#10267

>>8021381 Acting DHS Sec Chad Wolf: Agency Offered to Test Democrats’ Iowa Caucus App — ‘They Declined

>>8021414 Russia's top brass says White Helmets to upload video on fake chemical attack in Idlib

>>8021362 FBI Claims Previously Undisclosed Peter Strzok and Lisa Page Emails on Seth Rich Are Redacted to Protect Investigation They Claim Never Happened!

>>8021547 Two Virginia state Democrats joined Republicans to block a gun-control bill proposed by Gov. Ralph Northam (D-VA).

>>8021662 Complete map of Libyan Civil War: February update

>>8021751 HuffPost UK editor works with gov’t censorship program while smearing anti-war scholars as tools of Russia

>>8021781 Pro-Israel Buttigieg backer Seth Klarman is top funder of group behind Iowa’s disastrous voting app

>>8021793 A 20-year-old father of two will serve two years on probation for having sexual contact with a 7-year-old girl.

>>8021828 Iran to Execute Alleged ‘CIA Spy’ Accused of Leaking Nuclear Secrets

>>8021883 Twitter cites ‘Iran & Israel state actors’ after suspending researcher who exposed new user-data flaw

>>8021896 RAND PAUL Drops MOAB on Senate Floor — Reads Aloud His Question Naming Anti-Trump CIA Leaker Eric Ciaramella and Sean Misko

>>8021922 Goldman Sachs Banker in Malaysian Fund Scandal Is Barred From Banking

>>8021983 RCMP resolves impasse, pays $56K bill related to Trudeau's trip to Aga Khan's island

Bakers hiding truth, why weren't these noted? Many called but ignored.

Rabobank: "Central Banks Will Save Us Not Just From The Business Cycle And Climate Change, But From Global Pandemics"

Chinese stocks are up; the Chinese currency is up, slightly (though still weaker than 7); global stocks are up; and US Treasury yields are slightly higher.

Yet at the same time we have the first reported death of a 39-year old resident in Hong Kong, where medical workers are on strike over the refusal to totally close the border with China; China reporting 425 deaths and over 20,000 cases despite massive quarantine efforts; China’s Global Times reporting that the virus can be transmitted via the digestive system and contact with surfaces such as doorknobs or mobile phone screens, computer keyboards, etc. (which is also the case with many other coronaviruses); Xi Jinping publicly stating the virus “directly affects” China’s economic and social stability and has again cracked the whip against the bureaucracy to act better and faster; and the US Centre for Disease Control (CDC) stating it is planning as if this will become a global pandemic. The WHO remains relatively upbeat, however, stating the virus’s progression will remain “minimal and slow” if it is fought at the source and countries cooperate – which does not include closing their borders, apparently.

Who aside, something doesn’t seem to fit in that market reaction, perhaps? The missing link here is that the PBOC injected CNY400bn (USD57bn) in market liquidity this morning, the equivalent of one month’s QE in the US in recent times past. (Ah, the good old days!) Lots more is to follow apparently. Naturally, this relieves some immediate liquidity pressures. It also allows the PBOC to scoop up all the assets that nobody else wants to hold right now via reverse repo – which the Fed knows a thing or two about. What I fail to see is how this is in any way positive for CNY. Only the USD can operate on such a profligate basis without risk of collapse due to its global role: who is stockpiling CNY right now?

Hypothetically, if this virus were to follow the dreadful path mapped out by the CDC, even just within China, would more central bank money really ease our pain? It’s almost as if all of the believers in Adam Smith’s free markets also have no idea what he wrote (following Plato and others) about the relative value of water and diamonds in different circumstances, an intellectual argument that ended up with Marxism via the labour theory of value - and here we come full circle back to China and the PBOC.

The underlying market hope is clear: central banks will save us, not just from the business cycle, and not just from climate change, but now from global pandemic too. The same people who can’t generate 2% y/y CPI sustainably will ensure we all stay at 36.5 – 37.5 degrees centigrade body temperature range. As Bloomberg helpfully summarises today, “Coronavirus Won’t Restrain Global Stocks For Long”. This is because, as the detail and irony of the article become clear, “It’s a bullish sign for global stocks that facts have taken a back seat in much of the market ‘analysis’ of how to react to the coronavirus.” How true that is. Nonetheless, in such an uncertain dynamic, I would still wager that if one wants to be brave enough to dive in to these markets aggressively, one should also be brave enough to stand next to someone who has recently been in Asia coughing without wearing a mask: if you won’t do the latter, are you really sure about the former?

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/rabobank-message-clear-central-banks-will-save-us-not-just-business-cycle-and-climate

Hardcore jihadist resurfaces in France using… EU-paid student exchange program

A man who represented one of the most brutal jihadist groups in Syria has been arrested in France. Bizarrely enough, the suspected war criminal apparently freely enjoyed the benefits of the EU student exchange program.

Last week, several human rights groups celebrated the arrest of a man named Majdi Mustafa Nameh, a humble 30-something student. He is better known under his nom-de-guerre, Islam Alloush, which he used while serving as the spokesman for the jihadist group Jaysh al-Islam. He resigned in August 2016, after giving an interview to an Israeli researcher.

Following his arrest in Marsaille, the man was charged with "war crimes" and "complicity in enforced disappearances."

Alloush was personally involved in kidnappings, torture and forced enlistment of children into the fighting ranks of the militant group, say the three NGO’s who helped track him down and arrest.

According to AFP, at that time the bald-headed bearded ex-jihadist has reinvented himself and was living in France on an Erasmus student visa, meaning his stay in southern France was covered by the European Union. He was reportedly enlisted in the Aix-Marseille University for a three month course, and arrived on French soil in early January. He spent previous years in Turkey studying at the Istanbul University, but had also visited Hungary as a student.

Apparently his self-explained experience in “revolutionary activities” qualified the retired “moderate rebel” for some quality time in Provence. Jaysh al-Islam, meanwhile, has called for release of their former senior member, saying the charges against him must be dropped. They said allegations against him tarnish their image.

Jaysh al-Islam, or Army of Islam, was mostly active in Douma, the suburb of Damascus that was liberated by the Syrian government forces in April 2018. While not as graphically violent as their rivals from Islamic State, the group was still notorious for its atrocities. In 2015, a video emerged showing Alawite civilians held in cages in Douma as human shields against government attacks on terrorists.

https://www.rt.com/news/480043-jihadist-student-france-program/

Hyundai, Kia Factories Crippled In South Korea As Part Suppliers In China Remain Closed

A globalized world is full of complex supply chains that wind in and out of countries. When one country goes offline, the chain breaks, and that's exactly what's happening in Asia.

Yonhap News reports that Hyundai Motor Co. and its sister Kia Motors Corp. suspended production lines in South Korea after it was hit with a parts shortage from China as the coronavirus outbreak continues to leave entire manufacturing hubs shut down.

The plants are expected to reopen on Feb. 10 or 11, but that entirely depends if manufacturing plants, cities, and transportation networks open in China.

"If auto parts factories in China resume operations on Feb. 10 or 11, production losses from lack of parts will be limited," the spokesman said. However, if the factories in China where Hyundai sources parts from remain closed through early next week, then severe supply chain disruptions will be seen, causing production output to crater in South Korea.

Vice President Ha Eon-tae, head of Hyundai's main plant, emailed workers at Ulsan plants on Monday, specifying how production suspensions are imminent because part suppliers in China remain closed due to the virus.

According to the local union, Kia, which is 34% owned by Hyundai, has had output reduced in Hwaseong and Gwangju, outside of Seoul, for similar issues.

Hyundai and Kia, together, are the world's fifth-largest carmaker by sales. If production lines in South Korea are halted and extend past next week, then a slump in economic output could weigh down South Korean 1Q GDP figures.

The fallout from the virus could force investors to reprice growth across the world. This would undoubtedly weigh on risk asset prices that remain near all-time highs.

https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/hyundai-kia-factories-crippled-south-korea-part-suppliers-china-remain-close

Another Fmr Cop Arrested in Connection to Child Sex Ring Run by High-Level SWAT Commander

Livingston, LA — As TFTP reported late last year, a high level Livingston Parish Sheriff’s Office deputy — who commanded the SWAT team — and his wife were indicted on more than 150 felonies for unspeakable crimes against children and animals. Dennis Perkins, 44, and and his wife Cynthia Perkins, 34, are accused of multiple counts of child rape and the production of child pornography, among other disturbing charges. Now, another former cop, Melanie Barnett Curtin, 41, of Denham Springs, was arrested Saturday, Feb. 1 as she returned from a cruise in New Orleans.

Adding to the disturbing nature of this case is the fact that Curtin worked for the Livingston Parish Sheriff’s Office starting in 2011—the same department as Perkins. Her ex-husband is also a former LPSO deputy.

Curtin was arrested on two charges: first degree rape and video voyeurism in connection to crimes committed with the Perkins. She was booked into the Livingston Parish Detention Center Feb. 1. Judge Jeff Johnson set a bond of $250,000 for Curtin’s first degree rape charge and $100,000 for the video voyeurism charge on Feb. 3, according to WAFB.

After news of her former employment with the LPSO broke, the department issued a statement distancing themselves from the accused rapist.

“Melanie Curtin has not been employed with the Sheriff’s office since August 13, 2012. She worked for the Sheriff’s Office for roughly 18 months in the tax department. She terminated her employment with this office on August 13, 2012. At the time of the alleged crime for which she was arrested she was not an employee of this office,” the statement read.

WAFB reports that the Perkins indictment in December stated that on Nov. 8, 2014, Dennis raped an adult victim. It went on to say that sex was “…with the assistance of a yet unidentified adult female perpetrator.” It is from this claim that the first degree rape charge stemmed.

Sources confirm to theWAFB Investigators that “unidentified adult female perpetrator” was Curtin.

In October, the Perkins were arrested after a months-long criminal probe headed up by the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office. Then in December, a grand jury indicted Dennis Perkins on 78 felonies and his wife, Cynthia Perkins, on 72 felonies.

According to WAFB, among the felonies are child pornography charges, first-degree rape, attempted first-degree rape, sexual battery of a child under the age of 13, video voyeurism as well as a count of sexual abuse of an animal. The indictment also includes 61 counts of producing child pornography.

Judging from the video voyeurism charge, Curtin was allegedly involved in filming the rapes.

Also, according to the Advocate, the pair both face a count of mingling harmful substances, which involves putting harmful substances in food, drink or medicine with intent to hurt someone. According to the indictment, Perkins is accused of ejaculating on various pastries and into bottles of energy drinks that were then ingested by unsuspecting victims. Cynthia is accused of giving them to her students.

According to a source close to the case, the couple was seen in videos and photos committing unspeakable acts with naked children. Horrifying indeed.

https://thefreethoughtproject.com/former-lpso-deputy-arrested-connection-child-ring/

Tech Firm Behind Iowa Caucus Disaster Also Played Role In Creating A Covert Democratic Propaganda Media Outfit

The firm responsible for the app that caused delays in counting votes during Monday’s Iowa caucuses had a role in developing an outlet promoting Democratic propaganda outlets ahead of the 2020 election.

Campaign consulting nonprofit ACRONYM owns Shadow Inc., a company that operates the app Democrats hoped would simplify the process of counting the votes in Iowa’s roughly 1,700 precincts. Officials across the state struggled to use the app, leaving the results of the caucuses in limbo.

HuffPost, citing campaign finance records, reported out ACRONYM’s role in the debacle late Monday night.

ara McGowan, a digital producer for Obama for America in 2011 and the proprietor behind ACRONYM, raised at least $25 million from wealthy liberals to create a media company called Courier Newsroom that is designed to deliver information favorable to Democrats.

Courier is rolling out newspapers in swing states to counter what McGowan believes is right-wing spin on Facebook and across the digital domain.

McGowan plans on spending roughly $75 million on digital ads to rebut what Democrats believe is President Donald Trump’s insurmountable edge in battleground states, Bloomberg Businessweek reported in November.

https://dailycaller.com/2020/02/04/iowa-caucus-shadow-buttigieg/

Italian Police Attacked with Bricks in Turin Migrant Centre

Eleven police and two army soldiers were attacked with bricks at a migrant repatriation centre in Turin over the weekend in just the latest case of violence at the centre.

The migrants in the centre tore bricks off the walls of a structure and climbed onto the roof of a housing module before raining the bricks down on police officers, wounding 13 people, Il Giornale reports.

Police have stated that they are examining CCTV evidence to confirm their suspicions that the five migrants involved in the violence against the officers were originally from North Africa.

The incident comes just a month after residents of the centre set the entire building complex on fire which caused thousands of euros worth of damage, destroying a canteen and several dormitories.

Another incident took places two weeks later when migrants set their mattresses on fire along with setting fire to other objects. In the ensuing chaos, five police officers were injured.

The city of Turin has had problems with illegal migrant violence for years, with the former Olympic Village, built to house athletes during the 2006 Winter Olympics, being turned into a virtual no-go zone by migrants and far-left extremists where police would not enter.

African migrants even led a large-scale riot in November of 2016 with one migrant claiming the radical Islamic terror attack on the Bataclan nightclub in Paris in 2015 had been the “revenge of the excluded”.

Around 300 migrants took part in the rioting, throwing bottles and rocks while yelling “racist” at Italians who passed by them.

In December of 2018, populist League leader Matteo Salvini, who was serving as Interior minister at the time, spearheaded an eviction of far-left extremists and migrants from the former Olympic Village.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/04/italian-police-attacked-with-bricks-in-turin-migrant-centre/

In Sweden, Just One in Sixteen New Migrants Have a Job That Isn’t Being Subsidised by Taxpayers

The Swedish Employment service has revealed that just 6.1 per cent of new arrival migrants were able to find full-time work not subsidised by the government last year.

The figures further illustrate the failure of new migrants to Sweden, which has one of the most generous welfare states on earth, to find real work while the vast majority remain totally unemployed. The number reflects those migrants who have been in the Employment Service’s establishment programme for at least 90 days and is down from 2018 which saw 6.6 per cent of migrants in work not subsidised by the government, Swedish broadcaster SVT reports.

The rate for migrants employed in jobs that are subsidised was much higher in 2019 at 24.5 per cent. Such jobs include start-up businesses as well as so-called “extra services” which generally include positions in the public sphere or in non-profit companies.

Staffan Johansson, Head of Unit at the Employment Service, said that the decrease in migrants employed in any job after 90 days, just 31 per cent, could be explained by a “downturn in the economy” and said that work on extra services had been halted as well.

“The extra services have proven to be very effective for this target group, which has led them to a greater extent to come to work after having an extra service,” he said.

Migrant unemployment rates are consistently much higher than those of native-born Swedes, with many reports showing the migrant rate being several times that of natives.

According to Statistics Sweden’s integration database for health insurance and labour market studies (LISA), around 90 per cent of the migrants who arrived at the height of the 2015 migrant crisis and gain permanent residency status are unemployed.

Migrant unemployment numbers are unlikely to dramatically increase in the near future as Sweden’s general unemployment rate has been rising for several months. October Eurostat figures put the country’s unemployment rate at 24th out of the now 27 EU member states.

The situation shows no signs of improving this year either, with Swedish bank Handelsbanken stating that the country shows weak signs of growth and expects unemployment rates to remain high.

https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/04/sweden-only-6-1-per-cent-new-migrants-non-subsidised-jobs-2019/

Posting anti-vaccine propaganda on social media could become criminal offence, Law Commissioner says

Posting anti-vaccine propaganda on social media could become a criminal offence - even if those promoting it believe the pseudoscience, the UK’s new criminal Law Commissioner has said.

In her first interview since taking up the role, Penney Lewis, revealed she is considering whether laws should be amended to “lower the threshold” of criminality for posting false information online that endangers lives.

It comes as the Health Secretary Matt Hancock said in September he was “looking very seriously” at making vaccinations compulsory for state school pupils after the UK lost its official measles-free country status due to a steady fall in MMR immunisation rates.

Currently, people are protected from prosecution if they sincerely believe the misinformation they publish under laws designed more to tackle bomb hoaxes than internet health conspiracies.

Speaking to the Sunday Telegraph, Prof. Lewis said current legislation also meant people only faced prosecution for publishing information with the purpose of causing “annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety”.

However, she cited anti-vaccination posts and people advocating cancer patients treat themselves with the apricot extract laetrile instead of chemotherapy as areas where lives could be endangered.

The former King’s College professor said: “If their purpose is actually not to [cause annoyance or anxiety], but they think they are doing the right thing by posting false information about a vaccine, for example, it is then should there be a recklessness-based fault element or even a lower (criminal) threshold?

“So where they’ve really not done their homework and they’ve been negligent in the way they have spread this false information or disseminated it.”

“I think we need to look into whether there is a role (for criminal law) in relation to false health information.”

However, Prof Lewis said that criminalisation would be “difficult to justify” in cases where no malicious intent could be proved.

Prof. Lewis became one of the Law Commission’s five commissioners last month, and will lead its work drawing up reforms to modernise swathes of the UK's criminal law over her five-year term, starting a wide-ranging review of how Britain’s communications laws function in the social media age.

To date, over two thirds of the independent statutory body's recommendations for Government to amend or pass new legislation have been implemented wholly or in part.

As part of the review, Prof Lewis said the commission would be considering whether “glorification” of self-harm online should also be made a criminal offence.

The Law Commission is set to release its proposals on modernising communication laws for public consultation later this year. Prof. Lewis will then draw up recommendations, which will be signed off by four other law commissioners, before going to the Government.

The 52-year-old comes to the task with a wealth of experience dealing with contentious legal cases in three different countries, with most of her work to date focusing on historic child sex abuse prosecutions and the medical ethics around assisted dying.

http://www.tathasta.com/2020/02/posting-anti-vaccine-propaganda-on.html

Sink The European Union! Deutsche Bank Crashes To Massive €5.7bn Loss

Sink The European Union (EU)!

Deutsche Bank slipped to a larger than expected loss of €5.7bn (£4.8bn) last year, as the costs of its turnaround drive hit profits.

The German banking giant has now posted losses for five consecutive years.

Deutsche has struggled with misconduct scandals, failed US growth plans and an abortive merger with rival Commerzbank.

Chief executive Christian Sewing’s latest attempts at a turnaround is a €7.4bn (£6.3bn) drive to cut 18,000 jobs, increase its focus on corporate banking and slim down its investment bank.

The €1.6bn loss in the fourth quarter was larger than the €1bn forecast, meaning the full-year result missed expectations of a €5bn loss.

“Our new strategy is gaining traction,” Sewing said today, pointing to stabilising revenue in the second-half of 2019 and an improved capital position. (What else is he going to say?)

In the last five years the bank has lost €15bn and over the last decade its share price has crashed 82 per cent.

Revenue fell four per cent in the fourth quarter to €5.3bn and was down eight per cent for the year to €23.2bn. In other words, sinking like the Bismarck.

https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/sink-the-european-union-deutsche-bank-crashes-to-massive-e5-7bn-loss/

Saudi Arabia seeks to buy missiles from Israel company

Saudi Arabia intends to buy weapons from Israel’s Rafael company which is known for its precision missiles, Hebrew news sites have reported.

Israel Defence Magazine said yesterday that Saudi Arabia has expressed a desire to purchase equipment from Rafael and if permission is obtained from Israeli authorities, arms can be supplied to the kingdom through its European representative, Euro Spike.

The magazine indicated that allowing the company to provide Saudi with advanced combat weapons has “problematic ramifications”, noting that the Israeli Security Ministry may not allow the export of missiles to Saudi Arabia, fearing that they might one day be used against the occupation army. However others have speculated that a deal would be allowed to pass because missiles have a lifespan of ten years, a period during which no confrontation is expected with Saudi Arabia.

The kingdom, the report continued, is looking to diversify its weapons sources, it currently relies on the TOW missiles, which the Saudi authorities began importing from the US company Raytheon in 2017.

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200204-saudi-arabia-seeks-to-buy-missiles-from-israel-company/

Toxic 'Black Goo' Base Used by US Had Enriched Uranium. More Veterans Report Cancer

WASHINGTON – For the last six weeks, a private Facebook group set up to help veterans who served at a toxic base in Uzbekistan has been flooded with new members, many with hauntingly familiar stories: I served at K2. I have cancer.

"It was overwhelming," said retired Army Chief Warrant Officer Scott Welsch, a special operations military intelligence officer who deployed to K2, or Karshi-Khanabad, Uzbekistan, in October 2001.

McClatchy exclusively reported in December that the Pentagon had known from the beginning that K2, a former Soviet and Uzbek base, was contaminated with radioactive processed uranium, chemical weapons remnants and underground pools of fuel and solvents that broke through the soil in a "black goo."

Despite the contamination, about 7,000 U.S. forces were deployed there after the 9/11 attacks, from October 2001 to 2005, until Uzbekistan withdrew permission for the United States to use the base.

After the K2 story became public, the veterans' K2 Facebook site was flooded with new requests to join. Each new member was vetted for their military service. Once accepted, more names of ill veterans began to surface.

As the new stories came in, Welsch volunteered to track the reported illnesses. But he had to step away.

"I was in bad shape from reporting all these medical issues," said Welsch, who was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in 2014.

By the end of January the group had recorded 310 cancers.

The last government count, done by the Army in 2015, was that 61 service members who had been at K2 were diagnosed with cancer. That study was prompted by a number of U.S. Army Special Operations Command forces at K2 who had developed various types of cancer.

Despite the Army Special Operations Command requesting the review, special operations forces personnel could not be identified because of the classified nature of their missions, so those illnesses likely were not included in the 2015 count, the Army said at the time.

The self-reported 310 cancers from the K2 veterans group, if accurate, means the number of cancer-stricken K2 veterans is now five times greater than the Army reported.

Some of those K2 veterans will be in Washington this week, looking for help from Congress.

"I've been wondering all of these years, 'How many more, how many more. How many more?'" said Kim Brooks, widow of Army Lt. Col. Timothy Brooks.

Timothy Brooks was one of the first to deploy to K2, and one of the first K2 veterans to die of cancer.

The first signs came in 2002. That spring Timothy Brooks and his wife were standing in their Fort Drum, N.Y., kitchen and he was agitated, she recalled in a phone interview with McClatchy.

Timothy Brooks had just left a meeting on base where he and other soldiers from the 10th Mountain Division had been handed a form to sign. The unit had just returned home from K2.

"They told us we were exposed to some really bad stuff," Brooks recalled her husband saying.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/02/04/toxic-black-goo-base-used-us-had-enriched-uranium-more-veterans-report-cancer.html

Israel minister tells settlers government is preparing for annexation

Israeli Defence Minister Naftali Bennett told settler leaders yesterday that the government is preparing for the annexation of occupied West Bank territory, reported the Jerusalem Post.

According to the site, Bennett met with the leadership yesterday “prior to his departure for Washington”.

Bennett, whose ministry would play a key part in practical preparations for annexation, told settler leaders “that he supported the application of sovereignty now, irrespective of the US position, and that he would personally discuss the matter with the prime minister upon his return” from the US.

“Bennett also told the settler leaders that he had created a team to prepare his ministry for the application of sovereignty,” the Jerusalem Post added.

Yossi Dagan, head of the settlers’ so-called Samaria Regional Council, said he had also met separately with Bennett to affirm the need to move on annexation immediately.

Dagan sent a letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday telling him, “we chose you Mr. Prime Minister, not [US President Donald] Trump and not even [US special envoy Jared] Kushner”.

Meanwhile, in the Jordan Valley region of the occupied West Bank, the head of the settlers’ Yesha Council, David Elhayani, “also demanded a sovereignty vote, or at the very least a vote on the application of sovereignty to the valley”.

“After 53 years, the time has come to apply sovereignty,” Elhayani said.

As explained by the Post, “settler leaders are pushing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to ignore a White House directive not to apply Israeli sovereignty to West Bank settlements [i.e. annexation]” until after Israel’s forthcoming 2 March elections.

“Netanyahu had initially said he would bring it to a cabinet vote, but has since held off. No cabinet meeting has been scheduled so far this week,” the report added.

https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20200204-israel-minister-tells-settlers-government-is-preparing-for-annexation/

US Supports Turkey 'Self-Defence' Actions in Syria’s Idlib - Pompeo

“We stand by our NATO Ally Turkey in the aftermath of the attack, which resulted in the death of multiple Turkish personnel serving at an observation post used for coordination and de-escalation, and fully support Turkey’s justified self-defence actions in response", Pompeo said.

https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/202002041078227891-us-supports-turkey-self-defence-actions-in-syrias-idlib/

Syrian Army Liberates More Areas In Idlib As Erdogan Pledges To Not Allow Syrians To Fight Terrorists

The Syrian Army is developing its operation against terrorist groups in the southeastern part of Idlib province. Since the morning of February 4, government forces have liberated the villages of Balisah, Tal Aghar, Abandoned Air Defense base, Jadida Tal Khatra, Mushrifa, Mredikh and Tall Mredik.

Meanwhile, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan claimed that Turkey will not allow the Syrian Army to gain territory in the province of Idlib. Speaking on a flight back from Ukraine, Erdogan reported said that there was no need to be in “serious contradiction” with Russia over developments in Syria for now. He noted that Ankara and Moscow will sit down to talk about the issue “without anger”. He also said he may call Russian President Vladimir Putin on February 4.

“We do not intend to enter into serious conflict with Russia at this stage.

We have strategic projects, such as TurkStream and the Akkuyu power plant and we will not abandon the S-400 air defense system…. We will discuss everything. I may call Putin on Tuesday”, Erdogan said, as quoted by the Sabah news outlet.

https://southfront.org/syrian-army-liberates-more-areas-in-idlib-as-erdogan-pledges-to-not-allow-syrians-to-fight-terrorists/

WTF?

Is the cabal flooding mil bases with conornavirus infected to weaken mil?

Military Bases May Be Asked to House Even More Coronavirus Evacuees

The Pentagon is preparing to house as many as 1,000 more coronavirus evacuees from China in what would effectively be a 14-day quarantine at four U.S. military bases, chief spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said Monday.

But he "wouldn't rule out more" evacuees, he said, should the virus continue to spread.

Defense Secretary Mark Esper held discussions with Air Force Gen. Terrence O'Shaughnessy, head of U.S. Northern Command, centered on arrangements for the additional evacuees and assurances the command has the necessary resources, Hoffman said at a briefing.

The 1,000 evacuees taken to the four bases will be in addition to the nearly 200 who arrived last week at March Air Reserve Base in California.

Charter flights are expected to leave the U.S. for China throughout the week to evacuate American citizens from Wuhan in central Hubei province, where the coronavirus is believed to have originated, according to the State Department.

The charters will take the evacuees to Travis Air Force Base and Marine Corps Air Station Miramar in California; Fort Carson in Colorado; and Lackland Air Force Base in Texas.

Hoffman said about 198 evacuees are currently at March and will be monitored by the Department of Health and Human Services and local health officials for 14 days from their arrival. Similar restrictions will be in effect at the other four bases, he added.

There have been no reports of confirmed cases of coronavirus among the evacuees at March.

Efforts are being made to provide each evacuee with an individual bathroom and access to quality care at local hospitals should they show symptoms of the pneumonia-like coronavirus, Hoffman said. He stressed that DoD personnel will have no contact with the evacuees.

Hoffman said he "wouldn't rule out" requests for more assistance from the military.

Last week, Adm. Phil Davidson, commander of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, banned travel to China for all service members and civilians in his command and ordered those in China to leave immediately.

Hoffman didn't have figures on how many command personnel are in China on leave, but said there are still flights out they could take. Once back at the command, the personnel will be monitored for 14 days.

The latest report Monday from the World Health Organization in Geneva said there had been 361 deaths from coronavirus in China; the number of confirmed cases there had risen to more than 17,230.

Outside of China, 153 cases had been confirmed in 23 countries, including at least 11 in the U.S., the WHO said.

https://www.military.com/daily-news/2020/02/04/military-bases-may-be-asked-house-even-more-coronavirus-evacuees.html

Gambling Capital Macau Orders All Casinos to Close Over Virus Outbreak

Gambling hub Macau announced it would shut down casinos for 15 days as coronavirus spirals out of control, triggering lockdowns and quarantines in China.

Officials in Macau, considered the world’s gambling capital, called on its several dozen casinos to close, impacting American casino firms such as Wynn Resorts and Las Vegas Sands.

“Of course this was a difficult decision, but we must do it for the health of Macau’s residents,” Ho Iat Seng, the head of the Chinese territory, said in a TV press conference, according to The New York Times. Secretary for Economy and Finance Lei Wai Nong said confirmed that 41 casinos, bars, theaters, and clubs would be shut down in the meantime, reported The Wall Street Journal.

Ho said there would be a meeting of local casino operators on Tuesday, and he did not elaborate exactly on when the shutdown would begin. But he said it might start as early as Tuesday night, Wednesday, or Thursday.

All government services in Macau would be suspended, he added. Emergency services would continue without disruption.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/gambling-capital-macau-orders-all-casinos-to-close-over-virus-outbreak_3227013.html

Tech Firm Whose Half-Baked App Cocked Up Iowa Results Run By Ex-Clinton, Obama Staff

An app developed by a Democratic digital nonprofit group that botched the Iowa caucus results is run by former staffers for Hillary Clinton's 2016 campaign, Obama's presidential campaign, as well as Google, Apple and former DNC employees.

The app was created by Shadow, Inc., which was acquired in January 2018 by the nonprofit, ACRONYM and paid $60,000 by the Democratic Party for "website development" - which, according to the Huffington Post, was used to develop the app which caucus site leaders were supposed to use to upload the results at their locations. According to the Post, Shadow CEO Gerard Niemira, COO James Hickey and product manager Ahna Rao worked together on the Hillary for America campaign.

As the Washington Examiner reports, the Nevada Democratic Party also paid Shadow $58,000 for "website development."

Perhaps even more disturbing, however, is FEC filings which reveal Presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg's campaign paid the software company tens of thousands of dollars on July 23, 2019 for "software rights and subscriptions." Buttigeig, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, claimed victory on Monday night before any official numbers were in, saying in a tweet that he was "going on to New Hampshire victorious." His campaign claims they paid Shadow for "text messaging services to help us contact voters."

ACRONYM CEO Tara McGowan was notably very excited after Buttigieg announced his candidacy.

ACRONYM, meanwhile, has distanced themselves from Shadow, Inc., claiming that they are merely "an investor." In a late Monday statement, spokesman Kyle Tharp stated last Monday that the nonprofit is "not a technology company," and has "not provided any technology to the Iowa Democratic Party, Presidential campaigns, or the Democratic National Committee."

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/tech-firm-whose-shadow-app-cocked-iowa-results-run-ex-clinton-obama-staff

Mossad's Bloody Trail of Assassinations of Leading Americans and Others Should Infuriate You

https://russia-insider.com/en/history/mossads-bloody-trail-assassinations-leading-americans-and-others-should-infuriate-you

American Pravda: Mossad Assassinations

From the Peace of Westphalia to the Law of the Jungle

The January 2nd American assassination of Gen. Qassem Soleimani of Iran was an event of enormous moment.

Gen. Soleimani had been the highest-ranking military figure in his nation of 80 million, and with a storied career of 30 years, one of the most universally popular and highly regarded. Most analysts ranked him second in influence only to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s elderly Supreme Leader, and there were widespread reports that he was being urged to run for the presidency in the 2021 elections.

The circumstances of his peacetime death were also quite remarkable. His vehicle was incinerated by the missile of an American Reaper drone near Iraq’s Baghdad international airport just after he had arrived there on a regular commercial flight for peace negotiations originally suggested by the American government.

Our major media hardly ignored the gravity of this sudden, unexpected killing of so high-ranking a political and military figure, and gave it enormous attention. A day or so later, the front page of my morning New York Times was almost entirely filled with coverage of the event and its implications, along with several inside pages devoted to the same topic. Later that same week, America’s national newspaper of record allocated more than one-third of all the pages of its front section to the same shocking story.

But even such copious coverage by teams of veteran journalists failed to provide the incident with its proper context and implications. Last year, the Trump Administration had declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard “a terrorist organization,” drawing widespread criticism and even ridicule from national security experts appalled at the notion of classifying a major branch of Iran’s armed forces as “terrorists.” Gen. Soleimani was a top commander in that body, and this apparently provided the legal figleaf for his assassination in broad daylight while on a diplomatic peace mission.

But consider that Congress has been considering legislation declaring Russia an official state sponsor of terrorism, and Stephen Cohen, the eminent Russia scholar, has argued that no foreign leader since the end of World War II has been so massively demonized by the American media as Russian President Vladimir Putin. For years, numerous agitated pundits have denounced Putin as “the new Hitler,” and some prominent figures have even called for his overthrow or death. So we are now only a step or two removed from undertaking a public campaign to assassinate the leader of a country whose nuclear arsenal could quickly annihilate the bulk of the American population. Cohen has repeatedly warned that the current danger of global nuclear war may exceed what which we faced during the days of the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, and can we entirely dismiss his concerns?

https://www.unz.com/runz/american-pravda-mossad-assassinations/

Huge report very detailed, 30 minute read

Another extraordinary article from Ron Unz. It looks like the Soleimani murder is just part of a decades long pattern, as American statecraft blends indistinguishably with Israel's penchant for the underhanded and bloody.

9/11, the Kennedys, senior American polticians and bureaucrats - they even seriously considered assassinating the elder George Bush in 1991, when he was president! Jaw dropping stuff.

"The sheer quantity of such foreign assassinations was really quite remarkable, with the knowledgeable reviewer in the New York Times suggesting that the Israeli total over the last half-century or so seemed far greater than that of any other nation."

"I might even go farther: if we excluded domestic killings, I wouldn’t be surprised if the body-count exceeded the combined total for that of all other major countries in the world. I think all the lurid revelations of lethal CIA or KGB Cold War assassination plots that I have seen discussed in newspaper articles might fit comfortably into just a chapter or two of Bergman’s extremely long book."

"The extent to which the agents of the Jewish state and its Zionist predecessor organizations have engaged in the most rampant international crime and violations of the accepted rules of warfare is really quite extraordinary, perhaps having few parallels in modern world history."

"Their use of political assassination as a central tool of their statecraft even recalls the notorious activities of the Old Man of the Mountains of the 13th century Middle East, whose deadly techniques gave us the very word “assassin.”"

https://russia-insider.com/en/history/mossads-bloody-trail-assassinations-leading-americans-and-others-should-infuriate-you

#10268

>>8022145 Rabobank: "Central Banks Will Save Us Not Just From The Business Cycle And Climate Change, But From Global Pandemics"

>>8022157 Shadow app could have been developed for $6 worth of coding

>>8022201 Saudi envoys summoned over Iran-Arab spy ring in Europe

>>8022210 JARED KUSHNER: PALESTINIANS Are HYSTERICAL and STUPID

>>8022381 Toxic 'Black Goo' Base Used by US Had Enriched Uranium. More Veterans Report Cancer

>>8022515 Gambling Capital Macau Orders All Casinos to Close Over Virus Outbreak

>>8022551, >>8022333 Tech Firm Whose Half-Baked App Cocked Up Iowa Results Run By Ex-Clinton, Obama Staff

>>8022602 Mossad's Bloody Trail of Assassinations of Leading Americans and Others Should Infuriate You

Control the kitchen to protect the Cabal

>>8022712

Narrative control protect cabal interests at all costs

>>8022805

Jesus is the way, the devil is being forced into the open his minions will soon endure the lake of fire

>>8022726

just pointing out that the kitchen is comped