Iran’s Intelligence Chief Says Arrested Terrorist Leader Boasted About Being Protected by FBI

On Saturday, Iranian authorities apprehended Jamshid Sharmahd, the leader of the Tondar (‘Thunder’) terrorist group. The US-based group has carried out several terror attacks inside Iran, including the bombing of a mosque and the assassination of a nuclear scientist, and has called for the violent overthrow of the Iranian government.

US officials were confounded by the Iranian intelligence services’ operation to capture Tondar leader Jamshid Sharmahd, Intelligence Minister Mahmoud Alavi has said.

“The reason why they first denied [his arrest] was that they knew he was strongly supported by American and Israeli services, and they considered it unlikely for Iran’s Intelligence Ministry to be able to penetrate their umbrella of support…and apprehend him inside the Islamic Republic of Iran through a complicated operation,” Alavi said on Sunday, his remarks quoted by Tasnim.

“Jamshid Sharmahd and his associates planned some 27 acts of terror, all of which were thwarted thanks to the perseverance, vigilance and knowledge of Iranian intelligence forces,” Alavi added.

According to the minister, “the Americans still don’t believe that Sharmahd has been arrested in Iran. They still think that he’s located abroad and that these photos are from abroad.”

Earlier, Iranian media released a photo and video footage of Sharmahd with a black cloth covering his eyes during questioning. In the video clip, he can be heard saying “They needed explosives and we provided it.”

Protected by the FBI

Alavi revealed new details about the extent to which Mr. Sharmahd believed that he was protected by US intelligence services. According to the official, in one instance, when an Iranian intelligence operative phoned up Sharmahd and threatened to arrest him, the terror leader boasted that he had an office on the sixth floor in an FBI building and couldn’t be gotten to. He was wrong, Alavi said.

The intelligence official also offered insight into the specifics of the Tondar organization itself, saying that among the pro-monarchist currents in Iran, Tondar is the “most violence-prone” and the most prepared to commit acts of terror to reach its goal. Other royalist opposition groups have limited themselves mostly to statements and slogans, he added.

Interpol Request Ignored

Alavi noted that Iranian authorities had sought cooperation from Interpol in arresting Sharmahd, particularly after the 2008 terror bombing of the Seyed al-Shohada Mosque in Iran, which killed 14 people and injured 202 others. These requests were reportedly ignored, however.

“Despite our complaint to Interpol, Sharmahd would travel everywhere under his own name. This shows how empty anti-terror slogans by the US and their European allies are,”Alavi suggested.

https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/202008021080040518-irans-intelligence-chief-says-arrested-terrorist-leader-boasted-about-being-protected-by-fbi/

Damascus Slams SDF-U.S. Oil Agreement As ‘Deal Between Thieves’

Damascus has slammed the recent agreement between the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and a U.S.-based oil company.

An official source in the Syrian Foreign Ministry told the Syrian Arab News Agency on August 2 that the deal is “null and void,” stressing that it has “no legal effect.”

“This agreement is considered as an integrated and aggravated theft and it can be only described as a deal between thieves who are stealing and thieves who are buying,” the source said, adding: “it constitutes an assault against Syria’s sovereignty, and a continuation of the U.S. hostile approach towards Syria.”

The source also warn the SDF that U.S. presence in northeast Syria will “inevitably disappear,” threatening the Kurdish-led group with a military defeat.

The SDF’s agreement with the Delaware-based Delta Crescent Energy LLC was singed without any permission from the legitimate government in Damascus.

According to a report by Al-Monitor, the agreement will allow Delta Crescent Energy LLC to market oil in northeast Syria and modernize oil fields there. The U.S. company was granted a license to work in Syria by the Office of Foreign Assets Control, OFAC.

The questionable oil deal is likely designed to set an additional foothold for the occupation of Syrian oil fields by US forces as well as to set condictions for the further separation of the SDF-controlled territory from Syria as a state.

https://southfront.org/damascus-slams-sdf-u-s-oil-agreement-as-deal-between-thieves/

Reminiscent Of Nazi Behavior Activists Burn Bibles And American Flags In Portland

A stack of bibles and American flags were burned outside the federal courthouse in Portland, Oregon by what appeared to be left wing Antifa activists in a new video posted by blogger and journalist Ian Miles Cheong.

What do these actions have to do with the horrific death of George Floyd who was murdered by a Minneapolis Police Officer? Nothing.

In fact, Floyd’s death has now become an excuse for anti-American, anti-Democratic factions to target our communities and major cities prior to the November, 2020 election.

The incident in Portland raises significant concerns about the continuing destructive actions of Neo-Marxists and young American millennials that have been indoctrinated by their university and college professors to oppose American values and establish a new form of ‘cancel culture’ socialist ideology.

It is an ideology that advocates civil unrest, opposition to western values, violence against government officials and targeting of civilians who oppose their beliefs.

Burning the stack of Bibles is also symbolic of anti-Judeo Christian values and reflects similar actions that were taken in Germany by young Neo-Natzi’s who burned books that did not reflect the beliefs of the rising Nazi Party.

What happened in Germany when the majority of the German people ignored what was happening before their very eyes? The silent majority in America needs to wake up.

From The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum:

“On May 10, 1933 student groups at universities across Germany carried out a series of book burnings of works that the students and leading Nazi party members associated with an “un-German spirit.

Enthusiastic crowds witnessed the burning of books by Brecht, Einstein, Freud, Mann and Remarque, among many other well-known intellectuals, scientists and cultural figures, many of whom were Jewish. The largest of these book bonfires occurred in Berlin, where an estimated 40,000 people gathered to hear a speech by the propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels, in which he pronounced that “Jewish intellectualism is dead” and endorsed the students’ “right to clean up the debris of the past.”

https://saraacarter.com/reminiscent-of-nazi-behavior-activists-burn-bibles-and-american-flags-in-portland-what-does-this-have-to-do-with-george-floyd/

Afghan Intel Claims ISIS Chief Killed, Others Captured In Major Operation

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan – Afghanistan officials told SaraACarter.com Saturday that the top intelligence chief for the terrorist organization ISIS in the region was killed Friday in an operation in Eastern Nangarhar province.

A senior official with the National Directorate of Security (NDS), Afghanistan’s intelligence agency, told this reporter that Assadullah Orakzai was killed during an operation near Jalalabad city, the capital of the province. The claim has not been independently verified as of yet by U.S. military or intelligence officials but it is being reported throughout the South Asian region and NDS has issued an official statement.

“Assadullah Orakzai along with two other key commanders have been killed during in intelligence based operation,” Imtiaz Wardag, a local police official in Nangarhar province told SaraCarter.com by phone.

In Afghanistan, a person’s last name is many times attributed to the region where a person is born. Orakzai is a district in Kohat Division of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan. It is an area that borders Afghanistan and is part of the lawless Federally Administered Tribal Areas.

A statement released by Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security (NDS) Saturday confirmed the death of Assadullah: “The Special Units of the National Directorate of Security NDS have eliminated Ziaurrahman known as Assadullah Orakzai, the native of Akhel Orakzai agency of Pakistan during a targeted operation.”

“Afghanistan’s regional and international partners should remember that Afghanistan is a key player in the fight against terrorist and will crush terrorists’ roots anywhere,” the NDS statement said.

Assadullah, who originally came from the Orakzai region, was behind several terrorist attacks including a deadly attack on a hospital’s maternity ward in capital Kabul and suicide bombing at a funeral prayer in Nangarhar on May 12, which killed 56 people and left nearly 150 other wounded.

Wardag told this reporter the that the ISIS Chief, along with other followers of the extremist terrorist organization, operated and established a basecamp in the border lands between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The ISIS intelligence chief had long been a threat to both Afghan and U.S. troops but was believed to have been hiding with other ISIS terrorists in North Western Pakistan, an area that was once a stronghold for the Pakistani Taliban. A 2014 military operation by the Pakistan army greatly decimated the Taliban’s forces in the area but the

An Afghan intelligence official said that Assadullah was once a close associate of Mufti Abu Sayeed Orakzai, the former chief of ISIS in Afghanistan. In the region ISIS is often referred to as Daesh. Sayeed Orakzai was killed in a U.S. drone strike in 2018.

Sayeed Orazai was replaced an Afghan national, Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost, as the chief of the Khorasan ISIS chapter, which includes Pakistan. Interestingly Sayeed had also served as district Chief of Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) for Orakzai Agency chapter before discarding the TTP umbrella in mid-October 2014. The Taliban and ISIS have been fighting against one another in the region for dominance.

“Assadullah Orakzai was student of Mufti Sayeed in his seminary and remained his close aid,” Saboor Khattak, Peshawar based senior journalist said.

According to Khattak, this is another “major blow to Daesh” ISIS in the region after its key commanders were also recently captured by Afghan forces.

On April 4, Afghan forces captured Aslam Farooqui, the head of ISIS Khorasan in the eastern province of Kandahar, while later another key commander of an offshoot ISIS group, known in the region as Ziaul Haq, was also arrested on May 11.

https://saraacarter.com/afghan-intel-claims-isis-chief-killed-others-captured-in-major-operation/

The Privatization of Global Chaos

A recent off-hand remark by one of America’s oligarchs points toward a new methodology for undermining what is left of international law and order. Speaking in earnest or in jest, nobody really knows, but smart money would certainly bet on the former, when admonished that the Bolivian coup that toppled President Evo Morales last year “wasn’t in the best interests of the Bolivian people,” Elon Musk, the Tesla electric car magnate, brazenly tweeted: “We will coup whoever we want. Deal with it!”

There is, of course, room for plausible deniability here because Musk was responding to another tweet calling the U.S. government, not Musk directly, to account for “organizing a coup against Evo Morales in Bolivia so you could obtain the lithium there.” Musk’s “we” response could theoretically be interpreted as not a personal confession of responsibility for the dastardly deed but, rather, a good citizen’s loyal expression of support for his country’s foreign policy. Charitably speaking such a reading is possible. But speaking more realistically Musk, although associated in the public mind with a pioneering electric car design, did in fact have a very vital interest in the Bolivian regime change operation. Electric cars, to put it very simply, run on lithium batteries, and Bolivia just happens to be a major supplier of that ore. No lithium, no Tesla or any other electric vehicles.

To fill in some more blanks, it also happens that just weeks before the coup in November of 2019, President Morales issued a decree essentially nationalizing Bolivia’s mineral wealth, including lithium deposits. Bolivia watchers, of course, could see it coming for some time. The politically artless President disclosed his audacious game-plan to empower the Bolivian people to enjoy the benefits of their country’s wealth two years before. Just read and weep at his naiveté: “Bolivian President Evo Morales sees a prosperous future for his currently impoverished South American nation, pinning his hopes on the rapid rise in the global price of this valuable resource. ‘We will develop a huge lithium industry, over $800 million have already been made available,’ Morales told the German DPA news agency.”

So the jackals were put on notice as early as 2017. Morales’ “sins” were numerous enough and he would have been targeted for removal anyway even if he had not antagonized the lithium cartel by announcing the ambitious project to extract a fair price from it. But now we have at least established that Elon Musk and his local agents “highly likely” were not neutral observers while preparations for the coup were being conducted. Musk may have made his “we can coup whoever we want” remark as a loyal citizen who supports his country’s hemispheric interests, but clearly he also had significant financial interests of his own in this controversy.

Indeed, the contest between the individual by the name of Elon Musk and the country of Bolivia was anything but the “level playing field” that noble U.S. diplomacy insisted on in Bosnia while their local team was losing. Musk’s personal worth of $68 billion contrasts rather conspicuously with Bolivia’s GNP of $40.58 billion in 2019. Quite simply, the American oligarch could buy Bolivia and have plenty of change left over. But why buy it if you can far more cheaply organize a coup, put your people in charge, and then own it, including the lithium? That is a much more sensible business plan.

President Morales’ cheeky pipe-dream of “Bolivia’s enormous reserves provid[ing] a major windfall for the country, allowing it to generate wealth and spread prosperity among its destitute population” was clearly a non-starter in some influential circles and last year’s fascist coup at least temporarily put an end to it.

https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/08/02/the-privatization-of-global-chaos/

US Announces New Action Against "Array" Of Chinese Software Companies

As the White House teased in a media trial balloon yesterday, the administration has just announced its latest initiative to hector Beijing, and the Chinese technology sector, as the Trump Administration ratchets up the retaliatory pressure in a burst of election-year fervor.

The Trump administration will announce measures shortly against "a broad array” of Chinese-owned software that pose a "national security risk", according to Mike Pompeo, Trump's Secretary of State.

Ever since President Trump said late Friday that a ban on the popular social media app TikTok was "imminent", talks between ByteDance, the owner of TikTok and a separate app called "Douyin" - (equivalent to "TikTok" in English) which is similar to TikTok in many ways, but is a different app built to operate on the Chinese Internet - have apparently collapsed. Media reports claimed that, after being courted by a group of VC firms, ByteDance was in advanced talks to sell TikTok to Microsoft.

But those talks have apparently stalled. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said earlier that the app must either be "sold or blocked", and it appears that Beijing has soured on the optics of appearing to kowtow to Trump just before the election - god forbid President Xi be accused of intervening on Trump's behalf.

Pompeo signaled he expects a Trump announcement “shortly." He added that Chinese software companies doing business in the US are working with Chinese State Security: "whether it’s TikTok or WeChat, there are countless more," Pompeo said during an interview on Fox New's "Sunday Morning Futures" program.

Trump "will take action in the coming days with respect to a broad array of national-security risks that are presented by software connected to the Chinese Communist Party," Pompeo added.

From placing new restrictions and pressures on Huawei - including successfully pressing allies like the UK to walk back their earlier support for allowing Huawei parts to be incorporated into "non-core" parts of their 5G networks - as well as taking shots at foreign students studying in the US, among other things.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/us-announces-new-action-against-array-chinese-software-companies

Singapore: COVID-19 Patients Have T-Cell Immunity

While the global media and political leaders and their health officials focus exclusively on the issue of antibodies, there is a growing body of scientific evidence which demonstrates how other layers of adaptive immunity are being used to fight off COVID infections.

Of course, such findings are not welcome by everyone, particular those who maintain that the only road to herd immunity in the wider population is through the aggressive administration of a coronavirus vaccine.

Patients who recovered from COVID-19 harbour SARS-CoV-2-specific T cells as shown in a Singapore study. This, the scientists suggest, bodes well for the development of long-term protective immunity against the coronavirus.

T cells, along with antibodies, target and kill infected cells, but their importance in fighting SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, remains unclear.

Interestingly, the Singapore study found that even people who had SARS infection 17 years ago, and over 50 percent of healthy individuals who had not been infected with SARS or SARS-CoV-2, have these cellular defences. The researchers said these were likely because of cross-reactive immunity obtained from previous exposure to common cold viruses or some unknown animal coronaviruses. [Nature 2020;doi.org/10.1038/s41586-020-2550-z]

“This suggests that infection and exposure to coronaviruses induce long-lasting memory T cells … and a level of pre-existing SARS-CoV-2 immunity may have been present in the general population,” said corresponding author Professor Antonio Bertoletti from the Duke-NUS Emerging Infectious Diseases programme. However, this does not mean that people who have recovered from COVID-19 are protected from re-infection.

First-of-a-kind rapid COVID-19 test

Singapore scientists have developed a first-of-a-kind rapid SARS-CoV-2 surrogate virus neutralisation test (sVNT) that could aid COVID-19 investigations in the heat of the pandemic.

sVNT could help determine infection rate, herd immunity, predicted humoral protection, and vaccine efficacy during clinical trials…

https://21stcenturywire.com/2020/08/01/singapore-covid-19-patients-have-t-cell-immunity/

Masks Signal Start of Civil War

When I arrived at the dentist's office yesterday, the receptionist motioned me over to a table where she ritualistically administered a hand sanitizer.

Then, a questionnaire where I attested that I was not showing symptoms of a deadly virus; had not been out of province for 14 days, and had not had contact with COVID cases.

Then, she took my temperature and administered a blood test.

After determining I was not sick, she handed me a facemask to wear in the waiting room.

When I took it off, she insisted I put it back on.

I refused, saying there is no mandatory mask order in Manitoba.

She said it was for the safety of the people working there. If I wouldn't wear it, I'd have to leave.

The absurdity of this situation was mind-boggling. She had just determined that I am healthy yet I still must wear a mask.

I left. I do not want to engage with people who have zero respect for their clients.

They didn't mention that face masks are mandatory when they called Thursday to remind me of my appointment. They just assumed they could force one on me.

Obviously this is not about health. This is about control and conformity. A medical hoax has been used to justify a political tyranny.

You quarantine the sick, not the healthy. Why don't more people question this?

When healthy people must act like they have a deadly contagion, the message is clear. In the eyes of the Illuminati, we are the disease.

https://www.henrymakow.com/2020/08/covid-hoax-is-about-control.html

CABAL

TALPIOT, FOUNDED 1979

Clinton

ISRAEL AND HIGH TECHNOLOGY

THE RISE OF THE NEOCONS _ WOHLSTETTER NETWORK

TECHNION – ISRAEL INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

PEDOPHILE NETWORKS CONTROL THE WORLD

Obama Roommate and Former Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett Would Not Answer Whether President Obama Knew of Trump Spying

Obama Senior Advisor would not answer whether former President Obama directed any of the spying and investigations into candidate and President Trump when on with Maria Bartiromo earlier this week.

Maria Bartiromo had Senator Ron Johnson on this morning on ‘Sunday Morning Futures’. During this segment, Bartiromo shared a piece from her interview earlier this week with Obama close aid Valerie Jarrett. When Bartiromo asked Jarrett whether former President Obama directed any of the criminal and corrupt spying on the Trump campaign, Jarrett would not answer.

By not addressing the question, Jarrett indirectly admits that President Obama was behind the fraudulent and criminal spying and investigations targeting candidate and President Trump. Of course this comes as no surprise.

Obama and Jarrett should be in jail for this and numerous other criminal actions they committed during their years in power.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/08/unreal-obama-roommate-former-senior-advisor-valerie-jarrett-not-answer-whether-president-obama-knew-trump-spying/

Iran's Supreme Leader: Fresh Talks With US Would Only Boost Trump Ahead Of November

It appears the door has now been fully and finally shut on any Trump administration hopes of a complete 're-do' of the Iran nuclear deal.

Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said during his annual Eid al-Adha address that there will be no new talks with Washington, and further vowed that Iran will only expand its nuclear program, not give it up.

He further underscored in the speech that the Islamic Republic's nuclear program remains a "necessity" for the country's survival and prospering - though it should be underscored that Tehran has long maintained it's for peaceful civilian nuclear energy.

While the speech was one of typical defiance amid ongoing crippling US sanctions and the 'maximum pressure' campaign, Iran's top cleric and Supreme Leader addressed Trump's prospects for November in a rare moment.

He underscored that any fresh talks with Washington would only serve to boost Trump's chances in the upcoming election, and on this basis must be resisted. As The New York Times summarized of the statements:

In a Friday speech for the Eid al-Adha holiday, Ayatollah Khamenei said that entering talks with Washington over Iran’s nuclear program, as President Trump has urged Tehran to do, would only improve Mr. Trump’s chances of being re-elected in November. That, the ayatollah said, was Mr. Trump’s reason for suggesting such talks in the first place.

“He is going to benefit from negotiations,” Ayatollah Khamenei said. “This old man who is in charge in America apparently used negotiations with North Korea as propaganda,” he added — a reference to Mr. Trump’s high-profile nuclear diplomacy on another front, which to date has been mostly fruitless.

Khamenei also emphasized that Iranians must pursue self-sufficiency and complete independence from the US-dominated international economic system, and be prepared to weather the ongoing economic warfare out of Washington and its allies.

Meanwhile, recall that since the start of this year Iran's enrichment capabilities have grown significantly.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/irans-supreme-leader-fresh-talks-us-would-only-boost-trump-ahead-november

Biggest Decline In Nominal Output & Income In Our Lifetime… While Stocks Gained $7 Trillion

The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) estimated that Q2 Nominal GDP declined 34.3% annualized, the largest quarterly drop in our lifetime. On March 12, I penned the article “Investors Should Brace for a Record Decline in GDP”. Never did I imagine that the Q2 GDP decline would be nearly 5X times the previous record drop of 7.2% in Nominal GDP in Q4 2008.

Here’s a few observations.

First, Q2 Nominal GDP was estimated at $19.4 trillion annualized, a drop of over $2 trillion from Q1 level of $21.5 trillion. BEA reports the GDP figures on an annualized basis. So the quarterly rate for Q2 Nominal GDP was $4.85 trillion, a figure that roughly matches the aggregate amount of fiscal and monetary stimulus injected in Q2.

According to my estimates, the combination of federal stimulus payments to individuals plus the expansion of the Federal Reserve Balance sheet amounted to an increase of approximately $5 trillion in aggregate fiscal and monetary stimulus over the three months ending in June. Never before has the scale of fiscal and monetary stimulus matched the nation’s nominal output in a single quarter.

Second, Q2 nominal consumer spending declined at an annualized rate of 35.8%. But the actual decline is much worse. BEA estimated that people’s rent payments in Q2 increased $ 2 billion to a record $641 billion. BEA estimates consumer spending for rent based on an accrual basis. In other words, BEA methodology assumes people made their rent payments on time and in full. Yet, reports show that more than one-third of renters skipped paying part or all of their rent in Q2.

Third, Q2 saw a record decline in Nominal output and a record increase in financial (equity) wealth. Based on preliminary data the market capitalization of domestic companies increased by $7 trillion in Q2 while nominal GDP, measured quarterly, declined by approximately $500 billion.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/biggest-decline-nominal-output-income-our-lifetime-while-stocks-gained-7-trillion

Remote Control Behavior with Rewarding Electrical Stimulation of the Brain, 1965 (Remote Controlled Dogs)

According to the document’s abstract:

“The specific aim of the research program was to examine the feasibility of controlling the behavior of a dog, in an open field, by means of remotely triggered electrical stimulation of the brain. The report describes such a system which depends for its effectiveness on two properties of electrical stimulation delivered to certain deep lying structures of the dog brain: the well-known reward effect, and a tendency for such stimulation to initiate and maintain locomotion in a direction which is accompanied by the continued delivery of stimulation. Experiments on the parameters of stimulation are described, in addition to an experiment on the ability of a conventional reinforcer, food, to disrupt ongoing, free field behavior under the control of rewarding brain stimulation. Finally, supporting research employing albino rats is summarized. (Author)”

This document was released by the CIA in late 2018 after a FOIA request by The Black Vault. The document, redacted in some parts with details missing, highlighted the research of creating remote control dogs using implants on the brain. The record’s release was specifically highlighted by Newsweek, which as a result, was picked up by many other outlets.

After months of research, I tracked down a much cleaner copy of the document at the Defense Technical Information Center (DTIC), which contained NO redactions (therefore, new details about the research have emerged) but also much clearer copies of the photographs.

In addition, in July of 2020, I found one of the annual reports, which is also archived below. One additional FOIA request remains open for one last document (I believe to be the last) which will be added here, when it comes in.

Document Archive

Remote Control Behavior with Rewarding Electrical Stimulation of the Brain, 1965 (Remote Controlled Dogs), Final Report [103 Pages, 11MB] (For comparison, here is the CIA’s 2018 release: C00021825.pdf)

https://documents2.theblackvault.com/documents/dtic/AD0467355.pdf

https://documents2.theblackvault.com/documents/cia/behavioral/C00021825.pdf

https://www.theblackvault.com/documentarchive/remote-control-behavior-with-rewarding-electrical-stimulation-of-the-brain-1965-remote-controlled-dogs/

Communist China

>>10163614

AJ would have consented