WarSclerotic

‘It feels like we’re moving backward’
Gadi Golan and Yehuda Shlezinger Wednesday August 20, 2014 Via Israel Hayom

A crater caused by a rocket that fell at Yad Mordechai junction, near Ashkelon | Photo credit: AFP

(Tuco: “When you have to shoot, shoot. Don’t talk.” from The Good, the Bad and the Ugly (1966).-LS)

Sderot Mayor Alon Davidi: “Any response other than cutting the head off the snake that controls Gaza should not be considered and would only make the current situation worse”

Mayors and community leaders in southern Israel are not prepared to take the renewed rocket fire from Gaza lightly, and are advocating an aggressive response to the cease-fire violation.

“We must respond strongly to the rocket fire, as if there were no negotiations in Cairo, and at the same time, we must continue trying to achieve a long-term deal in Cairo as if there was no rocket fire,” said Shaar Hanegev Regional Council head Alon Shuster.

Sderot Mayor Alon Davidi was similarly angered by the renewed Hamas aggression, saying, “We must deal Hamas a heavy blow that will decisively change the game. Any response other than cutting the head off the snake that controls Gaza should not be considered and would only make the current situation worse.”

These sentiments were also shared by Hof Ashkelon Regional Council head Yair Farjoun, who said, “We must act immediately and decisively to stop all rocket fire directed at us. We will not tolerate the threat of rocket fire, and we will allow the government to put forward a policy for continued calm.”

Eshkol Regional Council head Haim Yalin did not demand sweeping military action as did his colleagues, but rather expressed trust in the government’s ability to handle the situation. “We support and stand behind the cabinet as long as it continues to work toward long-term quiet along the Gaza border and in the south [of Israel],” he said.

“Now is the time to use military force wisely to win the diplomatic battle.”

Sedot Negev Regional Council head Tamir Idan said that he expects the government and the military “to respond forcefully to any escalation or fire on the communities of southern Israel.”

Meanwhile, Finance Minister Yair Lapid visited Sapir College near Sderot, where he outlined his solution to the ongoing conflict.

“Our commitment as a government is to provide quiet for residents of southern Israel, and we will continue to fight for that quiet,” he said. “We must wrap up this campaign with diplomatic success as well, and set up a regional committee that will allow for long-term quiet, and most importantly, we need you to know that we are with you, no matter what happens.”

Beersheba plans to go ahead with its White Night festival scheduled for Thursday, despite rocket fire directed at the city. The event will include performances by several leading Israeli singers and musicians.

On Tuesday evening, the Tel Aviv Municipality announced that it would reopen public bomb shelters in the city, due to the renewed rocket fire at central Israel.

“We don’t have to deal with [rocket] barrages the way they do in the south,” said Tel Aviv resident Yarin Galzar, “But, we still feel it very much, you notice it in the mood [around the city]. This past month, we went out much less — not because we were afraid, but because of the general mood — and this past week we had just started returning to our usual routine. People starting going out again to the bars, to the beach, people had parties.

“It feels like we are moving backward. On the other hand, maybe the time has come to teach them a lesson for once and for all, so that we don’t have to live week by week.”

Orit Shilon, a resident of southern Tel Aviv, was unconcerned by the renewed rocket fire. “We aren’t scared, it is something you can deal with. We already saw in the last round that it’s not so bad. The problem is constantly being vigilant, and that it just keeps repeating itself. I hope the army and the politicians will understand that we are not prepared to live like this, and that they will do what needs to be done.”

U.S. Has Not Expressed Concerns Over Hamas Leader in Turkey
BY: Adam Kredo August 20, 2014 5:00 am Via: The Washington Free Beacon

(Turkey may find itself swimming in its own gravy one day.-LS)

Turkish official says no ‘concerns’ expressed to Turkey following Hamas coup plot

The Obama administration has not expressed to Turkey any concerns over recent reports indicating that a senior Hamas operative operating in Turkey had been implicated in a coup plot to overthrow the Palestinian government in the West Bank and wage war on Israel, according to a Turkish official.

The State Department on Monday defended new missile sales to Turkey just hours after news emerged that Ankara is hosting a senior Hamas operative who Israel accused of hatching a plan to violently overthrow the Palestinian Fatah government in the West Bank.

(That’s just their way of thanking Obama for all that support. Afterall, the Palestinian goverment refused to play ball with his stooge Kerry so now Obama’s out for revenge.-LS)

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf did not respond yesterday to Free Beacon requests for comment on whether the Obama administration had related any concerns to Ankara over its reported sheltering of Hamas official Saleh Al-Arouri, who is said to have been responsible for planning the kidnapping of three Israeli teens who were killed by Hamas.

A Turkish official confirmed to the Free Beacon late Tuesday that the Obama administration has not reached out to express concerns over the reports about the alleged coup and rejected allegations that Turkey may be aiding Al-Arouri.

“Turkey strongly condemns and rejects such allegations. As a matter of fact Turkey’s strong support to the National Unity Government in Palestine and to the President [Mahmoud] Abbas himself is self-explanatory and refutes such accusations,” the official said.

The Turkish official further noted that “U.S. authorities are well aware” of Turkey’s support for Abbas and his government.

“Since U.S. authorities are well aware of Turkey’s aforementioned position, there has been no such concern [expressed by the Obama administration] as you mention in your email which has been conveyed to the Turkish side,” the official said.

Turkey’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs also addressed the controversy in a statement issued Tuesday in Turkish.

“Turkey is at the top of the list of countries that have supported the Palestinian reconciliation” between Hamas and Fatah, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry said in the statement, which was translated for the Free Beacon by Merve Tahiroglu, a research associate for the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD). “In this regard, our country has welcomed and supported the Palestinian unity government that was formed on June 2.”

Turkey views this unity government as “an indispensible element” for peace in the region and “the welfare of the Palestinian people,” the statement adds.

Turkey maintains that is has not “overlooked any attempts to overthrow the Palestinian national unity government,” according to the statement. “We strongly reject and condemn such slander. Turkey’s close contact and strong cooperation with the Palestinian administration will, just as it has been in the past, continue with determination in the future.”

A heated back-and-forth between reporters and Harf broke out at the State Department’s daily briefing on Monday and Tuesday when questions emerged about why the administration is going through with the transfer of U.S. missiles to Turkey while simultaneously holding up similar weapons shipments to Israel.

Harf again on Tuesday ducked questions by reporters asking if the U.S. government had conveyed concerns to Turkey over the plot.

“Do you have any concerns at all about the apparent role of Turkey in this?” AP reporter Matt Lee asked Harf.

“I don’t have any more details on this, Matt. I’m happy to check with our team,” Harf responded.

(In other words, it’s none of your damned business, Matt….and no, I won’t get back with you.-LS)

“Okay. Because I did ask this yesterday. You weren’t aware of the incident, but … now, the Israelis say that this is all being planned and funded from Turkish territory,” Lee followd up.

“Well, as I said, I think it involves some Hamas militants and cash, but let me check on that piece of it. I certainly have nothing to confirm that,” Harf told Lee.

“I’m most curious to know if you guys are planning to raise any concerns with the—I don’t know, maybe you don’t have any concerns … if you’ll raise them with the Turks,” Lee responded.

Harf responded that she would “check on that.”

Harf maintained on Monday that the Turkish and Israeli arms shipments are completely separate matters.

“Turkey is also a NATO ally,” she told reporters. “So for all of us who are—talk a lot about the importance of the NATO alliance, particularly when it comes to Russia and Ukraine and what’s happening there, we think it’s important to provide our NATO allies with resources. We think that’s an important use of our resources. The two [cases] aren’t comparable, but those are the facts behind them, I would say.”

Additionally, Harf could not explain to reporters the exact process taking place behind the scenes regarding the hold up in Israeli arms shipments.

“I don’t know how the process specifically works in that granularity,” she said, when faced with questions about who in the government holds veto power over the arms shipments.

When asked later in the briefing to comment on reports about the Turkey-backed Hamas coup, Harf could not provide much information.

“I don’t have anything to confirm those [reports],” she said. “I hadn’t heard about that otherwise. I can check,” she told reporters.

Netanyahu: Hamas leaders are legitimate targets, no one is invincible
By JPOST.COM STAFF, HERB KEINON 08/20/2014 20:51

(It’s not over until it’s over.-LS)

PM says that Operation Protective Edge is not over; does not confirm or deny reports that Israel attempted to kill Hamas military leader Muhammad Deif; says Hamas and ISIS are “branches of the same tree.”

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday night during a televised address that “Operation Protective Edge is not over.”

He said this his main priority at this time was to protect the citizens of Israel and keep them safe. He said the fight against terror, including international terror organizations, is Israel’s biggest challenge.

“This is the hardest that Hamas has ever been hit since it was founded. I promise that we will not stop until the goal of security for our citizens is achieved.”

Netanyahu warned Hamas that “If you shoot, you will be hit back seven-fold.”

When asked if Israel had attempted to assassinate Hamas military leader Muhammad Deif, Netanyahu said, “the leaders of Hamas are legitimate targets, no one is invincible.”

Netanyahu compared Hamas to the Islamic State, saying that the organizations were “branches of the same tree.”

The Prime Minister’s comments came following a long security cabinet meeting in Tel Aviv discussing the developments in Gaza, and how to go forward.

The meeting came amid an escalation of the fighting in Gaza, with Hamas firing dozens of rockets at Israel throughout the day.

The meeting also took place amid growing public criticism among some of the key ministers of the way Netanyahu is managing the Gaza crisis.

For instance, Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman, in a posting on his Facebook page a few hours before the meetings, said “I hope that it is now clear to everyone that the policy of ‘quiet will be met with quiet’ means that Hamas is the one that takes the initiative and the one that decides when, where, and how many rockets it fires on Israeli civilians, while we make do with reacting. Even if our reaction is a strong it is still a reaction.”

“Hamas controls the intensity of the flames when it is convenient for it, it interrupts the daily routine of Israeli civilians, particularly those living in the South,” the foreign minister wrote. “It happened on [Tuesday], it’s happening today, and it is liable to happen on September 1st and also on the eve of Rosh Hashanah..”

“The proposals we have heard up until now, whereby there is no deal, no agreement, and no unequivocal commitment by the Palestinians to halt their fire forever means that we are in for a war of attrition, which is something that the State of Israel cannot be dragged into.” He slammed unilateral proposals suggested by “certain politicians suffering from memory lapse,” and said he wanted to “remind everyone about a unilateral measure known as ‘disengagement,’ that was already been carried out in Gaza, and which we are paying for until today..”

“Even if, Heaven forbid, [Meretz chief] Zehava Gal-On was prime minister and [Hadash MK] Dov Henin was defense minister, they, too, would ultimately order a wide-scale military operation to topple the Hamas regime,” Liberman wrote.

“So when people speak seriously about the security of the citizens of Israel, one needs to understand that there is no other viable alternative except for a determined Israeli campaign that leads to one thing – bringing Hamas to submission.”

Gal-On’s office issued a press release in response to Liberman’s post, calling the foreign minister’s claims “infantile.”

“Liberman is trying to sell us the delusion of liquidating Hamas for years now,” the Meretz chairperson said. “If the residents of the South are still vulnerable to rocket fire and shelling after a month of destruction and killing in the Gaza Strip, then apparently this operation didn’t change anything, and no military operation will change it.”

“Whoever calls for a more massive response and more assassinations in order to create deterrence and achieve a victory apparently has not learned the bloody lessons of the last month, during which 64 soldiers were killed on the Israeli side and 2,000 Palestinians were killed.”

Justice Minister Tzipi Livni also took public issue with Netanyahu’s policies, saying in a Ynet interview that the attempt to reach an arrangement with Hamas was “not right,” and that she was not willing to “pay Hamas,” or “establish Hamastan on our southern border that will send a message to Islamic State (IS), and Hezbollah, and all the other crazy groups in the region that we will be pay a price for quiet.”

Rather than come to an agreement with Hamas in Egypt, Livni is in favor of Israeli working with the US, EU, UN and Palestinian Authority to create different reality inside Gaza that would include demilitarization, massive humanitarian aid, and eventually transferring control of the Gaza Strip to the PA.

Meanwhile in Paris, French President Francois Hollande called on Israel and the Palestinians to resume truce talks, and said the demilitarization of the enclave and a lifting of a blockade should be part of a deal.

“We are at a critical point. France supports the Egyptian mediation,” Hollande told Le Monde in an interview. “Gaza can no longer remain like it is. The objective must be a demilitarization and a lifting of the blockade.”

“Demilitarization can only be done under the auspices of the Palestinian Authority. France with Europe can be useful in lifting the blockade at the Rafah crossing. Gaza must neither be an open prison or a military base,” Hollande said.

Hollande said if negotiations failed then the international community would have to take the lead to find a solution.

“We must do everything to ensure negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority resume to find a solution to the conflict. We know the parameters, the only solution is a two states living side by side,” he said.

Reuters contributed to this report

In first, Hamas official takes credit for kidnap and murder of Israeli teens, August 20, 2014

Salah al-Aruri praises “heroic action” of Kassam Brigades; Hamas had previously denied kidnapping Fraenkel, Shaer and Yifrah.

A senior Hamas official admitted for the first time on Wednesday that the organization’s armed wing, the Kassam Brigades, was behind the kidnapping and murder of Israeli teens Nafatli Fraenkel, Gil-Ad Shaer and Eyal Yifrah in the West Bank in June.

The Hamas official, Salah al-Aruri made the comments during a conference of Islamic clerics in Turkey. He praised the “heroic action of the Kassam Brigades who kidnapped three settlers in Hebron.”

Video: Tazpit News Agency

Israel has contended that Hamas was behind the kidnapping of the boys, a claim that Hamas had previously denied.

In the aftermath of the kidnapping, the IDF launched a wide-scale operation in the West Bank , arresting hundreds of Hamas operatives.

The two suspects in the kidnapping, Marwan Kawasme and Amar Abu Aysha are Hebron-area Hamas operatives who remain at large.

The alleged mastermind of the kidnapping, Hussam Kawasame was arrested on July 11.

On Monday, Border Patrol officers demolished the homes of Hussam Kawasme and Abu Aysha and sealed off the home of Marwan Kawasme.

Report: Islamic State Expanding by the Thousands, Breitbart, Frances Martel, August 20, 2014

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a group dedicated to following the developments on the ground in the Syrian Civil War, tells Reuters that the jihadist terror group, the Islamic State (IS), has expanded by “at least 6,300” jihadists in the past month, the fastest expansion of the organization to date.

Rami Abdelrahman, founder of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, told the news outlet that this expansion significantly enhances the Islamic State’s ability to grow its activities outside of strongholds. Reuters notes that anecdotal evidence from speaking to individuals living in Raqqa, Syria–the city the Islamic State has proclaimed its capital–corroborates the large increase in Islamic State members. While as many as one thousand of these recruits are international, the majority who have been enlisted into the terrorist group are Syrian.

Reuters cites the total number of Islamic State fighters at 15,000, but estimates vary. Al Jazeera is reporting that the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights offered a number as large as 50,000 jihadists, including 20,000 foreigners from “Chechnya, China, Europe and Arab countries,” who had entered Syria mostly through Turkey. They also cite a source directly tied to the Islamic State telling the Qatari outlet that there were 30,000 active jihadists working for IS in Iraq.

The Islamic State’s media operation has dedicated much of its efforts to recruiting international jihadists to travel out of the West and into Iraq and Syria. The group’s Al Hayat Media outlet has released videos calling for Indonesian, Bosnian, Canadian, and other Western Muslims to abandon their families and move to Syria to fight jihad. One video specifically targeted UK and Australian Muslims to leave the West. Reports have surfaced that the Islamic State has even resorted to handing out free fried chicken vouchers to recruit Muslims to wage jihad on their behalf in the Middle East.

On the ground in Syria, the Islamic State also uses “preaching vans” to travel from town to town recruiting jihadists–this in addition to forcing religious minorities in areas they control to convert to Islam and pay the infidel’s tax (jizya), leave the area, or be killed. The Islamic State has been known not only to target and kill those of other religions, but execute fellow Sunni Muslims who are considered insufficiently extreme in their religious ideology. In June, Islamic State jihadists displayed the bodies of nine men crucified in Syria who were identified as anti-Assad Muslims rebels, but were not considered extreme enough in their embrace of jihad. They were, therefore, crucified as an example to others.

Israel, Hamas and the third (and fourth?) Gaza war: A Clausewitzian perspective, Jerusalem Post, Frederick Krantz, August 20, 2014

For Hamas, a “success” – long-range Hamas rockets falling on densely-populated Tel Aviv or Jerusalem – could radicalize Israel’s determination to pursue the conflict to the bitter end.

Hamas operatives in Gaza. Photo: REUTERS

“Violence, that is to say physical force (for there is no moral force without the conception of states and law), is therefore the means; the compulsory submission of the enemy to our will is the ultimate object. In order to attain this object fully, the enemy must be disarmed; and this is, correctly speaking, the real aim of hostilities in theory. It takes the place of the final object, and puts it aside in a manner as something not properly belonging to war.” – Carl von Clausewitz, On War

Despite the hypocrisy and pusillanimity of the “international community” and the distortions and blindness of the media, the nature and goals of the Hamas terrorist organization in its third war against Israel are clear enough. Hamas’ binding covenant explicitly proclaims its dedication to the destruction of the Jewish state, a genocidal intention expressed in terrorist murders of Jews and indiscriminate rocketing of Israeli civilian populations.

An offspring of the Muslim Brotherhood fundamentalists in Egypt, Hamas emerged as a radical, explicitly Islamist faction within Yasser Arafat’s PLO. Coming to power in Gaza after Israel’s unilateral withdrawal in 2005, Hamas won a US-backed, onetime Palestinian Authority election, taking full power subsequently in a bloody putsch against the PA and its president, Mahmoud Abbas.

Sworn to war against the Jewish state and backed by Israel’s nemesis, Iran, Hamas acquired and began to use a vast arsenal of short- and intermediate-range missiles against Israeli civilian populations. This lead to Israeli military responses in 2008, and again in 2012; despite short truces, new longer-range missiles were added, and tunnels dug for the secret import of contraband goods and weapons from Egypt.

The current war differs from the two previous conflicts in quantity and quality. More and longer-range rockets, supplied by Iran and capable of reaching deep into Israel, are being used, while the number, complexity and extent of cross-border attack tunnels has markedly increased.

The political context is also different, in two related respects. First, under increasing domestic pressure as its economy sank, Hamas saw unemployment skyrocket, and its large 40,000-strong bureaucracy’s salaries went unpaid. Second, internationally, Gen. Abdel Fattah Sisi’s defeat of Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt deprived Hamas of a political and economic patron, while Sunni Hamas’ support for the Iranbacked Assad regime’s Islamist opponents in Syria distanced Teheran from Gaza.

Hence Hamas’ recent reconciliation with the PA, temporarily creating a reunified Palestinian government, was aimed as much at getting Gaza salaries paid by Abbas as it was at reconciling with the hated Fatah.

Hamas’ launching of missiles, and then of the tunnel attacks, expressed a considered, if desperate, rolling of the dice, an effort to reinforce its shaken Gazan hegemony, attract Arab and Muslim (Qatar, Turkey) financial and political aid, and reaffirm its “revolutionary” leadership.

Yet Hamas alone cannot hope to defeat the regional hegemon, Israel; if a traditional military victory isn’t its goal, what is? The answer is three-fold:

1) To demonstrate, first to its own Gazan subjects, to the larger West Bank population and to Arab world generally, that it is indeed the incarnation of the “Resistance,” standing alone against the Jewish infidel “occupier” of the Palestinian Wakf, the regional area of Islam’s inalienable patrimony.

Here Hamas’s readiness to use its Gazan subjects as “martyrs” turns on the assumption (proven in the earlier Gazan conflicts, and in the Arab-Israeli wars generally) that the “international community” – moved by the mass media’s scenes of civilian casualties – will pressure Israel into compliance with a cease-fire well before Hamas can be destroyed and/or Gaza re-occupied.

2) Importantly, Hamas’ notion of “victory” differs from the Clausewitz epigraph’s statement. Immediate submission of Israel’s will to that of Hamas, and its full disarmament [and therefore destruction] is not Hamas’ proximate goal (though it is, with the presumptive aid of the larger Muslim and international world, its hoped-for final objective).

Hamas’ specific goal is – by standing up to the Jewish entity’s superior military machine and inflicting casualties on Israeli civilians – to delegitimate the Jewish state internationally, by representing it to the world as a “genocidal” war criminal and racist human-rights violator. (Here, too, the functional, deeply anti-Semitic meaning of the world-wide “BDS” and “apartheid analogy” campaign is revealed: “delegitimation,” denial of the Jewish state’s right to exist, prepares the way for its destruction.

Delegitimation and genocide are intimately linked.) Hamas’ reliance on aggression and martyrdom, its seeking, as one of is spokesmen put it, for death rather than (like the Jews) life, to delegitimize Israel and thereby to spark a wider conflagration, is a good example of another of Clausewitz’s themes, that when war itself becomes an end, and not a means, it can have unimagined (or in Hamas’ case, imagined) consequences.

As current short-term truces collapse under the weight of Hamas’ truculence, Israel’s response to the third Gazan war’s amplified threat may morph from artillery and airborne bombing to a sustained ground war. It looks more and more as though Hamas has miscalculated, and that a quick cease-fire and a US – and “international community” – forced “peace” may not be available to rescue it. Squeezed between Sisi’s Egypt and Israel, with even Abbas (while condemning Israel for the mounting civilian casualties) condemning the rocket attacks, Hamas could be about to suffer a decisive defeat.

Clausewitz, well aware of the vagaries of war, and of the close filial relation between Bellona, the goddess of war, and Fortuna, goddess of chance, always insisted on the subordination of war to state policy. Currently unforeseen considerations (for Israel, massive international pressure resulting from a truly terrible accidental bombing) may give Hamas an escape route, or even realize its hopes for a widening of the conflict.

For Hamas, a “success” – long-range Hamas rockets falling on densely-populated Tel Aviv or Jerusalem – could radicalize Israel’s determination to pursue the conflict to the bitter end, the “international community” and the media notwithstanding.

The political objective, Clausewitz wrote, not war per se, is always the essential factor: “War is a… continuation of policy by other means,” not a substitute for it. In Hamas’ case, war – the killing of Jews, the hopedfor genocidal destruction of Jewish Israel – is a nihilistic end-in-itself. This explains the seemingly paradoxical disproportion between Hamas’ limited means and its apocalyptic goal: steadfastness, unending aggression, murder and martyrdom are more important even than victory itself.

But for democratic Jewish Israel, a sophisticated, bureaucratic Western state, war is a calibrated adjunct of rational policy, not a nihilistic end-in-itself. When necessary, it is a means to achieve Israel’s overarching moral-political purpose: the preservation and well-being of the Jewish state, and of the Jewish People itself.

As the third Gaza war enters its fifth week and casualties continue to mount, it is clear that Israel’s policy goal cannot be yet another easily-terminated de facto cease-fire. If a fourth Gazan war is to be avoided, the atavistic terrorists’ ability to re-supply, and ultimately to resume the deadly hostilities, must finally be blocked. And this may well mean the destruction not only of the missiles and tunnels, but of their recidivist progenitor, Hamas.

Islamic State posts execution of US journalist to deter Obama from further involvement in Iraq war, DEBKAfile, August 20, 2014

(Those not asleep for the past twenty-four hours know about the IS execution of Mr. Foley, to which the DEBKAfile post adds little if anything. However, there is useful information down a bit in the article about Tikrit, the Kurds and the Mosul dam.– DM)

US photojournalist James Foley before his execution

DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources report that the Al Qaeda Iraqi wing has been sighted gearing up for a counter-offensive against the Peshmerga and Iraqi army. Their commander, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, has taken some of Saddam Hussein’s most professional and experienced army officers as advisers.

It is almost impossible for US and British spy satellites and aerial surveillance to predict where the Islamists will strike next after the shocking video. They already control vast areas of northern western, central and eastern Iraq, roughly the size of Britain and Ireland combined, with a front line 1.600 km long.

Sending a Shiite force commanded by Iranian officers to recapture a Sunni town like Tikrit was scarcely likely to appeal to the town-dwellers, draw the Sunni factions fighting with IS over to the national Iraqi army, or indeed make them fans of the new prime minister.

***********

Iraqi Islamic State terrorists released a video online Tuesday night, Aug. 19, purportedly showing the beheading of American photo-journalist James Wright Foley, 40, abducted in Syria 22 months ago, after threatening to punish the US and Britain for air strikes in Iraq.

Also visible was another kidnapped US journalist, Stevent Sotloff, who had been missing from northern Syria since July 2013. Under the caption “A Message to America,” it was indicated that Sotlof was being held hostage to the next United States actions in Iraq. It is not clear where the videotaped atrocity had been filmed whether in Syria or Iraq.

It was posted as Iraqi and Kurdish forces awaited tensely for Barack Obama to decide whether to expand US involvement to other sectors of the war against IS, after American and British air strikes tipped the balance of the battle for the Mosul dam. The tape aimed at deterring any foreign intervention in the Iraqi-Kurdish struggle to contain the Islamist advance.

Obama held back from making a public statement about the beheading until the video could be formally authenticated. “If genuine, we are appalled by the brutal murder of an innocent American journalist and we express our deepest condolences to his family and friends,” White House National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said in a statement.

The audio revealed a voiceover in a pure British accent. This was noted in London and prompted UK Prime Minister David Cameron to cut short his vacation and return to Downing Street Wednesday, to take charge of discussions on the British connection with US efforts in support of the forces fighting IS in Iraq.

At least 500 British Muslims have joined IS – possibly twice that number have joined Islamist forces in Syria and Iraq.

As for the situation in Iraq, it is still not clear if Kurdish Peshmerga troops backed by US air strikes have finally wrested the strategic Mosul dam from Islamist control. After its recovery was reported and confirmed Monday by President Obama, who said in Washington: “Iraqi and Kurdish forces, backed by American air strikes, had captured a strategically important dam near Mosul,” witnesses on the spot attested to DEBKAfile’s military sources that renewed fighting had erupted.

It appeared that IS had raised reinforcements from Mosul, just 15 km away to take the strategic dam, the largest in Iraq, back, because they own a strong interest in holding onto it. Blowing it up would inundate large parts of the country and cause tens of thousands of deaths. And so the threat itself is a powerful psychological lever. On the other hand, IS would think twice about carrying it out, because most of the victims would be Sunni Iraqis, whose support and sympathy the group courts.

Control of the dam also provides the town of Mosul, which the Islamic State captured two months ago, with a good defense line as well as a jumping-off position against the Kurdish capital of Irbil, headquarters of the Peshmerga and some 1,000 US servicemen deployed there.

DEBKAfile’s military and intelligence sources report that the Al Qaeda Iraqi wing has been sighted gearing up for a counter-offensive against the Peshmerga and Iraqi army. Their commander, Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, has taken some of Saddam Hussein’s most professional and experienced army officers as advisers.

It is almost impossible for US and British spy satellites and aerial surveillance to predict where the Islamists will strike next after the shocking video. They already control vast areas of northern western, central and eastern Iraq, roughly the size of Britain and Ireland combined, with a front line 1.600 km long.

They have proved they are able to flit across long distances at speed, mingling with indigenous populations, which are friendly enough to keep the Sunni jihadis supplied with intelligence, food, fuel and medical care.

The Islamic State therefore enjoys a substantial strategic advantage on the ground, to offset its relatively small numbers (estimated at 35,000) – even when pitted against the far larger Iraqi army and Kurdish Peshmerga supported by US and British air strikes.

The Peshmerga has mustered some 200,000 fighting men, drawing on its Turkish PKK brethren and Syrian Kurdish militias, as well as Kurdish volunteers from other countries, intent on saving the only Kurdish semiautonomous republic, the KRG, from being overrun by Islamic terrorists.

But Kurdish troops are starved of weapons and ordnance; they have no air force or even helicopters for air cover, and lack armor and self-propelled artillery.

The Islamists in contrast are heavily armed with the latest American tanks and self-propelled artillery taken booty from the 30,000 Iraqi soldiers who fled from their advance.

Tuesday, Iraqi forces launched and halted an offensive to recapture Tikrit, home town of executed dictator Saddam Hussein, in the face of fierce resistance from Islamic State fighters. This was the seventh Iraqi military bid to recapture the predominantly Sunni town of Tikrit, which fell to IS in late June, and which commands the highways linking Baghdad to the north and the east.

This attempt had special significance, because it was the first Iraqi military operation since Haidar Al-Abadi took over as prime minister of Iraq last week from fellow-Shiite Nouri al-Maliki. The new man was heavily backed by the Obama administration in the belief that he would have better luck than his predecessor in persuading Sunni leaders to support a major campaign to halt the Islamic State.

But the operation was doomed from the start by the composition of the assault units. They consisted of poorly trained Iraqi Shiite militiamen, accompanied by Iranian Revolutionary Guards officers, under the command of Al Qods Brigades chief Gen. Qassam Soleimani.

Sending a Shiite force commanded by Iranian officers to recapture a Sunni town like Tikrit was scarcely likely to appeal to the town-dwellers, draw the Sunni factions fighting with IS over to the national Iraqi army, or indeed make them fans of the new prime minister.

▶ Queen – Another One Bites the Dust Official Video – YouTube.

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IRAQ: ISIS terrorists’ mass executions and beheadings of Iraqi soldiers and civilians
By Patricia Date August 9, 2014

(Another beheading video? Yes. If you want to see it, follow the above link. But that’s not what I want to present here. One video of a coward, a victim, and a knife is enough. What I want to present is the comment posted by someone calling herself Patricia. Great comment. I think you’ll agree.-LS)

From Patricia:

“Though these videos are extremely hard to watch & I could not stomach more than 3 of the beheadings, everyone, including Obama himself, needs to see what these devils are doing! These demon possessed PIGS are the scum of the earth!! They are raised to think & act like this from the time they learn to walk & talk so by the time they are 6 or 7 they are stating the fact that they cannot wait to behave in like manner as their heroes do & saw off the heads of every Jew & Christian throughout the world, be they man, woman or child!!

Someday we may finally know who is behind the curtain & making all the calls for this President (possibly Valarie Jarred who is usually at his side, but rarely no more than a few steps behind Obama). Obama himself has stated on numerous occasions that he only knew about such & such event after he read it in the paper or hears about it on the news. That being the case, who is behind the curtain & running things while Obama is off playing yet another round of golf as one disaster after another is taking place all around us?
As in the book, “The Wizard of Oz”, 3 of the main characters in this WH are the ‘Tin Man’ with no heart (for his job), played by Obama himself. Next we have the brainless ‘Scarecrow’ known as Joe Biden, who is forever putting his foot in his mouth. And thirdly we have the “cowardly Lion”, who is in reality the cowardly John Kerry. Kerry is a left over from the Vietnam days who showed his cowardly ways by giving aid & comfort to the enemy back then & today we see him once again giving aid & comfort to enemy Muslim terrorist groups (the PLO) against our true ally, Israel.

People may have been duped into voting for Obama the first time around by the cover-up that took place by the mainstream media & I considered those people to be IGNORANT! 4 years later those same people continued to be ignorant because they didn’t want to admit they had been wrong nor admit that Obama was destroying America, so they voted for him again. Or as in the case of most Democrats, and to quote my Democrat neighbor, “I only vote for Democrats no matter who they are!” (huh? Even if the person is the personification of Hitler himself??). So those who voted for him the 2nd time around, I cannot consider them to be ignorant, I now consider them to be nothing more than TRAITORS!!

Today we see the Tin Man still has no heart to be the leader of the (once) free world as he has continued to tear down America while turning his back to the be-headings and other murderous acts against Christians & Jews in Africa and elsewhere while catering to Muslims. He once more claims he knew nothing about what was taking place with Issis until 2 days he was informed that they were closing in on Mosul. If he had acted at the very beginning of Issis’ move, they would not be where they are today nor would they have beheaded children and Iraqi soldiers & civilians. As usual with this Tin Man, he is once again “a day late and a dollar short”. Now, in an attempt to quiet the cries directed toward him, the Tin Man “plays” at war by selectively dropping a few bombs here & there. If he had a heart for his job, he would eradicate these PIGS known as Issis from the world. He would order a 24 hour assault against Issis in order to wipe out every weapon at their disposal (due to the Iraqi army, who as usual, were too cowardly to stand & fight).”

(Now we see Obama and the rest of his filthy race-baiting cowards inciting riots in Ferguson. Scenes from this once peaceful community in the beautiful state of Missouri are beginning to resemble the ‘arab street’. Thanks a fucking lot for your lack of leadership you semi-retired President Obama.-LS)