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Israel’s prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, has ordered his security officials to examine changing the rules governing when soldiers can shoot young Palestinian stone-throwers. A statement issued by his office on Wednesday revealed Netanyahu was considering giving security forces a freer hand to open fire with live ammunition after meeting with his cabinet to discuss a recent increase in the number of incidents involving firebombs and stone-throwing in Jerusalem and on the West Bank. Despite rules of engagement that in theory permit potentially lethal live fire to be used only in life-threatening situations, a number of recent incidents have led to young Palestinians being killed by Israeli soldiers – including a brigade commander – while fleeing and posing no immediate threat.

The chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court (ICC) is appealing a ruling ordering her to reconsider her decision not to investigate Israel’s lethal attack on an aid flotilla to Gaza five years ago. But Geoffrey Nice, lead counsel for victims and families of those killed in the Israeli attack on the Mavi Marmara, told The Electronic Intifada that the arguments Chief Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda has put forward are “complete hogwash.” Nice, who worked for the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia from 1998 to 2006, led the prosecution of former Serbian President Slobodan Milošević. Nice and his law firm Stoke and White also represent the government of Comoros, the Indian Ocean archipelago state where the Mavi Marmara is registered. Instead of doing her job and properly investigating the case, Nice said, Bensouda’s appeal is “a last ditch attempt to do what would be expected of her by the US and supporters of Israel.”

A professor of law at London’s Gresham College who has previously represented victims before the ICC, Nice said he doubted that Bensouda even had a right to go to the appeal judges at this stage. He said his first legal response would be to ask them to throw her appeal out on procedural grounds. Serious errors Earlier this month, a panel of ICC judges found in a scathing 2-1 ruling that Bensouda had made serious errors of fact and law in her decision not to pursue the case. They said that the chief prosecutor had underestimated the seriousness and international significance of the crimes and ordered her to review her decision not to proceed with an investigation into the attack. In the early hours of 31 May 2010, Israeli commandos boarded and seized the flotilla boats in international waters in the eastern Mediterranean. Israeli forces carried out a particularly violent armed attack on the largest vessel, Mavi Marmara, killing nine persons. A tenth victim died of his injuries in June 2014. The victims were all Turkish citizens. One of them, 18-year-old Furkan Doğan, was also a US citizen.

The initial request for the ICC to investigate the killings was submitted in 2013 by Comoros. Bensouda decided not to proceed with a full investigation in November 2014. Ignoring evidence In a notice of appeal filed Monday, Chief Prosecutor Bensouda says that the judges overstepped their mandate and trampled on her prosecutorial discretion by ordering her to review the case. She also claims that the ruling gives her no clear explanation of how to review her decision. But Nice said that her claims are “absolute rubbish” and the judges’ ruling is very clear about what matters and evidence should be looked at again. The judges’ 16 July ruling lists a long litany of errors by the prosecutor.

The development came after President Bashar al-Assad in a televised address in July pardoned all soldiers who have fled the army, saying that his words served as a general decree to relevant officials. Hundreds of gunmen have been laying down their weapons and turning themselves in to authorities in areas across the country. This number seems to be on the rise as the army has been making steady gains in the battlefield against the terrorist groups, recapturing an increasing number of regions, including strategic sites, which helped cut off many of the militants’ supply routes and forced them to surrender or run away. Also in the past 24 hours, the Syrian air raids destroyed concentration centers of the ISIL, al-Nusra Front and other terrorist groups in Hama and Idlib. The Syrian warplanes conducted airstrikes against positions of ISIL and the so-called Jeish al-Fath terrorists in the countryside of Hama and Idlib.

The airstrikes hit positions of the ISIL terrorists in al-Rahjan village, 50 km to the Northeast of Hama City, destroying a number of terrorists’ vehicles with all arms, ammunition and equipment on board. The airstrikes also hit positions of al-Nusra Front and other terrorist groups in Aqrab village in the Southwestern countryside of Hama, killing scores of terrorists. A number of vehicles belonging to Jeish al-Fath terrorists were also destroyed in airstrikes in Abdin village in the countryside of Ma’aret al-Nu’aman in Idlib countryside. Meantime, the Syrian fighter jets pounded hideouts of the Takfiri militants in the countryside of Homs. The Syrian air raids destroyed Takfiri terrorists’ hideouts and vehicles in al-Qaryatain, al-Sa’an, and in the vicinity of al-Sha’er field in Homs countryside.

Also, the Syrian army conducted military operations against the foreign-backed Takfiri militants in Aleppo province, leaving hundreds of them killed and injured. Hundreds of terrorists were killed or wounded in Aleppo City and its countryside in the past 24 hours, a military source said. Elsewhere, at least 28 militant fighters of the ISIL terrorist group were killed during clashes with the Kurdish forces in the Northeastern Syrian province of Hasaka.

Ratcheting up the confrontation over the Syria war, Russia said Monday that its “volunteer” ground forces would join the fight,

The Russian air and ground deployments in Syria challenge the regional policies of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey, President Obama and NATO.

A Russian ground force could fundamentally alter the conflict, which has left 250,000 people dead and displaced half the country’s population since it started in 2011.Although President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said he would not put troops in Syria, the plan for so-called volunteers was disclosed Monday by his top military liaison to the Parliament, Adm. Vladimir Komoyedov. It seemed similar to Russia’s stealth tactic in using soldiers to seize Crimea from Ukraine in March of 2014 and to aid pro-Moscow rebels in eastern Ukraine.Moreover, American military officials said they believed that more than 600 Russian military personnel were already on the ground in Syria, not counting aircrews, and that tents for nearly 2,000 people had been seen at Russia’s air base near Latakia, in northwest Syria near the Turkish border.

California, New York, Illinois, Hawaii, Maryland, Indiana, Tennessee, and Washington. 

"No later than January 1, 2011,all non­coded ammunition for the calibers listed in this act,whether owned by private citizens or retail outlets,shall be disposed."

Some more thoughts on the leaked tape from a meeting in the Turkish foreign ministry which is only very selectively reported in "western" media. A video with recorded voices and English text is available as is the seemingly complete text in two parts. The setting of the recording is this: The voices of the illegal recording believed to belong to Davutoğlu, National Intelligence Organization (MİT) Hakan Fidan, Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Feridun Sinirlioğlu, and Deputy Chief of General Staff Gen. Yaşar Gürel. According to the information obtained from sources, the recording consists of a chat between four officials in Davutoğlu’s office before the commencement of the official meeting with the participation of more civil and military bureaucrats in another room at the Foreign Ministry. It is not clear when exactly the meeting happened. It would fit the situation late last year or early 2014.

The major points from my view: Turkey has delivered 2,000 trucks of weapons and ammunition to the insurgents in Syria. There are plans for false flag attacks on Turkey or Turkish property to justify an attack from Turkey on Syria. The Turkish military has great concerns going into and fighting Syria. The general atmosphere between these deciders is one of indecisiveness. Everyone seems to be unclear what Erdogan wants and is waiting for clear orders from above. U.S. military has shortly before the meeting presented fresh plans for a no-fly one over Syria. Then there is the fact in itself that this tape and others leaked. Internal government communication in Turkey and personal communication of Turkish official has been thoroughly compromised. This will hinder future decision making and will erode any trust Turkish government allies may have in it.

It is somewhat astonishing how "western" media avoid the content of the leaked tape. An AP report on it makes a lot of the youtube blocking the Turkish government ordered in reaction to the tape. Of the recording itself the AP only mentions this: The four are allegedly heard discussing a military intervention in neighboring Syria, a sensitive political issue in Turkey, although the context of the conversation is not clear. The Washington Post filed that AP report under Technology. This is an incredible disservice to its readers. The Guardian report based on Reuters is not any better: The move by the TIB came hours after an anonymous YouTube account posted a leaked audio recording allegedly of a confidential conversation between Turkish intelligence chief Hakan Fidan, foreign minister Ahmet Davutoglu, undersecretary of the foreign ministry Feridun Sinirlioglu and deputy chief of the general staff, Yasar Gürel, discussing possible military action in Syria. There is no mentioning at all of the false flag attack. The Wall Street Journal comes somewhat nearer to the truth: ... a leaked recording published anonymously on the platform purported to reveal a conversation in which Turkey's foreign minister, spy chief and a top general appear to discuss how to create a pretext for a possible Turkish attack within Syria. For once kudos to the NYT which at least touches one point but leaves out the other important ones: ... the officials were heard discussing a plot to establish a justification for military strikes in Syria. One option that is said to have been discussed was orchestrating an attack on the Tomb of Suleyman Shah ... German media did not do any better.

large explosion in a Sudanese ammunition warehouse last Friday was the result of an Israeli attack targeting weapons intended for Hamas, and not a fire, as claimed by the government, an Arab daily reported on Monday

Sudanese Intelligence had claimed that the explosion, which took place in a military training camp in Al-Gaili, north of the capital Khartoum, early Friday morning, was caused by “a local fire.” A Sudanese army spokesman, A-Sawarmi Khaled Sa’ad, said the explosion had no connection to “external hands, or a domestic act of sabotage.” But unnamed Sudanese sources told the London-based daily Al-Arab that Sudan was merely trying to cover the tracks of its cooperation with Hamas, as President Omar Al-Bashir tries to convince the United States and Arab Gulf states that his country is no longer a sponsor of terrorism. Bashir, the daily reported, met with Hamas’s political bureau chief Khaled Mashaal in the Qatari capital, Doha, two weeks ago.

It would not be the first time that Israel reportedly struck Sudanese territory in a bid to preempt the delivery of weapons to Hamas. Three airstrikes carried out in March 2009 destroyed a convoy of trucks in western Sudan reportedly carrying long-range Iranian missiles to the Gaza Strip. A mysterious explosion in the Yarmouk weapons plant in Khartoum in October 2012, which killed four people, was also believed to be the result of an Israeli airstrike targeting arms destined for Hamas. Al-Arab noted that the official Sudanese narrative regarding Friday’s incident was contradictory. The government spoke of a local fire that was quickly put out, but eyewitnesses reported hearing a loud explosion followed by a surge of flames. In addition, a statement issued by the intelligence claiming no injuries or damage contradicted an army communique which reported six men injured in the blast.

Reports, including photographic evidence reveal that Israel is using an energy weapon to attack targets in Gaza. The destructive beam, thought to be a high energy laser, is emitted from a plane identified as a Boeing KC707 “Re’em,” originally configured for Electronic Warfare. Those observing the attacks cite a beam from a 4 engine jet hitting a target which immediately turns “white hot.” After these attacks, the target area is then hit with either bombs or artillery to destroy evidence of the use of an American designed and built energy weapon illegally given to Israel. BACKGROUND The weapon used is identified as part of the YAL 1 system, a COIL laser (chemical, oxygen/iodine laser), originally intended as an aircraft mounted system to shoot down ICBMs. Boeing approached the Department of Defense in 2002 and by 2004 had mounted its first system on a 747/400 previously flown by Air India. Boeing had convinced Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld that this system, mounted on as many as 7 aircraft, could fly 24 hours a day around Iran and defend “the free world” against nuclear tipped ICBMs that Rumsfeld believed Iran was planning to use. Please note that it was Rumsfeld that told television audiences that Afghanistan was “peppered” with underground cities serviced by rail links that supported division sized Al Qaeda units that, after ten years, no one was able to locate.

Boeing tested the system in 2007. The Department of Defense claimed the system could shoot down low earth orbit satellites and that in tests conducted in 2010, destroyed multiple test missiles. There is no reliable confirmation of this other than a press release from then Secretary of Defense Robert Gates. CANCELLATION AND MYSTERIOUS DISAPPEARANCE The Center for Strategic Studies, in an interview with then Defense Secretary Gates published the following: “I don’t know anybody at the Department of Defense who thinks that this program should, or would, ever be operationally deployed. The reality is that you would need a laser something like 20 to 30 times more powerful than the chemical laser in the plane right now to be able to get any distance from the launch site to fire.” So, right now the ABL would have to orbit inside the borders of Iran in order to be able to try and use its laser to shoot down that missile in the boost phase. And if you were to operationalize this you would be looking at 10 to 20 747s, at a billion and a half dollars apiece, and $100 million a year to operate. And there’s nobody in uniform that I know who believes that this is a workable concept.”

After $5 billion was spent, the functioning prototype only capable of being fired directly at nearby targets, a system very capable of acquisition and destruction of ground targets with no air defense protection only, was said to have been flown to a scrap yard. The plane itself is still there, at Davis Monthan Air Force Base, with other failed dreams and nightmares. However, the weapons system disappeared, only to reappear in Israel as a “missile defense” project, an adjunct to the “Iron Dome” system. Israel’s Rafael Defense had been trying to develop laser weapons on its own to intercept rockets being fired from Gaza. It was never able to neither deploy a laser powerful enough nor develop a radar system able to be effective.

“The separatists are backed, trained, armed, financed by Russia. Russia determined that it had to be a little more overt in what it had already been doing, but it’s not really a shift.”Obama, 29 August 2014.  ”If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth.”  -  Joseph Goebbels (Hitler’s Propaganda Minister) Interestingly, most of us who are seeking the truth are primarily attempting to undo the lies – lies umpteen times repeated, lies about “Russian invasions”, first proclaimed by Poroshenko, Ukraine’s oligarch leader (sic), lies of Russia “not respecting Ukraine’s sovereignty”, demonization directed against President Putin, Malaysian airliners downed by Russia – and-so-on. The latest accusation is that JP Morgan and four other Wall Street banks have been hacked. And the culprit is…. Of, course Russia, according to the presstitute MSM.

It doesn’t matter whether what Poroshenko said and is repeated the world over was based on a translation error (according to the German Tagesschau, the German mainstream TV news) – or whether it is just a conventional lie continuously repeated until it becomes the truth à la Goebbels – the western bought propaganda machine takes full advantage of this hundreds of years old simple strategy of deception. The interesting part, however, is that hardly anyone on that very occasion is presenting the counter-weight, so to speak, namely to what extent Kiev is assisted by US paid mercenaries, CIA military and strategic advisers and their equipment, all paid for in one way or another by the State Department, CIA, or NATO. And these are facts. Not inventions for deception.

There is enough proof about who caused the 22 February 2014 coup (Maidan) – Madame Nuland, Kerry’s assistant, bragged about it at the Washington Press club – remember the US$ 5 billion “investment” in Ukraine’s regime change that cannot be let go down the drain because of the f….ing Europeans. She was caught hot-handed or hot-voiced on the phone with the US Ambassador in Kiev.  Ever since that infamous coup, the US / NATO and the EU have had their dirty hands in Kiev’s Nazi killer junta – otherwise the Kiev thugs would have never had either the courage or the military knowledge to advance to the Donbas area of Ukraine, where they were literally ordered to kill their brothers. Some of them with some conscience defected early on; then they were accompanied under threats of life by CIA ‘advisers’. Eventually they defected by the thousands because of lack of food and ammunition and the resulting low-low morale.

The following report is a slap in the face to president Obama and his NATO partners meeting today in Newport Wales.  Obama confirmed on September 3 that  “Russian combat forces with Russian weapons in Russian tanks”  had been deployed in Eastern Ukraine. That’s not only a Lie, it is Lie which could potentially precipitate humanity into a Third World War. Observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) “have registered no troops, ammunition or weapons crossing the Russian-Ukrainian border over the past two weeks” (Itar-Tass)

The OSCE report contradicts the statements made by the Kiev regime and its US-NATO sponsors. It confirms that NATO accusations pertaining to the influx of Russian tanks are an outright fabrication. NATO backed up Obama’s statements with “fake” satellite images (28 August 2014) that allegedly “show Russian combat forces engaged in military operations inside the sovereign territory of Ukraine”.  These statements are refuted by a detailed report of the OSCE monitoring mission stationed at the Russia-Ukraine border. The NATO reports including its satellite photos were based on fake evidence. It is worth noting that the OSCE carefully categorizes movements across the border, which largely consist of refugees:

Urban Guerrilla Warfare Careful planning and preparation; Kalashnikovs; rocket-propelled grenade launcher; balaclavas; sand-colored ammunition vest stuffed with spare magazines; army boots; piece of cake escape in a black Citroen and the icing on the lethal cake; faultless Paris-based logistical support to pull that off. A former top French military commander stresses the perfect application of “urban guerrilla technique”.

The United States has allowed Israel, waging an offensive in the Gaza Strip, to tap a local US arms stockpile in the past week to resupply it with grenades and mortar rounds, Rear Admiral John Kirby, the Pentagon's press secretary, has said.

Additional Israeli requests for US-manufactured ammunition were also being processed in the US, the anonymous defence official said.

Separately, US politicians were working in Congress to provide millions of dollars in additional funding for Israel's "Iron Dome" missile shield.The US Senate Appropriations Committee added $225m for Iron Dome to a spending bill intended mainly to provide money to handle an influx of thousands of Central American children across the US-Mexico border.

As the war against the Islamic State in Syria has fallen into even more chaos – partially due to the United States government’s increasing involvement there – the White House’s bright new idea seems to be to ramping up the involvement of the intelligence agency that is notorious for making bad situations worse. As the Washington Post reported late Friday, “The Obama administration has been weighing plans to escalate the CIA’s role in arming and training fighters in Syria, a move aimed at accelerating covert U.S. support to moderate rebel factions while the Pentagon is preparing to establish its own training bases.” Put aside for a minute that the Central Intelligence Agency has been secretly arming Syrian rebels with automatic rifles, rocket-propelled grenades, ammunition and antitank weapons since at least 2012 – and with almost nothing to show for it. Somehow the Post neglected to cite a front-page New York Times article from just one month ago alerting the public to the existence of a still-classified internal CIA study admitting that arming rebels with weapons has rarely – if ever – worked

Even America’s top spies know that arming rebels is ‘doomed to failure’ – but that can’t stop Obama’s gun-running operation

Senior American officials are considering the deployment of US advisors to some largely isolated pockets of resistance in Iraq’s al-Anbar Province. Such a move would be fraught with risk since Anbar is mainly controlled by the Islamic State (ISIS or IS). These garrisons behind IS lines have been coming under greater pressure, and some have recently fallen. A handful of US advisors out there would make little difference, but other measures could help these garrisons hang on. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s government has done practically nothing to reverse the dynamic in Anbar by turning Sunni Arabs against IS. Just as former PM Nouri al-Maliki senselessly drove most Sunni Arabs into IS’s arms through persecution, the Abadi government might rather see most Sunni Arabs crushed than empower them by making important concessions. That may sound bizarre, but not if Abadi and his Shi’a cronies believe the US would eventually feel compelled to intervene militarily with combat troops to smash IS (along with a lot of Sunni Arab Iraqis caught in the middle) if Iraqi forces cannot rebound. Baghdad also knows US Congressional hawks have been pressing for such military action.

Joint Chiefs Chairman General Martin Dempsey announced on October 30 that it was necessary to expand the American “train, advise and assist mission…into the al-Anbar Province.” US planners meant to reassure by stating they would not place advisors with units smaller than an Iraqi Army brigade (roughly 2,000 men), but several vulnerable garrisons either have that many soldiers or a composite force that large of soldiers, tribesmen, and in some cases Shi’a militiamen (presumably making them candidates for a US advisory presence—yet not especially safe ones). The makeup of the garrison of the sprawling al-Asad Airbase complex near the city of Hit is unclear, but the defenders of the vital Haditha Dam on the Euphrates are a mixed bag of soldiers and tribesmen, and those holding the city of Samarra and much of Baiji north of Baghdad are soldiers bolstered by Shi’a militiamen. The garrison of the city of Ramadi west of Baghdad consists of soldiers and tribesmen.

The hazards of deploying US advisors into isolated garrisons could be extreme. Since some garrisons were overwhelmed very quickly once their resistance cracked, there is no guarantee US advisors could be extracted quickly amidst the chaos of such a collapse. Advisors could be killed or captured. If captured, IS would showcase them, and then probably use them for televised beheadings. Additionally, in pockets with garrisons of Iraqi soldiers mixed with either Shi’a militiamen or tribesmen, US advisors could be threatened by their hosts. Many Shi’a militias are anti-American, harboring profound grudges. Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army lost hundreds of fighters to US forces in Karbala in 2004 and Baghdad and Basra in 2008. American advisors could be killed by militiamen under murky circumstances. And garrisons nearing the end of their ability to defend themselves might even turn US advisors over to IS in exchange for guarantees of a safe passage out or better treatment.

In the war on the Islamic State, the alleged scourge of humanity, little is heard about the position of America’s much-ballyhooed greatest ally in the Middle East, if not the world, Israel. Now the Islamic State has been conquering territory in very close proximity to the border of Israel. But Israel does not seem to be fearful and it is not taking any action. And the Obama administration and American media pundits do not seem to be the least bit disturbed.  This is quite in contrast to the complaints about other Middle East countries such as Turkey that are being harshly criticized for their failure to become actively involved in fighting the Islamic State.

Returning to the issue of Israel, the fact of the matter is that Israel acts to protect its own national interests.  At the current time, the primary goal of the Islamic State is to purify Islam rather than attack non-Muslims. In response to Internet queries as to why the militant group wasn’t fighting Israel instead of killing Muslims in Iraq and Syria, its representatives responded: “We haven’t given orders to kill the Israelis and the Jews. The war against the nearer enemy, those who rebel against the faith, is more important. Allah commands us in the Koran to fight the hypocrites, because they are much more dangerous than those who are fundamentally heretics.”

Now there is nothing strange about Israel’s position here. It is simply acting in its own national interest. There is no reason to fight a group that doesn’t threaten it. Furthermore, it is in Israel’s interest to try to make it appear that it is acting for the good of all humanity when attacking Hamas, and though these arguments are unlikely to sway any UN members, the prime minister did provide ammunition to the Israel lobby and its supporters that could be used to persuade some gullible Americans.

The Pentagon says Master Sgt. Joshua Wheeler, the Delta Force soldier who died last week in a hostage rescue mission in Iraq, was the first U.S. service member killed in action in the ISIS war. But Wheeler was not the first combat casualty. Five other service members have been “wounded in action” since the U.S. first sent troops back into Iraq last year, according to statistics from the Pentagon and interviews with officials in Iraq (PDF). But how and when they were injured, the Pentagon refuses to say.As the Obama administration holds to the increasingly dubious claim that U.S. troops are not engaged in combat against the self-proclaimed Islamic State, the Pentagon is withholding details about its wounded that would give key insights into the kind of fight American troops are facing in Iraq. Were any of the five shot by the Iraqi forces they are training? Did a mortar round shot at their base injure a soldier? Has ISIS wounded a U.S. service member?According to U.S. Central Command, which oversees military action in the region, the details of the wounded are not available, despite repeated requests for such basic information. The only specifics available are from a Washington Post story, which reported the first service member was wounded in March, just south of Baghdad, while in a guard tower. He was struck in the face by bullet fragments, according to the report, while coming under enemy fire.

In announcing that the U.S. would fight ISIS, Obama was adamant the U.S. could “degrade and ultimately destroy” ISIS without U.S. combat troops. But the number of troops has slowly increased since that September 2014 pronouncement, from a few hundreds advisers to thousands of troops, at least some of them conducting combat missions. During a June 2014 press conference, Obama stressed that Americans would not be at risk: “I think we always have to guard against mission creep, so let me repeat what I’ve said in the past: American combat troops are not going to be fighting in Iraq again.”

That the administration does not publicly admit that troops are in combat has stung many in uniform who feel such distinctions are insulting. That’s particularly true in the halls of the Pentagon, filled with war veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, where the consensus is: “If I am being shot at by enemy forces, I am in combat.”On paper at least, the U.S. military treats the troops serving in Iraq as if they are in a war zone. American service members in Iraq receive hazardous-duty pay, a gun, and live ammunition—standard fare for troops in combat.

Israeli forces shot and wounded at least 2,617 Palestinians with live and rubber-coated steel bullets through October, the Palestinian Red Cross said Sunday, as clashes carried on into the new month.A Red Crescent spokesperson told Ma'an that at least 760 Palestinians were shot with live rounds across the occupied Palestinian territory, while another 1,857 were hit with rubber-coated steel bullets.He said that a further 5,399 Palestinians were treated for excessive tear gas inhalation during the period, while another 246 were injured in other ways, including assault by Israeli soldiers and burns from tear gas canisters.The spokesperson said that it brought the total injured during October to 8,262 Palestinians.

While Palestinians agree that a number of Palestinians were shot dead while carrying out attacks -- ultimately claiming 10 Israelis' lives -- footage and witness testimony have raised serious doubts over the Israeli army's version of events in many of the other cases.Moreover, Palestinian, Israeli and international rights groups have said that in the majority of cases, Israeli forces needlessly killed their alleged attackers when they posed no imminent threat, a practice Israeli group B'Tselem referred to as "extrajudicial executions."Amnesty International said last week that Israeli force appeared "to have ripped up the rulebook and resorted to extreme and unlawful measures." The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Zeid Raad al-Hussein said: "The high number of casualties, in particular those resulting from the use of live ammunition by Israeli security forces, raise concerns of excessive use of force, and violations of the right to life and security of the person."

The wave of unrest that swept the occupied Palestinian territory last month seemed unabated at the start of November, as fresh clashes left more Palestinians injured on Sunday.In the central Gaza Strip, Israeli forces shot and injured two Palestinians with live rounds east of al-Buriej refugee camp, medics told Ma'an.

US fighter jets have been deployed in Turkey to protect slower American warplanes from potential Russian or Syrian attacks, a Pentagon official says.Six F-15C warplanes are tasked with providing cover for bomber, attack and cargo aircraft from threats posed by Syrian and Russian fighters, an unnamed US defense official told USA Today on Tuesday.The US Air Force B-1 bombers, A-10 and AC-130 attack planes, which are reportedly used in US-led strikes on Daesh (ISIL) positions in Syria, all fly at slow speeds and are vulnerable to attacks from enemy pilots, the official added.He added that cargo planes that are airdropping ammunition for US-backed militants will also be protected.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon announced Tuesday that the fighter jets, sent to Turkey’s Incirlik Airbase last week, will be protecting the Turkish airspace."At the request of the government of Turkey, the US Air Force F-15Cs that arrived last week will conduct combat air patrols to assist in defense of the Turkish airspace," Laura Seal, a Pentagon spokesman, said in a statement Tuesday."We will be conducting these patrols at the request of the government of Turkey. Turkey faces increased instability along its border with Syria and Iraq and irresponsible behavior from actors in the region. This includes the incursions Russia made into Turkey's — and thereby NATO's — airspace in October," the statement noted.According to NATO officials, Russian Sukhoi SU-30 and SU-24 jets, based in Syria, entered the Turkish airspace early in October. Ankara scrambled two F-16s to intercept the planes.

The Syrian Arab Army and the YPG troops of the Syrian Kurds are making good progress in the Azaz pocket. The pocket formed after the Syrian army cut through the "rebel" corridor between Aleppo city and the Turkish border. The aim now is to push all foreign proxy forces who are still in that pocket (green) back north into Turkey and to get full control of the border.

The Syrian-Russian command decided to let the YPG (yellow) have the fun of cleaning the pocket only to taunt the Turkish President Erdogan. Erdogan has a serious domestic policy problems when the Kurdish forces gain control in parts of Syria that the wannabe Sultan Erdogan regarded as sacred neo-Ottoman ground. His court jester, the Prime Minister Davutoglu, announced that his country would not allow the town of Azaz to fall to Kurdish fighters. He will have to eat a flock of craws over that. The Turks are firing artillery from Turkish ground in the north onto Kurdish position in the pocket. Turkish special forces are likely near the front line to control that fire. But artillery alone can not make the difference. The Kurds have air support from the Russian airforce which Turkey no longer dares to attack. The Russians will not attack the Turkish artillery as such an attack could widen the war. The Kurdish troops will have to suffer through that barrage as they push out the Turkish and CIA paid proxies. Some reinforcement for the CIA proxies arrived from Idleb. These passed from Idleb into Turkey and from Turkey into the pocket. The destruction of these forces in the Azaz pocket will make the further fights  of the Syrian army in Idleb and elsewhere a lot easier.

Who are the professionals that are helping the YPG to take the Azaz pocket? My first thought was of course Russian Spetsnaz. But I asked around and none of my usual sources would confirm this. The sources acknowledged that the YPG in west Syria has special force support but there was some quite unexpected silence over who these forces were. It is clear to me that these are not Syrian special forces. The YPG does not want to be seen as a adjunct to the Syrian government. No one would confirm to me that these are Russian forces even as that would be of no great surprise to anyone. This leads me to speculate that some U.S. special forces are directing the YPG in the Azaz pocket. This in coordination with the Syrian army and the Russians. Is that a crazy thought? Consider: The Syrian YPG Kurds are supported by the U.S. military. They received weapons and ammunition from the U.S. military and, at least in the east, have some U.S. military special forces embedded with them. These Pentagon supported YPG troops currently fight foreign proxy forces in the Azaz pocket which are supported, equipped and paid by the CIA, the Saudis, the Turks and other Arab U.S. "allies". The CIA is running the show. The Turkish NATO member is shelling the Pentagon supported YPG to protect the CIA supported "moderate rebels". The current CIA director was once the CIA Chief of Station in Riyadh and has intimate connection to the Saudi rulers (and their pockets?). It was the military's Defense Intelligence Agency that warned in 2012 of the emergence of a "Salafist Principality" - the Islamic State - in Syria and Iraq. It warned against continuing the CIA support for the "rebels". It was the Pentagon that sabotaged the White House intent to create another "moderate rebel" force to attack the Islamic State:

This last Friday, more than 200 Palestinians were injured by Israeli forces across the occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, during confrontations with the military, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry.

118 Palestinians were shot with live ammunition, while another 60 were shot with rubber-coated steel bullets, including 41 who received treatment by local medics without the need for hospitalization, as stated by the Health Minister. Clashes between the Palestinian youth and the Israeli occupation forces took place in several areas of the occupied West Bank and in the Gaza Strip, PNN reports.

Since the beginning of October, the number of Palestinians killed by Israeli occupation forces has now reached 91, including 18 children and four women, according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. The Ministry said that 72 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank since October 1, 18 in the besieged Gaza Strip, and one in the Negev. Over 10,000 Palestinians were injured, including at least 1,458 who were shot with live fire, and 1,070 with rubber-coated steel bullets.