hezbollah
<div>axis of evil reboot</div><div>=</div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">=</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/as-coronavirus-pandemic-sweeps-the-globe-trump-authorizes-new-bombing-campaign-in-the-middle-east" style="text-decoration-line: none; font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 51, 153); outline: none;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.alternet.org/2020/03/as-coronavirus-pandemic-sweeps-the-globe-trump-authorizes-new-bombing-campaign-in-the-middle-east</font></a></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>As coronavirus pandemic sweeps the globe, Trump authorizes new bombing campaign in the Middle East</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams March 13, 2020</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Authorized by President Donald Trump, U.S. forces late Thursday carried out a wave of airstrikes across Iraq purportedly targeting an Iran-linked militia that the Pentagon claims was behind a rocket attack that killed two American servicemembers earlier this week.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The airstrikes risk sparking yet another dangerous escalation of military tensions between the U.S. and Iran at a uniquely perilous moment: Both nations are struggling to contain and combat the novel coronavirus, with Iran hit particularly hard by the pandemic as it works to muster adequate medical resources while in the vice grip of Trump administration sanctions.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Trump White House, meanwhile, is under fire for bungling its response the the outbreak and failing to devote sufficient government resources to fighting COVID-19, which has infected over 1,400 people in the United States—a number that experts say is likely to rise dramatically in the coming days as the disease spreads and the remarkably slow rate of testing picks up speed.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“This moment is the last three decades of U.S. foreign policy in miniature: spare nothing for war and military dominance and find little to spare for true threats like climate change and pandemic disease,” tweeted Stephen Wertheim, deputy director of research and policy at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate, noted Thursday that “the annual Pentagon budget is $738,000,000,000.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is 1.5% the size,” Sanders tweeted. “If we can find money on bombs and missiles to kill people, we can damn well afford to protect everyone’s health and take care of each other.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">A senior Trump administration official told the Washington Post late Thursday that the president directed U.S. forces to bomb five Kataib Hezbollah weapons facilities with the stated goal of reducing the group’s “ability to carry out future attacks.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><b>Kataib Hezbollah is the same Iran-linked militia group that the Trump administration blamed—falsely, according to Iraqi officials—for a rocket attack last December that the White House used as a justification to assassinate Iranian Gen. Qassem Soleimani with a drone strike in Baghdad, a move that nearly sparked an all-out war</b>.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">It is not clear whether there were any casualties from the latest round of U.S. airstrikes in Iraq. Harakat al-Nujaba, a separate Iran-backed militia, “accused the United States of hitting militia and Iraqi army headquarters, as well as a civilian airport,” the Post reported.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“In the middle of a global pandemic—while people across the country quarantine in fear and struggle to pay their rent—Trump is bailing out fossil fuel corporations and bombing the Middle East,” tweeted Michael Galant, senior communications associate with advocacy group Win Without War. “It’s all laid bare. For everyone to see.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Assal Rad</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">@AssalRad</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Remember escalation w/#Iran is Trump’s manufactured crisis.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Stories from #Italy & Iran describe fight against #CODVID19 like war. All hands on deck needed. This is when we’re reminded of real crisis & global challenges. We need diplomacy & cooperation now more than ever.</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">?????? https://twitter.com/katekizer/status/1238130441359679492 …</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Kate Kizer ??</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">@KateKizer</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">escalating into a direct conflict with Iran is the last thing the U.S., Iran, and the world needs right now. https://twitter.com/JackDetsch_ALM/status/1238128480581234691 …</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Ryan Costello, policy director with the National Iranian American Council, said in a statement late Thursday that “without a radical change in U.S. policy, we risk repeating the escalatory cycle, threatening to plunge the region in yet another conflict and sucking the U.S. into another endless war.”</b></font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Fortunately, Congress just sent a bipartisan resolution to the president’s desk clarifying that he does not have authority to start a war with Iran and urging him to withdraw troops in hostilities with Iran,” Costello said, referring to the War Powers Resolution passed by the House Wednesday. “Rather than ignore Congress and the American people’s wishes on war and peace, he should sign the resolution and urgently seek diplomacy to put the war threat on ice.”</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div></div><div style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4"></font></div></div><div><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">---</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">an 220</font></p><p><a href="https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/bombshell-report-finds-iraqi-officials-doubt-trumps-basis-for-escalating-to-the-brink-of-war/"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/bombshell-report-finds-iraqi-officials-doubt-trumps-basis-for-escalating-to-the-brink-of-war/</font></a></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">no lnx</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>‘Bombshell’ report finds Iraqi officials doubt Trump’s basis for escalating to the brink of war</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">President Donald J. Trump, joined by Vice President Mike Pence, senior White House advisors and senior military personnel, delivers remarks during a national televised address Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2020, from the Cross Hall of the White House, responding to the retaliatory missile strikes against U.S. military and coalition forces in Iraq on Tuesday by the Islamic Republic of Iran. (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Written by Jake Johnson / Common Dreams February 7, 2020</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">In a “bombshell” revelation that calls into question one of the Trump administration’s stated justifications for assassinating Iranian Gen. Qasem Soleimani—a move that nearly sparked a region-wide military conflict—Iraqi intelligence officials told the New York Times that they believe ISIS, not an Iran-linked militia, was likely responsible for the Dec. 27 rocket attack that killed an American contractor at an airbase near Kirkuk, Iraq.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The Times reported Thursday that “Iraqi military and intelligence officials have raised doubts about who fired the rockets… saying they believe it is unlikely that the militia the United States blamed for the attack” was responsible.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);">“All the indications are that it was Daesh</span>,” Brigadier General Ahmed Adnan, the Iraqi chief of intelligence for the federal police at the K-1 air base, told the Times, using the Arabic acronym for ISIS. “We know Daesh’s movements.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Trump administration has not released a single piece of evidence showing that the Iraqi militia Khataib Hezbollah, which has ties to Iran, was responsible for the attack on K-1. The group has denied carrying out the attack.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The U.S. responded to the rocket attack days later with deadly airstrikes on Khataib Hezbollah targets in Iraq and Syria, setting off a dangerous escalatory spiral that brought Iran and the U.S. to the brink of war.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">On Jan. 2, the U.S. assassinated Soleimani with a drone strike in Baghdad ordered by President Donald Trump. Following the assassination, which was widely condemned as an act of war, the U.S. Department of Defense issued a statement claiming without evidence that Soleimani “orchestrated attacks on coalition bases in Iraq over the last several months—including the attack on December 27th—culminating in the death and wounding of additional American and Iraqi personnel.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">But Iraqi officials told the Times that “based on circumstantial evidence and long experience in the area where the attack took place,” there is good reason to be skeptical about U.S. claims that Khataib Hezbollah was behind it.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">As the Times reported:</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>The rockets were launched from a Sunni Muslim part of Kirkuk Province notorious for attacks by the Islamic State, a Sunni terrorist group, which would have made the area hostile territory for a Shiite militia like Khataib Hezbollah.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Khataib Hezbollah has not had a presence in Kirkuk Province since 2014.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Islamic State, however, had carried out three attacks relatively close to the base in the 10 days before the attack on K-1. Iraqi intelligence officials sent reports to the Americans in November and December warning that ISIS intended to target K-1, an Iraqi air base in Kirkuk Province that is also used by American forces…</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">These facts all point to the Islamic State, Iraqi officials say.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“We as Iraqi forces cannot even come to this area unless we have a large force because it is not secure,” Brig. Gen. Adnan said of the area from which the rocket attack was launched. “How could it be that someone who doesn’t know the area could come here and find that firing position and launch an attack?”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">In response to the Times report, Jamal Abdi, president of the National Iranian American Council, tweeted: “Al-Qaeda attacked the U.S. on 9/11 and we went to war with Iraq. If this report is true, ISIS attacked the U.S. and we nearly went to war with Iran.”</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Sina Toossi</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">@SinaToossi</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">This is huge: Iraqi military & intelligence officials say it’s highly unlikely that a rocket attack that killed an Iraqi-American contractor in early January—& led to an escalation cycle that almost started a war—was carried out by an Iran-allied militia.https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/06/world/middleeast/iraq-iran-hezbollah-evidence.html …</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Iraqi soldiers at the K-1 base, which was struck by rockets on Dec. 27.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Was U.S. Wrong About Attack That Nearly Started a War With Iran?</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Iraqi military and intelligence officials have raised doubts about who fired the rockets that started a dangerous spiral of events.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">nytimes.com</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">184</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">3:57 PM - Feb 6, 2020</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Twitter Ads info and privacy</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">119 people are talking about this</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">CODEPINK</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">@codepink</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The US almost started WWIII based on questionable evidence.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">After all of the violence in the Middle East following the attack on US bases, #Iraqi officials are now questioning the US's claim that the #Iran-backed militia Khataib Hezbollah are to blame. https://buff.ly/31CpWqT </font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Iraqi soldiers at the K-1 base, which was struck by rockets on Dec. 27.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Was U.S. Wrong About Attack That Nearly Started a War With Iran?</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Iraqi military and intelligence officials have raised doubts about who fired the rockets that started a dangerous spiral of events.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">nytimes.com</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">47</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">1:15 PM - Feb 6, 2020</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Twitter Ads info and privacy</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">44 people are talking about this</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 204, 102);"><b>U.S. officials insisted to the Times that they have “solid evidence” showing that Khataib Hezbollah carried out the attack, but they have not released any of this evidence to the public or to Iraqi officials.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>“We have requested the American side to share with us any information, any evidence, but they have not sent us any information,” Lt. Gen. Muhammad al-Bayati, chief of staff for former Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi, told the Times.</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Ilan Goldenberg, Middle East security director at the Center for a New American Security think tank, tweeted that the U.S. Congress “must ask questions about this and get the intel.”</b></font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Responsible Statecraft managing editor Benjamin Armbruster agreed.</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></p><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“Congress needs to investigate ASAP,” Armbruster tweeted.</font></p><div style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div></div></div><div>
</div><div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">https://www.counterextremism.com/roundup/eye-extremism-january-11-2019</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
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</font><p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><a href="https://counterextremismproject.nationbuilder.com/r?u=KVYzWTFUuJ0SsyVZLAg-7Jw2TEvklax0oou7wpg1OCEnjbtz1CuQMLCTkjVMghCc9F3J9sU79K4NtMONf6ubWe-pFFdqvEE_4VdooJuu7oxUaeeSkmku9q4rXy2xgggUd2KJ7spnQvq45vONkohIgA&e=591e68f8a591259df80db68df9e5ac4d&utm_source=counterextremismproject&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=eoe_1_11_2019&n=9" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://counterextremismproject.nationbuilder.com/r?u%3DKVYzWTFUuJ0SsyVZLAg-7Jw2TEvklax0oou7wpg1OCEnjbtz1CuQMLCTkjVMghCc9F3J9sU79K4NtMONf6ubWe-pFFdqvEE_4VdooJuu7oxUaeeSkmku9q4rXy2xgggUd2KJ7spnQvq45vONkohIgA%26e%3D591e68f8a591259df80db68df9e5ac4d%26utm_source%3Dcounterextremismproject%26utm_medium%3Demail%26utm_campaign%3Deoe_1_11_2019%26n%3D9&source=gmail&ust=1547305445623000&usg=AFQjCNF_Nydw-Nwh_BxbzW-ZpgImt9tYrA"><strong>Fox News: Venezuela, Iran And Hezbollah - All Hostile To The US - Forge Closer Ties</strong></a></font></p>
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<p><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“As<b> </b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b>Iran and Venezuela become increasingly isolated and sanctioned by
the U.S and much of the international community, the two governments
are said to be tightening their bond - with the help of Tehran's proxy
group, Hezbollah, in the middle of the action. </b>"Training between Iran
and Venezuela has increased in the past few years as part of a larger
plan between the Venezuelan regime, consisting of increasing the number
of Hezbollah operatives and their supporters across Latin America,”</span>
<b>Johan Obdola, President of the Canada-based Global Organization for
Intelligence (IOSI) and former counter-narcotics chief in Venezuela,
told Fox News. </b>“(Hassan) Rouhani and (Nicolas) Maduro have established a
very firm and close relationship, which was of course initiated by
(Hugo) Chavez.” Venezuela’s connections to Iran – and by default its
proxy militia, Hezbollah – go back more than a decade. Hezbollah, which
translates to “The Party of God,” is an Iran-backed, Shiite-dominant
political and military group that began in Lebanon in 1982, following
the Israeli occupation. It was designated a foreign terrorist
organization by the U.S State Department in 1997.”</font></p>
</blockquote></div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==</font></div>