Gazan behind Mars drone says visiting home is no small step - 0 views
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An electronics engineer from Gaza, Loay Elbasyouni, had worked with the NASA team that made history this month by launching an experimental helicopter from the surface of Mars.But he says an expedition to his hometown in the Gaza Strip, where posters celebrate his achievement, feels even farther away because of Israeli and Egyptian restrictions.“When you deal with electrons and technology, you can calculate things and know their path,” he told The Associated Press in a video interview from his home in Los Angeles. “When you deal with people and politics, you don’t know where things can go.”
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Elbasyouni says Israeli military tanks bulldozed his father’s fruit orchards on four occasions
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He struggled to afford tuition at the University of Kentucky, especially after the family farm was bulldozed. At one point he said he worked more than 90 hours a week at a Subway sandwich shop to make ends meet. He eventually transferred to the University of Louisville, where he earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in electrical engineering.
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The Associated Press: China, wary of Arab Spring, hosts Egypt's Morsi - 0 views
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Morsi's first state visit outside the Middle East and Africa since becoming president, underscoring China's importance as one of five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and as a vital source of trade and investment. The visit is also seen as part of a reorientation of Egyptian foreign policy away from a heavy focus on Washington.
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China's authoritarian one-party government was decidedly cool toward that movement, criticizing what Chinese state media derided as thuggish "street democracy." Beijing also bitterly condemned the NATO air campaign that brought down dictator Moammar Gadhafi in neighboring Libya and continues to join with Russia in blocking U.N. Security Council actions to force Syrian leader President Bashar Assad from power.
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While largely a bystander in Middle Eastern politics, China's economic importance to the region has ballooned amid Europe's economic woes and the sluggish U.S. recovery.
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Where and why food prices lead to social upheaval - The Washington Post - 0 views
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Unlike other commodities, global food prices have followed a different trajectory. Although down from near-historic highs in 2007-2008 and 2011, they are still higher than at any point in the previous three decades.
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The economic effects of higher food prices are clear: Since 2007, higher prices have put a brake on two decades of steady process in reducing world hunger. But the spikes in food prices over the past decade have also thrust food issues back onto the security agenda, particularly after the events of the Arab Spring. High food prices were one of the factors pushing people into the streets during the regionwide political turmoil that began in late 2010. Similar dynamics were at play in 2007-2008, when near-record prices led to food-related protests and riots in 48 countries.
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Unlike energy and electronics, demand for basic foodstuffs is income-inelastic: Whether I have adequate income has no effect on my need for sustenance. Not surprisingly, 97 percent of the post-2007 ‘food riots’ identified by a team at the New England Complex Systems Institute occurred in Africa and Asia, which are home to more than 92 percent of the world’s poor and chronically food-insecure. Careful empirical work bears out this conventional wisdom: High global food prices are more destabilizing in low-income countries, where per capita incomes are lower.
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Russia Confirms Its Uran-9 Robot Tank Is On The Ground In Syria - 1 views
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Russia has been on the forefront of building unmanned ground vehicles and last week the Russian Defense Ministry confirmed that their armed drone tank Uran-9 was tested in Syria.
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While the deployment of the Uran-6, a minesweeping drone, in Syria has been widely reported on, little has been said publicly about the Uran-9, and military observers and analysts have yet to see it in Syria.
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the resurgent Russian military has battle tested an arsenal of new weapons including the Su-57 stealth fighter jet, the T-90 battle tank, ship-launched cruise missiles and air defense systems
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Border Patrol, Israel's Elbit Put Reservation Under Surveillance - 0 views
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The vehicle is parked where U.S. Customs and Border Protection will soon construct a 160-foot surveillance tower capable of continuously monitoring every person and vehicle within a radius of up to 7.5 miles. The tower will be outfitted with high-definition cameras with night vision, thermal sensors, and ground-sweeping radar, all of which will feed real-time data to Border Patrol agents at a central operating station in Ajo, Arizona. The system will store an archive with the ability to rewind and track individuals’ movements across time — an ability known as “wide-area persistent surveillance.” CBP plans 10 of these towers across the Tohono O’odham reservation, which spans an area roughly the size of Connecticut. Two will be located near residential areas, including Rivas’s neighborhood, which is home to about 50 people. To build them, CBP has entered a $26 million contract with the U.S. division of Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest military company.
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U.S. borderlands have become laboratories for new systems of enforcement and control
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these same systems often end up targeting other marginalized populations as well as political dissidents
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Russia's future in Iran looks brighter as Europe, US fade - 0 views
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To ease the isolation and economic pressure, Iran is looking to strengthen trade and financial relations with Russia as well as China and neighboring countries such as Turkey, Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Iran has been seeking to conclude banking agreements and establish non-dollar and SWIFT-free financial mechanisms with these countries. Iran's efforts in this regard in relation to Iraq, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey have been somewhat fruitful.
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trade between Iran and Russia grew 24.6% in the first seven months of 2019, reaching $1.33 billion. Russian exports to Iran reached $999.3 million (39.3% growth) and Iran’s exports to Russia stood at $333.7 million — a 6.2% decrease compared with the same period in the preceding year. Iran's share of Russia's total foreign trade rose from 0.3% to 0.4%.
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The Libyan Civil War Is About to Get Worse - 0 views
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Yet another clash between the two main Libya camps is now brewing, and events in recent weeks suggest that the fighting will be more devastating than at any time before—and still may not produce a definitive victory for either side.
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Facing stiff resistance from disparate militias nominally aligned with the government, the LNA has failed to breach downtown Tripoli. On top of this, the marshal’s campaign, while destructive, has been hampered by gross strategic and tactical inefficiency. The resulting war of attrition and slower pace of combat revealed yet another flaw in his coalition: Few eastern Libyan fighters wish to risk their lives for Haftar 600 miles away from home.
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the UAE carried out more than 900 air strikes in the greater Tripoli area last year using Chinese combat drones and, occasionally, French-made fighter jets. The Emirati military intervention helped contain the GNA’s forces but did not push Haftar’s objectives forward. Instead, it had an adverse effect by provoking other regional powers. Turkey responded to the UAE by deploying Bayraktar TB2 drones and several dozen Turkish officers to carry out roughly 250 strikes in an effort to help the GNA resist Haftar’s onslaught. The stalemate also inspired Russia to increase its own involvement in Libya.
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Pentagon turns to irregular tactics to counter Iran - 0 views
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The Pentagon is trying to put the finishing touches on a plan to use irregular warfare tactics to temper Iran’s military escalation in the Middle East
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“Iran utilizes, principally through the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Quds Force, an economy of force and capital model that prioritizes relatively low-cost operations,” said Mick Mulroy, the Pentagon’s top Middle East policy official. “We can do much more to combat this strategy by calibrating our responses and levying a counter-cost imposition strategy against Iran, whose pockets are much shallower than ours.”
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“Every time we deploy conventional forces they actually take unconventional action,” Mulroy added. “So conventional overmatch has not deterred.”
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Graham and Fox News expert showed Trump a map to change his mind about Syria withdrawal - 0 views
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Retired Gen. Jack Keane, a Fox News analyst, first walked the president through a map showing Syria, Turkey and Iraq on Oct. 8, pointing out the locations of oil fields in northern Syria that have been under the control of the United States and its Kurdish allies, two people familiar with the discussion said. That oil, they said Keane explained, would fall into Iran's hands if Trump withdrew all U.S. troops from the country.
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Keane went through the same exercise with Trump again Oct. 14, this time with Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., at his side
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Keane displayed a map showing that almost three quarters of Syria's oil fields are in the parts of the country where U.S. troops are deployed, the people familiar with the meeting said. They said that Graham and Keane told the president that Iran is preparing to move toward the oil fields and could seize the air space above them once the U.S. leaves.
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World Cup host Qatar used ex-CIA officer to spy on FIFA | AP News - 0 views
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a trend of former U.S. intelligence officers going to work for foreign governments with questionable human rights records
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“Pickaxe,” which promised to capture “personal information and biometrics” of migrants working in Qatar. A project called “Falconeye” was described as a plan to use drones to provide surveillance of ports and borders operations, as well as “controlling migrant worker populations centers.”“By implementing background investigations and vetting program, Qatar will maintain dominance of migrant workers,” one GRA document said.
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The private surveillance business has flourished in the last decade in the Persian Gulf as the region saw the rise of an information war using state-sponsored hacking operations that have coincided with the run-up to the World Cup.
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Saudi Crown prince threatened economic pain on U.S. during oil standoff - The Washingto... - 0 views
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Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman threatened to fundamentally alter the decades-old U.S.-Saudi relationship and impose significant economic costs on the United States if it retaliated against the oil cuts
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It is unclear whether the crown prince’s threat was conveyed directly to U.S. officials or intercepted through electronic eavesdropping, but his dramatic outburst reveals the tension at the heart of a relationship long premised on oil-for-security but rapidly evolving as China takes a growing interest in the Middle East and the United States assesses its own interests as the world’s largest oil producer.
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Biden, who pledged to make Saudi Arabia a “pariah” as a presidential candidate, scarcely communicates with the crown prince but the president’s top aides have gradually rebuilt ties with him hoping the two nations can work together on pressing issues, including a long-sought peace deal in Yemen, a sustained cease-fire in Sudan, counterterrorism challenges and continued disagreements over the supply of oil.
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The Ukraine War: A Global Crisis? | Crisis Group - 0 views
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The Ukraine conflict may be a matter of global concern, but states’ responses to it continue to be conditioned by internal political debates and foreign policy priorities.
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China has hewed to a non-position on Russian aggression – neither condemning nor supporting the act, and declining to label it as an invasion – while lamenting the current situation as “something we do not want to see”. With an eye to the West, Beijing abstained on rather than vetoing a Security Council resolution calling on Russia to withdraw from Ukraine, and reports indicate that two major Chinese state banks are restricting financing for Russian commodities. Beijing now emphasises the principles of territorial integrity and sovereignty in its statements, a point that had either been absent from earlier statements or more ambiguously discussed as “principles of the UN Charter”.
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the worldview that major powers can and do occasionally break the rules
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