dChan
Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 2:45 a.m. No.10042515   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2523 >>2533 >>2553 >>2580 >>2774 >>2998 >>3005

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/07/21/cybersecurity-202-joe-biden-is-putting-kremlin-notice-about-election-interference/

 

The Cybersecurity 202: Joe Biden is putting the Kremlin on notice about election interference

 

Democrats are sounding alarms about foreign election interference and pledging to punch back hard against Russia or any other adversary that undermines U.S. voting.

 

In his most expansive statement to date on the subject, presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden pledged to “leverage all appropriate instruments of national power and make full use of my executive authority to impose substantial and lasting costs on state perpetrators [of election interference]” if he wins the White House.

 

“I am putting the Kremlin and other foreign governments on notice,” the former vice president said. “If elected president, I will treat foreign interference in our election as an adversarial act that significantly affects the relationship between the United States and the interfering nation’s government.”

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 2:52 a.m. No.10042532   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2535 >>2580 >>2774 >>2967 >>2998 >>3005

>>10042527

>https://twitter.com/rosemcgowan/status/1285420215262748672

http://unlimitedhangout.com/2020/07/reports/alleged-salas-family-assailant-previously-worked-for-us-israeli-intelligence-linked-firm/

 

Alleged Salas Family Assailant Previously Worked for US/Israeli Intelligence-Linked Firm

 

The alleged gunmen who killed the son of Esther Salas, the judge recently assigned to the Epstein-Deutsche Bank case, worked for a company of corporate spies and mercenaries with ties to intelligence and also to Deutsche Bank.

 

The news of the shooting of the husband and son of Esther Salas, the judge recently assigned to oversee the Jeffrey Epstein – Deutsche Bank case, caused shock and confusion while also bringing renewed scrutiny to the Epstein scandal just a week after Epstein’s main co-conspirator, Ghislaine Maxwell, was denied bail in a separate case.

 

The case Salas is set to oversee is a class action lawsuit brought by Deutsche Bank investors who allege that Deutsche Bank “failed to properly monitor customers that the Bank itself deemed to be high risk, including, among others, the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.” The case came after the New York state Department of Financial Services had settled with Deutsche Bank over the bank’s failure to cut ties with Epstein-linked accounts, resulting in Deutsche Bank paying a $150 million fine. Deutsche Bank, unlike other financial institutions, failed to close all of its accounts linked to Epstein until less than a month prior to his arrest last year, even though the bank had identified him as “high risk” yearsbefore.

 

Beyond the tragedy of Sunday’s shooting, which claimed the life of Salas’ only child, the quick discovery of the death of the main suspect, Roy Den Hollander, of a “self-inflicted” gunshot to the head before he could be arrested or questioned by authorities has led to speculation that there is more to the official narrative of the crime than meets the eye.

 

With law enforcement sources now claiming that Esther Salas was not the intended target of the attack and some media reports now suggesting that Den Hollander’s motive was related to his dislike of feminism, it appears there are efforts underway to distance Sunday’s tragic shooting from Salas’ recent assignment to the Epstein case, which occurred just four days before the tragic shooting.

 

The most likely reason for any such “damage control” effort lies in the fact that both U.S. law enforcement investigations and mainstream media reports have consistently downplayed the connections of Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual trafficking and financial crimes to intelligence agencies in the U.S. and Israel. Similarly, Roy Den Hollander previously worked for a New York firm has been described as a “private CIA” with ties to those countries’ intelligence agencies and, also, ties to Deutsche Bank.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 2:52 a.m. No.10042535   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2536

>>10042532

>http://unlimitedhangout.com/2020/07/reports/alleged-salas-family-assailant-previously-worked-for-us-israeli-intelligence-linked-firm/

 

A Private CIA

 

According to his website, Den Hollander once worked for Kroll Associates Moscow Office, where he “managed and upgraded Kroll’s delivery of intelligence and security in the former Soviet Union” from 1999 to 2000. A few years prior, Kroll had won a considerable bid from the Russian government to locate money allegedly “spirited out of the country by the directors of state enterprises when they realized that privatization was inevitable.” The Kroll executives in charge of the Russian portfolio prior to Den Hollander were E. Norbett Garrett, a former CIA station chief in Cairo and Kuwait, and Joseph Rosetti, former chief of security for IBM. During that period and prior to his hiring at Kroll, Den Hollender worked as a lawyer in Russia regarding “legal and business issues, including international financing and marketing” and married a Russian woman he met during his time there that he subsequently claimed was part of the “Russian mafia.”

 

Founded by Jules Kroll in 1972, Kroll Associates would later become known as the “CIA of Wall Street” and “Wall Street’s Private Eye” and was alleged to be an actual front for the CIA by French intelligence agencies, according to theWashington Post. Part of the reason for this nickname, which was once a boasting point for top Kroll executives, owes to the fact that the firm frequently hired former CIA and FBI officers, as well as former members of MI6 and Mossad. K2 Intelligence, the successor to Kroll Associates founded by Jules Kroll and his son Jeremy in 2009, has similar hiring practices, counting former FBI and NSA officials among its ranks alongside former high-ranking members of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic intelligence agency. Kroll also boasted ties to the Bush family, with Jonathan Bush (George Bush Sr.’s brother) serving on its corporate advisory board, and Kroll was also employed by Bill Clinton’s first presidential campaign.

 

Though it is mainly involved in corporate security and investigations, Kroll has also frequently investigated targets of Washington foreign policy, including Saddam Hussein, and was also the company tapped to “reorganize” Enron in 2002. Kroll Associates also has long been a subject of scrutiny for those that question the official narrative on the attacks of September 11, 2001, given that the company was put in charge of security for the World Trade Center complex from 1993 bombing up through the 2001 attacks and has no shortage of ties to companies and individuals that profited from the attacks. Kroll itself experienced a “surge in business” following the events of 9/11, a day when its top executives all avoided going to work despite ostensibly providing security for the complex.

 

A similar “surge in business” for Kroll followed the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq after the company’s investigations into Saddam Hussein’s and the Bath Party’s finances had been used as partial justification for the military incursion. Kroll became a major provider of mercenaries along with companies like Blackwater and DynCorp to the U.S. invasion and subsequent occupation through its subsidiary Kroll Security International. Its clients included the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which has long fronted for the CIA, and also provided mercenaries for the war in Afghanistan.

 

Kroll executives over the years have commented to the press on their reputation as a “private CIA” and have also noted the advantages of being a “private” as opposed to “public” intelligence agency. For instance, E. Norbett Garrett, the former CIA official turned Kroll executive, told The New Yorker in 2009 the following:

 

“Garrett explained the disparity between what Kroll could do and what the C.I.A. could in a place like Sudan. “They have to rely on public and covert sources,” he said. “But we can go straight to Salah Idris. He’s our client, after all. We can go straight to his friends. We can be manipulated, of course, shown incomplete information, and sometimes we have to walk away from a case if we don’t trust somebody. But we definitely have some advantages.”

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 2:53 a.m. No.10042536   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2777

>>10042535

>http://unlimitedhangout.com/2020/07/reports/alleged-salas-family-assailant-previously-worked-for-us-israeli-intelligence-linked-firm/

 

Kroll Associates and the Epstein Network

 

Aside from Kroll Associates’ own role as a private intelligence firm, it is also worth pointing out that Jules Kroll had an odd meeting with Robert Maxwell, Ghislaine Maxwell’s father, shortly before his death, alleged by most Maxwell biographers and his family to have been a homicide. Roughly two weeks before his death, Kroll met with Maxwell at New York’s Helmsley Palace Hotel. According to a 1992 article in Vanity Fair, “Maxwell had ushered Kroll and two other men out onto the patio so that their conversation could not be overheard or bugged,” with Maxwell allegedly seeking to hire Kroll to uncover “people out to get him, to destroy his empire, to cripple him financially, and to destroy his life and business in any way they could.”

 

The article further notes that “the meeting broke up with Maxwell’s promising that he would send Kroll what he called “a memorandum of suspicions and unexplained events.” “Maxwell was working on this compendium,” said the [anonymous] participant [in the meeting], “when he met his death.” Kroll Associates was never formally hired.”

 

Much more recently Kroll came under scrutiny after being hired by disgraced media mogul Harvey Weinstein alongside the “private Mossad for hire” firm Black Cube. Weinstein had been instructed to hire Black Cube by Ehud Barak, the former Israeli military intelligence head and Israeli Prime Minister with close ties to Jeffrey Epstein and a frequent visitor of Epstein’s residences. Weinstein hired Kroll to harass and cyberstalk women who had accused him of sexual assault. Weinstein was a one-time business partner of Jeffrey Epstein’s and the testimony of Epstein victim Maria Farmer strongly implies that Ghislaine Maxwell and Epstein “shared” women, and potentially underage girls, with the film producer. The Daily Beast later reported that Epstein had used his ties to Weinstein to impress and recruit potential victims and at least one of those victims landed a role in a film produced by a Weinstein-owned company due to Epstein’s ties to Weinstein.

 

In addition, Kroll’s long-time executive Vice President for Operations, James Bucknam, was previously chief adviser to former FBI director Louis Freeh and is now CEO of the Freeh Group. Freeh has since become notorious for having been hired by Epstein associate, lawyer Alan Dershowitz, to “investigate” the Epstein scandal, and was also involved in the cover-up of the Penn State child molestation and abuse scandal. Freeh was also director of the FBI when the Bureau declined to investigate accusations regarding Leslie Wexner, Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein and their involvement in the sex trafficking of minors, first reported to the FBI in 1996 by Maria Farmer.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 2:59 a.m. No.10042554   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2575 >>2579 >>2774 >>2943 >>2998 >>3005

https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/lilley-trudeau-wants-us-to-deny-reality-on-we-fiasco

 

Trudeau wants us to deny reality on WE fiasco

 

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau wants us to continue to believe the impossible: That it was the non-partisan public service, and not anyone political, who suggested that WE Charity be given a $912-million, sole-sourced contract.

 

“It was the independent public service that made the recommendation of the WE Charity to deliver opportunities to students,” Trudeau stated in the House of Commons on Tuesday.

 

The PM said this even though we heard directly from a senior civil servant last week that WE had been pitching cabinet ministers on a program before the government announced one. We also learned on Monday that Bardish Chagger, the minister in charge of the program, met with WE co-founder Craig Kielburger on April 17, five days before the PM announced the Canada Student Service Grant Program.

 

In fact, Rachel Wernick — the most senior civil servant on the program — said Kielburger had pitched several ministers by mid-April and sent her a specific proposal on April 22, the day Trudeau announced a student program would be launched.

 

The claim that there was no political involvement doesn’t stand up to scrutiny no matter what Trudeau may say.

 

It’s true that the PM has apologized for not recusing himself from the decision but when Ian Shugart, the Clerk of the Privy Council and Canada’s most senior civil servant appeared before committee, he said there was no need for Trudeau to step aside from the decision because everyone knew Trudeau was involved with WE.

 

“In a sense, the prime minister’s involvement being in the public domain, I must say that it didn’t particularly cross my mind that there was anything that needed to be disclosed,” Shugart said.

 

Well, was Shugart aware that the PM’s mother was paid $312,000 between 2016 and 2020 to deliver speeches and appear at events? Or what about the $40,000 paid to the PM’s brother for the same in 2017-18?

 

The answer from Shugart was no, he wasn’t aware.

 

That’s the same answer most Canadians would have given. They had no idea that the Trudeau family was being paid quite well to appear at WE Day events even as other professional speakers with no connection to the PM were being told that WE didn’t pay and were asked to donate their services.

 

Previously, Trudeau has tried to deflect from any claims that his government was favourable to WE Charity by noting that the Harper government also gave them grants.

 

“I can highlight, indeed, that the previous Conservative government provided half a million dollars in funding to WE over the period of 2012, 2013 and 2014,” Trudeau said on July 8.

 

Well, just like most people didn’t know that between 2016 and 2020 the Trudeau family was paid more than $350,000 to appear at WE events, they also wouldn’t know how much WE’s government funding had grown. In the Trudeau era, the $500,000 he cited under the Harper government grew tenfold.

 

Under Trudeau, more than $5 million has been transferred from taxpayers to WE through grants or contracts. All of that was before the $912-million contract that, according to Chagger, would have seen WE earn as much as $43 million for administering the student grant program.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 3:12 a.m. No.10042603   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2774 >>2998 >>3005

>>10042598

 

https://web.archive.org/web/20140115140208/http://www.jeffreyepsteineducation.com/

 

Jeffrey Epstein, Education Activist, Applauds Bloomberg's Plan for New York City Charter Schools

 

New York City Mayor, Michael Bloomberg, recently announced that he will personally fund the creation of four charter schools in New York City. The announcement was welcomed by New York financier and education philanthropist, Jeffrey Epstein. Epstein, a long-time supporter of Bloomberg, has financed numerous charter schools across the country including the Maya Angelou schools in Washington DC, the highly acclaimed Bard High School Early College in New York City and the Harlem Link Charter School.

 

Bloomberg's funding will come through his foundation, the Young Men's Initiative, which is also funded by George Soros' Open Society Foundations. Once approved by the state Board of Regents, the co-ed charter high schools will open in September 2014, alongside four public schools in five high-poverty neighborhoods: in Brooklyn, the South Bronx, Queens and East Harlem. Both the public and charter schools will share a board of trustees, with Melanie Hartzog, a former City Hall official for Health and Human Services, as a proposed member.

 

He is a former member of the Trilateral Commission, the Council on Foreign Relations, Rockefeller University, New York Academy of Science and sits on the board of the Mind, Brain and Behavior Committee at Harvard University.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 3:32 a.m. No.10042671   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2676 >>2774 >>2998 >>3005

https://globalnews.ca/news/7203637/mexican-police-abducted-children/

 

Search for missing boy leads Mexican police to 23 abducted children

 

The search for a 2 1/2 year-old boy who was led away from a market in southern Mexico three weeks ago led police to a horrifying discovery: 23 abducted children being kept at a house and forced to sell trinkets in the street.

 

Prosecutors in Chiapas state said Tuesday that most of the children were between two and 15 years old, but three babies aged between 3 and 20 months were also found during a raid Monday at the house in the colonial city of San Cristobal de las Casas.

 

San Cristobal is a picturesque, heavily Indigenous city that is popular among tourists. It is not unusual to see children and adults hawking local crafts like carvings and embroidered cloth on its narrow cobblestone streets.

 

But few visitors to the city suspected that some of the kids doing the selling had been snatched from their families and kept in deplorable conditions.

 

The Chiapas state prosecutors’ office said in a statement that the children “were forced through physical and psychological violence to sell handicrafts in the centre of the city,” adding the kids showed signs of “malnutrition and precarious conditions.”

 

“According to the children, many of them were forced to go out on the streets to sell things, and moreover they were forced to return with a certain minimum amount of money for the right to get food and a place to sleep at the house,” said state prosecutor Jorge Llaven.

 

According to video presented by the prosecutors, many of the children slept on what appeared to be sheets of cardboard and blankets on a cement floor.

 

Three women have been detained in the case and may face human trafficking and forced labour charges. The children were handed over to child welfare authorities. Authorities showed a photo of some of the children, their faces blurred, having a boxed lunch after their rescue.

 

The search was set off by the June 30 disappearance of 2 1/2-year-old Dylan Esau Gomez Perez, when he was with his mother at a public market in San Cristobal.

 

A surveillance camera from a nearby shop showed that a young girl who appeared to be about 13 had grabbed the little boy by the hand and led him away, raising the possibility that some of the children were used to abduct other kids.

 

After the disappearance of the boy, who reportedly speaks the Indigenous language Tzotzil, his mother and relatives began a desperate campaign to locate him.

 

But the Chiapas state prosecutors office did not immediately confirm whether Dylan, who will turn 3 in November, was among the children rescued from forced labour this week.

 

Interviewed Tuesday outside the National Palace in Mexico City, his mother, Juana Perez, said officials told her that her son had not yet been found.

 

“None of the children (rescued) is my son,” Perez said, sobbing. “I haven’t heard anything about my son.”

 

Perez, who travelled to Mexico City to ask President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador to help find her son, works at the market selling fruit and vegetables. She said her son would sometimes wander off to play, but that no children had ever been snatched from the market before.

 

The boy’s father emigrated to California to find work, and thus Perez, 23, has had to raise Dylan and his sister by herself.

 

She described him as a chubby, happy boy who market vendors nicknamed “Gordito,” and tearfully appealed for help in finding him.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 3:43 a.m. No.10042698   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2700 >>2702 >>2710 >>2738 >>2774 >>2998 >>3005

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-chinese-hackers-working-ministry-state-security-charged-global-computer-intrusion

 

Two Chinese Hackers Working with the Ministry of State Security Charged with Global Computer Intrusion Campaign Targeting Intellectual Property and Confidential Business Information, Including COVID-19 Research

 

The 11-count indictment alleges LI Xiaoyu (李啸宇), 34, and DONG Jiazhi (董家志), 33, who were trained in computer applications technologies at the same Chinese university, conducted a hacking campaign lasting more than ten years to the present, targeting companies in countries with high technology industries, including the United States, Australia, Belgium, Germany, Japan, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Spain, South Korea, Sweden, and the United Kingdom. Targeted industries included, among others, high tech manufacturing; medical device, civil, and industrial engineering; business, educational, and gaming software; solar energy; pharmaceuticals; defense. In at least one instance, the hackers sought to extort cryptocurrency from a victim entity, by threatening to release the victim’s stolen source code on the Internet. More recently, the defendants probed for vulnerabilities in computer networks of companies developing COVID-19 vaccines, testing technology, and treatments.

 

According to the indictment, to gain initial access to victim networks, the defendants primarily exploited publicly known software vulnerabilities in popular web server software, web application development suites, and software collaboration programs. In some cases, those vulnerabilities were newly announced, meaning that many users would not have installed patches to correct the vulnerability. The defendants also targeted insecure default configurations in common applications. The defendants used their initial unauthorized access to place malicious web shell programs (e.g., the “China Chopper” web shell) and credential-stealing software on victim networks, which allowed them to remotely execute commands on victim computers.

 

To conceal the theft of information from victim networks and otherwise evade detection, the defendants typically packaged victim data in encrypted Roshal Archive Compressed files (RAR files), changed RAR file and victim documents’ names and extensions (e.g., from “.rar” to “.jpg”) and system timestamps, and concealed programs and documents at innocuous-seeming locations on victim networks and in victim networks’ “recycle bins.” The defendants frequently returned to re-victimize companies, government entities, and organizations from which they had previously stolen data, in some cases years after the initial successful data theft. In several instances, however, the defendants were unsuccessful in this regard, due to the efforts of the FBI and network defenders.

 

The indictment charges the defendants with conspiring to steal trade secrets from at least eight known victims, which consisted of technology designs, manufacturing processes, test mechanisms and results, source code, and pharmaceutical chemical structures. Such information would give competitors with a market edge by providing insight into proprietary business plans and savings on research and development costs in creating competing products.

 

The defendants are each charged with one count of conspiracy to commit computer fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison; one count of conspiracy to commit theft of trade secrets, which carries a maximum sentence of ten years in prison; one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison; one count of unauthorized access of a computer, which carries a maximum sentence of five years in prison; and seven counts of aggravated identity theft, which each carries a mandatory sentence of two non-consecutive years in prison. The maximum potential sentences in this case are prescribed by Congress and are provided here for informational purposes only, as any sentencings of the defendants will be determined by the assigned judge.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 3:56 a.m. No.10042733   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2774 >>2787 >>2998 >>3005

>>10042717

>https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1312747/china-news-china-consulate-houston-shut-burning-world-war-3-US-china-latest-donald-trump

China consulate closed by US after 'documents burned' - furious Beijing vows action

Spokesperson for the State Department Morgan Ortagus said: "We have directed the closure of PRC Consulate General Houston, in order to protect American intellectual property and American's private information.

 

But China warned the closure was "an unprecedented escalation" and said it would retaliate if the U.S. did not revoke the decision.

 

Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin added the US Government “abruptly informed” China it had to immediately close the consulate.

 

He said: “This political provocation has been unilaterally initiated by the US side in violation of international law and basic norms guiding international relations."

 

“China strongly condemns this outrageous and unjustified move to sabotage China-US relations.

 

"The Chinese side urges the US side to immediately retract this wrong decision.

 

“Otherwise the Chinese side will make a legitimate and necessary response.”

 

The spokesman added: “The US has far more diplomatic missions and staff working in China.

 

"So if the US is bent on going down this wrong path, we will resolutely respond."

 

Video footage has emerged on social media showing people in the courtyard of the consulate in Houston, apparently burning paper in drums.

 

Television station KPRC2 reported emergency services attended the scene after calls from locals, but did not enter the building.

 

A police official told the Houston Chronicle witnesses in nearby buildings told officers people were burning paper in what appeared to be trash cans.

 

Houston fire department chief Samuel Pena was quoted as saying by KTRK, an ABC television affiliate: "It appears to be open burning in a container within the courtyard of the Chinese consulate facility.

 

"It does not appear to be an unconfined fire but we have not been allowed access.

 

"We are standing by and monitoring."

 

The Houston Chronicle quoted an unnamed official as saying the consulate staff have been told they will be evicted from the building at 4pm local time on Friday.

 

The consulate in Houston opened in 1979 and is located in an area with a large Chinese community.

 

The mission handles consular matters for eight states: Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia and Florida, plus Puerto Rico.

 

Relations between the US and China has deteriorated dramatically, particularly since the outbreak of coronavirus in Wuhan at the start of this year.

 

Both countries have also clashed over trade, technology, a national security law imposed on Hong Kong and Beijing's claims in the South China Sea.

 

On Tuesday, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo launched a blistering attack on China, and said the UK was right to cool off its relationship with the Communist state over a string of human rights abuses.

 

Mr Pompeo met with both the Prime Minister Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab yesterday, a day after the Government announced the suspension of an extradition treaty with Hong Kong.

 

He told a press briefing in London: “I want to take this opportunity to congratulate the British government for its principled responses to these challenges; you have made a sovereign decision to ban Huawei from future 5G networks, you have joined other free nations to condemn China’s broken promises on the Sino-British treaty, you generously opened your doors to Hong Kongers who are fleeing for freedom.

 

“And yesterday you suspended your extradition treaty and extended your arms embargo on China to Hong Kong itself. We support those sovereign choices, we think well done.”

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 3:58 a.m. No.10042741   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2745 >>2749

>>10042735

>https://www.timesofisrael.com/huge-kingdom-of-judah-government-complex-found-stones-throw-from-us-embassy/

Huge Kingdom of Judah government complex found near US Embassy in Jerusalem

One of the largest collections of royal Kingdom of Judah seal impressions has been uncovered at a massive First Temple-period public tax collection and storage complex being excavated near the new United States Embassy in Jerusalem. The main Iron Age structure is exceptional in terms of both its size and architectural style, said Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist Neri Sapir, who co-directed the excavation.

 

Uncovered only three kilometers (1.8 mile) outside the Old City, the compound is believed by Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologists to have served as an administrative center during the reigns of Judean kings Hezekiah and Menashe (8th century to the middle of the 7th century BCE).

 

Over 120 jar handles stamped 2,700 years ago with ancient Hebrew script seal impressions were discovered at the site, clearly indicating the location’s use as a storage and tax center, according to an IAA press release Wednesday. Prevalent among the stamped inscriptions is “LMLK,” “LamMeLeKh,” or “Belonging to the King,” a way of marking that the foodstuffs stored in the jars had been tithed to the Judean ruler.

 

This trove of LMLK seal impressions adds to the over 2,000 similar seals previously discovered at excavations and allows archaeologists to rethink the administrative and tax collection systems of the Kingdom of Judah.

 

“This is one of the most significant discoveries from the period of the Kings in Jerusalem made in recent years. At the site we excavated, there are signs that governmental activity managed and distributed food supplies not only for shortage but administered agricultural surplus amassing commodities and wealth,” said IAA excavation co-directors Sapir and Nathan Ben-Ari in a press release Wednesday.

 

According to the archaeologists, the large number of seal impressions here and at nearby Kibbutz Ramat Rachel shows that much of the Kingdom of Judah’s governmental administration took place outside the City of David during at least the final centuries of the monarchy.

 

The ongoing salvage excavations in Jerusalem’s Arnona neighborhood are conducted by the Israel Antiquities Authority, funded by the Israel Land Authority and administrated by the Moriah Jerusalem Development Corporation ahead of the construction of a new building project.

 

The IAA’s Jerusalem District Archaeologist Dr. Yuval Baruch said the agencies are working together to preserve the site within the plan of the new project as part of the IAA’s trend of sustainable development of local heritage.

 

“The archaeological discoveries at Arnona identify the site as a key site — the most important in the history of the final days of the Kingdom of Judah and of the return to Zion decades after the destruction of the Kingdom. This site joins a number of other key sites uncovered in the area of Jerusalem which were connected to the centralized administrative system of the Kingdom of Judah from its peak until its destruction,” said Baruch.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 3:59 a.m. No.10042745   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>2751

>>10042741

>https://www.timesofisrael.com/huge-kingdom-of-judah-government-complex-found-stones-throw-from-us-embassy/

Death, idolatry, and taxes

 

A collection of what appear to be clay idols was also discovered at the site. According to Sapir and Ben-Ari, “Some of the figurines are designed in the form of women, horse riders or as animals. These figurines are usually interpreted as objects used in pagan worship and idolatry — a phenomenon, which according to the Bible, was prevalent in the Kingdom of Judah.”

 

While perhaps not all citizens participated in idol worship, taxes were assured — as illustrated by the LMLK handles and other archaeological evidence. According to the archaeologists’ discoveries, taxes in the form of agricultural produce such as wine and olive oil were collected in an orderly manner.

 

“The site once dominated large agricultural plots and orchards of olive trees and grape vines which included agricultural industrial facilities such as winepresses for winemaking,” said the archaeologists.

 

Royal LMLK jar handle impressions have been found at excavations associated with the Kingdom of Judah, mostly around Jerusalem. Several complete pots stamped with LMLK were found at Lachish in the Judaean foothills. Some two dozen types of impressions have been found so far, though all are typically stamped with a sun disc that is flanked by two (as in the case of Arnona) or four wings.

 

Usually the ancient Hebrew LMLK inscription appears above the sun disc; in the case of the Arnona impressions and also some of those found at excavations elsewhere, below the sun disc is recorded one of four cities in the kingdom of Judah: Hebron, Ziph, Socho or Mmst.

 

According to Sapir and Ben-Ari, Hebron, Ziph and Socho are clearly identified with known ancient cities in Judea in the Hebron Hills area. “However, the identification of Mmst is still controversial.”

 

A 2011 Tel Aviv University article, “Judahite Stamped and Incised Jar Handles: A Tool for Studying the History of Late Monarchic Judah,” explains that the stamped handles are a widely known phenomenon of late Iron Age Judah. “Excavations and surveys conducted in this area have yielded over 2000 stamped or incised jar handles dated to the very short period spanning from the late 8th century to the destruction of the kingdom at the beginning of the 6th century BCE.”

 

Also found among the Arnona impressions and at other excavations are names of senior officials and wealthy individuals from the Kingdom of Judah: Naham Abdi, Naham Hatzlihu, Meshalem Elnatan, Zafan Abmetz, Shaneah Azaria, Shalem Acha and Shivna Shachar.

 

“These names appear on storage jar handles at various sites across the Kingdom of Judah and attest to the elite position of those whose names are impressed on the jars,” said the archaeologists. It is hypothesized that these are senior officials who were in charge of specific economic areas, or perhaps wealthy individuals at that time — those who owned large agricultural lands, propelled the economy of their district, and owned private seals.”

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 4:01 a.m. No.10042751   🗄️.is 🔗kun

>>10042745

>https://www.timesofisrael.com/huge-kingdom-of-judah-government-complex-found-stones-throw-from-us-embassy/

A rock-hard mystery

 

According to the archaeologists, the Arnona site is dated to a period in which the Bible documents tumultuous upheavals, including the failed Assyrian King Sennacherib campaign to conquer Jerusalem in the days of King Hezekiah. The artifacts at the site, including the stamped seals, show that taxation likely remained uninterrupted during this period.

 

“It may be that the government economic provisions indicated by the stamp seals are related to these events, however, the excavation revealed that the site continued to be active after the Assyrian conquest,” say the archaeologists.

 

With the destruction of the Kingdom of Judah in 586 BCE and Babylonian exile, the site was abandoned, said the researchers. However, shortly thereafter, “the site was resettled and administrative activity resumed. During this time governmental activity at the site was connected to the Judean province upon the Return to Zion in 538 BCE under the auspices of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, which then ruled over the entire ancient Near East and Central Asia.”

 

The archaeologists’ findings corresponds with the hypothesis presented by the Tel Aviv University article on the jar handles. “The stamped jar handles were part of the Judahite administrative system that was already established when Judah became an Assyrian vassal kingdom and continued to be in use as long as Judah was a vassal kingdom and afterwards a province under the rule of the Babylonian, Persian and Ptolemaic empires.”

 

After this resumption of activity at the Arnona administration site, however, at some point thousands of years ago the large building at the site was covered over with a massive pile of flint stones to create a 20-meter (65.5 foot) artificial hill spread over seven dunams that is still visible to the naked eye. The archaeologists think that another storage facility may be under the stones.

 

“These artificial stone hills have been identified at several sites in Jerusalem and are a phenomenon of the end of the First Temple period and have aroused the curiosity and fascination of Jerusalem researchers since the beginning of archaeological research in the area,” said the archaeologists.

 

“Nevertheless, the reason for the huge effort made in stacking them over many acres remains an unresolved archaeological mystery,” they said.

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 4:05 a.m. No.10042763   🗄️.is 🔗kun

Dr. Robert Epstein, a researcher who has argued Google has the power to sway up to 10 percent of American voters in the 2020 election, concurred with Wacker. “It’s likely that a person or algorithm at Google added ‘breitbart.com’ and other URLs to one or more of the company’s blacklists,” Epstein said. “Then, perhaps after some pushback, someone pulled those URLs off the blacklists.”

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 5:20 a.m. No.10042985   🗄️.is 🔗kun

>>10042972

>https://nypost.com/2020/07/22/epstein-employee-saw-video-of-prince-andrew-with-topless-woman/

Jeffrey Epstein employee saw video of Prince Andrew with topless woman

A former employee for late pedophile Jeffrey Epstein claims she walked in on him and his alleged fixer Ghislaine Maxwell as they joked about “randy Andy” while watching a video of Prince Andrew with a topless woman, according to a report.

 

Tiffany Doe, 48, who didn’t want to reveal her real name, told the UK’s Sun that she was at the financier’s Manhattan home when she stumbled on the pair watching the secretly recorded clip of the Duke of York and the woman.

 

“I don’t know who the girl was on the video, but she was topless,” the woman told the news outlet, which described Doe as a former lap dancer working with lawyers representing Epstein and Maxwell’s alleged victims.

 

“I was looking for Jeffrey to talk to him about something and couldn’t find him anywhere,” Doe said. “I had no idea Ghislaine and Jeffrey were in there. I didn’t know Ghislaine was in the house.”

 

The woman claimed the large room contained several TV screens.

 

“It was so dark when I walked in they didn’t notice me. I went to say something but they were speaking and laughing so I looked at the screen to see what they were talking about,” Doe continued.

 

“I do not know who the girl was on the video but she was topless. I really can’t say what her age was,” she added.

 

“I couldn’t see all of Andrew so I don’t know if he was clothed or not. It looked like it was filmed in a bedroom. I don’t think Andrew knew he was being filmed,” Doe told the Sun.

 

Maxwell then reportedly said, “Oh that’s Randy Andy for you,” the woman claimed.

 

“Jeffrey laughed at that and I of course immediately recognized who it was on the tape,” she told The Sun. “But then Jeffrey and Ghislaine noticed me and made it clear they didn’t want me in there.”

 

Doe told the outlet that “it was an open secret” that Epstein had cameras in the bedrooms.

 

“Jeffrey spent a lot of time in that room watching videos. I am sure he had videos of girls and guys having sex that he watched as a voyeur because that was what he was like,” she said.

 

“But he let everyone know he had power. Power over all these rich and famous people who came to his house. So what would that power be? It was pretty obvious,” the woman continued.

 

“He would never say to me, ‘Come and watch this with me of so-and-so having sex and see how powerful I am.’ But he would be like that with Ghislaine.”

 

Doe told The Sun that she met Epstein when she was 22 and that he manipulated her into recruiting young girls for himself.

 

The pedophile committed suicide in his Manhattan jail cell 11 months ago as he awaited trial on sex-trafficking charges.

 

Maxwell, 58, is expected to spend a year awaiting trial at the Brooklyn Detention Center, where she has been held since shortly after her July 2 arrest in New Hampshire.

 

Prince Andrew has forcefully denied all allegations against him but is yet to cooperate with prosecutors — although his legal team insists that he has offered to do so.

 

A spokesman for the prince’s legal team said of Doe’s claims: “There will doubtless be a welter of these kind of ‘recollections,’ some 10 or more years after the fact, particularly where claims on the Epstein estate are concerned. Where is the evidence?”

 

In an interview last year, Doe alleged that Andrew placed his head on her chest to blow a raspberry — known colloquially as “motorboating” — at Epstein’s home in the 1990s.

 

“There were always big players at the events so it was almost normal for a prince to turn up,” she told The Sun. “It wasn’t out of the ordinary. Andrew was at a party and, in English slang, back then I had big jubblies, big breasts.”

 

She added: “He said I should be in a magazine for big-breasted women. I found him quite awkward, quite clumsy. I had drinks with him but that’s it.”

Anonymous ID: aaa106 July 22, 2020, 5:29 a.m. No.10043014   🗄️.is 🔗kun   >>3091

https://www.wsj.com/articles/espn-anchor-sage-steele-claimed-black-colleagues-excluded-her-from-race-special-11595365089

 

ESPN Anchor Sage Steele Claimed Black Colleagues Excluded Her From Race Special

 

ESPN anchor Sage Steele has told management she believes she was excluded from a special the network aired on race last month because she wasn’t considered by certain Black colleagues to be an authentic voice for the Black community, a person familiar with the matter said.

 

Ms. Steele, one of the network’s most prominent on-air personalities, voiced her concerns to ESPN President Jimmy Pitaro in early June, saying the incident showed the network has a divisive work environment, the person said.

 

Ms. Steele said colleagues told her she was considered for the special by the executive in charge, Michael Fountain, until two of the other on-air personalities involved, Elle Duncan and Michael Eaves, complained, saying Ms. Steele wouldn’t be accepted by what they considered the Black community, according to the person familiar with her account to management.

 

Ms. Steele’s critics on social media have accused her of not being supportive enough toward the Black community and being insensitive in her comments about racial-justice protests.

 

The ESPN special, “The Undefeated Presents Time for Change: We Won’t Be Defeated,” aired on June 24. It was a reflection on race and sports after the killing of George Floyd by a white police officer in Minneapolis. His death and the subsequent nationwide racial-justice protests triggered debate about race and diversity in the workplace, including at Walt Disney Co. ’s ESPN and other media outlets.

 

Ms. Steele said in a statement, “I found it sad for all of us that any human being should be allowed to define someone’s ‘Blackness.’ Growing up biracial in America with a Black father and a white mother, I have felt the inequities that many, if not all Black and biracial people have felt—being called a monkey, the ‘n’ word, having ape sounds made as I walked by—words and actions that all of us know sting forever. Most importantly, trying to define who is and isn’t Black enough goes against everything we are fighting for in this country, and only creates more of a divide.”

 

An ESPN spokesman denied that Ms. Steele wasn’t invited to participate in the special because of a campaign by colleagues to undermine her or that her views played any role in Mr. Fountain’s decisions.

 

Kevin Merida, senior vice president and editor in chief of The Undefeated, ESPN’s platform focused on sports, race and culture, said, “At The Undefeated, we don’t have litmus tests for Blackness. ESPN has a tremendous range of Black voices, and we’ve been honored to work with many of them.” He added, “We had already talked to Sage a number of times about working together, and look forward to that opportunity.”

 

In a joint statement about the race special, Ms. Duncan and Mr. Eaves said, “We wish we had more than an hour to include more of the many strong voices we have at ESPN; however, we are hopeful that this doesn’t distract from the important message conveyed that night.” The pair didn’t address the comments attributed to them about Ms. Steele.

 

Ms. Steele, a 13-year ESPN veteran and host of the 6 p.m. flagship “SportsCenter,” wasn’t primarily concerned with her exclusion from the special, but rather what she felt have become regular attacks on her character over the past several years because of her views, the person familiar with her account said.

 

A self-described Army brat whose father is a West Point alumnus and a retired colonel, she has criticized those who don’t stand during the national anthem. She has sometimes called out athletes for off-field missteps.

 

Recently, she said on air and on social media that most Black athletes were unwilling to criticize Philadelphia Eagles player DeSean Jackson for making anti-Semitic comments. “The silence is deafening,” she said on ESPN. Mr. Jackson later apologized.

 

In an Instagram post, Ms. Steele said the lack of outrage over Mr. Jackson’s remarks was especially frustrating given the backlash New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees faced for his stance on players kneeling during the anthem, saying he would “never agree with anybody disrespecting the flag of the United States of America or our country.” Mr. Brees later apologized for what he said were his “insensitive remarks.”

 

“Are we all in on holding people accountable for insensitive remarks? Or only when it’s convenient for us?” Ms. Steele wrote. She explained her views on race and tolerance at length in a 2016 Facebook post.