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EUROPE
His remarks sound an awful lot like Biden's or Mayorkas', don't you think?
MIDDLE EAST
So oil was supposed to appease Hezbollah? What a joke!
It's Iranian oil the one that fuels that terrorist organization in the first place!
OCEANIA
SCOTUS on Immigration
Quote:The Supreme Court ruled in a 5-4 opinion against three illegal aliens fighting their deportation orders from the United States, claiming they did not receive proper notice of their removal hearings in federal immigration court.
When illegal aliens Esmelis Campos-Chaves, Varinder Singh, and Raul Daniel Mendez-Colín failed to appear before federal immigration judges, they were ordered deported in absentia. In each case, the Department of Justice (DOJ) sent initial Notices to Appear (NTA) in immigration court that did not specify the time and place of the hearings.
Later, though, the DOJ sent notices of hearings to each of the illegal aliens which included the time and place for when they needed to appear before a federal immigration judge. In each case, though, the men did not appear at their court hearings and were ordered deported from the United States in absentia.
Each illegal alien then moved to have their deportation orders rescinded, claiming the DOJ did not sufficiently notify them of their immigration hearings. The Fifth Circuit denied one of the petitions while the Ninth Circuit sided with the other two illegal aliens.
On Friday, Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the majority, finding that the DOJ did provide proper notice of immigration hearings to each of the illegal aliens, and thus they cannot seek rescission of their deportation orders:
Campos-Chaves, Singh, and Mendez-Colín all received “notice in accordance with paragraph (1) or (2)” for the hearings they missed, and thus their in absentia removal orders may not be rescinded on that ground. The Government concedes that none of them received a compliant NTA. Each did, however, receive a “notice in accordance with paragraph . . . (2),” and each notice met all of the requirements for a notice under that provision. After receiving a defective NTA, each alien received a notice that provided a specific time and place for their removal proceedings. Those notices provided “new” times, and thereby “change[d]” the time and place of their removal proceedings, within the meaning of §1229(a)(2).
Another Biden Gaffe
Quote:President Joe Biden appeared to freeze while on stage during a star-studded fundraiser on Saturday night and was seen being led off the stage by former President Barack Obama.
Biden and Obama attended the Los Angeles fundraiser, along with celebrities such as George Clooney, Julia Roberts, late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel, Jack Black, and Jason Bateman, among many others. Before the fundraiser, it was reported that the Biden campaign had raised more than $28 million.
[X Post]
“Biden freezes before Obama grabs his arm and leads him off stage,” the Republican National Committee’s account on X posted. “Yikes!”
Video footage on social media showed Biden and Obama standing on the stage as the curtains were drawn open, revealing musicians playing behind them. Biden can be seen facing the side of the stage while clapping his hands, before turning to face the audience in front of the stage.
[X Post]
Obama can be seen giving a few small waves to the crowd before taking Biden’s arm to indicate they should walk off the stage. As the two are walking off stage, Obama is seen keeping his hand on Biden’s back.
“Biden froze again last night and had to get escorted out by Obama,” the X account End Wokeness wrote. “Is this normal?”
“Can you feel the energy?” Pradheep J. Shanker, a radiologist and contributor with National Review wrote in a post on X.
[X Post]
Building Firebombed!?
Quote:Pro-Palestinian protesters reportedly firebombed “the side of a building” on the University of California Berkeley (UCB) campus and claimed that students had been “attacked” on another campus.
In a post on Instagram on Thursday, Palestine Action in the United States shared a post from an anonymous user who claimed responsibility for firebombing the side of Koshland Hall, a building at UCB that houses “labs from the Department of Molecular & Cell Biology.”
The post included a screenshot of a notice that had been written by an author, “student intifada,” on the San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center website. In the post the author wrote that students at the University of California Los Angeles “were attacked” and in response, anti-Israel protesters “retaliated” by setting off a firebomb on the side of Koshland Hall.
“Not sure what building it even was,” the group added. “Honestly don’t really care. Every single building on the UC Berkeley campus deserves to be incinerated following the UC system’s treatment of student protestors. Last night they attacked a young woman student who was speaking her mind on a megaphone. So we unloaded a firebomb on the side of a campus building. The flame was big and spread across the trees and bushes on the side of a building.”
Officers from the University of California Police Department (UCPD) began an investigation regarding the alleged use of arson at UCB’s campus, according to Kron4 News.
“Long live the student intifada for Palestine liberation,” the post continued. “Stop the genocide now. UC System must divest from Israel or face our wrath of revenge. Blessed is the flame.”
The Jerusalem Post noted that the post from the “student intifada” author mentioned that a “student with a megaphone” was attacked. However, Students for Justice in Palestine at UCLA (SJP UCLA) reportedly confirmed that she had been “later released.”
The manifesto referred to a Students for Justice in Palestine UCLA student with a megaphonne who had been seized by police, but later released, according to SJP UCLA.
So it TRULY Was His Lappy!
Quote:Hunter Biden is dropping his lawsuit accusing Rudy Giuliani and the former New York City mayor’s ex-lawyer of manipulating data found on his infamous laptop.
Biden’s lawyer Abbe Lowell filed the stipulation for dismissal Thursday in the US District Court for the Southern District of New York.
The attorney asked the court to dismiss the lawsuit against Giuliani and Robert Costello “without prejudice, with each party bearing its own attorneys’ fees, costs, and expenses.”
Attorneys for all three parties have agreed to the stipulation, court documents show.
The lawsuit claimed that Giuliani, 80, and Costello violated the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act when they allegedly hacked and manipulated data on the abandoned laptop in a “total annihilation” of the disgraced first son’s “digital privacy.”
Filed last September, the lawsuit sought more than $75,000 in damages, plus attorneys’ fees and other penalties.
“This dismissal – along with Hunter Biden’s conviction based on evidence taken from the laptop – is a vindication for Mr. Giuliani and Mr. Costello as well as all of the media outlets who broke the laptop story in 2020 and suffered orchestrated censorship by social media, the leftist mainstream media, and others who engaged in election interference,” Giuliani’s attorney Joe Sibley said in a statement to The Post.
Sibley argued that Biden’s legal team agreed to dismiss the lawsuit because “they know they have problems on the merits.”
Lowell and Costello’s lawyer did not respond to The Post’s requests for comment.
The motion to dismiss the suit must be approved by US District Judge Jessica Clarke before it is finalized.
MS-13 Colluding with Russian Mobsters?
Quote:Russian gangsters, MS-13 members, and a cadre of corrupt surgeons, lawyers and lenders are pulling off the latest big con in the city: bogus personal-injury lawsuits where immigrants go under the knife to help their twisted ruse.
Migrants and other desperate New Yorkers are pressured into getting unneeded spinal fusion surgery and other operations to boost the value of their fake-accident claims, according to court records, insurance investigators and law-enforcement sources.
Doctors cash in on the sick swindle by performing back and neck fusions, allowing fraudsters to swipe billions through bogus insurance filings, according to court filings and sources.
The racket typically involves a healthy person taking a seemingly minor tumble on the street or at a construction site, then claiming a devastating injury that requires multiple surgeries. A crooked surgeon fuses healthy vertebrae with screws and plates, leading to a lawsuit against a business or landlord or both. Settlements start at $1 million each but can go much higher.
“One-five is now on the cheap side,” said an insurance industry lawyer who asked for anonymity.
These scams rely on law firms that take on hundreds of such cases, along with high-profile doctors, sketchy lending firms that hard-sell migrants into borrowing to cover the costs, and an army of “runners” who recruit victims and orchestrate their falls, according to legal papers and sources familiar with the mix of schemes.
The set-up is fed by a seemingly endless supply of low-income dupes willing to risk their health for a quick score.
“They’re regularly recruiting migrants and homeless people and in some cases are proactively arranging for them to come to New York,” a private investigator told The Post.
So-called “shot callers” pocket most of the windfall settlements, while those who pose as injured receive as little as $1,000 each, according to testimony in one case. Their share gets shriveled by sky-high interest on loans they’re told they need for medical and legal expenses. Others can collect up to six figures.
Trump on Taxes
Quote:Former President Donald Trump vowed to “make the Trump tax cuts permanent” during a speech at Turning Point Action’s “People’s Convention” on Saturday.
During his speech at the convention in Detroit, Michigan, the former president added that if elected president in November, his administration would also “cut taxes even more for working families and small businesses.”
“We will make the Trump tax cuts permanent and cut taxes even more for working families and small businesses,” Trump told the crowd at the end.
Trump’s promise to make the Trump tax cuts permanent comes as many of the provisions of the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) passed under the Trump administration, are set to expire at the end of 2025.
Under the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, middle-class families and small businesses received major tax cuts, and Obamacare’s individual mandate was repealed. The legislation also included cutting the tax rate from 35 percent to 21 percent and opening the Arctic Wildlife Refuse up to oil drilling, among other things.
A report from the Tax Foundation revealed that as a result of the TCJA, 1.4 million jobs would be added to the United States economy by 2025.
Democrats Against Netanyahu
Quote:Democrats plan to disrupt Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to a special joint session of Congress on July 24 in an unprecedented show of hostility to the democratically-elected leader of a close American ally.
56 Democrats boycotted Netanyahu’s speech in 2015, when Republicans invited him to argue against then-President Barack Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran. This time, Axios reports, “Democrats plan to go bigger than a boycott”:
The proposals include a press conference, a vigil, or an event with families of those taken hostage by Hamas, many of whom feel Netanyahu hasn’t done enough to free their loved ones.
In a sign of how extensive and high-level some of these discussions are, former House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-S.C.) told Politico he was participating in one counter-programming meeting.
…
Several progressive House members are planning to attend the speech but disrupt it, one lawmaker said.
The speech may be especially awkward, given that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) called earlier this year for Netanyahu to be ousted in new elections. The Biden administration has been trying to undermine the Israeli leader since he was elected in November 2022, with the exception of a brief period when Israel and Saudi Arabia were near a peace deal before October 7 last year.
Republican on Ukraine & Democrats
Quote:Senator Tom Cotton (R-AR) said Sunday on CNN’s “State of the Union” that he has “noticed that Russian President Vladimir Putin only invades Ukraine and Democrats are president.”
Anchor Jake Tapper said, “Let’s start with Ukraine, which I know is an issue you care about in terms of military aid. Last night at a rally in Michigan, the former president, Mr. Trump, went after Ukrainian President Zelenskyy for constantly seeking U.S. aid, saying, ‘It never ends, it never ends.’ This is a criticism that comes after he reportedly told House Republicans that the money the U.S. is sending to Ukraine isn’t worth it and asking, ‘If Ukraine wins, what will be the benefit?’ Now, you’ve been a strong supporter of military aid to Ukraine to fend off Putin’s war. What is your answer to that question? What will be the benefit if Ukraine wins?”
Cotton said, “I think it’s important to look at the context of what’s happened in Ukraine over the last ten years. I’ve noticed that Vladimir Putin only invades Ukraine, and Democrats are president. It happened under Barack Obama. It happened under Joe Biden. It didn’t happen with Donald Trump. In fact, the weapons that Ukraine used in the early days of this war to fend off the Russian invasion are the weapons that Donald Trump sent, that Barack Obama and Joe Biden had refused to send. One reason why Vladimir Putin thought he could get away with going for the jugular and Ukraine is because of the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan, which projected weakness and indecision. It was just a few weeks later that he began to mass troops on Ukraine’s border. President Trump has said that he believes and supports Ukraine’s survival and strength, but he also thinks that Europe should do more.”
Love Vegan Meat? Perhaps You Should Stop Eating it
Quote:While experts extol the health and environmental benefits of a diet free of animal products, new research suggests that consuming ultra-processed vegan food can increase the risk of heart death.
Ultra-processed foods include packaged goods, drinks, cereals and ready-to-eat products that contain colors, emulsifiers, flavors and other additives. UPFs are typically high in sugar, saturated fat, and salt and devoid of vitamins and fiber.
Researchers from the University of São Paulo and Imperial College London assessed the diets of more than 118,000 Brits aged 40 to 69 years old.
They found that a plant-based eating plan promotes overall heart health, but only when that diet features fresh plant-based foods such as fruits and vegetables, whole grains and legumes.
Researchers found that for every 10% increase in plant-based foods, the risk of death from heart disease fell by 20%.
Yet, when the increase in plant-based foods came from UPFs, it was linked to a 12% rise in heart disease-related deaths.
Lead study author Fernanda Rauber explained that the composition and processing methods of UPFs can lead to higher blood pressure and cholesterol.
“Food additives and industrial contaminants present in these foods might cause oxidative stress and inflammation, further aggravating the risks,” she said.
“Those shifting towards plant-based foods should also think about the degree of processing involved before making their choices.”
Dr. Eszter Vamos, co-author of the study, noted the deceptive marketing and public perception of plant-based products as healthy.
“While ultra-processed foods are often marketed as healthy foods, this large study suggests that plant-based ultra-processed foods do not seem to have protective health effects and are linked to poor health outcomes,” she said.
Chicago Under Fire... Shootings Are the Norm There
Quote:At least 21 people were shot, two of them fatally, Friday into Saturday night in Mayor Brandon Johnson’s (D) Chicago.
ABC 7 / Chicago Sun-Times reported the first fatal shooting occurred just prior to 8:30 p.m. Friday night.
The shooting happened in “the 1300 block of South Independence Boulevard” and a 13-year-old who was on the sidewalk was killed.
A woman was shot in killed while inside a car “in the 3000 block of North Cicero Avenue” Saturday morning around 2;30 a.m. The shots were fired by a suspect in another car who pulled along side the vehicle in which the woman was sitting.
At least 45 people were shot the weekend of June 7-9, 2024, in Chicago, and at least 41 were shot over Memorial Weekend.
The Sun-Times pointed out that 216 people were killed in Chicago January 1, 2024, through June 15, 2024.
Shooting in Detroit
Quote:Nine people were injured after an attacker opened fire on people at a Detroit water park Saturday just after 5 p.m.
The Associated Press noted that the shooting victims included “an 8-year-old boy was shot in the head and in critical condition Saturday night.”
The 8-year-old’s brother and mother were shot in the incident as well.
Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard stressed the attack was apparently random. He explained that the gunman drove to water park, walked up to the pad containing “sprays and fountains,” and began shooting.
The attacker allegedly fired around 28 rounds and “[stopped] multiple times to reload.”
1 News reported that police were able to corner the suspect inside a nearby home, where the suspect took his own life.
Michigan has universal background checks, a gun storage law, a red flag law, and numerous other gun controls.
Garland Not Being Prosecuted
Quote:The Department of Justice (DOJ) revealed that it was declining to prosecute Attorney General Merrick Garland after the House of Representatives voted to hold Garland in contempt of Congress concerning his refusal to comply with Congressional subpoenas.
In a letter addressed to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) on Friday, Carlos Felipe Uriarte, the Assistant Attorney General, explained that President Joe Biden had “asserted executive privilege and directed” Garland not to “release materials” that were subpoenaed by the House Oversight and Accountability Committee and the House Judiciary Committee in February, according to CNN.
On Wednesday, the House of Representatives voted 216 to 207 to hold Garland in contempt of Congress for not complying with subpoenas for “records, including transcripts, notes, video, and audio files,” relating to Special Counsel Robert Hur’s investigation of Biden’s “willful mishandling of classified information,” according to a press release from the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability.
“That directive was based on a legal opinion from the Department of Justice (Department) advising that asserting privilege would be legally proper,” the DOJ wrote. “The President’s directive was issued after the Department produced materials responsive to all four requests in the Committee’s subpoenas. The Department provided Special Counsel Hur’s report without any additional redactions and facilitated his congressional testimony.”
As Breitbart News previously reported, the “audio tapes of Hur’s interview with Biden” were requested due to the fact that Garland “only provided written transcripts” that were deemed “insufficient” after a transcript of Hur’s interview with Biden showed he had “poor memory.”
The transcript of Hur’s interview with Biden showed that the president could not remember the date his son Beau had died or even when he had served as vice president.
Most importantly, Republicans wanted the audio tapes of Hur’s interview with Biden. Garland had only provided written transcripts, which Republicans said were insufficient after Hur revealed that Biden experienced mental lapses and “poor memory” during his interview.
In February, Hur concluded his investigation of Biden’s handling of classified information, and revealed in a report that he would not be prosecuting Biden due to him being an “elderly man with a poor memory.”
The Border Section
Quote:U.S. Customs and Border Protection officers assigned to the San Diego Field Office seized tons of illicit drugs during May. A single smuggling attempt led to the seizure of more than 11,000 pounds of methamphetamine — the third-largest meth seizure in CBP history.
On May 20, CBP officers assigned to the Otay Mesa Commercial Facility inspected a tractor-trailer carrying squash from Mexico to California. Officers referred the driver, a valid border crossing card holder, to the secondary inspection area.
During the secondary inspection, a non-intrusive scanner detected anomalies, leading to a physical search of the trailer. The search led to the discovery of 1,419 packages containing a substance that tested positive for methamphetamine. Officials valued the 11,469 pounds of methamphetamine at more than $18,000,000.
During May, San Diego Field Office officers seized a total of more than 16,000 pounds of methamphetamine, nearly 562 pounds of fentanyl, nearly 914 pounds of cocaine, 22 pounds of heroin, and more than four pounds of marijuana.
The drugs were found during 145 attempted smuggling incidents, CBP officials stated. The seizures were valued at $38,300,000.
“These extraordinary efforts stand as a testament to the diligent and exceptional work by our officers,” Sidney K. Aki, CBP Director of Field Operations for San Diego, said in a written statement. “The interdiction of these drugs not only disrupts criminal networks but also underscores the importance for continued vigilance and collaboration in the fight against drug trafficking.”
The seizures occurred at the San Ysidro, Otay Mesa, San Diego air and sea ports, Calexico East and West, Tecate, and Andrade Ports of Entry.
The suspects were turned over to ICE Homeland Security Investigations.
Quote:Border Patrol agents in Blythe, California, arrested a California man and his 17-year-old brother after a service K-9 alerted the agents to the presence of a large cache of semi-automatic rifles in their vehicle. In total, agents seized 25 AK-style rifles, two handguns, and ammunition magazines on Wednesday in Blythe, California. Jose Palma Almendariz and his teenage brother now face federal charges related to Wednesday’s firearms and magazine seizure.
Both suspects were turned over to local authorities as the case continues to be investigated. Yuma Sector Chief Sean Patrol agent Sean McGoffin commented on the seizure saying, “Transnational Criminal Organizations traffic weapons to fuel their illicit activity on both sides of the border. This weapons seizure clearly demonstrates the importance of our Border Security mission and commitment of keeping our communities safe.”
According to the Border Patrol, the seizure is believed to be the largest in recent Yuma Sector history.
Law enforcement officers assigned to the Coachella Valley Violent Crime Gang Task Force (CVVCGTF) responded to the U.S. Border Patrol Blythe Station to assist with the weapons seizure and investigation. Based on initial interviews with both suspects, authorities believe the weapons were originally picked up by the pair in Phoenix, Arizona, and were ultimately destined for Mexico. The weapons were found in the cargo compartment of a Honda CRV crossover.
Blythe sits 100 miles north of the Mexican state of Sonora. As reported by Breitbart Texas, clandestine gravesites in the state were recently discovered — evidence of violent clashes between Mexican cartel members. Splinter groups within the Sinaloa Cartel that controls the state have been engaged in internal battles and are largely responsible for the most recent skirmishes in Sonora. The Sinaloa Cartel is also at odds with its rival Juarez Cartel to the east. The weapons seized Wednesday may have been destined for this region of the U.S./Mexico border.
The elder of the two brothers, Jose Palma Almendariz, is currently being held in the Blythe jail as the investigation continues. Palma’s juvenile brother was released to his parents and remains free as the case progresses.
EUROPE
Harris & Direct Aid for Ukraine
Quote:Vice President Kamala Harris promised another $1.5 billion in direct U.S. aid for Ukraine on Saturday at a peace summit in Switzerland.
The funds will be made available through the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development.
That includes money for energy assistance, repairing damaged energy infrastructure, helping refugees and strengthening civilian security in the wake of the aggression by Russian President Vladimir Putin, AP reports.
Harris used a a meeting with Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky to set out the reasons behind the latest funding bequest courtesy of U.S. taxpayers:
This war remains an utter failure for [Russian President Vladimir] Putin.
I am here in Switzerland to stand with Ukraine and the leaders from around the world in support of a just and lasting peace,” she added. “As we look forward to that peace and work toward that, the United States is committed to helping Ukraine rebuild.
The new aid total is broken down into $500 million in funding to go toward energy assistance, the White House said in its press release, as Russian strikes have continuously targeted Ukraine’s energy sector.
The effort will also direct $324 million of the previously announced funds to helping the nation repair its energy infrastructure.
More than $379 million will go to humanitarian assistance from the U.S. Agency for International Development and the State Department to “address urgent needs of refugees, internally displaced persons, and conflict affected communities impacted by Russia’s brutal war against the Ukrainian people,” per the release.
The funding comes just days after President Joe Biden signed an agreement tying the U.S. to a decade-long “security” pact with Ukraine that includes continued training of Ukraine’s armed forces, more cooperation in the production of weapons and military equipment, and greater intelligence sharing.
Biden has also approved sending Ukraine another Patriot missile system, something Zelensky says is desperately needed to defend against Russian strikes on Ukraine’s power grid and civilian areas, as well as military targets.
Switzerland & Ukraine
Quote:Western leaders rejected Vladimir Putin’s framework for a ceasefire while backing Ukraine’s demands that Russia return all occupied territories as the basis for any potential peace agreement.
The “first annual Global Peace Summit” held in the luxury Swiss resort of Burgenstock, which did not include any representatives from Moscow, concluded with the status quo essentially remaining the same, with Ukraine continuing to demand that Russia cede territory in the East and Crimea as a prerequisite for actual peace talks to begin, a likely non-starter for Vladimir Putin.
Following the conclusion of the meeting, which saw around 100 delegates from 92 countries and eight international organisations attend, President Zelensky claimed that all participants agreed that Ukraine’s “territorial integrity” must be kept intact, Ukrinform reports.
Despite Ukraine failing to recapture the occupied regions in the Donbas during last year’s counteroffensive, Zelenksy’s chief-of-staff Andriy Yermak said that there would be “no compromise on independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity” in any peace negotiations with Russia.
Before the summit, Vladimir Putin said that Russia would be willing to agree to a ceasefire and potential peace with Ukraine if Kyiv withdraws its troops from the mostly ethnically Russian territories, which Moscow now claims sovereignty over, citing the internationally contested referenda held in the regions to join Russia.
Additionally, Putin demanded that Ukraine forfeit its ambitions to join the American-led NATO military alliance, state media RT reports. Moscow also proposed a “pan-European security architecture” in which all countries on the continent, including Ukraine, would be protected. For this, Putin said that all foreign military operations must cease in Ukraine.
French Politician Against His Own People!?
Quote:Those who consider themselves “native French” represent a “serious problem” for social cohesion, far-left leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon declared as he laid out the vision for the “New Popular Front” alliance in the snap legislative election called by President Emmanuel Macron.
Former French presidential candidate, leader of the far-left La France Insoumise (LFI) party and effective head of the New Popular Front leftist election alliance, Jean-Luc Mélenchon hailed the demographic changes in his country while attacking the native population of France in a speech to supporters on Friday.
“When I was born, one in ten French people had a foreign grandparent, now it’s one in four. Consequently, those who call themselves native French pose a serious problem to the cohesion of society,” he said in comments reported by Le Journal du Dimanche.
“In the Paris region, there are thirteen million of us, including at least eight million immigrants: Corsicans, Bretons, Malians, Algerians, Moroccans… Everyone was torn from the environment from which their parents or grandparents came and put against the wall to build a society.”
The leftist leader went on to call for the “re-foundation of France”, explaining: “Ransacked by liberal policies, trashed by racism, trashed by divisions, it is this new France that we must have in mind when we undertake the policy of the New Popular Front.”
The comments drew swift pushback from nationalist figures, including former presidential candidate and leader of the populist Reconquête (Reconquest) party, Éric Zemmour.
“Let Mélenchon understand: the French were here a thousand years ago, they will remain here for another thousand years and we will do everything to prevent their replacement by his new people,” Zemmour said.
His remarks sound an awful lot like Biden's or Mayorkas', don't you think?
Hollande is Back... Sort of
Quote:Former French President François Hollande said he will run as a candidate in the snap legislative elections after throwing his support behind the far-left-led “New Popular Front” alliance.
Seven years after leaving office from a presidency mired by Islamic terrorism and economic hardship, François Hollande has returned to the frontlines of French politics, throwing his hat in the ring to once again serve as a deputy in the National Assembly.
Hollande, a longtime member of the Socialist Party, was nominated by the leftist party to represent the so-called “New Popular Front” in the constituency of Corrèze, Le Figaro reports.
“In an exceptional situation, I had to make an exceptional decision,” Hollande said on Saturday, adding: “If I made this decision, it is because I felt that the situation was serious. The danger represented by the extreme right is now proven. How can we remain indifferent?”
While the far-left has been deeply divided over the past several months, particularly in the wake of the October 7th terror attacks on Israel and the rise of antisemitism in France, the Socialist Party, the green Les Écologists, and the French Communist Party announced this week they would partner with the far-left La France Insoumise (France Unbowed/LFI) party of radical leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
The move of partnering with Mélenchon — the leading leftist in the country who is often compared to Bernie Sanders in the U.S. or Jeremy Corbyn in the UK and who has been accused of antisemitism and cosying up to radical Islamists — explained by the more centrist elements of the “New Popular Front” as being necessary to confront the rise of the populist right-wing National Rally of Marine Le Pen, which is predicted to win the snap elections called by President Emmanuel Macron after being trounced by the Le Pen party in the European Parliament elections earlier this month.
French Left on the Streets Protesting Against the French Right
Quote:Hundreds of thousands of leftists took to the streets across France on Saturday to protest the alleged threat to democracy posed by the possibility of people voting for the populist National Rally party of Marine Le Pen in the impending snap election called by President Macron.
According to the far-left aligned CGT union, 640,000 leftists protested in 145 anti-National Rally (RN) demonstrations throughout France on Saturday, with approximately 250,000 in Paris, alone.
Estimates from the Ministry of the Interior were considerably lower, however, still showed significant numbers, with the government counting around 75,000 in Paris and 175,000 across the rest of the country for a total of around a quarter million people.
The ministry said that the second-largest gathering was seen in Marseille where an estimated 12,000 people protested, followed by Nantes with 8,500, Rennes with 8,000, Grenoble with 6,900, and Toulouse with 5,000.
At least nine people were arrested in Paris and three police officers were injured according to the capital’s Police Prefecture, Le Figaro reports.
At the Place de la Bastille — the starting point for the French Revolution — the July Column was tagged with graffiti by leftists who wrote “Free Gaza” and “Bardella FDP” (Bardella son of a ***) in reference to the popular 28-year-old president of the anti-mass migration National Rally party.
MIDDLE EAST
Israel Says No to France as Negotiator
Quote:Israel rejected a French mediation effort with the Iran-backed terror group Hezbollah in southern Lebanon on Friday, saying that France had adopted “hostile” policies toward Israel and ignored atrocities carried out by Hamas terrorists.
In a statement, Minister of Defense Yoav Gallant said:
As we fight a just war, defending our people, France has adopted hostile policies against Israel.
In doing so, France ignores the atrocities committed by Hamas against Israeli children, women and men.
Israel will not be a party to the trilateral framework proposed by France.
France, the former colonial power in Lebanon, had proposed mediating as Hezbollah, which illegally occupies the border region in southern Lebanon, stepped up its attacks on Israel, and the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) responded.
But France has tarnished its credibility with Israel. In November, President Emmanuel Macron claimed falsely that Israel is killing “babies and women” in Gaza. More recently, France supported the enforcement of potential arrest warrants by the International Criminal Court against Gallant and against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Other mediation efforts have also faltered. The United States, represented by special envoy Amos Hochstein, has reportedly proposed that Israel withdraw its troops from its own border to ease tensions, effectively granting victory to Hezbollah and allowing it operational control of the border region. The U.S. is eager to protect the stability of the Lebanese government, which it has supported financially, even though the government is dominated by Hezbollah.
The violence, which began in October after Hezbollah began firing at Israel in solidarity with the Hamas terror attack, is a major failure for Biden administration policy, which proposed a major gas deal in 2022 that was supposed to help maintain peace. Biden pushed Israel to give up offshore gas fields to Lebanon, arguing that would appease Hezbollah.
So oil was supposed to appease Hezbollah? What a joke!
It's Iranian oil the one that fuels that terrorist organization in the first place!
Israel Pauses the Operation for Aid to Enter Southern Gaza
Quote:The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced Sunday that it will observe a daytime pause in fighting along a route in southern Gaza for aid deliveries, together with Coordination of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).
The route is just west of Rafah, where there is heavy fighting.
COGAT is a unit of the Israeli defense ministry that deals with the welfare of Palestinian civilians in Gaza, Judea, and Samaria (the West Bank).
In a statement, the IDF announced:
As part of ongoing efforts by the IDF and COGAT, to increase the volumes of humanitarian aid entering the Gaza Strip and following additional related discussions with the UN and international organizations, starting yesterday (Saturday), a local, tactical pause of military activity for humanitarian purposes will take place from 08:00 until 19:00 every day until further notice along the road that leads from the Kerem Shalom Crossing to the Salah al-Din Road and then northwards.
This is an additional step in the humanitarian aid efforts that have been conducted by the IDF and COGAT since the beginning of the war.
The IDF will continue to support humanitarian efforts on the ground.
The pause was instantly controversial upon its declaration, with right-wing ministers in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government complaining that the military took the decision without consulting the civilian leadership of the country, and arguing that pauses in fighting for aid deliveries only help Hamas continue to fight.
Palestinian sources claimed, falsely, that the humanitarian pause proved that Israel targets humanitarian convoys.
Iran & a Prisoners Exchange
Quote:Iran and Sweden carried out a prisoner swap Saturday that saw Tehran release a European Union diplomat and another man for an Iranian convicted in Stockholm of committing war crimes over his part in 1988 mass executions in the Islamic Republic.
The arrest of Hamid Nouri by Sweden in 2019 as he traveled there as a tourist likely sparked the detentions of the two Swedes, part of a long-running strategy by Iran since its 1979 Islamic Revolution to use those with ties abroad as chip in negotiations with the West.
As Iranian state television claimed without evidence that Nouri had been “illegally detained,” Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson described the detentions of diplomat Johan Floderus and Saeed Azizi as a “hell on earth” the two men faced.
“Iran has made these Swedes pawns in a cynical negotiation game with the aim of getting the Iranian citizen Hamid Nouri released from Sweden,” Kristersson said. “It has been clear all along that this operation would require difficult decisions, now the government has made those decisions.”
Oman, a sultanate on the eastern edge of the Arabian Peninsula, mediated the release, its state-run news agency reported. Oman long has served as an interlocutor between Iran and the West.
In 2022, the Stockholm District Court sentenced Nouri to life in prison over his role in the executions. It identified him as an assistant to the deputy prosecutor at the Gohardasht prison outside the Iranian city of Karaj.
The 1988 mass executions came at the end of Iran’s long war with Iraq. After Iran’s then-Supreme Leader Ruhollah Khomeini accepted a United Nations-brokered cease-fire, members of the Iranian opposition group Mujahedeen-e-Khalq, heavily armed by Saddam Hussein, stormed across the Iranian border in a surprise attack.
Iran ultimately blunted their assault, but the attack set the stage for the sham retrials of political prisoners, militants and others that would become known as “death commissions.”
International rights groups estimate that as many as 5,000 people were executed. Iran has never fully acknowledged the executions, apparently carried out on Khomeini´s orders, though some argue that other top officials were effectively in charge in the months before his 1989 death.
Houthis Keep Attacking Ships
Quote:U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said on Thursday that a Palau-flagged, Ukrainian-owned, Polish-operated bulk carrier called MV Verbena was sailing through the Gulf of Aden when it was hit by two anti-ship missiles launched by the Iran-backed Houthi terrorists of Yemen.
A fire broke out on the ship after the missile strikes and one of its crewmembers was severely injured.
CENTCOM said aircraft from the USS Philippine Sea, a Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruiser, “medically evacuated the injured mariner to a partner force ship nearby for medical attention.”
“This continued reckless behavior by the Iranian-backed Houthis threatens regional stability and endangers the lives of mariners across the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden,” CENTCOM said. “The Houthis claim to be acting on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza and yet they are targeting and threatening the lives of third country nationals who have nothing to do with the conflict in Gaza.”
“The ongoing threat to the ability to safely transit the region caused by the Houthis makes it harder to deliver critical assistance to the people of Yemen as well as to Gaza,” the statement noted.
The Verbena was reportedly carrying a load of timber from Malaysia to Italy when it was attacked. The Houthis ostensibly limit their attacks to American and Israeli vessels, and those bound for Israel, but their terror targeting profiles are often wrong. They have even been known to attack ships bound for their patrons in Iran.
The Houthis took responsibility for attacking the Verbena on Thursday, along with two other ships in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden over the previous 24 hours.
One of the other targets was a Greek-owned, Liberia-flagged coal carrier called the Tutor, which was struck by Houthi missiles and surface drones on Wednesday as it sailed about 66 miles southwest of Yemen’s port city Hodeidah.
OCEANIA
Australia & Illegal Chinese Immigrants
Quote:A boat carrying nine Chinese nationals was turned back by Australian Border Force officials forcing the passengers to return to their point of departure in Indonesia.
The human cargo of intended illegal immigrants were found by fishermen off Southern Java after claiming they were denied landing and forced back by Australian authorities, the Sydney Daily Telegraph reports.
The Chinese passengers, along with three Indonesian crew members, were sent back to the port town of Pelabuhan Ratu as part of Australia’s Operation Sovereign Borders which officially enforces a “turn back the boats” policy without exception.
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The port has long been known as a departure point for illegal smuggling vessels.
It is the fourth known attempt Chinese national groups have made to break through to Australia in 2024, after having been told by people smugglers that asylum awaits them should they make landfall.
Australia has long had one of the toughest anti-migrant boat policies in the world and never hesitates to push back vessels carrying intended illegals.
The Indonesian crew members told the local authorities different statements, with one saying they had been “captured by the Australian navy” who transferred them all to a new “lifeboat” before pushing them back to Indonesia.
Another claimed the navy had sent them back in their original boat.
Conservative coalition opposition Home Affairs spokesman James Paterson told the Weekend Australian newspaper that another attempt by smugglers to cross the country’s borders showed the left-wing Labor government’s “failure” to properly monitor and secure it even as the rest of the world looks to follow the push back against illegal migrants.
"For God has not destined us for wrath, but for obtaining salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ," 1 Thessalonians 5:9
Maranatha!
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My Original Stories (available in English and Spanish)
List of Compiled Binary Executables I have published...
HiddenChest & Roole
Give me a free copy of your completed game if you include at least 3 of my scripts!
Just some scripts I've already published on the board...
KyoGemBoost XP VX & ACE, RandomEnkounters XP, KSkillShop XP, Kolloseum States XP, KEvents XP, KScenario XP & Gosu, KyoPrizeShop XP Mangostan, Kuests XP, KyoDiscounts XP VX, ACE & MV, KChest XP VX & ACE 2016, KTelePort XP, KSkillMax XP & VX & ACE, Gem Roulette XP VX & VX Ace, KRespawnPoint XP, VX & VX Ace, GiveAway XP VX & ACE, Klearance XP VX & ACE, KUnits XP VX, ACE & Gosu 2017, KLevel XP, KRumors XP & ACE, KMonsterPals XP VX & ACE, KStatsRefill XP VX & ACE, KLotto XP VX & ACE, KItemDesc XP & VX, KPocket XP & VX, OpenChest XP VX & ACE
Maranatha!
The Internet might be either your friend or enemy. It just depends on whether or not she has a bad hair day.
My Original Stories (available in English and Spanish)
List of Compiled Binary Executables I have published...
HiddenChest & Roole
Give me a free copy of your completed game if you include at least 3 of my scripts!
Just some scripts I've already published on the board...
KyoGemBoost XP VX & ACE, RandomEnkounters XP, KSkillShop XP, Kolloseum States XP, KEvents XP, KScenario XP & Gosu, KyoPrizeShop XP Mangostan, Kuests XP, KyoDiscounts XP VX, ACE & MV, KChest XP VX & ACE 2016, KTelePort XP, KSkillMax XP & VX & ACE, Gem Roulette XP VX & VX Ace, KRespawnPoint XP, VX & VX Ace, GiveAway XP VX & ACE, Klearance XP VX & ACE, KUnits XP VX, ACE & Gosu 2017, KLevel XP, KRumors XP & ACE, KMonsterPals XP VX & ACE, KStatsRefill XP VX & ACE, KLotto XP VX & ACE, KItemDesc XP & VX, KPocket XP & VX, OpenChest XP VX & ACE
