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Once again focusing on escalations of tensions with Russia, State Department spokesman Mark Toner today said that in addition to the “diplomatic” efforts the US is making in Syria, they are also considering conducting “military or other options.” The US demonstrably is not conducting diplomatic efforts in Syria anymore, despite Toner’s claims to the contrary, as the US made a very public show of withdrawing from the diplomatic track yesterday, and condemning Russia on the way out. Adding to the uncomfortable talk about military possibilities, Toner also declared the US to “always consider unilateral options when looking at a situation like Syria,” and while he insisted the US prefers to work with its coalition, it’s unlikely much of the coalition will eagerly follow them into a war with Russia.

Earlier today, Russia announced they are deploying S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to their naval base at Tartus, to defend naval personnel against any potential attacks. With the US-led campaign materially the only air operations in Syria not directly aligned with Russia, the underlying message is that they’re preparing for a unilateral US attack. That US officials reacted negatively to the deployment of purely defensive missiles only adds to this.

The Obama administration went ahead with a $1.3 billion arms sale to Saudi Arabia last year despite warnings from some officials that the United States could be implicated in war crimes for supporting a Saudi-led air campaign in Yemen that has killed thousands of civilians, according to government documents and the accounts of current and former officials.State Department officials also were privately skeptical of the Saudi military's ability to target Houthi militants without killing civilians and destroying "critical infrastructure" needed for Yemen to recover, according to the emails and other records obtained by Reuters and interviews with nearly a dozen officials with knowledge of those discussions.U.S. government lawyers ultimately did not reach a conclusion on whether U.S. support for the campaign would make the United States a "co-belligerent" in the war under international law, four current and former officials said. That finding would have obligated Washington to investigate allegations of war crimes in Yemen and would have raised a legal risk that U.S. military personnel could be subject to prosecution, at least in theory.

For instance, one of the emails made a specific reference to a 2013 ruling from the war crimes trial of former Liberian president Charles Taylor that significantly widened the international legal definition of aiding and abetting such crimes.The ruling found that "practical assistance, encouragement or moral support" is sufficient to determine liability for war crimes. Prosecutors do not have to prove a defendant participated in a specific crime, the U.N.-backed court found.Ironically, the U.S. government already had submitted the Taylor ruling to a military commission at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, to bolster its case that Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and other al Qaeda detainees were complicit in the Sept 11, 2001 attacks.The previously undisclosed material sheds light on the closed-door debate that shaped U.S. President Barack Obama’s response to what officials described as an agonizing foreign policy dilemma: how to allay Saudi concerns over a nuclear deal with Iran - Riyadh's arch-rival - without exacerbating a conflict in Yemen that has killed thousands.The documents, obtained by Reuters under the Freedom of Information Act, date from mid-May 2015 to February 2016, a period during which State Department officials reviewed and approved the sale of precision munitions to Saudi Arabia to replenish bombs dropped in Yemen. The documents were heavily redacted to withhold classified information and some details of meetings and discussion.(A selection of the documents can be viewed here: tmsnrt.rs/2dL4h6L; tmsnrt.rs/2dLbl2S; tmsnrt.rs/2dLb7Ji; tmsnrt.rs/2dLbbIX)

In a statement issued to Reuters before Saturday's attack, National Security Council spokesman Ned Price said, "U.S. security cooperation with Saudi Arabia is not a blank check. ... We have repeatedly expressed our deep concern about airstrikes that allegedly killed and injured civilians and also the heavy humanitarian toll paid by the Yemeni people."The United States continues to urge the Kingdom to take additional steps to avoid "future civilian harm," he added.

The Syrian intelligence possesses an audio recording of conversation between Daesh terrorists and US military prior to the Washington-led coalition’s airstrikes on the government troops near Deir ez-Zor on September 17, the speaker of the People’s Council of Syria said Monday. “The Syrian Army intercepted a conversation between the Americans and Daesh before the air raid on Deir ez-Zor”, Hadiya Khalaf Abbas said as quoted by the Al Mayadeen broadcaster. US warplanes hit Syrian government troops near the eastern city of Deir ez-Zor on September 17, leaving 62 military personnel killed and a hundred wounded. The Pentagon said initially that the airstrike was a mistake and targeted Daesh militants. The head of the Syrian parliament, added during her visit to Iran that after the coalition’s airstrikes on the government troops, the US military directed terrorists’ attack on the Syrian army.

The attack on government positions put to test a US-Russia brokered nationwide ceasefire that came into being in Syria earlier that week. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said last Friday it was necessary to separate Daesh terrorists from “moderate” opposition forces in order to salvage the truce. Britain, Australia and Denmark confirmed their air forces’ participation in the deadly airstrikes. The politician noted that the details would be made public later.

The tentative first beginnings of a long-awaited US-backed color revolution has begun in Thailand, with a small protest of under 100 protesters in the downtown district of Thailand’s capital Bangkok. Despite the diminutive nature of the protest, the Western media and Western-funded organizations posing as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) transformed the event into headline news.

The protest leaders vowed to gather weekly until their demands were met. This is a thinly veiled threat, with the protests taking place precisely where previous protests organized by the same interests carried out gun battles with government troops, mass murder against counter-protesters, and committed widespread and devastating arson in the surrounding areas. The protesters seek to overthrow Thailand’s independent institutions including its military and constitutional monarchy, and return US proxies to power, particularly billionaire and former prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra and his Pheu Thai Party (PTP). Thaksin Shinawatra is a convicted criminal who fled Thailand to evade a two year jail sentence and a myriad of court cases still pending trial.

Switzerland and the United States are the biggest promoters of financial secrecy according to an index published today by the Tax Justice Network (TJN). The index ranks countries based on their level of secrecy and the percentage of financial services provided to non-residents.

As for the United States, it has refused to take part in international efforts to curb financial secrecy and instead set up a parallel system that seeks information on U.S. citizens abroad but does not provide data to foreign countries. Several U.S. states are also considered tax havens including Delaware, which doesn’t tax intangible assets such as intellectual property, patents or trademarks. “More than 66 percent of the Fortune 500 have chosen Delaware as their legal home,” claims the state’s Division of Corporations website.

This is not new. The U.S. ranked third in TJN’s 2015 secrecy index. Back in 2016, Mark Hays, senior adviser with Global Witness, told the Washington Post, “we often say that the U.S. is one of the easiest places to set up so-called anonymous shell companies.” Last month, a Bloomberg article referred to America as “one of the world’s best places to hide money from the tax collector.” “The 2018 release confirms the long-term picture, that the richest and most powerful countries have continued to pose the greatest global risks – with Switzerland and the U.S. established as the key facilitators of illicit financial flows,” said TJN chief executive Alex Cobham. Some of the criteria used to build the index include the absence of a public register, harmful tax residency rules and whether the system allows for bearer shares, which obscure ownership.

The Iraqi parliament has demanded that its government sets a deadline for the withdrawal of foreign troops, piling pressure on the prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, who is seeking re-election in May. There are believed to be more than 5,000 US soldiers stationed in Iraq to fight Islamic State. American troops make up the largest foreign presence, although Washington formed a 74-country coalition to help fight Isis. The US has been reluctant to significantly reduce those numbers. Mr Abadi declared victory over Isis in December but pockets of militants still operate in the north of the country. The parliament voted yesterday to set a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign forces.

Iran moved a step closer to a plan to ditch the dollar in its trade activities by announcing that purchase orders by merchants that are based on the greenback would no longer be allowed to go through import proceedings.Iran’s domestic media reported that the policy was in line with an official request by the Central Bank of Iran (CBI) and was specifically meant to address fluctuations in market rates of the dollar.IRNA news agency quoted Mehdi Kasraeipour, CBI’s director of Foreign Exchange Rules and Policies Affairs, as saying that the move had become effective from Wednesday by virtue of a letter sent to the Ministry of Industry, Mines and Trade.

DAMASCUS, August 16. /TASS/. Chemical agents found at arms depots abandoned by militants suggest they were delivered to terrorists in Syria from the United States and the United Kingdom, Syrian Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad said at a press conference in Damascus on Wednesday. "All the special means that have been found include hand grenades and rocket projectiles for grenade launchers, which are supplied with CS and CN irritant agents [they are shown in transparencies]. The discovered chemical munitions shown in the transparency were produced by Federal Laboratories on the US territory. And the chemical agents were produced by Cherming Defence UK and NonLethal Technologies (the USA)," Mekdad said.

According to the Syrian deputy foreign minister, the chemical agents were found at terrorists’ depots both in Aleppo and in liberated districts in the eastern suburb of Damascus. As Mekdad said, in compliance with article 5 of the convention on the prohibition of chemical weapons, the use of irritant agents is allowed only for fighting riots. They are prohibited for use as warfare means. "Therefore, it can be said with confidence that the United States and the United Kingdom, and also their allies in the region, are rendering all possible support to terrorist organizations active in Syria, thus violating the convention on the prohibition of chemical weapons. They are supplying terrorists not only with conventional arms but also with banned chemical agents," Mekdad said.

MEMORANDUM FOR: The President FROM: Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity (VIPS) SUBJECT: Being “Played” By Bogus Evidence on Iran NOTE: The evidence presented by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on April 30 alleging a covert Iranian nuclear weapons program shows blatant signs of fabrication. That evidence is linked to documents presented by the Bush Administration more a decade earlier as proof of a covert Iran nuclear weapons program. Those documents were clearly fabricated as well. We sent President Bush a similar warning about bogus intelligence — much of it fabricated by Israel —six weeks before the U.S./UK attack on Iraq, but Bush paid us no heed. This time, we hope you will take note before things spin even further out of control in the Middle East. In short, Israel’s “new” damaging documents on Iran were fabricated by the Israelis themselves.

A three-year investigation in Iraq and Syria. This report is the result of more than three years of field investigation into Islamic State supply chains. It presents an analysis of more than 40,000 items recovered from the group between 2014 and 2017. These items encompass weapons, ammunition, and the traceable components and chemical precursors used by the group to manufacture improvised explosive devices.

Colombia will be part, starting next week, of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) as the first Latin American "global partner", announced on Friday the president of that nation, Juan Manuel Santos. "We will formalize in Brussels next week -and this is very important- the entry of Colombia into NATO in the category of global partner, we will be the only country in Latin America with this privilege," the president said in a televised address from the presidential Narino Palace.

At that time, the neighboring government of Venezuela rejected the announcement as an "attempt to introduce external factors with nuclear capacity" in the region.At the beginning of 2017, the then Venezuelan Foreign Minister Delcy Rodríguez had denounced that with that entry Colombia could violate the Tlatelolco agreement, put into effect in 1969 with the purpose of establishing the denuclearization of Latin America and the Caribbean.In addition, Colombia is part of the Movement of Non-Aligned Countries (NAM) and one of the essential principles of the bloc states that its members "can not be part of any type of military and warlike organization such as the North Atlantic Treaty. "

A global survey from WIN/Gallup International, the world’s leading association in market research and polling shows that 61% of those polled across 64 countries would be willing to fight for their country, while 27% would not.   However, there are significant differences by region.  Willingness to fight is highest in the M.E.N.A. region (83%) while it is lowest in Western Europe (25%).  A history of those countries in recent conflict provides an interesting comparison.  The Japanese (11%) are the least likely of 64 countries polled to be willing to fight for their country.  Results from Germany are very similar – 13% willing to fight.  By comparison these numbers more than double in the UK (27%) and France (29%).

US President Donald Trump shocked G7 leaders with his explanation that Crimea belongs to Russia because residents of the peninsula speak Russian. But what was behind this thinking? In short, the Trump administration is a reflection of the US’s shrinking power relative to rising regional hegemons around the world. During a G7 dinner on June 8th, Trump also called Ukraine one of the most corrupt countries in the world and questioned why the leaders of the Group of Seven support the country, according to numerous diplomatic sources, and reported by numerous news agencies around the world.It was unclear whether Trump was sending mixed signals, or signaling a change in US government policy, given that the White House did not respond to the request for comment.

Nearly four years after Wells Fargo's reputation was terminally crushed by the humiliating fake accounts scandal, the punishment for Warren Buffett's favorite bank and its (mostly former) employees is still being doled out, and moments ago the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency announced $59 million in civil charges and settlements with eight former Wells Fargo senior executives on Thursday, including the payment of a $17.5 million fine by John Stumpf, the bank’s former CEO, who also agreed to a lifetime industry ban. Carrie Tolstedt, who led Wells Fargo’s community bank for a decade, faces a penalty of as much as $25 million.

In its last months the Obama administration ordered the intelligence agencies to collect and distribute information of contacts between the Trump campaign and Russia. This to prevent any change by the Trump administration of the hostile policy towards Russia that the Obama administration instituted. The intent was also to give the intelligence services blackmail material against the Trump crew to prevent any changes in their undue, freewheeling independence. The above is reported in a little discussed New York Times piece published yesterday. The reporting angle captured in the headline is biased to set the Obama efforts into a positive light: Obama Administration Rushed to Preserve Intelligence of Russian Election Hacking.

Make no mistake by straight-reading that headline. Not single shred of evidence has been provided that "Russia hacked the election" or had anything to do with various leaks of Clinton related emails. A lot of fluff and chaff was thrown around but not even one tiny bit of evidence. The Obama effort was clearly to sabotage the announced policy of the incoming administration of seeking better relations with Russia. Obama intended to undermine the will of the voters by abusing instruments of the state. Excerpts from the piece: In the Obama administration’s last days, some White House officials scrambled to spread information about  ... possible contacts between associates of President-elect Donald J. Trump and Russians — across the government. Former American officials say they had two aims: to ensure that such meddling isn’t duplicated in future American or European elections, and to leave a clear trail of intelligence for government investigators.

In a major scoop said to put a “stake in the heart of the Muslim ban,” MSNBC‘s Rachel Maddow reported Thursday evening on a new leaked Department of Homeland Security (DHS) analysis which essentially shreds the Trump administration’s rationale for banning travel from seven Muslim-majority nations. The document, prepared by DHS’ internal intelligence agency, the Office of Intelligence and Analysis, concludes that the majority of foreign-born, U.S.-based violent extremists were radicalized several years after their entry into the U.S.

The Washington Post‘s Greg Sargent on Friday suggested that the leaked analysis could be part of the “real reason for the delay,” rather than the stated reason of not wanting to sully the warm reception received by the president after his joint-session speech Tuesday evening. “The Trump administration can’t solve the problem that has always bedeviled this policy, which is that there isn’t any credible national security rationale for it,” he wrote. “Unlike on the campaign trail, when you’re governing, you actually have to have justification for what you’re proposing, or you often run into trouble.” Similarly, Maddow observed that “they really do have a problem here,” pointing to the document’s key finding, which states that “most foreign-born, U.S.-based violent extremists are likely radicalized several years after their entry to the United States, limiting the ability of screening and vetting officials to prevent their entry because of national security concerns.” “The national security justification for this whole ban—this setting up of extreme vetting—is bull-pucky,” Maddow said. “There’s nothing they can set up at the border to tell you years down the road who might become…a radical and violent person years from now.” This latest leak follows the release of another DHS analysis last week that similarly undermined the Trump administration’s claim that people traveling from Syria, Iran, Iraq, Yemen, Sudan, Libya, and Somalia pose a severe threat to the United States. That document, obtained by the Associated Press, concluded that “citizenship is an ‘unlikely indicator’ of terrorism threats to the United States and that few people from the countries Trump listed in his travel ban have carried out attacks or been involved in terrorism-related activities in the U.S. since Syria’s civil war started in 2011,” as AP reported. Taken together, the two documents throw cold water on most of the administration’s stated justification for the pending executive order.

The announcement today by Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman at the Knesset Defense and Foreign Affairs Committee, that the Trump administration warned Israel that imposing sovereignty over the West Bank would cause an “immediate crisis” between the U.S. and Israel, is spreading like wildfire. Newsweek reported the warning pointed to “a red line for the Trump administration in its relationship with the Israeli government”: “We received a direct message… imposing Israeli sovereignty [on the West Bank] would mean an immediate crisis with the new administration,” Lieberman told the Israeli parliament’s Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee. “The coalition should clearly state that there is no intention to impose [Israeli] sovereignty.” The warning came after Likud KM Miki Zohar, who advocates annexation, stated on Israeli television Channel i24 last night that the two state solution was “dead” and Palestinians, while not having full citizenship, would nonetheless enjoy rights like every citizen, except for the right to vote for the Knesset — unless they serve in the army or to “serve the country” which he hastened to assure viewers they would not do. Lieberman noted he’d been getting calls from “all of the world wanting to know if this is the position of the coalition,” continuing, “[W]e need to separate from the Palestinians and not to integrate them. The decision to annex Judea and Samaria [the West Bank] would mean the integration of 2.7 million Palestinians in Israel.” Rather confusing messaging from the Trump administration. Just last month Trump said he’d be “happy” with a one state solution “if Israel and the Palestinians are happy”. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley later walked that back, saying that the policy was still, two-state solution. Maybe Trump heard Palestinians are not happy. We may be hearing more on this latest development soon as Lieberman is due to meet with top U.S. administration officials this week in Washington.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would meet Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Thursday to voice US-Israeli concerns over Iran’s attempts to expand its influence in Syria, Israeli sources reported. Netanyahu’s spokesman said that during the latest phone conversation with US President Donald Trump, the Israeli prime minister coordinated stances towards Iran on the eve of his visit to Russia. A ministerial official with a military background said that Iran’s testing of ballistic missiles was a provocation to both the US and Israel, adding that Tehran’s “vital interests” in Syria could soon be targeted. When asked whether Israel would bomb Iranian forces in Syria, the official said: “Anything Iranian that moves in Syria will be a target”. Threats to target Iranian forces in Syria coincided with heavy raids by the Syrian regime on eastern Ghouta, breaking a fragile truce announced earlier by Russia in the area located near Damascus.

Judicial Watch filed a lawsuit Wednesday against the Department of Justice for records related to the meeting between then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch and former President Bill Clinton while his wife was under an FBI investigation in the 2016 presidential campaign. The conservative nonprofit watchdog group filed the suit after the Justice Department failed to respond to a June 29, 2016, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request seeking transcripts of the June 2016 meeting, communications regarding the encounter, and any references to the meeting in Lynch’s calendar.

“The infamous tarmac meeting between President Clinton and AG Lynch is a vivid example of why many Americans believe the Obama administration’s criminal investigation into Hillary Clinton was rigged,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said. “Now it will be up to Attorney General Sessions at the Trump Justice Department to finally shed some light on this subversion of justice,” Fitton said. (VIDEO: Why Did Bill Clinton And Loretta Lynch Meet On Her Airplane In Phoenix This Week?) Clinton and Lynch met privately on a plane parked at the Phoenix Sky Harbor International airport on June 27, 2016. The FBI was investigating a private email server Clinton’s wife and then-Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton used during her time as secretary of state. The FBI interviewed her just days after her husband met with Lynch. Lynch admitted that the meeting “cast a cloud” over the investigation. Clinton was not punished for what FBI Director James Comey called “extremely careless” actions surrounding her server. Judicial Watch also requested the Justice Department’s inspector general investigate the meeting. The watchdog group also filed a lawsuit in October seeking FBI interviews into Clinton’s email practices, related communications, and records regarding the tarmac meeting.

Iraq has sent military reinforcements to a highway linking its soil with Syria and Jordan, an army officer was quoted saying Sunday as the border regions witness an escalation of assaults by Islamic State militants. Jordan’s news agency Petra quoted Col. Ahmed al-Dulaimi, from the Iraqi army, saying that military and paramilitary reinforcements were sent to the international road extending from the city of Rutba, Anbar, to Jordan and Syria. He said the deployments seek to blocking sneaking attempts by the Islamic State members.