.S. Central Command, which runs U.S. military operations in the Middle East, suggests the actual toll is far less. According to the first comprehensive accounting, between November 2005 and December 2011, 1,526 EFPs killed a total of 196 U.S. troops and injured 861.

Between October 2006 and September 2007, EFPs killed 97 U.S. troops and wounded more than 300 soldiers. EFP attacks peaked in March, April and May 2008, near the end of the American troop surge, when 200 of the bombs were detonated. The deadliest month was April 2008, when EFPs killed 15 U.S. soldiers.

The Pentagon attributes the presence of EFPs in Iraq to the Quds Force, the special forces arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard led by Qasem Suleimani. Various EFP “factories” were found throughout Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom. Still, the exact degree to which Iran bears culpability for arming Shia militias in Iraq with EFPs and related equipment is a matter of some dispute.

“We weren’t always able to attribute the casualties that we had to Iranian activity, although many times we suspected it was Iranian activity, even though we didn’t necessarily have the forensics to support that,” Gen. Joseph Dunford, the incoming chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said at his July 9 confirmation hearing. During the hearing, Dunford said the numbers of American soldiers killed by Iran “has been recently quoted as about 500.”

A few weeks later at the July 29 hearing, Gen. Martin Dempsey, the outgoing Joint Chiefs chairman, said “several hundred” American forces were killed by EFPs.

The arrival of EFPs on the Iraqi battlefield around 2005 came as a shock to U.S. planners. Along with more run-of-the-mill improvised explosive devices, the deadly bombs drove a crash effort to create and deploy vehicles with far better armor.

Whereas most roadside bombs send energy and shrapnel in all directions, EFPs work more like cannons. The force of the blast molds a concave metal disc, called a liner, into a “formed penetrator” which is propelled at up to 3,000 meters per second. The effect is incredibly destructive, even to up-armored Humvees.

“You can do as much or more damage with a 5-pound EFP, which is aimed, as with a 200-pound conventional IED,” a Pentagon analyst told Los Angeles Times writer Andrew Cockburn in 2007. The analyst speculated that the cost to construct such a device was about $30 or less. They’ve been around since at least World War II, when resistance elements in Europe used them against Germans, Cockburn wrote.

***Worse, in 2011, the Obama administration made an accusation and continued to deal in back channels for a nuclear deal.***

Obama Administration Accuses Iran of ‘Secret Deal’ With Al Qaeda

FNC: WASHINGTON — The Obama administration accused Iran on Thursday of entering into a “secret deal” with an Al Qaeda offshoot that provides money and recruits for attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Treasury Department designated six members of the unit as terrorists subject to U.S. sanctions.

The U.S. intelligence community has in the past disagreed about the extent of direct links between the Iranian government and Al Qaeda. Thursday’s allegations went further than what most analysts had previously said was a murky relationship with limited cooperation.

David S. Cohen, Treasury’s point man for terrorism and financial intelligence, said Iran entered a “secret deal with Al Qaeda allowing it to funnel funds and operatives through its territory.” He didn’t provide any details of that agreement, but said the sanctions seek to disrupt Al Qaeda’s work in Iraq and deny the terrorist group’s leadership much-needed support.

“Iran is the leading state sponsor of terrorism in the world today,” Cohen said in a statement. “We are illuminating yet another aspect of Iran’s unmatched support for terrorism.”

Treasury said the exposure of the clandestine agreement would disrupt Al Qaeda operations by shedding light on Iran’s role as a “critical transit point” for money and extremists reaching Pakistan and Afghanistan.

“This network serves as the core pipeline through which Al Qaeda moves money, facilitators and operatives from across the Middle East to South Asia,” it said..

Treasury said a branch headed by Ezedin Abdel Aziz Khalil was operating in Iran with the Tehran government’s blessing, funneling funds collected from across the Arab world to Al Qaeda’s senior leaders in Pakistan. Khalil, the department said, has operated within Iran’s borders for six years.

Also targeted by the sanctions is Atiyah Abd al-Rahman, appointed by Osama bin Laden as Al Qaeda’s envoy in Iran after serving as a commander in Pakistan’s tribal areas. As an emissary, al-Rahman is allowed to travel in and out of Iran with the permission of government officials, the statement claimed.

The sanctions block any assets the individuals might have held in the United States, and bans Americans from doing any business with them.

No Iranian officials were cited for complicity in terrorism. The others targeted were Umid Muhammadi, described as a key planner for Al Qaeda in Iraq’s attacks; Salim Hasan Khalifa Rashid al-Kuwari and Abdallah Ghanim Mafuz Muslim al-Khawar, Qatar-based financial supporters who’ve allegedly helped extremists travel across the region; and Ali Hassan Ali al-Ajmi, a Kuwait-based fundraiser for Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

The action comes a day after the top U.S. commander for special operations forces said Al Qaeda is bloodied and “nearing its end,” even as he warned that the next generation of militants could keep special operations fighting for a decade to come.

Navy SEAL Adm. Eric T. Olson said bin Laden’s killing on May 2 was a near-fatal blow for the organization created by bin Laden and led from his Pakistan hide out. He said the group already had lost steam because of the revolts of the Arab Spring, which proved the Muslim world did not need terrorism to bring down governments, from Tunisia to Egypt.

Treasury’s public allegations against Iran may reflect part of a strategy to expand the pressure on smaller, less well-established offshoots of Al Qaeda as the weakening of the group’s leadership threatens to make its activities more disparate. Washington already has re-focused much attention on Al Qaeda’s Yemen-based branch, which has attempted to bomb a U.S.-bound jetliner and cargo planes in recent years.

But the exact nature of Iran’s relationship with Al Qaeda remains disputed in Washington, with different branches of the intelligence community disagreeing about whether Iran is supporting Al Qaeda as a matter of policy, according to one U.S. official. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.

Some hardline militants backing Al Qaeda, members of Islam’s majority Sunnis, see the Shiite Islam dominant in Iran as heretical, and they view Tehran’s regional ambitions as a greater threat than the West. Sunni insurgents in Iraq have used car bombs and suicide attacks against Shiite targets, killing thousands since 2003, as well as targeting Shiite militias allied to Iran.

Since 2001, Iran has appeared a somewhat reluctant host for senior Al Qaeda operatives who fled there after the U.S. invasion of Afghanistan, keeping them under tight restrictions. After an initial period of cooperation with the West, Iran now seems to be a more comfortable haven even if it remains on the edge of Al Qaeda’s orbit.

Western officials point to the release earlier this year of an Iranian diplomat who was held for 15 months after being kidnapped by gunmen in Pakistan.

In negotiations for the diplomat’s freedom, they say Iran promised better conditions for dozens of people close to Osama bin Laden who were being held under tight security. These included some of the terror chief’s children and the network’s most senior military strategist, Saif al-Adel.

Still, the life of the Al Qaeda-linked exiles in Iran continues to be very much a blind spot for Western intelligence agencies. Few firm details have emerged, such as how much Iran limits their movements and contacts.

 

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.

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.