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On Monday Oct 8.2018 , merchants in several Iranian cities went on strike and refused to open for business in an extension of ongoing protests against the regime of Tehran. The strike, which was preplanned and widely distributed across social media channels, is in protest to increasing prices and high inflation rates. The protest movement comprises 25 of Iran’s major cities Mrs. Maryam Rajavi, President-elect of the Iranian Resistance, commended the brave bazaar merchants and shopkeepers in Tehran and dozens of other Iranian cities who are on strike against the mullahs' corrupt regime. She said that the bazaar strike, coming...

A sprawling mansion on the Upper East Side has been frozen as part of a hard-core battle between the US government and Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, The Post has learned. US officials say Deripaska, an aluminum billionaire, is close both with Russian mob leaders and Russian President Vladimir Putin — and that he is on the sanctions list because he is allegedly involved in murder, money-laundering, bribery and racketeering. Deripaska also had President Trump’s ex-campaign manager Paul Manafort — who has been convicted of crimes including money-laundering and who is cooperating with US special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia probe —...

Iraqi social media star and model Tara Fares has been shot dead in Baghdad….The former Miss Baghdad, and first runner-up for Miss Iraq, was killed on Thursday after gunmen opened fire on her Tara was a Christian and “famous for her bold clothing and posts on social media.” Those attributes sealed her fate, along with that of other women in her country who fly in the face of the Sharia, such as the human rights activist, Suaad al-Ali, who “was shot and killed in an outdoor market by an unknown gunman” two days before. Last month, “two well-known women in...

Despite the United States recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in December and relocating its embassy from Tel Aviv in May, Americans born in Jerusalem are still unable to list “Jerusalem, Israel” on U.S. passports. “The president has made clear that the specific boundaries of Israeli sovereignty in Jerusalem remain subject to final-status negotiations between the [Israelis and the Palestinians],” a State Department spokesperson told JNS. “We have not changed our practice regarding place of birth on passports or Consular Reports of Birth Abroad at this time.”

Russia Derangement Syndrome: Syria Edition by David Archibald 6 August 2018 The road to hell is paved with good intentions. So it has been with US involvement in Syria. To provide a context to that involvement, let’s start part way through the story with the self-immolation of a Tunisian vegetable vendor on December 17, 2011, driven to despair by harassment from petty officials. That spark set off the Arab Spring. A number of Arab regimes changed; some remained resilient. That wasn’t good enough for David Cameron and Nicholas Sarkozy, the then leaders of the UK and France respectively. Their armed...

Former Secretary of State Colin Powell spoke out against President Donald Trump in an interview with CNN’s Fareed Zakaria on Sunday, blasting his anti-press rhetoric, the retreat from the world stage, and his insults of U.S. allies.

Women’s March leader Linda Sarsour on Friday launched a racial attack against Sen. Susan Collins, saying the Maine Republican was guilty of espousing “white supremacy” with her decision to support the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Brett Kavanaugh. Ms. Sarsour, a prominent Palestinian-American activist, blasted Ms. Collins on Twitter as a “white woman” and the “mother & grandmother of white women in America who gave us a Donald Trump presidency.”

JERUSALEM (Reuters) - An Israeli official played down on Wednesday the Russian upgrading of Syria’s air defences, saying the newly supplied S-300 missile system could be defeated by Israel’s stealth fighters and possibly destroyed on the ground. Moscow said on Tuesday that it had delivered the S-300, a decision it took after accusing Israel of indirect responsibility for the downing of a Russian spy plane by Syrian forces as they fired on attacking Israeli jets last month. Damascus and its big-power backer describe the advanced addition to Syria’s arsenal as a major deterrent. Israel and Washington have both voiced misgivings...

The Sudanese government has cleared a shipment of Bibles believed to have been held in Port Sudan for six years. The Arabic-language Bibles were released two weeks ago and transported to the capital, Khartoum, after years of appeals by church leaders, a local source told World Watch Monitor. “Since 2011, government customs officials have delayed the clearing of several shipments of Arabic Bibles via Port Sudan, without explanation,” the source said, adding that it had left Bibles decaying in shipping containers at the port while the approximate 2 million Christians in the country were facing a serious shortage of Bibles...

Former US Secretary of State John Kerry on Friday warned of a war with Iran after the United States pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal between the Islamic Republic and world powers, AFP reported. Kerry spearheaded the diplomacy that led to the 2015 agreement in which Iran promised Western powers, Russia and China to scale back its nuclear program drastically in return for sanctions relief. In May, US President Donald Trump withdrew from the agreement, which he has slammed as “the worst deal ever negotiated”. Trump later signed an executive order officially reinstating US sanctions against Iran. Additional US...

Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.) and Kirsten Gillibrand (D., N.Y.) spoke Thursday outside the Supreme Court at a rally hosted by prominent Women's March organizers and anti-Israel activists Linda Sarsour and Tamika Mallory. Sarsour and Mallory hosted the rally to show their support for Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, one of the women who have accused Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of sexual misconduct. Both Sarsour and Mallory shared remarks before turning over the microphone to Warren, who said that she believes Ford's testimony.

WASHINGTON -- President Trump seems convinced that he has found the formula for success in foreign policy: Bully your adversaries, sanction them, squeeze them -- and then flatter them and make a deal. Trump followed this approach with North Korea and he got a showy summit meeting in Singapore in June with Kim Jong Un and a pledge (encouraging but so far undelivered) for denuclearization. He adopted the hard-talk/sweet-talk tactics with Mexico and, eventually, after a long pout, with Canada, and he got a trade deal that's a modest but real improvement over NAFTA.

Senator Markey has announced his support for the Iran deal that will let the terrorist regime inspect its own Parchin nuclear weapons research site, conduct uranium enrichment, build advanced centrifuges, buy ballistic missiles, fund terrorism and have a near zero breakout time to a nuclear bomb. There was no surprise there. Markey had topped the list of candidates supported by the Iran Lobby. And the Iranian American Political Action Committee (IAPAC) had maxed out its contributions to his campaign. After more fake suspense, Al Franken, another IAPAC backed politician who also benefited from Iran Lobby money, came out for the...

As the fall arrives, the probability of a fourth Gaza war between Israel and Hamas is on the rise. IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Gadi Eisenkot decided on Thursday to reinforce troops along the tense security fence, citing the military’s policy of preventing infiltrations from the blockaded coastal enclave into southern Israel. The reinforcements include snipers, as well as infantry and armored forces. The IDF has also deployed the Iron Dome missile defense system over concerns of mortar and rocket fire from the blockaded coastal enclave. The decision was made ahead of the 29th week of violent Friday protests, out...

Syria’s foreign minister, Walid al-Moualem, told the United Nations General Assembly on Saturday that the country was ready for the voluntary return of refugees who fled during the more than seven-year conflict. ... We welcome any assistance with reconstruction from those countries that were not part of the aggression on Syria

The update was interrupted this afternoon by pro-Palestinians at the hotel and had to be re-broadcast later. All the parts of the S-300s are in Syria now and only the further steps are needed to make them operational. Israel basically now has a border with Russia, not with Syria. Other aspects of the buildup toward conflict, involving the United States and others. The big picture is taking shape.

THE HAGUE -- The United Nations' top court on Wednesday ordered the United States to lift sanctions on "humanitarian" goods to Iran that President Donald Trump re-imposed after pulling out of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) unanimously ruled that Washington "shall remove by means of its choosing any impediments arising from the measures announced on May 8 to the free exportation to Iran of medicines and medical devices, food and agricultural commodities" as well as airplane parts, said judge Abdulqawi Ahmed Yusuf. The court said sanctions on goods "required for humanitarian needs... may have...

""Pompeo Terminates Iran Treaty After UN Court Hands Tehran A Victory In Sanctions Lawsuit Against Washington"" Secretary of State Mike Pompeo announced Wednesday the U.S. will terminate a 63-year-old treaty with Iran, hours after a top United Nations court ruled in favor of Tehran in a lawsuit challenging U.S. sanctions. Pompeo said the abrogation of the 1955 Treaty of Amity was “39 years overdue,” referring to the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran that resulted in the overthrow of the U.S.-friendly shah. Until Pompeo’s announcement, the Treaty of Amity had remained in force even though Washington and Tehran have not had...

The U.N. nuclear watchdog has said its independence is paramount and it does not take intelligence presented to it at face value, in an apparent response to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s description of a “secret atomic warehouse” in Iran. Netanyahu — who opposes the nuclear deal between Iran and major powers that the International Atomic Energy Agency is policing — made the statement in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly last week. He urged the IAEA to visit the site in Tehran. A U.S. State Department official later seconded that call. “The agency sends inspectors to sites...

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has vowed Russia will do "everything possible" to preserve the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal despite the U.S. withdrawal. Speaking to the UN General Assembly on September 28, Lavrov denounced U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to pull the United States out of the deal that curbs Iran's nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. Lavrov called the U.S. move a violation of UN resolutions and a threat to regional stability. Lavrov also denounced what he said were "baseless accusations" of Russian interference in foreign affairs and criticized U.S. policies in Iran, Syria, and Venezuela. Lavrov accused...