Gazette 092314

Tuesday September 23rd 2014

Syria: US begins air strikes on Islamic State targets

The US and five Arab allies have launched the first strikes against Islamic State (IS) militants in Syria.

The Pentagon said warplanes, drones and Tomahawk missiles were used to targeted several areas including IS stronghold Raqqa. At least 70 IS militants were killed, Syrian activists say.
Syria said it was told in advance. But the US says it gave no warning of the timing of attacks on specific targets.
The IS controls large swathes of Syria and Iraq.
The US has already launched about 190 air strikes in Iraq since August. However, Monday's action expands the campaign against the militant group across the border into Syria.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said he supports any international efforts to combat "terrorism" in Syria, state media reports.
Pentagon spokesman Rear Adm John Kirby confirmed the operation, saying "US military and partner nation forces" had undertaken military action in Syria.
US Central Command (Centcom) said Sunni Arab countries Bahrain, Jordan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates "participated in or supported" the strikes.

Israel shoots down Syrian aircraft over Golan Heights

JERUSALEM –  The Israeli military shot down a Syrian fighter jet that infiltrated its airspace over the Golan Heights on Tuesday morning -- the first such downing in decades, heightening tensions in the volatile plateau.
The military said a "Syrian aircraft infiltrated into Israeli air space" in the morning hours and that the military "intercepted the aircraft in mid-flight, using the Patriot air defense system."

The military would not say what type of aircraft was downed and said the circumstances of the incident were "unclear."
A defense official identified the downed aircraft as a Sukhoi Su-24 Russian fighter plane. Perviously, it was reported to have been a MiG aircraft. He said the Syrian jet penetrated 2,600 feet into Israeli air space and tried to return to Syria after the Patriot missile was fired.
The crew managed to abandon the plane in time and landed in Syrian territory, the Israeli official said.
It was the first such incident since the war with Lebanon in 1982, the official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Israel has largely stayed on the sidelines of Syria's civil war raging across the border. But Israeli leaders appear increasingly nervous about the possibility of Al Qaeda-linked fighters occupying the Golan's high ground over northern Israel.

Israeli forces kill two Palestinians suspected of murdering teenagers

Marwan Qawasmeh and Amer Abu Aisha, accused over kidnapping that led to war in Gaza, shot dead during gun fight with IDF in Hebron
Israeli forces have killed two Palestinians suspected of the kidnap and murder of three Israeli teenagers three months ago, an event which triggered a sequence of actions leading to the 50-day war in Gaza.
The two men, Marwan Qawasmeh, 29, and Amer Abu Aisha, 32, were Hamas members, said the Israel Defence Forces. They died in an exchange of fire before dawn on Tuesday after the IDF fired a rocket at a house in Hebron, in the West Bank, where they had been hiding. Three other men were arrested.
Only one was confirmed dead by the Israeli military. IDF spokesman Peter Lerner said the second suspect fell backward in a hail of fire and was presumed dead, although the body had not been recovered.
“We opened fire, they returned fire and they were killed in the exchange,” Lerner said. “We have visual confirmation for one. The second one, we have no visual confirmation, but the assumption is he was killed.”
Palestinian officials decided to proceed with talks in Cairo on a long-term ceasefire agreement with Israel following the end of the Gaza war despite the killing of the two men. “After consultations within the Palestinian delegation and brothers in Gaza and abroad it was decided to continue the Cairo meetings,” said Mahmoud al-Zahar, adding that Israel must not be given any pretext “to escape from commitments” of last month’s truce.

Imprisoned Kurdish Rebel Leader Calls For Mass Mobilization Against ISIS

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — The imprisoned leader of a Kurdish rebel group fighting Turkey has called for a mass mobilization of all Kurds against the Islamic State militant group which is fighting Kurdish forces in Syria.
In a message relayed through his lawyer late Monday, Abdullah Ocalan said: "I call on all Kurdish people to start an all-out resistance against this high-intensity war."
"Not only the people of Rojava (Syrian Kurdistan) but also all people in the north (Turkey) and other parts of Kurdistan should act accordingly," lawyer Mazlum Dinc quoted Ocalan as saying.

The call came hours before the United States and five Arab countries on Tuesday launched airstrikes against the Islamic militants in Syria.
Ocalan, who is serving a life sentence on a prison island near Istanbul, leads the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, which has long fought Turkey for autonomy. PKK is affiliated with a Kurdish party in Syria whose armed wing is fighting the Islamic State group in northern Syria.
The Islamic State group's offensive against the northern Syrian city of Kobani, a few miles from the Turkish border, has sent 130,000 refugees to seek safety in Turkey in the last few days.
Related: Kurdish leader calls for 'all-out resistance' against ISIS offensive

Turkey hints at Iraq Mosul hostage exchange

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has hinted that 49 hostages, mostly Turks, may have been freed by Islamic State (IS) as part of a prisoner swap.

They were freed on Saturday, and Hurriyet newspaper reported that 50 IS members were released by Syrian rebel group Liwa al-Tawhid on the same day.
Mr Erdogan told reporters: "You might have an exchange but it takes some effort to prepare for such a thing."
The Turkish hostages were seized in northern Iraq and held for 101 days.
Turkey is currently struggling to cope with an influx of 138,000 Syrians, most of them Kurds, fleeing an Islamic State offensive in the northern city of Kobane. UN refugee officials have warned that number could surge to 400,000.
The government in Ankara had refused to take part in the air campaign against IS, which has now been extended to Syria as well as Iraq, partly because of fears for the safety of the hostages.

Police: Suicide car bomber targets Pakistani army, kills 5 people, wounds 29 in northwest

PESHAWAR, Pakistan –  A suicide car bomber blew himself up near a convoy of security forces in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, killing five people and wounding 29 others, police said.
In another development, the military said it carried out airstrikes against militant hideouts near the Afghan border, killing 19 insurgents.

The bombing in Peshawar took place as the deputy commander of the paramilitary Frontier Corps, Brig. Khalid Javed, was driving along a busy road in a convoy, the city's police chief Ijaz Ahmed said.
He said Javed escaped unharmed, but one of the soldiers and four bystanders were killed.
"This suicide car bombing in Peshawar seems to be a reaction to the ongoing military operation against Pakistani Taliban and foreign militants in North Waziristan," he told The Associated Press.
He said five people, including a soldier, were killed and 29 people were wounded in the suicide attack.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, which comes at a time when Pakistani security forces have been carrying out a major operation against the Pakistani Taliban and al-Qaida in North Waziristan. The long-awaited June 15 operation was launched after militants attacked Pakistan's one of the busiest airports in the southern city of Karachi.

Ukraine's Military Readies To Pull Back Big Guns From Crisis-Torn East

Ukraine's military said on Monday it was pulling back artillery and heavy armor from the front line with separatists, backing President Petro Poroshenko's peace plan for a conflict that has cost more than 3,000 lives.

Taking a noticeably soft line on the Russian-backed separatists for the first time, military spokesman Andriy Lysenko said reduced fire from the rebels and Russian forces meant the Ukrainian army could begin withdrawing heavy weaponry from a proposed 30-km (19-mile) buffer zone.

His announcement was in line with a call by Poroshenko on Sunday night for people to back his peace plan which he said was needed to keep support of the U.S. and other Western governments.
The president was forced to end an offensive against the separatists and call a ceasefire on Sept. 5 after big battlefield losses that Kiev ascribed to the direct intervention of Russian troops, something Moscow denied despite what Kiev and the West says is undeniable proof.
Though Ukrainian soldiers continue to die in spite of the ceasefire - two more were killed in the past 24 hours, Lysenko said - Poroshenko on Sunday defended his peace plan, saying Ukrainian deaths had been reduced ten-fold.

UK parties set to recall parliament to approve air strikes against Isis

David Cameron expected to hold talks with Ed Miliband later this week as consensus grows for attacks on Islamic State in Iraq

Britain’s main political parties are moving towards an agreement to recall parliament on Friday to allow MPs to approve British involvement in air strikes against Islamic State (Isis) forces.
David Cameron – who will attend a meeting of the UN security council in New York chaired by Barack Obama on Wednesday in the wake of US air strikes against Isis forces in Syria – believes it would be politically impossible for him to proceed without the support of Labour.
The opposition Labour leader, Ed Miliband, whose intervention during an emergency recall of parliament last year helped to stop air strikes against the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria, is expected to have talks with the prime minister later this week.
There is a growing consensus that there would be a legal basis to launch strikes against Isis forces in Iraq, not least if the government in Baghdad requests British involvement. There is less agreement in following the US example in launching strikes against Isis in Syria.
Chuka Umunna, Labour’s business spokesman, said the situation with Isis was different to the situation in Syria last year when the party opposed strikes against the Assad regime after a chemical weapons strike in a Damascus suburb. He said the party would apply the same principles that it applied a year ago. Labour sources stressed that these principles were used when the party supported military action in Libya.
Umunna told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme: “A request for support hasn’t been put in yet, as far as I understand. If it was we would apply the same criteria to judge what position we adopt in relation to any proposed action as that we applied last year in respect of the proposed intervention in Syria.

French tourist Herve Gourdel abducted by Algeria militants

A French tourist has been kidnapped in Algeria by a militant group linked to Islamic State (IS), French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has confirmed.

Herve Gourdel, 55, was seized on Sunday in the unsettled north-east Kabylie area.
Algerian militant group Jund al-Khilafa threatened to kill him if France did not halt air strikes on Iraq.
Mr Fabius said an online video that showed Mr Gourdel flanked by armed men was authentic.
He said France would do everything it could to liberate Mr Gourdel, but that the situation was "extremely critical."
Islamic State militants warned on Sunday they would target Americans and other Western citizens, "especially the spiteful and filthy French", after French jets joined the US in carrying out strikes in Iraq on IS targets. 
Related:  

• France won't abandon fight against ISIS despite citizen's abduction in Algeria 
• Algerian Islamists threaten to execute hostage unless France halts Isis attacks

Thousands Of Hong Kong Students Go On Strike In Democracy Battle

Thousands of Hong Kong college and university students boycotted classes Monday to protest Beijing's decision to restrict voting reforms, the start of a weeklong strike that marks the latest phase in the battle for democracy in the southern Chinese city.

The strike comes as dozens of the city's tycoons and business leaders paid a rare group visit to Beijing to meet with China's communist leaders, who want to bolster support from Hong Kong's pro-establishment billionaire elites for the central government's policies on the semiautonomous city.
Student organizers are dismayed over Beijing's decision in August to rule out open nominations for candidates under proposed guidelines for the first-ever elections for Hong Kong's top leader, promised for 2017.

Discontent over democratic reform is especially acute among Hong Kong's young people, who worry about their prospects amid widening inequality they blame on billionaire tycoons whose companies control vast parts of the economy and who have Beijing's ear.
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Obama announces US crackdown on inversion tax 'loophole'

The White House has announced a crackdown on tax avoidance deals known as inversions.

The practice involves a US firm merging with a firm in a country with a lower tax rate and has become popular over recent years.
But President Barack Obama said new treasury department measures would make inversions less attractive.
Those include making it more difficult for an inverted company to access money made outside the US.
One way inverted companies do that is by making loans between foreign units and the US business.
The benefits of so called hopscotch loans will be removed, according to today's announcement from the US Department of the Treasury.
The treasury department is also strengthening the requirement that the US owners of the new inverted firm have to earn less than 80% of the new entity.
It says that will mean some inversion deals "no longer make economic sense".
"We've recently seen a few large corporations announce plans to exploit this loophole, undercutting businesses that act responsibly and leaving the middle class to pay the bill, and I'm glad that [Treasury Secretary Jack Lew] is exploring additional actions to help reverse this trend," the president said in a statement.
In a recent inversion deal, Burger King bought Canadian coffee and doughnut chain, Tim Hortons.
Under the deal the new group moved its headquarters to Ontario, Canada, where the corporate tax rate is 26.5% - much less than the US rate of 35%.

Obama offers climate change help to other nations

President Barack Obama is pledging new U.S. help for other nations struggling to address global warming, as heads of state from around the world converge for a major summit on climate change.
Obama will use his speech at a U.N. summit Tuesday to announce plans to sign an executive order requiring the U.S. government to take climate change into account when it spends money overseas to help poorer countries, the White House said. The U.S. will also offer vulnerable communities abroad new tools to address the effects of climate change through science and technology.

The measures join a host of commitments Obama will announce at the summit, where more than 120 world leaders will gather on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly to galvanize support for a global climate treaty to be finalized next year in Paris. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the summit's host, is expecting leaders to come with specific pledges in hand to mitigate climate change, as a way to show they're serious about ambitious emissions reductions in the treaty.
Obama's goals at the summit: to convince other nations that the U.S. is doing its part to curb greenhouse gases, and make the case that other major polluters should step up, too.
"It's very clear to the international community that the president is extending considerable political capital at home in order to implement his climate plan, and that's true," said Nigel Purvis, a U.S. climate negotiator in the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations. "The hope is that when we take action, others will do so as well."

Flood Wall Street Protesters Cast Blame For Climate Change As Police Arrest 104

NEW YORK -- Thousands of protesters shut down blocks of Broadway in Lower Manhattan for hours on Monday in a demonstration that cast the blame for climate change squarely on Wall Street.
A brief, dramatic attempt by marchers to take Wall Street itself was met with police pepper spray. Despite the NYPD's tally of 104 arrests -- including one of a man in a polar bear costume -- the overall mood was markedly more contained than the Occupy Wall Street protests that began three years ago this week.
All but two of the arrestees chose to be taken in, defying six police orders to disperse.

"The world seems like it's ending, and it's the only thing I can think of to do," 56-year-old Seth Tobocman told HuffPost just before he was arrested.
Monday's Flood Wall Street demonstration had a more frankly anti-capitalist message than the massive march that took over midtown Manhattan the day before. Many of those present were veterans of Occupy, including organizers like Lisa Fithian, dubbed "Professor Occupy" for her role in teaching tactics to that movement. 

Bin Laden spokesman sentenced to life in prison for al-Qaida role after 9/11

Osama bin Laden’s son-in-law Suleiman Abu Ghaith, convicted in March, became voice of al-Qaida recruitment after 9/11

• The sad legacy of 9/11: Isis and al-Qaida are stronger than ever

Defiant to the end, Osama bin Laden’s son-in-law was sentenced on Tuesday to life in prison for acting as al-Qaida’s spokesman after the September 11 terror attacks.
Suleiman Abu Ghaith was sentenced by US district judge Lewis A Kaplan, who said he saw “no remorse whatsoever” from the 48-year-old imam.
“You continue to threaten,” the judge said. “You sir, in my assessment, still want to do everything you can to carry out al-Qaida’s agenda of killing Americans.”
Abu Ghaith was the highest-ranking al-Qaida figure to face trial on US soil since the attacks. The Kuwaiti cleric became the voice of al-Qaida recruitment videotapes after the 2001 attacks. He testified at trial that his role was strictly religious.
Just before he was sentenced, Abu Ghaith said through an interpreter that he “would not come here today and seek mercy from anyone but God”.
“At the same moment you were shackling my hands and intending to bury me alive, you are at the same time unleashing the hands of hundreds of Muslim youths,” he said. “They will join the ranks of the free men soon and very soon the world will see the end of these theater plays.”
As he announced Abu Ghaith’s sentence, Kaplan said that “as recently as 15 minutes ago, you continued to threaten”.
Defense attorney Stanley Cohen asked the judge to impose a 15-year sentence. A prosecutor called for life in prison.
Abu Ghaith was convicted in March on conspiracy charges that he answered Osama bin Laden’s request in the hours after the attacks to speak on the widely circulated videos used to recruit new followers willing to go on suicide missions like the 19 who hijacked four commercial jets on September 11.
“The storm of airplanes will not stop,” the Kuwaiti imam warned in an October 2001 video that was played for the jury.
Jurors also saw frames of a video made 12 September 2001 in which Abu Ghaith was seated next to Bin Laden and two other top al-Qaida leaders as they tried to justify the attacks.

Secret Service officers struggle behind the scenes

The break-in at the White House makes the US Secret Service look terrible. It also sheds light on an agency that operates largely behind the scenes.

People in Washington have advice for those guarding the White House.
Lock the door, said a US congressman, Mike Rogers, on CBS's Face the Nation.
On Friday, a man later identified as Iraq War veteran Omar Gonzalez climbed a fence, ran more than 60m (197ft) and made it through the North Portico door.
One former Secret Service officer who asked not to be identified ("I'm a private person," he says) is as puzzled as anyone about his former colleagues - and "how hapless they seemed".
He says he's spent "many hours" standing at the North Portico door. He wonders how Gonzalez made it that far.
"I'm at a loss to explain why somebody didn't tackle him," he says.
Gonzalez was captured - once he got inside. He had a knife and 800 rounds of ammunition in a car parked blocks away, according to authorities.
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