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Re: Regional geopolitics
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Re: Regional geopolitics
Finally it is bouncing back
Deadly attack rocks mosque in Saudi Arabia
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Re: Regional geopolitics
--- finally it is bouncing back ---Originally posted by Azad View Post
Well, hmm, yes, in the sense that it it happened in saud land.
However, saud is Sunni and only 15% Shia. If the report is correct, isil cowards attacked Shia exclusively for isil perception of Shia as being heretics. A view shared by the gown wearing cuties who rule. These terrorist are being supported by the ruling saud elite.
My guess is that it is a set up, framed by rulers so they can say ... We're suffering too.
When the Sunni extremists terrorizing Syria & Iraq hit the elite of saud or that that they (rulers) hold dear, then I'd say the faul conduct of saud has come back to bite the in the ass. Otherwise it's a PR stunt.Comment
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Re: Regional geopolitics
Yup it is Shia. Let us see Iran's reaction now.Originally posted by Artashes View Post
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Re: Regional geopolitics
Exposure of US spying on Israeli drones served a pressing Russian interest
30/1/16
debka
The latest batch of “top secret” documents to be leaked to the web magazine The Intercept by fugitive former NSA advisor Edward Snowden, showing that the US had spied on Israeli air force operations for more than 18 years, is as interesting for its timing as its revelations.
For three years, the magazine has published Snowdon leaks almost exclusively. This time, on Tuesday, Jan. 26, it released files exposing a joint operation by US and British intelligence agencies codenamed Anarchist. For almost two decades, Israeli air force operations, mainly by drones, were monitored and their transmission feeds intercepted from the British intelligence base in the Troodos Mountains in Cyprus, as well as the NSA base in Menwith Hill, north of Manchester, England,
The magazine story included some exaggerations, including a statement that “US and British spies had a virtual seat in the xxxxpit” of Israel’s drones. It was also suggested that Israel’s drones were armed with missiles, which is hardly a secret.
At some point, Israel acted to protect its drone fleet’s “downlinks” to headquarters, so that many of the feeds grabbed by the Troodos analysts were found to be encrypted or scrambled, showing up like the black-and-white snow on a TV screen.
On Friday, Jan. 29, Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu called US Vice President Joe Biden and demanded an explanation of what Israel considers its senior ally’s perfidy.
Biden used US collaboration with Britain to point a finger at the UK’s Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) – an organization similar to Israel’s Military Intelligence Unit 8200.
It is no secret that Britain serves the American NSA as a willing and productive “subcontractor,” with no interest of its own, military or otherwise, in the contents of the videos Israeli drones or other feeds relayed to the “pit” in IDF headquarters in Tel Aviv. London. The Brits were simply performing the bidding of “big sister” for very good reasons:
As a senior member of the “Five Eyes” grouping of intelligence organizations along with Canada, Australia and New Zealand, the UK obediently carries out whatever intelligence mission it is entrusted by the US.
In return, London receives priceless American intelligence data on domestic and external threats to Britain, as well as generous funding for MI5, MI6 and the GCHQ and technologies. The Americans share exclusive confidential data with the UK and they cooperate in many fields of intelligence.
Israel’s indignation over hostile spying by America and Britain on its air force operations, which has in fact been known for years, detracted attention from the equally important question of why this Snowdon bombshell was dropped now.
After quitting the NSA and fleeing the US, Snowdon won political asylum in Russia. He lives in Moscow. It may be assumed that the files he lifted from the NSA were either handed over to the Kremlin and Russian intelligence, or at least, their release was subject to their control.
So how did the Snowdon files on Anchor serve Moscow’s agenda?
Two pressing interests stand out:
1. The Russian military effort in Syria currently focuses strongly on dislodging the rebel forces concentrated in a southern strip adjoining the Israeli border. Until now, the Israeli air force felt free to block its enemies’ intrusions into that strip and counted on its superior avionics and electronic warfare measures to outwit Russian interference.
The disclosure of Operational Anchor at this time was intended to show Israel that its much vaunted technological superiority is a myth and highly vulnerable to US and British espionage.
It was therefore meant to be understood as Moscow’s Keep Out of Syria warning to the Israel air force.
2. Another implied warning was directed to Riyadh, three days before the conference on a political solution for ending the Syrian war opened in Geneva on January 29, under the joint US-Russian aegis.
This conference depends for much of its success on Saudi-backed opposition rebel groups playing ball. But those groups have been encouraged by Riyadh to play hard to get.
Moscow used the Snowdon files to advise the Saudis not to fall into the error of counting on the Israeli Air Force being free to operate in Syria in support of their goals, just as they were wrong to expect Israel to bomb Iran’s nuclear program.
Israel was certainly not taken aback by the “exposure” of Operation Anchor, since its military and defense organizations have always been on alert for America to use its best technology and limitless funds to stay on their tail.
Although Israel's failure to spot these alien intercepts in real time is certainly a matter of concern, an objective, factual analysis shows that the damage in real terms is minor, for the following reasons:
1, US and British intelligence were hardly likely to transfer the transmissions they picked up to a hostile third party for use against Israel.
2. Operations carried out by Israeli drones and other aircraft are often released to the public by the IDF Spokesman’s Office.
3. The Americans were not able to hack into the most important, secret and critical missions, as claimed, because they were conducted amid transmission hush. Such top-secret sorties are autonomous, with no “downlink”, or transmissions to base; their results evaluated behind closed doors after it is over and they return.
4. Decryption generally takes time, so it should be assumed that the US monitors needed a day or more to crack their encryption, by which time the feeds were largely irrelevant.
All the same, the secret tapping into live video feeds from Israeli drones and fighter jets by US and British espionage agencies for 18 years, the monitoring of Israel's military operations and close watch for potential strikes, is an extremely serious matter. It is cause for alarm in Israel’s counterintelligence agencies and accentuates the need to tighten coordination among the superabundance of bodies responsible.Comment
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Re: Regional geopolitics
Russians let Hizballah into Daraa, breaking their promise to Israel
On Wednesday, Jan. 27 a large Hizballah force entered the southern Syrian town of Daraa, a critically dangerous event for Israel’s security. The way to the town, which lies near the Jordanian border and across from the Israeli Golan, was opened before Hizballah by none other than Russian forces. This was a blatant violation of President Vladimir Putin’s commitments to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Jordanian King Abdullah not to permit Iranian and Iran-backed forces, such as Hizballah and Iraqi and Afghani Shiite militias, reach their borders in consequence of Russia’s military intervention in the Syria war.
Daraa is just 32 km from the southern Golan and 12 km from the Jordanian border. Hizballah forces in this town are therefore within easy striking distance from northern Israeli and Jordan.
What happened Wednesday was that a sizeable Hizballah contingent made it into Daraa, the day after a Syrian unit under the command of Russian officers captured the town of Sheikh Maskin, cutting off rebel forces east of Daraa from their comrades to the west.
Control of Sheikh Maskin is the key to the crossroads leading to Damascus in the north, the Druze Mountain town of es-Suwaida in the east, and Quneitra on Golan opposite Israel’s northern defenses.
The battle for Sheikh Maskin was the first in the Syrian conflict to be directly fought under Russian command. Its fall sparked accounts of Russian officers commanding Syrian troops in different parts of Syria.
So far, Israel has not reacted to the Hizballah force’s advance, notwithstanding public statements by Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon that this would never be allowed to happen.
DEBKAfile’s military sources explain this reticence by a persistent misreading of the Syrian crisis in the higher ranks of the Israeli defense establishment. Military Intelligence chief Maj. Gen. Herzl Halevi, who has a good grasp of its complexities, is a lone voice against the defense minister and IDF chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Gady Eisenkot
In Amman, however, King Abdullah and his generals signified both alarm and fury. DEBKAfile’s sources report that Wednesday morning, the king shot off an urgent message to President Putin demanding an explanation for the Russian officers’ action in opening the door of Daraa to hostile Hizballah fighters.
Jordan has fought Hizballah and its conspiracies for three years, ever since its security forces seized an arms cache that Hizballah had smuggled into the kingdom for a terror cell to mount attacks in the northern province of Irbid. Amman is now concerned that Hizballah is close enough to make a grab for Al-Ramtha, the only border crossing between Syria and Jordan. That would be a feather in the cap of Iran’s Lebanese proxy, as the first Arab border crossing to fall to a Hizballah force outside Lebanon, and one, moreover, located athwart a main regional water source, the Yarmouk River.
As of Thursday morning, Jan. 28, Abdullah had not received a reply to his missive from Putin, but a message did come through to Amman from Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Using a back-door intelligence channel, he sent a notice in the name of Gen. Bahjat Suleiman, former Syrian ambassador to Jordan until he was expelled in May 2014, that King Abdullah must now face the consequences of his long support for the rebels of southern Syria.
The monarch was also advised to prepare for the influx of thousands of fleeing rebel fighters whom the combined Syrian and Hizballah forces were pushing towards the Jordanian border.
The next hours will be critical for the development of a similar crisis on the Israel-Syrian border in the Golan region.Comment
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Re: Regional geopolitics
A new US-Russian-Turkish military buildup over Syria: In unison or at odds?
The US and Russia are in the process of a military buildup in the Kurdish areas of northern Syria. It is ranged along a narrow strip of land 85 km long, stretching from Hassakeh in the east up to the Kurdish town of Qamishli on the Syrian-Turkish border. Facing them from across that border is a parallel buildup of Turkish strength. This highly-charged convergence of three foreign armies athwart a tense borderland is reported here by DEBKAfile’s military sources. It is too soon to determine whether the three armies are operating in sync or at odds, especially in view of the bitter relations between Moscow and Ankara.
US Forces
American Special Operations troops and Air Force attack helicopters landed first at Remelan airport. They are the first US troops to operate from a ground base in Syria, accommodated in living quarters built for them in advance by a US engineering corps unit. The airport runway has been widened for US warplanes.
Russian Forces
Next came two Russian military missions on Jan. 16. One group, led by a general and consisting of air force and Special Operations officers, is preparing to take over a small abandoned base in Syrian army-controlled territory just 80 km from the new US facility at Remelan, and adapt it for Russian use.
The other group, which consists of intelligence officers - some from Russia’s FSB federal security service, which indicates that Moscow has decided it is high time for professionals to protect the classified information moving around the Russian Task Force in Syria and safeguard it from reaching the wrong hands. .
The abandoned base is less than 3.5 km from the Turkish border, and would act as a Russian barrier between US forces in northern Syria and the Turkish border contingents.
Turkish Forces
This Russian deployment set off alarm bells in Ankara, and so the Turkish army responded with the third troop buildup, arraying tanks and mobile artillery on the border across from Qamishli.
Over the weekend, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan stated, “We have said this from the beginning: we won't tolerate such formations (in northern Syria) along the area stretching from the Iraqi border up to the Mediterranean.”
At the same time, US Vice President Joe Biden said Saturday, Jan. 23, that the U.S. and Turkey are prepared for a military solution against ISIS in Syria should the Syrian government and rebel-opposition forces fail to reach a peace agreement during its upcoming meeting in Geneva.
However, Ankara views its war on terror as focused on both Kurdish separatists and ISIS, which is subjecting Turkey to multi-casualty attacks.
DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources note that Turkey’s military options are very limited. Its leaders know they dare not put a foot wrong because the Russian force in Syria is just waiting for an opportunity to avenge the downing of a Russian Su-24 warplane by the Turkish air force on November 24.
Another group of actors stirring the pot in northern Syria is the Kurds, particularly the YPG militia, the only fighting force in Syria capable of defeating ISIS, which has been reinforced by the Iraqi autonomous Kurdish region’s Peshmerga, as well as the outlawed Turkish PKK Kurdish organization.
At this stage, it is impossible to determine how this triple buildup will play out tomorrow – how far the US and Russia are in concert, at what point they may decide to vie for footholds in the Kurdish region of northern Syria and how far the Turks are clued into the joint US-Russian strategy for bludgeoning ISIS.Comment
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Re: Regional geopolitics
Over 200 Saudi-led Coalition fighters killed in Tochka missile strike
Written by Leith Fadel
31/01/2016
Saudi Army suffers overwhelming death toll in Jizan 30/01/2016 Iran requires Saudi Arabia to make amends 30/01/2016 Iran condemns terror attack on Shia mosque in Saudi Arabia (Video) 30/01/2016
The Yemeni Army and their popular committees launched a lethal missile strike on the Al-Anad Airbase in the Al-Lahij Governorate on Saturday, killing an estimated 200+ Blackwater mercenaries and Sudanese soldiers in the process. According to the Yemeni Army’s report, a Tochka missile was fired towards the Al-Anad Airbase by one the Republican Guard’s missile battalions; this missile strike caused severe damage to the base and to the equipment stored there. Apache helicopters, Typhoon fighter jets and armories belonging to the mercenaries were destroyed in the missile strike.
http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/26597/ | Al-Masdar NewsComment
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Re: Regional geopolitics
They covered all aspects except the reason of why all three armies are cramped into one location. The question, is Russia and the US working on a plan or just a chess game of control? turkey is as confused and feels left out. My observation is that the US would like to gradually be into kurdish state/territory as a back up location. Russia is waiting and observing US moves and retaliating with moves around Israel with Hozballah.Originally posted by Vrej1915 View PostComment
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Re: Regional geopolitics
Islamists recapture Nuwarah in northern Latakia
Written by Leith Fadel
01/02/2016
On Sunday morning in the northern countryside of the Latakia Governorate, the Islamist rebels of Jabhat Al-Nusra (Syrian Al-Qaeda group) and the Free Syrian Army (FSA) established full control over the village of Nuwarah near the Turkish border after a violent battle with the Syrian Arab Army’s 103rd Brigade of the Republican Guard and the National Defense Forces. According to the battlefield correspondent Eyad Al-Hussein, the Syrian Armed Forces have completely withdrawn from Nuwarah and its surrounding hills. The village of Nuwarah is strategically situated near the Turkish border-crossing into the Latakia Governorate; its imperative location on Jabal Al-Turkmen (Turkmen Mountains) makes it a priority for the Islamist rebels. Meanwhile, east of the Turkmen Mountains, the Syrian Arab Army’s Republican Guard forces – in close coordination with the National Defense Forces, Liwaa Suqour Al-Sahra (Desert Hawks Brigade), and the Syrian Social Nationalist Party (SSNP) – are advancing north of Jabal Al-To’uma and Jabal Al-Rousiya towards the rebel stronghold of Kinsibba after a series of violent clashes this morning. Kinsibba is currently the primary objective for the Syrian Armed Forces, despite the recent surge of Islamist rebel activity in the Turkmen Mountains; if captured, the government forces will be within striking distance of Jisr Al-Shughour.
http://www.almasdarnews.com/article/...thern-latakia/ | Al-Masdar NewsComment
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