MESOPOTAMIA NEWS : THAT’S THE QUESTION NOW ! – Will China invade Taiwan?
A panel of superforecasters considers the likelihood of an imminent global conflict
BY TOM CHIVERS unherd magazine – Tom Chivers is UnHerd’s Science Editor. His second book, How to Read Numbers, is out now.July 6, 2021
We’ve been lucky, for the last 70 or so years, to live through an essentially unprecedented period of world peace. It doesn’t necessarily feel like that, because there are always enough small wars and conflicts to fill 24-hour news channels – but there have been no direct conflicts between major powers since the Korean War of 1950-1953.
Since then, while there have been proxy wars (notably Vietnam) and local conflicts, no big, powerful countries have gone to war with one another. But there are still tensions, and if you were betting on a war between two great powers now, China and the US would again be the most likely.
The Korean peninsula is probably not where you’d bet on it starting, though. Instead, you might look to Taiwan, the self-governing island off the south-east coast of China. Just this week, a Chinese magazine published a video showing a simulation of a ballistic missile attack on Taiwan, disabling its defences ahead of an invasion.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS SENSATIONAL: Media report claims Swiss & German exports fed Syrian chemical weapons (NOVARTIS & BRENNTAG Duisburg)
Swiss info 6 July 2021 – A former Syrian army chief has alleged that a 2014 shipment of chemicals from a factory in the Swiss city of Basel, intended for medical purposes, was used to make chemical weapons.
The SonntagsZeitung newspaper quoted on Sunday ex-brigadier general Zaher al-Saket claiming that five tonnes of isopropanol and 280 kilogrammes of Diethylamine “without question went into the production of chemical weapons”.
Both chemicals are dual-use, i.e. they can be found in daily and military products: isopropanol, for example, is found in disinfectants, cleaning agents, paints and varnishes, but is also a major component of the type of gas used in suspected chemical attacks by the Assad regime.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS : SETTLERS AND/OR PIONEERS? – The Evyatar Outpost: Israel’s New Pioneers
By Maj. Gen. (res.) Gershon HacohenJuly 5, 2021 – Israel’s Highway 5, which is overlooked from the north by the Evyatar outpost, image – BESA Center Perspectives Paper No. 2,088, July 5, 2021 – ISRAEL
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY: The establishment of the Evyatar outpost is a direct continuation of the activist pioneering ethos that the Yishuv leadership developed during the Arab riots of 1936-39, and that has long been lost to considerable parts of the Israeli political establishment.
The Evyatar outpost was set up in the midst of the recent war in Gaza. Located on a hill overlooking Highway 5—the Trans-Samaria Highway— from the north, it has a vital security importance. In the past, a military base on that hill enabled the seizure of weapons and terror operatives in the area.
The highway is a main corridor between greater Tel Aviv and the Jordan Valley. During the Oslo process, PM Yitzhak Rabin, in demarcating Area C, identified the corridors crossing the West Bank from west to east as vital to Israel. In his view, keeping the Highway 5 corridor under Israeli control was a necessary condition for controlling the Jordan Valley. When the Trump plan was issued, the struggle over control of the highway intensified, including the Palestinian occupation of the ancient Hasmonean fortress of Tel Aroma.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS GREAT ARTICLE BY SHERI LAIZER !
Iraq in the Shadow of Khomenisim – Part II: Iran’s Proxies Parade Their Power Over Iraq
Posted on July 5, 2021 by Sheri Laizer – Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, (L), stands while the Shiite popular Mobilization Forces parade in Diyala, Iraq, June 26, 2021. Photo: AP
In a grotesque miscalculation – the fallout from which has become ever more alarming – the US and British handed Iraq to its enemies penly advancing Tehran’s agenda. The bungled US occupation fuelled Iranian revenge and is now leading to Tehran’s ultimate conquest of Iraq.
On June 26, 2021, Mustafa al-Kadhimi stood among the Hashd al-Sha’abi militia leaders, including Badr Organisation strongman, Hadi al-Ameri, addressing the parade in its dramatic show of thousands of men marching under arms. Iranian and Russian-made weaponry was flaunted from mounts on the back of trucks. (At least four of the Shrine Brigades loyal to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani (Atabats) refused to participate alongside the pro-Iran majority.[1])
The parade took place in Khalis, Diyala, at Camp Ashraf – a site once home to hundreds of anti-Khomeini activists and their families from Mujahideen al-Khalq (MeK), supported by Saddam. It was an irony not lost on the well informed. Criticism of the militias carries potentially lethal consequences.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS WORLD THREAT NO 1 – THE STRATEGIC CONTRACT BETWEEN RED CHONA & THE IRANIAN MULLAHS
Iran’s shadow fleet of tankers increases its smuggling of oil to China
It is estimated that during the last year the tankers delivered more than a million barrels of oil a day to China, and more than 300,000 barrels to other countries – Cmdr. (res.) Eyal Pinko | 28/06/2021 ISRAEL DEFENSE 3 July 2021
Iran has started to increase its illegal sales of oil despite the sanctions that were imposed on it in 2018 by the administration of then U.S. President Donald Trump. Over the last three years, the Iranian tanker fleet consisting of 123 ships has smuggled oil to countries such as China, North Korea, Syria, Lebanon, the UAE and Venezuela. Each day Iranian ships can deliver about 100 million barrels of oil, worth more than $7.6 billion.
It is estimated that during the last year the tankers delivered more than a million barrels of oil a day to China, and more than 300,000 to other countries. Just this week, the secretary general of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, declared that Iran would supply oil to Lebanon to help it overcome the huge shortage of oil in the country groaning under economic distress.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS MURDEROUS: PKK IN IRAQ TARGETS IRANIAN KURDISH KOMALA ! A CRIME !
Clashes between PKK, Iranian Kurdish opposition group in Erbil province
Khazan Jangiz 4 July 2021 – RUDAW – ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Clashes broke out between the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) and the military wing of a Iranian Kurdish political group in Erbil province over the weekend, a military leader confirmed to Rudaw on Sunday.
“The PKK guerillas apparently were not aware of our trainings. They first came here and asked us to move away, and we agreed, but to showcase their power and force, they came back and fired shots in the air over our base, and our Peshmerga answered their shots,” Abdullah Azarbar, head of the military wing of the Komala party, an Iranian Kurdish political group, told Rudaw.
Azarbar said their fighters had been attending a military training course in Erbil’s Sidakan sub-district for the past few days, and have now begun coordinating with local security forces after tensions with the PKK broke out on Saturday evening. No one was injured, he added.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS KURDS : US State Department: PKK continue to recruit and arm children in conflict
Hiwa Shilani ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The US Department of State says that the Kurdistan Workers’ Party is continuing to recruit and arm children and then push them into areas of conflict, especially the Qandil mountains.
The PKK is based in Qandil and uses the area as a launchpad for attacks on Turkish forces, in addition to occupying border villages.
In its 2021 report on human trafficking, the State Department said: “Multiple sources report the PKK and People’s Protection Units (YPG) operating in the [Kurdistan Region of Iraq] and Sinjar continued to recruit and use children. In 2021, an unverified source reported that the PKK recruited dozens of children to prepare them for combat, including children from Kirkuk, Iraq.”
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS Explainer: When is the US war in Afghanistan really over?
Robert Burns and Lolita C. Baldor, The Associated Press US MILITARY TIMES
WASHINGTON (AP) — As the last U.S. combat troops prepare to leave Afghanistan, the question arises: When is the war really over?
For Afghans the answer is clear but grim: no time soon. An emboldened Taliban insurgency is making battlefield gains, and prospective peace talks are stalled. Some fear that once foreign forces are gone, Afghanistan will dive deeper into civil war. Though degraded, an Afghan affiliate of the Islamic State extremist network also lurks.
For the United States and its coalition partners, the endgame is murky. Although all combat troops and 20 years of accumulated war materiel will soon be gone, the head of U.S Central Command, Gen. Frank McKenzie, will have authority until September to defend Afghan forces against the Taliban. He can do so by ordering strikes with U.S. warplanes based outside of Afghanistan, according to defense officials who discussed details of military planning on condition of anonymity.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS : ERDOGAN’S GERMAN SUBMARINES !
1 July 2021 – 12m – German Type 214 submarine sales to Turkey stir the waters of the eastern Mediterranean: good news for the Turkish Navy, NATO, and German industry, but oh so bad for Greece and Cyprus.
Shifting the balance – German submarines are giving Turkey an edge over Greece
That may make the eastern Mediterranean less stable
Jul 3rd 2021 – THE ECONOMIST – ON THE SOUTHERN shore of the Gulf of Izmit, at the Golcuk shipyard, Turkey’s naval future is slowly taking shape. The first of six German-designed submarines lies in the water, after being floated out from its dock in March. The Piri Reis will join the fleet next year; five other Reis-class subs will follow in successive years. It is a triumph for Turkey’s navy—and a headache for Greece.
MESOPOTAMIA NEWS PUTIN’S REPRESSION: Cross-border aid to Syria will end, says Russian ambassador to UN
1 July 2021 AFP The Bab al-Hawa border crossing from Turkey to Syria, March 2006.)
UN authorization of cross-border humanitarian aid to Syria without Damascus’s agreement will stop, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations said Wednesday, without giving a timeframe.
“It is now a day-to-day operation and eventually it will be closed,” Vassily Nebenzia told reporters when asked if a consensus could be found in the Security Council to extend the agreement that expires on July 10.
Asked if Russia deemed it unnecessary to re-authorize the only access – at Bab al-Hawa on the border between Syria and Turkey – he said: “I will not give you any definitive answer at this time. We are continuing consulting.”
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