Your Take On The ISIS Phenomenon

[zangtang]

that would be the 'big bosoms that bounce' revolution?

- apparently its just THE latest thing..........

[AlicetheKurious]

On a more serious note, this article from the Washington Post is a classic example of a limited hang-out. It carefully refrains from naming Israel as one of the "Middle Eastern allies" who played such a central role in creating, training and empowering ISIS, and recycles the debunked lie that ISIS' enormous funds were acquired from Iraqi banks that they robbed. In fact, the financing comes directly from Qatar. It also presages the current Republican campaign to make Obama the scapegoat for these 'mistakes'.

The terrorists fighting us now? We just finished training them.
No, the enemy of our enemy is not our friend.

By Souad Mekhennet August 18, 2014
Souad Mekhennet, co-author of “The Eternal Nazi,” is a visiting fellow at Harvard, Johns Hopkins and the Geneva Centre for Security policy.

In recent years, President Obama, his European friends, and even some Middle Eastern allies, have supported “rebel groups” in Libya and Syria. Some received training, financial and military support to overthrow Muammar Gadhafi and battle Bashar al Assad. It’s a strategy that follows the old saying, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” and it has been the American and allied approach for decades in deciding whether to support opposition groups and movements.

The problem is that it is completely unreliable — and often far worse than other strategies. Every year there are more cases in which this approach backfires. The most glaring and famous failure was in Afghanistan, where some of the groups taught (and supplied) to fight the Soviet Army later became stridently anti-Western. In that environment, Al Qaeda flourished and established the camps where perpetrators of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks were trained. Yet instead of learning from its mistakes, the United States keeps making them.

Washington and its allies empowered groups whose members had either begun with anti-American or anti-Western views or found themselves lured to those ideas in the process of fighting. According to interviews with members of militant groups, such as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria’s Al Nusra Front (which is aligned with al Qaeda), that is exactly what happened with some of the fighters in Libya and even with factions of the Free Syrian Army.

“In the East of Syria, there is no Free Syrian Army any longer. All Free Syrian Army people [there] have joined the Islamic State,” says Abu Yusaf, a high-level security commander of the Islamic State, whom The Washington Post’s Anthony Faiola wrote about last week.

The Islamic State is the most successful group for now, controlling the main areas of Syrian oil and gas fields. It has also acquired large amounts of cash, gold (from banks in the areas they control) and weapons in its fight against the armies in Syria and Iraq. “When the Iraqi Army fled from Mosul and the other areas, they left behind all the good equipment the Americans had given them,” Abu Yusaf says.

“From IS to the Mahdi army you see groups that basically are not our friends but who became more powerful because we have handled the situations wrong,” says a senior U.S. security official, who spoke under the condition of anonymity.

Some European and Arab intelligence officials also voiced their worries and frustration about what they call the mistakes the United States has made in handling the uprisings in Arab states. “We had, in the early stages, information that radical groups had used the vacuum of the Arab Spring, and that some of the people the U.S. and their allies had trained to fight for ‘democracy’ in Libya and Syria had a jihadist agenda — already or later, [when they] joined al Nusra or the Islamic State,” a senior Arab intelligence official said in a recent interview. He said that often his U.S. counterparts would say things like, “We know you are right, but our president in Washington and his advisers don’t believe that.” Those groups, say Western security officials, are threats not only in the Middle East, but also in the United States and Europe, where they have members and sympathizers.

The official’s account has been corroborated by members of the Islamic State in and outside the Middle East, including Abu Yusaf, the military commander. In several interviews conducted in the last two months, they described how the collapse of security during Arab Spring uprisings helped them recruit, regroup and use the Western strategy – to support and train groups that fight dictators — for their own benefits. “There had [also] been … some British and Americans who had trained us during the Arab Spring times in Libya,” said a man who calls himself Abu Saleh and who only agreed to be interviewed if his real identity remained secret.

Abu Saleh, who is originally from a town close to Benghazi, said he and a group of other Libyans received training and support in their country from French, British, and American military and intelligence personnel — before they joined the Al Nusra Front or the Islamic State. Western and Arab military sources interviewed for this article, confirmed Abu Saleh’s account that “training” and “equipment” were given to rebels in Libya during the fight against the Gadhafi regime.

Abu Saleh left Libya in 2012 for Turkey and then crossed into Syria. “First I fought under what people call the ‘Free Syrian Army’ but then switched to Al Nusra. And I have already decided I will join the Islamic State when my wounds are healed,” the 28-year-old said from a hospital in Turkey, where he is receiving medical treatment. He had been injured during a battle with the Syrian Army, he said, and was brought to Turkey with false documents. “Some of the Syrian people who they trained have joined the Islamic State and others jabhat al Nusra,” he said, smiling. He added, “Sometimes I joke around and say that I am a fighter made by America.”

For a long time, Western and Arab states supported the Free Syrian Army not only with training but also with weapons and other materiel. The Islamic State commander, Abu Yusaf, added that members of the Free Syrian Army who had received training — from the United States, Turkey and Arab military officers at an American base in Southern Turkey — have now joined the Islamic State. “Now many of the FSA people who the West has trained are actually joining us,” he said, smiling.

These militants are preparing for the day that Western governments catch on. “We do know the U.S. will go after the Islamic State at some stage, and we are ready for it. But they should not underestimate the answer they will get,” said an IS sympathizer in Europe who goes by the name Abu Farouk. He added that the “unconditional support” of the United States toward the government of outgoing premier Nuri al-Maliki, which he says has oppressed Iraqi Sunnis, and America’s “pampering Iran,” which is mainly Shia, made the Islamic State a more attractive alternative for some Sunnis who felt angry about double standards.

“Thanks to the Arab spring and the West fighting all these rulers for us, we had enough time to grow and recruit in the Middle East, Europe and the U.S,” Abu Farouk said. Then he paused for some seconds and smiled. “Actually, we should say, thank you, Mr. President.” Link

After Iraq was decimated, and sectarian divisions deliberately imposed by force (including the What is ISIS but the latest manifestation of the "neocon's" pet project, P2OG?

Back in 2002, following the trauma of 9-11, Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld predicted there would be more terrorist attacks against the American people and civilization at large. How could he be so sure of that? Perhaps because these attacks would be instigated on the order of the Honorable Mr. Rumsfeld. According to Los Angeles Times military analyst William Arkin, writing Oct. 27, 2002, Rumsfeld set out to create a secret army, “a super-Intelligence Support Activity” network that would “bring together CIA and military covert action, information warfare, intelligence, and cover and deception,” to stir the pot of spiraling global violence.

According to a classified document prepared for Rumsfeld by his Defense Science Board, the new organization–the “Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG)”–would actually carry out secret missions designed to provoke terrorist groups into committing violent acts. The P2OG, a 100-member, so-called “counter-terrorist” organization with a $100-million-a-year budget, would ostensibly target “terrorist leaders,” but according to P2OG documents procured by Arkin, would in fact carry out missions designed to “stimulate reactions” among “terrorist groups”–which, according to the Defense Secretary’s logic, would subsequently expose them to “counter-attack” by the good guys. In other words, the plan is to execute secret military operations (assassinations, sabotage, “deception”) which would intentionally result in terrorist attacks on innocent people, including Americans–essentially, to “combat terrorism” by causing it! Link

[AlicetheKurious]

that would be the 'big bosoms that bounce' revolution?

- apparently its just THE latest thing..........

Well, it's her trademark. Purists, including other belly dancers disparage her for it, but nobody else seems to be complaining...The point here, is that she's dancing to the ISIS anthem, which is intended to strike terror into the hearts of those who hear it. But with people dancing to it, and spoofing it, it now is more likely to make people laugh. Sometimes laughing is a revolutionary act.

[zangtang]

hope it doesn't get her killed. Mustn't generalize etc because that would be wrong but some people got major humour failure when it comes to ridicule.
(which when it isnt fatal is fuc#in hilarious)

[Harvey]

According to a classified document prepared for Rumsfeld by his Defense Science Board, the new organization–the “Proactive, Preemptive Operations Group (P2OG)”–would actually carry out secret missions designed to provoke terrorist groups into committing violent acts.[/b] The P2OG, a 100-member, so-called “counter-terrorist” organization with a $100-million-a-year budget, would ostensibly target “terrorist leaders,” but according to P2OG documents procured by Arkin, would in fact carry out missions designed to “stimulate reactions” among “terrorist groups”–which, according to the Defense Secretary’s logic, would subsequently expose them to “counter-attack” by the good guys. In other words, the plan is to execute secret military operations (assassinations, sabotage, “deception”) which would intentionally result in terrorist attacks on innocent people, including Americans–essentially, to “combat terrorism” by causing it!

The Blues theory of international relations, call and response. I have sympathy with it.

The problem is to restrict the 'call' to these so called 'elites.' As a diagnosis, this let's just about everyone else off the hook. The people who vote for these fools, either side of the theatre. The people who whine everyday but essentially change not one thing about the fact that most of their frame of reference is handed to them by their mediated environment, RI included, which formulates just about every major topic, issue or discussion in which they will ever spectate or engage.

If they were inclined to formulate their own questions they might ask how they would sell world peace to their neighbour who works for a major defence contractor? Would they really ask their neighbour to consider divesting from their current 'lifestyle'? Have they actually noticed how often they themselves turn down major opportunites because it comes with an ethical price tag they were not willing to pay?

How would they convince a former soldier that the price they paid was too high? Even if they earned a healthy scepticism? The basic need we all have to justify what we did with our lives applies to them. More so than most.They invested a lot more than most in their identity. You can't ask them to face the truth if it destroys any possible meaning which comes of their life's work. What, really believe they ended up enriching the architects of the war they fought? Really believe it!

And I suppose the next time someone comes asking, they'll ignore their deepest instinct to protect and be seen to protect against the latest clear and present danger?

An entire culture calling consciously and unconsciously for war, as part of it's basic metabolism, is that really some questionable elite providing the whole call, the whole response?

Really?

[Twyla LaSarc]

My tasteless parody...cuz it's all "TPTB" anyways right?

Tasteless? You have no idea. The latest craze over here is Egyptians of all ages and all walks of life making spoof videos mocking ISIS, and especially ISIS' super-solemn, super-scary anthem. When Egyptians make fun of you, that's bad enough. But when the belly dancers start gunning for you, it's a fact that your days are numbered (as the MB in Egypt discovered):

Thank you Alice. I am glad you are back.

[seemslikeadream]

New Player in the ISIS War: Christian Gazillionaire Foster Friess


He’s best known for bankrolling Republicans Rick Santorum and Scott Walker afloat, but Foster Friess has a new cause a long way from D.C.
Republican megadonor Foster Friess is shifting his sights from political campaigns to a military campaign: to fight ISIS and save Kurdish lives.

Behind the scenes, the conservative Christian has been traveling to the Middle East to support the vulnerable Kurdish minority in Iraq, and then coming back to the U.S. to lobby for arming and training their militias, known as the Peshmerga. These forces are on the front lines of the war with ISIS.

“They are fighting our fight and we have treated them disgracefully in terms of the armaments we have provided. Not only am I embarrassed to be an American, I’m actually ashamed,” Friess told The Daily Beast. Arming the Kurds, he added, would help “defeat a ghastly evil that is running amok.”

Some pro-Kurdish advocates have interpreted Friess’s interest to mean that he wants to raise a volunteer military force to aid the Kurds, or arm them through private funds. But Friess told The Daily Beast that is not on the table, at least not for now.

One of his informal advisers, retired U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Ernie Audino, seem to be singing from a slightly different hymnal.

“There is no reason why this monopoly [for equipping] should be owned by the U.S. government. I think there’s a role for private organizations to generate private support to help the Kurds,” said Audino, who as a soldier was stationed in Kurdistan for a year. “Foster and I are certainly talking about it, in concept… No one’s pulled the trigger on it.”

Last November, Friess traveled to the front lines of the Kurdish battle with ISIS, visiting a Peshmerga military camp called “Black Tiger.”

“When I visited Camp Black Tiger I was amazed to see how many of the fighters had come out of retirement and were in their 40s and 50s,” Friess said. “I had tears in my eyes to see the Yazidis [an ethnic minority]... as I passed out 5,000 blankets to them which our family had purchased from Turkey. To think they had to leave their homes and everything they owned and only had the clothes on their backs was indeed sad.”

Friess is primarily known for funding socially conservative causes, including hundreds of thousands of dollars to former Sen. Rick Santorum’s last presidential run. He spent more than a million on Koch-related causes, and six figures to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s 2012 recall campaign.

He backs all that with a net worth The Wall Street Journal has estimated at just north of half a billion dollars.

But Friess is no stranger to controversy, having stirred up outrage on the left during the 2012 presidential campaign when, as a prominent backer of Rick Santorum, the 74-year-old said that women in his day put aspirin “between their knees” as contraception.

“There is no reason why this monopoly [for equipping] should be owned by the U.S. government. I think there’s a role for private organizations to generate private support to help the Kurds.”
More disturbing, perhaps, is the fact that Friess’s website promotes books by well-known Islamophobes like Frank Gaffney and Robert Spencer, who helped inspire Norweigan mass murderer and terrorist Anders Breivik. (Although, it should be noted, the website also promotes moderate Islamic groups.)

In the Capitol, Friess has pressed lawmakers to expand airstrikes against ISIS, to help train and equip the Peshmerga, and expand humanitarian aid. He is also insistent on a rhetorical change: that politicians stop referring to the “war on terror.” Instead, he wants the world to take arms against the “global jihadist movement.”

The Kurdish military wish list is long, reflecting the nature of its grinding, daily fight with ISIS. They want counter-IED tools, anti-tank weapons, mine-resistant vehicles, and surveillance equipment.

“[Friess is] shooting for practical targets. What’s the most practical target right now? The easiest target right now is, let’s help the United States directly equip the Kurds,” said Brig. Gen. Audino, who serves as an informal adviser to Friess on Kurdish issues. “He has a genuinely good heart, and he wants to stay on the right side of history… He sees the awful slaughter of innocents in Iraq and Syria right now. He doesn’t see that ending at Iraqi and Syrian borders.”

ISIS could be pushed back, Friess said, if the United States would provide the Kurds with “Apache helicopters and tanks and anti-tank weapons,” as well as a more aggressive air campaign.


Some have interpreted the multimillionaire’s support for the Kurds as openness to privately funding their cause. Last month, an email from Friess to Sen. Rand Paul was leaked to the Washington Examiner’s David Drucker. In it, Friess urges Paul to support the Kurds. In particular, he asked the White House hopeful whether he’d support raising a force to aid their fight.

“Would you support a volunteer force from our military or contractors? I received a request from 2,000 young Christian men for help in training and arming. They want to protect their vulnerable, unprotected Christian community 30 miles from ISIS,” Friess wrote.

Audino, the retired general, said that while the businessman’s primary effort was to get the American government to directly arm the Kurds, they have talked about privately doing so as well, hypothetically.

Small wonder that rumors have been spreading among anti-ISIS Westerners that Friess could soon be bankrolling their efforts. Matthew VanDyke runs a security contracting firm called Sons of Liberty International in Iraq, which provides free military training to local Christians in Kurdish and Iraqi areas. He said he had heard that Friess “pledged to help fund the Peshmerga,” and had been looking to get in touch with him ever since.

But asked directly about it, Friess said he was not considering privately raising, training and equipping a militia to defend embattled Christians and Kurds in Iraq and Syria. He wouldn’t comment on the request that he received from the thousands of Christian men that he referenced in the email to Sen. Paul.

The scale of the problem, he said, makes a solution too large to privately finance.

“Do you realize the enormity of what it takes to defeat the enemy? I’m not in the business of financing private armies,” Friess told The Daily Beast.

Friess’s interest in the Kurds can at least in part be explained by his Christian faith, or as the businessman put it, when he “invited Jesus to become the Chairman of the Board of my life.”

American Christians have been generally supportive of the Kurds due to their role in protecting Christians in post-Saddam Iraq. Evangelical figures like former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Pat Robertson have touted the secular Kurds for their protection of Middle Eastern Christian communities. Though there has historically been animus between Kurds and Christians in the region, there has been in contemporary times a confluence of interests.

“The Kurds have been seen as protectors of the Christians, especially since the fall of Saddam in 2003, when the Christians began to be pushed out of and even murdered in Arab Iraq. By contrast the Christians have been thriving in the Kurdish region of Iraq,” said Professor Michael Gunter, who has written 11 books on the Kurdish people.

Since the proclamation of a so-called Islamic State last year, outside players have jumped into the ISIS war. From Saudi to Iranian involvement, from American military veterans looking for freelance work to Western jihadists looking for a battle to join, outsiders have flooded into the region for one cause or another.

If a high-profile Christian American businessman were to privately fund weapons in the ISIS battlespace, it would be a problematic foray into an already-nasty sectarian situation. So far Friess has stayed away from that role. While the Kurds welcome any help they can get from Christian Americans, ISIS has framed its war as one of them versus the “crusaders.”

In January, for example, ISIS urged its followers in the West to “to target the crusaders in their own lands and wherever they are found.”

The money Friess has thus far spent on the Kurdish cause has been slight, as compared to his financial commitments to political candidates. He spent some $50,000 on blankets as humanitarian aid to the Yazidis, another minority group in Iraq.

Awat Mustafa, who works at a Kurdish humanitarian aid group called the Barzani Charity Foundation, met Friess during the National Prayer Breakfast this year. Friess invited Mustafa to his office, and they’ve been tossing ideas back and forth ever since. Mustafa said he submitted a funding proposal, for humanitarian assistance to the millions of refugees in Kurdish areas, and hopes to get funding in the realm of six figures or more.

“I'm sure he’s going to be one of our big donors, no doubt about it,” Mustafa said. “In the past he has already donated some money for refugees in the Kurdistan region.”

Perhaps Friess’s most impactful effort for the Kurds has been in using his weight to press Congress to help them. Foster has wielded his influence to lobby lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to support Kurdish militias, including such figures as Democratic lawmakers Sen. Harry Reid and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard.

“Foster Friess agrees with me on this issue—in order for there to be military success on the ground and defeat ISIS, the U.S. must provide the heavy weapons and arms directly to trusted fighters, such as the Kurds,” Gabbard said.

On the Republican side, Friess’s role is praised.

“He’s a good friend of the Kurds, and he’s made a real difference. He’s provided his own money, among other things… and had an effect on opinion here [in the Senate]. He’s one of their strongest advocates,” Sen. John McCain told The Daily Beast.

Added Sen. Lindsey Graham: “He’s gotten to know the Kurds well. He’s very passionate.”

And there may be some coming legislative efforts: Sen. John Barrasso, Gabbard and others huddled with Friess in Graham’s conference room last month to work on a bill called the Kurdish Emergency Relief Act, the Washington Examiner reported, which would involve some $500 million in aid for the Kurdish people. The legislation has not yet been introduced.

[coffin_dodger]

^^ the Western Sovereign military goes in, fucks up the country - then the oligarchs fund private armies to secure the parts they want.
Niiiice. I think we reached peak humanitarianism (in the UK, at least) at some point in the last few decades... we're just sliding back towards an 'every man for themselves' scenario now.

[AlicetheKurious]

The 2007 New York Times article below, retrieved from the memory hole, is a textbook example of a "limited hangout", and also of how intelligence agencies play mind games in their media. First, the Americans claim the guy never existed. Then, they say it's not they who claim he never existed, but a leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq who wants to "rattle" his competitors with this ruse. But then, the Americans claim the ruse as theirs. The rest is pure obfuscation (claiming that the reference to "foreigners" means Pakistanis) and authoritative-sounding nonsense, and some really bad dialogue originating with the Mossad's SITE. Thanks to the New York Times, you are as confused and in the dark as it's possible to be.

Leader of Al Qaeda group in Iraq was fictional, U.S. military says
By Michael R. Gordon
Published: Wednesday, July 18, 2007

BAGHDAD — For more than a year, the leader of one the most notorious insurgent groups in Iraq was said to be a mysterious Iraqi named Abdullah Rashid al-Baghdadi.

As the titular head of the Islamic State in Iraq, an organization publicly backed by Al Qaeda, Baghdadi issued a steady stream of incendiary pronouncements. Despite claims by Iraqi officials that he had been killed in May, Baghdadi appeared to have persevered unscathed.

On Wednesday, a senior American military spokesman provided a new explanation for Baghdadi's ability to escape attack: He never existed.

Brigadier General Kevin Bergner, the chief American military spokesman, said the elusive Baghdadi was actually a fictional character whose audio-taped declarations were provided by an elderly actor named Abu Adullah al-Naima.

The ruse, Bergner said, was devised by Abu Ayub al-Masri, the Egyptian-born leader of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, who was trying to mask the dominant role that foreigners play in that insurgent organization.

The ploy was to invent Baghdadi, a figure whose very name establishes his Iraqi pedigree, install him as the head of a front organization called the Islamic State of Iraq and then arrange for Masri to swear allegiance to him. Ayman al-Zawahiri, Osama bin Laden's deputy, sought to reinforce the deception by referring to Baghdadi in his video and Internet statements.

The evidence for the American assertions, Bergner announced at a news briefing, was provided by an Iraqi insurgent: Khalid Abdul Fatah Daud Mahmud al-Mashadani, who was said to have been captured by American forces in Mosul on July 4.

According to Bergner, Mashadani is the most senior Iraqi operative in Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. He got his start in the Ansar al-Sunna insurgent group before joining Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia more than two years ago, and became the group's "media emir" for all of Iraq. Bergner said that Mashadani was also an intermediary between Masri in Iraq and bin Laden and Zawahiri, whom the Americans assert support and guide their Iraqi affiliate.

"Mashadani confirms that al-Masri and the foreign leaders with whom he surrounds himself, not Iraqis, made the operational decisions" for Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, Bergner said.

The struggle between the American military and Qaeda affiliate in Iraq is political as well as military. And one purpose of the briefing Wednesday seemed to be to rattle the 90 percent of the group's adherents who are believed to be Iraqi by suggesting that they are doing the bidding of foreigners.

An important element of the American strategy is to drive a wedge between Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, other insurgent groups and the Sunni population.

Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, for its part, has engaged in its own form of psychological warfare. The Islamic State of Iraq recently issued two videos that were said to show an attack in Diyala Province on an American Bradley vehicle with a roadside bomb, as well as an assault on an Iraqi military checkpoint.

The recent American operation to clear western Baquba, the provincial capital of Diyala, of Qaeda fighters was dubbed Arrowhead Ripper. In a statement, the Islamic State of Iraq claimed that "the arrows have been returned to the enemy like boomerangs," according to Site Institute, which monitors international terrorist groups.

Bruce Riedel, a former CIA official and a Middle East expert, said that experts had long wondered whether Baghdadi actually existed. "There has been a question mark about this," he said.

Nonetheless, Riedel suggested that the disclosures made Wednesday might not be the final word on Baghdadi and the leaders of Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. Even Mashadani's assertions, Riedel said, might be a cover story to protect a leader who does in fact exist.

"First, they say we have killed him," Riedel said, referring to the statements by some Iraqi government officials. "Then we heard him after his death and now they are saying he never existed. That suggests that our intelligence on Al Qaeda in Iraq is not what we want it to be."

American military spokesmen insist they have gotten to the truth on Baghdadi. Mashadani, they say, provided his account because he resented the role of foreign leaders in Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia. They say he has not repudiated the organization.

While the American military says that senior Qaeda leaders in Pakistan provide guidance, general direction and support for Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia (As opposed to Islamic State in Iraq -- ISI, get it? - Alice), they did not provide any examples of a specific raid or operation that was ordered by Pakistan-based leaders of Al Qaeda.

An unclassified National Intelligence Estimate on terrorist threats to the United States homeland, which was made public in Washington on Tuesday, suggested that Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia draws support from Al Qaeda leaders in Pakistan but also has some autonomy. It described Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia as "an affiliate."

"We assess that Al Qaeda will probably seek to leverage the contacts and capabilities of Al Qaeda in Iraq, its most visible and capable affiliate and the only one known to have expressed a desire to attack the homeland."

In the latest violence in Iraq, a series of roadside bombs exploded early Wednesday in separate areas of east Baghdad, killing 11 people and wounding more than a dozen, the police said, according to The Associated Press. The U.S. military reported that three more American soldiers had died in action in the Iraqi capital. Link

[8bitagent]

The irony being that the world knows and calls the Islamic State "ISIS", the name of a very non Abrahamic ancient diety. But maybe, that's the rub

http://news.yahoo.com/bulldozed-ancient ... 12292.html
http://abcnews.go.com/International/isi ... d=29441874

Condemnation poured in Friday of the Islamic State group's bulldozing of the ancient city of Nimrud, the jihadists' latest attack on Iraqi cultural treasures that the UN termed a "war crime".
Related Stories

After rampaging through Mosul's museum with sledgehammers and torching its library last month, IS "bulldozed" the nearby ruins of Nimrud Thursday, the tourism and antiquities ministry said.

Antiquities officials said IS militants had moved trucks last week to the site overlooking the Tigris River, 30 kilometres (18 miles) southeast of their main hub of Mosul.

"Until now, we do not know to what extent it was destroyed," one official said.

[solace]

Inside the ISIS cinema: Bloodthirsty crowds flock to theatre in Aleppo that plays videos of the terror group's atrocities on a loop

Citizens living in the Syrian city watch acts of terror in their local cinema
Young boys sit alongside bearded fighters to view the acts of murder
Beheadings, shootings and people being burnt to death are all shown
Barbaric film of Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kaseasbeh being set alight while locked in a cage appears to be the most popular clip

By John Hall for MailOnline

Published: 12:13 GMT, 6 March 2015 | Updated: 14:19 GMT, 6 March 2015

Bloodthirsty citizens living under the rule of the Islamic State in Syria are flocking to cinemas where the terror group's latest atrocities are played on a loop.

Photographs taken in Aleppo province show crowds sitting cross-legged on the floor of a theatre where they watch gruesome footage of beheadings, shootings and people being burnt to death.

Boys who appear no older than eight are seen sitting alongside bearded militants in the picture house, where the brutal beheadings of Western hostages by Jihadi John, and the sickening murder of Jordanian pilot Muath al-Kaseasbeh are played over and over.

Scroll down for video
Horrific: Photographs taken in Aleppo province show crowds of young boys sitting cross-legged on the floor of a theatre
Large groups of young men sitting on the floor of a cinema in Aleppo, watching images of ISIS murders
Gruesome: The most popular video at the cinema appears to be the brutal murder of Jordanian pilot Mu'ath al-Kasasbeh, who was burnt alive by ISIS earlier this year
+14

Gruesome: The most popular video at the cinema appears to be the brutal murder of Jordanian pilot Mu'ath al-Kasasbeh, who was burnt alive by ISIS earlier this year

The murder of al-Kaseasbeh appears to be a particular favourite among the sadistic crowd as the film of him being locked in a cage, covered in a petrol and set alight by masked militants is seen playing in the majority of the photographs released by ISIS.

The images carry the distinctive yellow markings of the group's Aleppo-based propaganda wing Al-Halab Media and appear to be still images taken from an as-yet unreleased propaganda video.


Pumped full of drugs as his arm is tightly bandaged to... Is this ISIS' sickest execution video yet? Now terrorists... Hurled to his death in front of a baying mob: ISIS... Yemeni boy, 10, locked in a cage and set alight by his...

They show large groups of young men sitting on the floor of a cinema in the city, while a machine projects images of ISIS murders on to a screen.

Young children stare intently at the shocking images of beheadings and immolation as they sit alongside thick-bearded men wearing military fatigues and traditional Arabic clothing.

The overall impression is of a local population not in any way shocked by the barbaric acts of terror and instead reveling in ISIS' atrocities.
Jeering crowds watch the horrific murder of pilot on big screen

On a loop: The murder of the Jordanian pilot appears to be a particular favourite among the sadistic crowd

Grisly: The most popular video at the cinema appears to be the brutal murder of Jordanian pilot Mu'ath al-Kasasbeh, who was burnt alive by ISIS earlier this year

Sick: Boys who appear no older than eight are seen sitting alongside bearded militants in the picture house
Engrossed: Men stare intently at the shocking images of beheadings and immolation as they sit alongside thick-bearded men wearing military fatigues and traditional Arabic clothing
+14

Engrossed: Men stare intently at the shocking images of beheadings and immolation as they sit alongside thick-bearded men wearing military fatigues and traditional Arabic clothing

The chilling footage, entitled 'Healing the Believers' Chests', shows the caged airman wearing an orange jumpsuit and seemingly doused in fuel as a trail of petrol leading up to the iron bars is seen being set alight.

Flames are seen quickly spreading across the dirt to the cage, where they completely engulf the helpless pilot in images that are far too distressing to publish.

Extremists pour debris, including broken masonry, over the cage, which is then flattened by a bulldozer.

The horrific murder led to Jordan immediately executing two ISIS prisoners and carrying out an unprecedented number of attacks on the terror group in Syria.

Crowds: The overall impression is of a local population not in any way shocked by the barbaric acts of terror and instead reveling in ISIS' atrocities
Grisly: The images carry the distinctive yellow markings of the group's Aleppo-based propaganda wing Al-Halab Media and appear to be still images taken from an as-yet unreleased propaganda video
+14

Grisly: The images carry the distinctive yellow markings of the group's Aleppo-based propaganda wing Al-Halab Media and appear to be still images taken from an as-yet unreleased propaganda video

A group of young men stare intently at a cinema screen where ISIS murders are played on a loop
A thick-bearded militant is seen standing alongside young boys in the pro-ISIS cinema in Aleppo
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A thick-bearded militant is seen standing alongside young boys in the pro-ISIS cinema in Aleppo

The images emerged as photographs were released that showing ISIS depraved militants are now attaching high-definition cameras to the barrels of their guns in order to film barbaric executions in gruesome detail.

The shocking pictures were captured by the terror group's Tigris River branch, who are currently engaged in fierce battles with up to 30,000 Iraqi Army soldiers and Shia militia roughly 70 miles north of the ISIS-held city of Tikrit.

Still images from the video shows a group of blindfolded prisoners being forced to their knees while heavily armed militants line up behind them.

The photographs then cut to the gun barrel cameras, which display in graphic detail the young men being shot to death from point blank range.

The unorthodox camera view and the use of HD equipment give the footage the appearance of a computer game and is just the latest example of ISIS attempting to portray their atrocities in a manner that could appeal to young men and women living in the West.
ISIS video shows bodies of soldiers dragged behind motorbikes

HURLED TO HIS DEATH IN FRONT OF A BAYING MOB: ISIS BARBARIANS THROW 'GAY' MAN OFF BUILDING IN ANOTHER SICKENING DAY IN JIHADI CAPITAL OF RAQQA

Militants fighting for the Islamic State in Syria have thrown yet another young man to his death from a building after accusing him of being gay.

Stomach-churning photographs show a large bloodthirsty crowd gathered at the foot of a multi-storey building in the group's de facto capital Raqqa to watch the murder of the young victim.

With the baying crowd clambering on to rooftops to get a better view of the savage scene, the blindfolded man is dragged to the roof of the tallest building in the neighbourhood by bearded militants, who use mobile phones to film him being barbarically thrown to his death.

Barbarians: Militants fighting for the Islamic State in Syria have thrown yet another young man to his death from a building after accusing him of being gay
Horror: The blindfolded man is dragged to the roof of the tallest building in the neighbourhood by bearded militants, who use mobile phones to film him being barbarically thrown to his death
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Horror: The blindfolded man is dragged to the roof of the tallest building in the neighbourhood by bearded militants, who use mobile phones to film him being barbarically thrown to his death

Sick: The stomach-churning photographs show a large bloodthirsty crowd gathered at the foot of a multi-storey building in the group's de facto capital Raqqa to watch the murder of the young victim

The images were released by local activist group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently, who work undercover in the ISIS stronghold to expose the terror group's atrocities.

The photographs carry the distinctive yellow logo of ISIS' propaganda wing Al Hayat Media Centre, suggesting they come from an as-yet unreleased video of the savage murder.

The photographs shows a huge crowd gathering at the foot of a run-down building in the west of the city, which ISIS captured in early 2014 amid the ongoing chaos of the Syrian Civil War.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z3TeLwI8BW
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[Iamwhomiam]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Harvey. You should make yourself visible more often. It's quite amazing how people often rationalize their occupation by aiding our defense. War toys are always offensive, even when used defensively.

Friess! Great! Now our religious fanatics are mustering their forces to combat another religion's fanatics.

As uncomfortable as it is to read the name Rumsfeld, it was rewarding to read in print what we've all believed, some longer than others. Thanks Alice.

[semper occultus]

.....first I've heard of ISIS hand-signs....

[Iamwhomiam]

Nimrud's destroyed, looted to support ISIS, ancient tombs of memorable individuals honored since antiquity have been destroyed or targeted for destruction, Mosul Museum and its phenomenal ancient sculptures and carvings, and it's been claimed they want to destroy the Kaaba in Mecca. There can be no justification for people living less than 100 years to destroy our world's most ancient and incredibly historic artifacts. And today I read this:

Jihadists May Have Wrecked an Ancient Iraqi Site

By ANNE BARNARD MARCH 7, 2015


A temple in Hatra, an archaeological site from the first century B.C. Nearby residents report that the Islamic State destroyed it. Credit De Agostini — Getty Images

BAGHDAD — Iraqi officials said Saturday that they were investigating reports that Islamic State militants had destroyed Hatra, an archaeological site that dates to the first century B.C., two days after officials confirmed that the group had bulldozed another nearby site, the ancient Assyrian city of Nimrud.

Officials have been unable to review visual evidence, Qais Hussein Rashid, the deputy minister for tourism and antiquities, said in a telephone interview, because their local contacts have not had Internet access for several days. But, he said, “our local sources confirmed it to us.”

Iraqis living nearby and across the country lamented the wholesale destruction of their heritage, with Kurdish and Shiite militias and army troops on the ground, and an international coalition bombing from the air, apparently unable to stop it.

“We are in despair with the government,” Ali al-Nashmi, a professor of history at Mustansiriya University in Baghdad, said in a telephone interview. He was nearly in tears after hearing the reports about Hatra, which he said had been rare in Iraq for its classical ruins. “We are losing the country.”

On its website, the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities blamed what it called a less than concerted international effort to prevent the looting and destruction of Hatra, the most renowned of hundreds of ancient sites in Nineveh Province, which Islamic State militants have controlled along with its capital, Mosul, since June.

“The response wasn’t at the required level,” the ministry said, “which encouraged the terrorist gangs to commit another crime by looting and destroying the Hatra site.”

On Saturday, residents of Mosul and Nineveh Province offered new details about the destruction of Nimrud by the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL.

Salim al-Jabouri, who lives just across the Tigris River from Nimrud, a sprawling, ancient mud-brick city, recalled being startled to see bulldozers and other construction vehicles entering the site recently.

He fetched binoculars to watch more closely, he said, and saw men he believed to be members of the Islamic State get out of cars and armored vehicles, walk closer to the ruins and “start bulldozing them completely.”

Capt. Mohammad al-Lahaibi, a police officer in Mosul, said it had taken the militants three hours to destroy the site. Other residents said that before the bulldozing, the militants had begun removing objects and causing damage. The bulk of the destruction occurred on Wednesday, according to journalists at Mosul TV.

Gov. Atheel al-Nujaifi of Nineveh said in a recent statement that the group was also looting the sites for artifacts to sell, despite its declarations that they violate Islamic law. “ISIS tries to disguise the looting of Iraq artifacts,” he said. “What has been destroyed so far is not more than what has been looted.”

One Mosul resident, Muaid, 40, who provided only his given name for safety reasons, seemed resigned. “Most of Mosul’s people are not satisfied with ISIS attitudes, but we can do nothing,” he said. “The government and the army left us prisoners.”

He said the group had “fallen in people’s sights” after destroying other revered sites, including a mosque associated with the Prophet Jonah.

Dr. Nashmi, the history professor, expressed frustration with the government and the international coalition, saying they could have seen a military or construction convoy heading to Hatra across the desert and responded, perhaps by bombing.

He has been calling for action to stop the destruction. “They didn’t listen to me,” he said.

An employee of The New York Times contributed reporting from Mosul, Iraq, and Omar Al-Jawoshy and Falih Hassan from Baghdad.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/world/middleeast/jihadists-may-have-wrecked-an-ancient-iraqi-site.html

[Nordic]

And gosh, we're just so powerless to stop them! These Devils somehow operate in broad daylight in a country where the skies are dominated 100% by the U.S. Air Force. These Totota pickup trucks and their formidable weapons offer an indomitable defense against the world's largest and most powerful armed forces, so of course we are helpless and can only watch as these priceless treasures are destroyed before our very eyes.

Say WUT?

Just how weird is this gonna fucking GET??