DreamHost ordered to hand over data on anti-Trump website: The criminalization of political dissent - World Socialist Web Site
▻https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2017/08/26/pers-a26.html
In a chilling attack on free speech, a District of Columbia Superior Court judge Thursday ordered the web hosting company DreamHost to make available to the Trump administration vast amounts of data related to a website, disruptj20.org, which organized protests against Trump’s inauguration in January.
North Korea war not ’imminent,’ Trump aides say
▻https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/08/13/north-korea-war-not-imminent-trump-aides-say/562957001
Top Trump administration officials sought to assure Americans on Sunday that the nation is not on the brink of nuclear war with North Korea, despite the president’s recent threats.
National security adviser H.R. McMaster and Central Intelligence Agency Director Mike Pompeo said an attack by North Korea does not appear imminent, and that the threat of war is no closer today than it was last week.
“I think we’re not closer to war than a week ago, but we are closer to war than we were a decade ago,” McMaster said on ABC’s This Week. “The danger is much greater and is growing every day, with every missile test, with the consideration of possibly a sixth nuclear test. And so what we can no longer do is afford to procrastinate.”
“I’ve heard folks talking about [the U.S.] being on the cusp of nuclear war,” Pompeo said on Fox News Sunday. “I’ve seen no intelligence that would indicate that we’re in that place today.”
McMaster said President Trump’s references to the U.S. military being “locked and loaded” is an effort to maintain peace, not provoke war. The military has made no significant movement of troops or equipment in recent days to prepare to fight North Korea.
“The United States military is always locked and loaded, but the purpose of capable, ready forces is to preserve peace and prevent war," he said. "George Washington said it: The most effective way of preserving peace is to be prepared for war.”
Tout est bon pour rétropédaler, même attribuer l’antique si vis pacem para bellum au pater conscriptus George Washington…
:-D
Trump gets a folder full of positive news about himself twice a day
▻https://news.vice.com/story/trump-folder-positive-news-white-house
Twice a day since the beginning of the Trump administration, a special folder is prepared for the president. The first document is prepared around 9:30 a.m. and the follow-up, around 4:30 p.m. Former Chief of Staff Reince Priebus and former Press Secretary Sean Spicer both wanted the privilege of delivering the 20-to-25-page packet to President Trump personally, White House sources say.
These sensitive papers, described to VICE News by three current and former White House officials, don’t contain top-secret intelligence or updates on legislative initiatives. Instead, the folders are filled with screenshots of positive cable news chyrons (those lower-third headlines and crawls), admiring tweets, transcripts of fawning TV interviews, praise-filled news stories, and sometimes just pictures of Trump on TV looking powerful.
What is the culture of “Trumpism”? What best characterizes the rhetoric, actions, and personality of a figure so dazzlingly conceited, so pathologically narcissistic, and yet so politically inept that he has stunned many into stunned disbelief? As President Donald J. Trump’s administration is gradually staffed, we are beginning to get a clearer idea.
▻https://www.cineaste.com/summer2017/trump-at-the-movies-ayn-rand-fountainhead
US federal department is censoring use of term ’climate change’, emails reveal | Environment | The Guardian
▻https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/aug/07/usda-climate-change-language-censorship-emails
On vit une époque formidable.
Staff at the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) have been told to avoid using the term climate change in their work, with the officials instructed to reference “weather extremes” instead.
A series of emails obtained by the Guardian between staff at the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), a USDA unit that oversees farmers’ land conservation, show that the incoming Trump administration has had a stark impact on the language used by some federal employees around climate change.
EA and Take-Two say Trump administration is harming the games industry
▻http://www.gamesindustry.biz/articles/2017-08-03-ea-and-take-two-say-trump-administration-is-harming-the-ga
There is a constant shortage of qualified, high-skilled labour within our industry
The Mothers Being Deported by Trump
On June 28th, President Trump convened a roundtable at the White House that included victims of crimes committed by undocumented immigrants. The event was part of the Administration’s push to pass several new immigration bills designed to, in Trump’s words, “close the dangerous loopholes exploited by criminals, gang members, drug dealers, killers, terrorists.” A regular theme of the Trump Administration’s messaging on immigration has been to present undocumented “bad hombres” as an immediate threat to the safety and cohesion of the American family unit.
In Victory for #Standing_Rock Sioux Tribe, Court Finds That Approval of Dakota Access Pipeline Violated the Law - THE INDIGENOUS AMERICAN
►https://www.theindigenousamericans.com/2017/07/16/victory-standing-rock-sioux-tribe-court-finds-approval-dakot
Ruling: Trump administration shortcut environmental review; Court seeks additional briefing on whether to shut down pipeline – Washington, D.C. —
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe won a significant victory today in its fight to protect the Tribe’s drinking water and ancestral lands from the Dakota Access pipeline.
A federal judge ruled that the federal permits authorizing the pipeline to cross the Missouri River just upstream of the Standing Rock reservation, which were hastily issued by the Trump administration just days after the inauguration, violated the law in certain critical respects.
In a 91-page decision, Judge James Boasberg wrote, “the Court agrees that [the Corps] did not adequately consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice, or the degree to which the pipeline’s effects are likely to be highly controversial.”
#états-unis #peuples_premiers #nations_premières #peuples_autochtones
#Israel escalates threats against Iran - Middle East News - Haaretz.com
▻http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/1.802076
But developments along the Syrian border have an even greater potential for drama. Though it’s doubtful Israel will attack Iranian bases in Syria the next morning, as Amidror’s words might seem to imply, there’s clearly a point of friction over which Netanyahu, for the first time, has been willing to publicly clash with the Trump administration.
Israel’s suspicions about Washington’s conduct in the Syrian theater relate to several issues: Russian-American coordination, which Israel sees as being dictated mainly by Moscow; the emerging American plan to reduce its military presence in the region once the Islamic State is defeated in its Syrian capital of Raqqa; and Trump’s apparent acceptance of Iran’s growing role in Syria.
The administration’s announcement, two years after the nuclear deal was signed with Iran, that Tehran is honoring its commitment to freeze its nuclear program also apparently made Netanyahu uncomfortable. Until then, President Donald Trump had sounded much more forceful and suspicious toward Iran than some of his top officials.
In Victory for Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, Court Finds That Approval of Dakota Access Pipeline Violated the Law - THE INDIGENOUS AMERICAN
►https://www.theindigenousamericans.com/2017/07/16/victory-standing-rock-sioux-tribe-court-finds-approval-dakot
The #Standing_Rock Sioux Tribe won a significant victory today in its fight to protect the Tribe’s drinking water and ancestral lands from the Dakota Access pipeline.
A federal judge ruled that the federal permits authorizing the pipeline to cross the Missouri River just upstream of the Standing Rock reservation, which were hastily issued by the Trump administration just days after the inauguration, violated the law in certain critical respects.
In a 91-page decision, Judge James Boasberg wrote, “the Court agrees that [the Corps] did not adequately consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice, or the degree to which the pipeline’s effects are likely to be highly controversial.”
The Court did not determine whether pipeline operations should be shut off and has requested additional briefing on the subject and a status conference next week.
Court Blocks E.P.A. Effort to Suspend Obama-Era Methane Rule - The New York Times
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/03/climate/court-blocks-epa-effort-to-suspend-obama-era-methane-rule.html
Dealing a legal blow to the Trump administration, a federal appeals court ruled on Monday that the Environmental Protection Agency cannot suspend an Obama-era rule to restrict methane emissions from new oil and gas wells.
The 2-to-1 decision from the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit is a legal setback for Scott Pruitt, the E.P.A. administrator, who is trying to roll back dozens of Obama-era environmental regulations. The ruling signals that the Trump administration’s efforts to simply delay environmental and public health actions are likely to face an uphill battle in the courts and require a more painstaking process.
EPA Takes First Step to Repeal Clean Water Rule - Pacific Standard
▻https://psmag.com/environment/epa-takes-first-step-to-repeal-clean-water-rule
The Environmental Protection Agency took the first formal step on Tuesday to repeal the Clean Water Rule, which the Trump administration hopes to replace with a more industry-friendly version.
“We are taking significant action to return power to the states and provide regulatory certainty to our nation’s farmers and businesses,” EPA head Scott Pruitt said in a statement.
The Obama-era regulation, which was based on a review of more than 1,200 peer-reviewed scientific studies and the input of hundreds of stakeholders, was meant to protect our nation’s waterways from pollution, and determine which water bodies were subject to federal oversight. A 2015 survey found that 80 percent of Americans, including 94 percent of Democrats and 68 percent of Republicans, supported the rule.
“Once again, the Trump Administration has agreed to do the bidding of the worst polluters in our country, and once again it’s putting the health of American families and communities at risk,” Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in a statement.
#Environnement #Eau #USA
MEXICO’S SOUTHERN BORDER
http://i.imgur.com/UsKmVoL.png 
http://i.imgur.com/PlN0mok.png 
http://i.imgur.com/8yK54ol.png 
http://i.imgur.com/m7NXcCo.png 
http://i.imgur.com/sOtaXkc.png #frontières #Mexique #asile #migrations #transit #réfugiés #rapport #statistiques #chiffres
A Flawed Asylum System in Mexico, Strained Further by U.S. Changes
MEXICO CITY — As the Trump administration pushes forward with its plans to harden the southwest border, Mexico has found itself under pressure to take in an increasing number of asylum seekers making their way north from Central America, many of them fleeing gang violence.
▻https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/05/world/americas/mexico-central-america-migrants-refugees-asylum-comar.html?_r=0
Cherry Picking Intelligence For War in the Middle East? Here We Go Again - Defense One
▻http://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2017/06/cherry-picking-intelligence-war-middle-east-here-we-go-again/139030
Will Trump follow the Bush playbook and start a war with #Iran?
The ingredients are in place for the United States to repeat a scenario that has cost us dearly in the past: the misuse of intelligence to muster public support for an unwise war. Fifteen years ago, Bush administration officials led the nation to invade Iraq based on their own political agenda more than facts. This time the adversary would be Iran, the target of unrelenting hostility from the Trump administration.
Assad préparerait une attaque chimique selon Washington, qui menace Damas - L’Orient-Le Jour
▻https://www.lorientlejour.com/article/1059269/assad-preparerait-une-attaque-chimique-selon-washington-qui-menace-da
Ce Bachar, il est tellement bête qu’il ne mérite pas d’être sur terre comme disait l’autre ! Non seulement il fait des attaques chimiques tactiquement inutiles, mais en plus il le dit à l’avance. La #syrie, toujours aussi surréaliste !
A moins que ce ne soit une réacrtion aux nouvelles révélations de Seymour Hersh : « Une enquête menée par le célèbre journaliste Seymour Hersh prétend que les autorités américaines savaient que l’armée syrienne n’avait pas utilisé d’armes chimiques à Khan Cheikhoun en avril dernier », fort peu relayées comme il se doit (▻https://francais.rt.com/international/40209-donald-trump-disposait-il-preuves-tangibles-justifiant-attaque-al).
Juste un aperçu :
Assad may be preparing a chemical attack, says US - Aljazeera.com
Assad preparing new chemical weapons attack in Syria, claims ... - The Guardian
White House says Syria’s Assad preparing another chemical attack ... - Washington Post
White House Suspects Syria Is Preparing For Another Chemical Attack - NPR
Assad regime ’preparing chemical weapons attack’, White House says - Sky News
Syria Will ’Pay a Heavy Price’ for Another Chemical Attack, White ... -New York Times
White House says Syria’s Assad preparing another chemical attack, warns of ’heavy’ penalty - Washington Post
White House warns Syria’s Assad against chemical attack -
Los Angeles Times
US warns Syria over ’potential’ plan for chemical attack - BBC News
White House accuses Syria of preparing another chemical attack, issues ominous warning to Assad - Business Insider
White House threatens Syria over possible chemical attack - Politico
US threatens Syria, says Assad is planning chemical weapons attack - Reuters
Et il y en a encore des pages comme ça !
Et dans ces cas là, tout le monde (qui compte) se (re)met à aimer Trump,
Tight circle of security officials crafted Trump’s Syria warning - POLITICO
▻http://www.politico.com/story/2017/06/27/trump-syria-warning-security-240021
The move, and the frustration were reflective of the Trump administration’s approach of making key decisions within a close, inner circle — unlike the deliberative, and sometimes paralyzingly inclusive, decision making that defined Obama’s process.
Syrie. Macron et Trump prêts à riposter en cas de nouvelle attaque chimique
▻http://www.ouest-france.fr/monde/syrie/syrie-macron-et-trump-prets-riposter-en-cas-de-nouvelle-attaque-chimiqu
Les présidents français et américain Emmanuel Macron et Donald Trump ont souligné mardi lors d’une conversation téléphonique « la nécessité de travailler à une réponse commune en cas d’attaque chimique en Syrie », a annoncé la présidence française.
U.S. Will Lose Syria to Iran and Abandon Kurdish Allies, Former Ambassador Says
▻http://www.newsweek.com/us-military-kurds-lose-iran-syria-former-ambassador-627395
Robert Ford, who served as envoy to Syria under former President Barack Obama from 2011 through 2014, said during an interview Monday with the London-based Arabic-language newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat that “Obama did not leave the Trump administration many options to achieve its goal” of defeating the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) and curbing Iran’s foothold in the region. While Iran and Russia back Syrian President Bashar al-Assad against various insurgents and jihadists trying to topple him, the U.S. supports an irregular coalition, the Syrian Democratic Forces, made up mostly of Kurds, but including other ethnic minorities and Arabs. Despite the group’s recent successes in storming ISIS’s de facto capital of Raqqa, Ford said “the game was finished” for U.S. plans to overthrow Assad or compete with Iran’s success in the country.
(...) The Syrian Democratic Forces were mostly neutral in the battle between pro- and anti-Syrian government forces, but tensions have risen between the U.S. and pro-Syrian government forces that now share extensive front lines since ISIS’s collapse on multiple fronts. Recent clashes between the Syrian army and the Syrian Democratic Forces were followed by the U.S.’s unprecedented decision to shoot down a Syrian military jet it claimed was operating too close to positions held by the Syrian Democratic Forces. Siding with the U.S,, however, will turn out to be a grave mistake for the Kurds, according to Ford. He said U.S. support for Kurds would disappear, as it did in post-invasion Iraq, after ISIS was defeated in Raqqa and in other areas.
“[The U.S.] will not defend the Kurds against Assad’s forces,” the former envoy said. “What we’re doing with the Kurds is not only politically stupid, but immoral.”
“Syrian Kurds are making their biggest mistake in trusting the Americans,” he added.
De fait, on peut imaginer que ce seront les Kurdes qui finiront par payer la note en #syrie, même si c’est immoral comme le dit un ex-ambassadeur qui s’y connaît dans ce domaine...
Israel, Saudi Arabia are reportedly negotiating economic ties
Ties between Israel and Saudi Arabia, two of Iran’s staunchest enemies, would start small, The Times reports
Haaretz Jun 17,
read more: ▻http://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/1.796215
Saudi Arabia and Israel are negotiating the establishment of economic ties, The Times reported on Saturday.
The British daily quoted Arab and American sources as saying that the first steps toward ties between two of Iran’s staunchest enemies would start small, including allowing Israeli businesses to operate in the Gulf and letting Israel’s El Al airline fly over Saudi airspace.
>> Get all updates on Israel, Trump and the Palestinians: Download our free App, and Subscribe >>
But it also cited sources close to Saudi Arabia as saying that improved relations between the two countries are nothing more than wishful thinking on the part of the White House in the wake of President Trump’s promise to reach the “ultimate” peace deal in the Middle East.
The report said the prospect has caused discord in the Trump administration. Jared Kushner, Trump’s adviser and son-in-law, has grown close to Mohammed bin Salman, the Saudi deputy crown prince, and the two have reportedly discussed improved ties with Israel as a step toward Israeli-Palestinian peace. In contrast, Trump’s envoy to the Middle East, Jason Greenblatt, is favoring a more traditional approach to the peace process.
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According to the report, the Palestinians are opposed to the idea, fearing it would normalize ties between Arab states and Israel without ensuring the establishment of a Palestinian state.
BOYCOTT the June 19 Tech Summit
▻https://techsolidarity.org/boycott_the_june_19_summit.html
Boycott the Trump Summit
On Monday, June 19, the CEOs of at least six major tech companies plan to fly to the White House to attend a meeting with Donald Trump. The known attendees are:
Jeff Bezos, Amazon
Satya Nadella, Microsoft
Tim Cook, Apple
Safra Catz, Oracle
Ginny Rometty, IBM
Eric Schmidt, Alphabet (aka Google)
The remit of the group will be to “transform and modernize” government information technology and digital services, under the leadership of Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law.
This meeting doesn’t have to happen. Tech employees have the power to stop it.
We’ve learned in the last six months that there is no clean way to do business with the Trump Administration. The President does not respect boundaries or institutions. You are either for him, or against him. That decision doesn’t belong to our CEOs; it belongs to us as an industry.
Tech executives met with Trump once before, in a famously awkward December meeting in Trump Tower. They know perfectly well who they’re dealing with, and yet they’re choosing to offer their tacit support to:
- A president who has attempted to bar people, including our own neighbors and colleagues, from entering the United States based on their religious beliefs or national origin.
- A president who has boasted on tape of his history of sexual assault.
- A president who has made shameless use of his office to profit his many business interests.
- A president who has unilaterally withdrawn the United States from the Paris agreement, and makes public statements doubting the existence of climate change.
- A president whose Administration is even now passing a bill in secret to deprive millions of Americans of health care.
- A president who fired his own FBI director for investigating his Administration, and who now accuses him of perjury.
- A president whose agenda for tech includes dismantling the few remaining protections on online privacy, and eliminating net neutrality.
Appel au boycott de la réunion des Gafam avec Trump le 19 juin 2017.
About 4,000 more US troops to go to #Afghanistan - ABC News
▻http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/apnewsbreak-us-send-4000-troops-afghanistan-48074562
The Pentagon will send almost 4,000 additional American forces to Afghanistan, a Trump administration official said Thursday, hoping to break a stalemate in a war that has now passed to a third U.S. commander in chief. The deployment will be the largest of American manpower under Donald Trump’s young presidency.
US signs deal to supply F-15 jets to Qatar after Trump terror claims | World news | The Guardian
▻https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/15/us-signs-deal-to-supply-f-15-jets-to-qatar-after-trump-terror-claims
The US and Qatar have signed a $12bn deal to supply dozens of F-15 jets to the tiny gas-rich Gulf emirate, despite recent high-profile claims by President Donald Trump alleging Qatar’s “high-level funding” of terrorism.
The signing of the deal on Wednesday is the latest twist in the highly contradictory US diplomacy over the crisis around Qatar – now in its second week – with the emirate targeted by a Saudi-led embargo.
Hailed by Qatar, the deal underlines the reigning confusion inside the Trump administration as it handles one of its first big foreign policy crises, which was in large part triggered by Trump.
En gros c’était du bluff pour les menacer et leur faire acheter du matériel de protection US ? C’est du pur racket mafieux
La demande avait été acceptée dans son principe en novembre 2016 (sous BHO donc) pour un montant de 21,1 $Mds
Government of Qatar – F-15QA Aircraft with Weapons and Related Support | The Official Home of the Defense Security Cooperation Agency
▻http://www.dsca.mil/major-arms-sales/government-qatar-f-15qa-aircraft-weapons-and-related-support
The Government of Qatar requested to purchase seventy-two (72) F-15QA multi-role fighter aircraft and associated weapons package; the provision for continental United States based Lead-in-Fighter-Training for the F-15QA; associated ground support; training materials; mission critical resources and maintenance support equipment; the procurement for various weapon support and test equipment spares; technical publications; personnel training; simulators and other training equipment; U.S. Government and contractor engineering; technical and logistics support services; and other related elements of logistical and program support. The estimated total program value is $21.1 billion.
This proposed sale enhances the foreign policy and national security of the United State by helping to improve the security of a friendly country and strengthening our strategically important relationship. Qatar is an important force for political stability and economic progress in the Persian Gulf region. Our mutual defense interests anchor our relationship and the Qatar Emiri Air Force (QEAF) plays a predominant role in Qatar’s defense.
Ça fait drôle de relire la motivation aujourd’hui…
Troubled waters in the Gulf
▻http://www.petroleum-economist.com/articles/politics-economics/middle-east/2017/troubled-waters-in-the-gulf
Even before the Qatar controversy erupted, the population of the Gulf was witnessing a radical change in leadership styles—at least in two of the key GCC states, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Two charismatic and ambitious leaders, Deputy Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman, the son of the king of Saudi Arabia, and Muhammad bin Zaid, crown prince of Abu Dhabi and the strongman of the UAE, have led the way.
These two young and energetic princes have challenged the traditional structures and mechanisms of Gulf leadership, offering a new approach that’s more decisive, but less accountable and less predictable.
[...]
The continuation of this new leadership trend would gradually give the two men involved a status more akin to an all-powerful president than a king, more like Sisi of Egypt than the late King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. For many Gulf citizens this represents a traumatic break with tradition, disturbing in a region where change has always been gradual and measured, and the future has never looked anything other than calm and secure.
There is a danger that the populations could feel even more disenfranchised than before. And with the solid support of the Trump administration, which has cast aside Obama’s dictum that Arab states adhere to high standards of human rights, dissent would be firmly stifled.
Trump Weighing Combining Agencies Separated After Gulf Spill, Sources Say - Bloomberg
▻https://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2017-06-08/trump-said-to-mull-combining-agencies-separated-after-gulf-spill
After the 2010 Gulf oil spill, the Obama administration broke the scandal-plagued federal agency that policed offshore drilling into separate bureaus.
Now the Trump administration is considering putting it back together again.
The change, described by Interior Department officials and lobbyists familiar with the deliberations, would combine two agencies: one that enforces regulations on offshore drilling safety and another in charge of leasing offshore tracts. Keeping those roles separate was a key recommendation of a presidential commission that investigated the #Deepwater_Horizon blast that killed 11 men and sent oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico for months.
Au cas où on n’aurait pas encore compris qui élabore la politique industrielle et la réglementation aux États-Unis…
Perverse Law in 9 States Enriches Donors to Private Schools: Trump Could Be on the Verge of Taking It National | Alternet
▻http://www.alternet.org/education/perverse-law-9-states-enriches-donors-private-schools-trump-could-be-verge
Education
Perverse Law in 9 States Enriches Donors to Private Schools: Trump Could Be on the Verge of Taking It National
A GOP-sponsored bill finds more ways to starve traditional public schools.
By Steven Rosenfeld / AlterNet
June 5, 2017, 1:39 PM GMT
The Trump administration’s push to privatize public education not only seeks to deprive traditional K-12 schools of billions in federal aid, but may greatly expand existing tax loopholes that already allow wealthy people and firms to make money on donating to private schools.
The proposed Education Opportunities Act would “put two new federal voucher tax shelters within reach for many more Americans and lead to an explosion in funding for private schools,” a joint release from the School Superintendents Association (ASSA) and Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP) said. “It would also keep in place an existing federal loophole that permits savvy taxpayers to benefit from certain ‘double-dipping’ practices, where they receive a federal deduction and state tax credit on the same donation to a private school.”
Ambassador Slammed Donald Trump Amid UAE Campaign To Isolate Qatar | HuffPost
▻http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/yousef-al-otaiba-emails-trump_us_59358e71e4b013c48169d5dc?section=us
WASHINGTON ― Yousef Al Otaiba, the United Arab Emirates’ ambassador to the U.S. and a confidant of White House senior adviser Jared Kushner, repeatedly criticized President Donald Trump in private correspondence last year ― including with officials loyal to President Barack Obama ― emails obtained by HuffPost show.
Otaiba, one of the most powerful diplomats in Washington, figures in an unfolding regional crisis centered on U.S. partner nation Qatar, which hosts America’s largest military base in the region. The UAE and three other U.S.-aligned Middle East governments ratcheted up a simmering dispute with Qatar on Sunday night when they cut diplomatic and transportation ties to the Gulf nation over its support of the transnational Muslim Brotherhood and alleged assistance to Iran-backed militants around the region.
The Trump administration has not taken a formal position on the issue. Many in Trump’s orbit agree with the UAE on the need to combat forces that Qatar supports in the region, particularly the Muslim Brotherhood movement. The UAE has designated the group a terrorist organization and pushed for the U.S. to do the same, a step counterterrorism researchers say would be controversial and risky.
The leaked emails, which show Otaiba’s comments during a yearlong campaign to discredit Qatar in the U.S., threaten the UAE’s hope to win official American blessing for its pressure campaign against the Qataris. Trump is notoriously thin-skinned: He has banned people who publicly criticized him from his team (including GOP consigliere Elliott Abrams, a fellow Qatar skeptic who is friends with Otaiba) and seems unable to get over slights even years after they occur. And his administration already seems disinclined to pick a side. Top officials like Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Defense Secretary James Mattis have emphasized the importance of resolving the dispute.
Israel set to approve plans for 2,100 new settlement housing units in West Bank - Israel News - Haaretz.com
▻http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.793342
Settlers had hoped for approval of thousands more homes, but Prime Minister’s Office reduced the number; around 600 outside of settlement blocs
Yotam Berger and Barak Ravid Jun 03, 2017 9:02 PM
Some 2,100 new housing units all over the West Bank will be on the agenda of the planning and building committee of the Israel Defense Forces’ Civil Administration next week. Most of the units – around 1,500 – are to be constructed inside the settlement blocs.
The top planning council for the West Bank announced the agenda for the meeting on Friday morning. This is the first significant meeting of the council since U.S. President Donald Trump took office in January.
While some of the plans to be examined relate to final approval before construction, the vast majority still have some way to go before reaching that stage.
Many of the projects are not actually new, but their progress has been delayed for bureaucratic reasons, a source told Haaretz. Some of the housing units already exist and their approval by the planning council will just authorize their status retroactively, he added.
Despite the seemingly large number of homes under consideration, the settler leadership was disappointed because it had hoped for thousands more units to be discussed by the planning council.
On Friday, several settlement leaders released statements accusing Netanyahu of freezing construction.
Yossi Dagan, the head of the Samaria Regional Council, said in a statement to the press that “Netanyahu is trying to create a voluntary construction freeze. After eight years of Obama, a new freeze won’t pass.”
Knesset Member Bezalel Smotrich said on Twitter that the agenda is “very disappointing,” and added: “I don’t think we will be able to live with it.”
The Yesha council, an umbrella organization for all local authorities in the territories, said that while it welcomes the renewed planning and construction, dozens of plans are missing from the agenda.
The prime minister’s bureau reacted angrily to the statements.
“Contrary to the claims, there is no construction freeze,” it said. "In recent months, thousands of housing units have been approved across Judea and Samaria, and a new town has been approved for the first time in decades.
“Repeating the lie doesn’t make it true. The policy set by the cabinet is very clear: planning will be advanced next to the settlements’ built-up area, and plans are to be approved every three months. No one takes care of the settlements more than Prime Minister Netanyahu, while also maintaining the national and international interests of the State of Israel in an informed manner.”
Settlers’ dashed hopes
The planning council will meet to issue permits to advance a number of different projects in various settlements. Some of the plans are outside the large settlement blocs and will be for construction in Susya, in the South Hebron Hills; Beit El, north of Jerusalem; and Revava in the northern West Bank. However, a large amount of the construction expected to be approved is in Ma’aleh Adumim, east of Jerusalem, and Ariel.
The publication of the agenda of the Civil Administration’s top planning council came after a meeting Thursday evening in the Prime Minister’s Office.
The settlers have been waiting for the meeting for weeks, and the regional councils in the West Bank and the Yesha Council of Settlements in Judea and Samaria had been hoping the meeting would lead to the legalization of unauthorized outposts and the approval of thousands of new homes.
The settler leadership had hoped understandings with the Trump administration would enable the advancement of numerous projects that were frozen during the Obama administration.
Settler leaders have said recently they expected five-digit numbers of new housing units to be approved all over the West Bank, both inside and outside the settlement blocs.
At Thursday’s meeting in the PMO, it was decided to limit the number of units to be discussed by the planning council, two people involved in the process told Haaretz.
Now the settlers are hoping for approval of at least 5,000 new housing units, and not the tens of thousands they had hoped for.
Thousands of units were taken off the agenda at the meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, said one of those involved.
The retroactive legalization of the unauthorized outpost of Kerem Re’im in the Mateh Binyamin Regional Council will be on the agenda, and its expansion may even be discussed.
Will Trump’s Slow-Mo Walkaway, World in Flames Behind Him, Finally Provoke Consequences for Planetary Arson?
▻https://theintercept.com/2017/06/01/will-trumps-slow-mo-walkaway-world-in-flames-behind-him-finally-provok
Pretty much everything that is weak, disappointing, and inadequate about that deal is the result of U.S. lobbying since 2009.
The fact that the agreement only commits governments to keeping warming below an increase of 2 degrees, rather than a much safer firm target of 1.5 degrees, was lobbied for and won by the United States.
The fact that the agreement left it to individual nations to determine how much they were willing to do to reach that temperature target, allowing them to come to Paris with commitments that collectively put us on a disastrous course toward more than 3 degrees of warming, was lobbied for and won by the United States.
The fact that the agreement treats even these inadequate commitments as non-binding, which means governments apparently do not have anything to fear if they ignore their commitments, is something else that was lobbied for and won by the United States.
The fact that the agreement specifically prohibits poor countries from seeking damages for the costs of climate disasters was lobbied for and won by the United States.
The fact that it is an “agreement” or an “accord” and not a treaty — the very thing that makes it possible for Trump to stage his action-movie slow-mo walk away, world in flames behind him — was lobbied for and won by the United States.
Oui, voilà, Obama n’est pas sans reproche dans cette histoire sordide, je le précise pour tous les qui y croient encore...
Dès qu’un accord multilatéral est en discussion, ils (les US) participent, affaiblissent au maximum l’accord, et finalement en sortent...
So as we try to make sense of this latest drama, make no mistake: The Trump administration was never divided between those who wanted to shred the Paris Agreement and those who wanted to respect it. It was divided between those who wanted to shred it and those who wanted to stay in it but completely ignore it. The difference is one of optics; the same amount of carbon gets spewed either way.