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Middle East
Hezbollah, Future Vow to
Support Army Against Terrorists
BEIRUT (Press TV) - The two
main Lebanese rival parties have
vowed to take “practical steps”
to support the army in the face of
terrorist groups operating in the
country’s border areas with Syria.
The support for security forces
came during a Monday meeting
between senior officials from Hezbollah resistance movement and
the Future Movement at Speaker
Nabih Berri’s residence in the
Lebanese capital, Beirut.
Referring to the ongoing fighting with terrorist groups such as
ISIL and al-Nusra Front in the
northeastern parts of the country, “The participants reaffirmed
the firm stance in backing the
army and security forces with all
means to confront terrorism and
protect Lebanon,” according to a
statement issued after the meeting.
Both parties also “appreciated
the positive development of the
dialogue and its subsequent impact on the public opinion.”
“They have agreed on some
practical steps that will boost the
climate of stability” in the country, it added.
The statement came days af-
Hezbollah leader Seyyed Hassan Nasrallah (R) meets ex-PM Saad Hariri in Beirut (L) Speaker Nabih Berri (C)
ter eight Lebanese soldiers were
killed following fierce clashes
with Syria-based Takfiri terrorists near the Syrian border.
In a statement released on Sunday, the Lebanese army stated
that 12 Syria-based suspects were
detained for attempts to organize
a terrorist cell following a raid
by the Lebanese troops in the al-
Marj district of the Bekaa Valley.
The army said five others were
also taken into custody over illegal entry into the Lebanese territory.
Over the past months, Lebanon
has been suffering from terrorist attacks by the Takfiri terrorists and random rocket attacks,
viewed as a spillover of the con-
flict in Syria.
Takfiri groups, with members
from several Western countries,
control parts of Syria and Iraq,
and have been carrying out horrific acts of violence such as public decapitations and crucifixions
against all communities such as
Shias, Sunnis, Kurds, and Christians.
To Discuss ISIL Fight in al-Hasakah
Syrian Commander Meets With Tribal Leaders
DAMASCUS (Press TV) – A
Syrian military commander has
met with local tribal leaders in
northeastern Syria to discuss
cooperation in the battle against
foreign-backed Takfiri terrorists,
Press TV reports.
The meeting was held in the
city of al-Hasakah, the capital
of a province with the same
name.
During the meeting, the two
sides reviewed the prospects of
recruiting more troops to fight
the Takfiri ISIL terrorists.
Last week, the terrorists executed dozens of civilians in the
province. Local sources, speaking on condition of anonymity,
said the ISIL terrorists overran
the villages of Tal Maghas as
well as Um Raqabah on January 22, and fatally shot dozens
of people. The Takfiris later de-
‘Iraq Obtains Intelligence on
ISIL From Ex-Troops in Mosul’
BAGHDAD (AP) – A senior
Iraqi MP says “sleeper cells” made
up of the nation’s former military
and police officers are tipping off
Iraqi authorities to positions of
ISIL Takfiri terrorists in the northern city of Mosul.
“Those patriotic groups, some
operate from inside the city of
Mosul and others from the areas
surrounding it, are now giving
us information about the military
preparations being made by ISIL
in order to face any attack by government forces to retake the city,”
said the head of Iraqi parliamentary committee on security and
defense, Hakim al-Zamili, cited
in an AP report on Monday.
According to the report, the remarks reflect the first high-level
confirmation of the groups’ existence following weeks of rumors
about such informants.
“We receive a lot of useful information from Mosulis who are
becoming fed up with the mili-
tants and this is the reason why
the ISIL blocked all mobile phone
networks in the city,” Zamili added.
According to the Iraqi lawmaker,
their information then gets passed
to Iraqi military commanders in
charge of airstrikes and military
operations in Ninevah province.
Their work, however, remains
extremely risky as the ISIL Takfiri terrorists have shut down mobile phone networks and execute
suspected government collaborators on a regular basis.
The Takfiri terrorists captured
Mosul in August when they led
an offensive across northern Iraq.
At the time many Iraqi troops
and police officers dropped their
weapons and fled the scene during the terror group’s initial offensive, said the Iraqi MP.
He added, however, that now
some of the ex-officers have begun spying on behalf of the Iraqi
government.
stroyed the victims’ houses, according to Syria’s official news
agency, SANA.
ISIL Takfiris executed eleven
civilians and mutilated their
bodies in Syria’s eastern province of Deir ez-Zor on January
15.
The ISIL controls parts of Syria and Iraq, and has been carrying out horrific acts of violence
such as public decapitations and
crucifixions against all communities, including Shias, Sunnis,
Kurds, and Christians.
Over 200,000 people have
been killed in the crisis in Syria
since 2011, when the foreignbacked militancy began in the
Arab country. New figures
show that over 76,000 people,
including thousands of children, lost their lives in Syria
last year alone.
Zionist Military Dismisses 43
Troops for Criticizing Regime
WEST BANK (Dispatches) – The Zionist regime’s military has dismissed
over 40 soldiers for publicly criticizing the Tel Aviv regime’s crimes against
Palestinians.
The 43 male and female reserve troops, who were members of the Zionist
army’s spying unit, were fired on Monday after they refused to “continue
serving the system which affects the rights of millions of people.”
In a letter published by Israeli media in September 2014, the troops wrote
to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and top army chiefs that they could
no longer serve in the unit because they didn’t want to participate in the
injustices committed against Palestinians.
The signatories also criticized the “political persecution” their spying activities involved.
The letter was reportedly written a few weeks after the regime’s 50-day
offensive on the Gaza Strip last summer.
The occupying regime started its latest war on Gaza in early July 2014.
Over 2,100 people died and some 11,000 others were injured in the war,
which ended on August 26 with a truce that took effect after indirect negotiations in the Egyptian capital, Cairo.
More than 15,500 housing units were also damaged in the attacks while
over 2,200 houses were totally destroyed, according to official figures released by Palestinian sources.
JANUARY 28, 2015
Zionists...
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forced Israel’s hand by building an offensive infrastructure on
its backyards. The Zionist regime
stressed it did not want the situation to deteriorate into a regional
conflict.
“Russian leaders conveyed this
message to Beirut and Tehran,” the
Times of Israel reported.
The Zionist regime’s war minister
Moshe Ya’alon said Monday Iran
was seeking to open a new front
against Israel from the Syrian Golan Heights.
Speaking a little more than a week
after the assassinations, Ya’alon appeared to link the airstrike to Iran’s
activities in Syria.
Ya’alon made the remarks while
visiting a missile and satellites plant
in Yehud together with the occupying
regime’s PM Benjamin Netanyahu.
“It’s true regarding the need to
prevent it (Iran) from attacking us,
whether from Lebanon with Hezbollah or from Gaza, with Hamas
and Islamic Jihad, or whether it’s
what we saw last Sunday – an Iranian arm that is beginning to develop,
to open a front against us on the Golan Heights,” he said.
Monster...
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OMX Group, and BATS Global
Markets said they expected their
exchanges to stay open for normal
operating hours on Tuesday.
The last time foul weather led to
the closing of the stock markets was
in October 2012 when Superstorm
Sandy hit the East with flooding,
punishing winds and widespread
power outages.
The latest storm posed a fresh
challenge to New York City Mayor
Bill de Blasio, under fire from police who criticized his support of
public protests about white police
violence against black men.
De Blasio was vilified for keeping schools open in the last major
storm.
Vacationers and business travelers faced headaches as airlines
canceled around 7,000 U.S. flights,
with Boston and New York airports
most heavily affected, according to
flight-tracking service FlightAware.
New York authorities said “virtually all” flights at LaGuardia Airport on Tuesday would be canceled
and cancellations at John F. Kennedy International Airport would be
“significant”.
Amtrak suspended rail service on
Tuesday between New York and
Boston, and into New York state,
Vermont, Massachusetts and Maine.
The biggest snowfall on record
in New York City came during the
storm of Feb. 11-12, 2006, dropping 26.9 inches (68 cm), according
to the city’s Office of Emergency
Management.
U.S. ...
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potentially tagging people as
criminals without due process,” the
ACLU warned.
The Wall Street Journal, citing official documents and anonymous
officials, reported that the program
built a national database to track vehicles in real time and stored hundreds of millions of records about
motorists.
The
database’s
expansion
“throughout the United States”, as
one DEA email put it, worried Senator Patrick Leahy, who sits on the
Senate judiciary committee.
“The fact that this intrusive technology is potentially being used
to expand the reach of the government’s asset forfeiture efforts is of
7
even greater concern,’’ he told the
Wall Street Journal.
Leahy called for additional accountability and said Americans
should not have to fear that “their
locations and movements are constantly being tracked and stored in a
massive government database”.
According to the ACLU, the
government-run national license
plate tracking program dates from
2008. Information had trickled
out over the years but far too little
was known about the program, the
ACLU said.
‘Surveillance a Threat to Human Rights’
Europe’s top rights body has said
mass surveillance practices are a
fundamental threat to human rights
and violate the right to privacy enshrined in European law.
The parliamentary assembly of the
Council of Europe says in a report
that it is “deeply concerned” by the
“far-reaching, technologically advanced systems” used by the U.S.
and UK to collect, store and analyze the data of private citizens. It
describes the scale of spying by
the U.S. National Security Agency,
revealed by Edward Snowden, as
“stunning”.
The report also suggests that British laws that give the monitoring
agency GCHQ wide-ranging powers are incompatible with the European convention on human rights. It
argues that British surveillance may
be at odds with article 8, the right to
privacy, as well as article 10, which
guarantees freedom of expression,
and article 6, the right to a fair trial.
There is compelling evidence that
U.S. intelligence agencies and their
allies are hoovering up data “on a
massive scale”, the report says.
U.S.-UK operations encompass
“numerous persons against whom
there is no ground for suspicion of
any wrongdoing”, it adds.
The assembly is made up of delegates from 47 member states, including European Union and former Soviet countries. It was due to
debate the report’s recommendations on Tuesday.
Several British surveillance cases
are currently before the Strasbourg
court. Amnesty International, the
American Civil Liberties Union,
Privacy International and Liberty
all argue that GCHQ’s mass collection of data infringes European law.
It says the assembly is deeply
worried by the fact that intelligence
agencies have deliberately weakened internet security by creating
back doors and systematically exploiting weakness in security standards and implementation.
Another concern is the use of “secret laws, secret courts and secret
interpretations of such laws” to justify mass surveillance. Typically,
these laws “are very poorly scrutinized”.
The report says that Europe’s intelligence services work closely
with their American counterparts.
India...
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India used to settle part of its oil
debt in rupees that Iran then used
to buy other goods from India.
But a deal between Iran and
western powers in November
2013 that eased some of the trade
sanctions broke India’s hold on
soymeal sales to Iran.
“Now since sanctions have
eased, Iran is not ready to pay a
premium over global prices,” said
Jain. “It has been buying soymeal
from South American countries at
lower prices.”
India exported 140,400 tons of soymeal to Iran over April to December
last year, versus record shipments of
1.23 million tons in 2013/14.