RUTHFULLY YOURS

As stubborn facts ruin their narrative that neonicotinoid pesticides are causing a honeybee-pocalypse, environmental pressure groups are shifting to new scares to justify their demands for “neonic” bans.

Honeybee populations and colony numbers in the United States, Canada, Europe, Australia and elsewhere are growing. It is also becoming increasingly clear that the actual cause of bee die-offs and “colony collapse disorders” is not neonics, but a toxic mix of predatory mites, stomach fungi, other microscopic pests, and assorted chemicals employed by beekeepers trying to control the beehive infestations.

Naturally, anti-pesticide activists have seized on a recent study purporting to show that wild bee deaths in Britain have been correlated with neonic use in oil seed rape fields (canola is a type of OSR). In a saga that has become all too common in the environmental arena, their claims were amplified by news media outlets that share many activist beliefs and biases – and want to sell more subscriptions and advertising.

(Honeybees represent a small number of species that humans have domesticated and keep in hives, to produce honey and pollinate crops. Many are repeatedly trucked long distances, to pollinate almond and other crops as they flower. By contrast, thousands of species of native or wild bees also flourish across the continents, pollinating plants with no human assistance.)

The recent Center for Ecology and Hydrology study examined wild bee population trends over an 18-year period that ended in 2011. It concluded that there was a strong correlation between population and distribution numbers for multiple species of British wild bees and what study authors called their “measure of neonic dose” resulting from the pesticide, which is used as a seed coating for canola crops.

The study is deeply flawed, at every stage – making its analysis and conclusions meaningless. For example, bee data were collected by amateur volunteers, few of whom were likely able to distinguish among some 250 species of UK wild bees. But if even one bee of any species was identified in a 1-by-1 kilometer area during at least two of the study period’s 18 years, the area was included in the CEH study.

This patchy, inconsistent approach means the database that formed the very foundation for the entire study was neither systematic nor reliable, nor scientific. Some species may have dwindled or disappeared in certain areas due to natural causes, or volunteers may simply have missed them. We can never know.

There is no evidence that the CEH authors ever actually measured neonic levels on bees or in pollen collected from OSR fields that the British wild bees could theoretically have visited. Equally relevant, by the time neonics on seeds are absorbed into growing plant tissue, and finally expressed on flecks of pollen, the levels are extremely low: 1.3-3.0 parts per billion, the equivalent of 1-3 seconds in 33 years.

On August 8, I reported here at PJ Media on American journalist Lindsey Snell, who had reportedly escaped from Jabhat al-Nusra/Jabhat Fateh al-Sham custody in Syria only to be arrested when she arrived back in Turkey earlier this month. No other American media outlet reported on this story — until now.

Snell’s biography notes she has worked for MSNBC, VICE News, ABC News, the Discovery Channel, and Amnesty International, among others.

State Department spokesman John Kirby confirmed her arrest during his daily briefing today, stating that she is being held on charges of “violating a military zone”:

QUESTION: Do you have any information about a U.S. citizen who was arrested in Turkey?

MR KIRBY: Who was arrested in Turkey? Yes. I can confirm that U.S. citizen Lindsey Snell was detained in Turkey on the 7th of August, 2016. She is currently being held in a prison facility in Hatay Province. I believe that’s how you say it. Consular officers from the consulate in Adana visited Ms. Snell most recently on the 26th of this month and are providing all possible consular assistance. The embassy and the department are following this case closely. State Department officials have been in contact with Turkish Government officials regarding this case.

QUESTION: Can you spell her name?

MR KIRBY: Lindsey. L-i-n-d-s-e-y. Snell. S-n-e-l-l.

Did you have more?

QUESTION: Yeah. Is – was the arrest at all related to her profession as a journalist or in any case – any way associated with that?

MR KIRBY: What I – what we understand is that she has been charged with violating a military zone, but I can’t speak to her reasons for being in Syria, for traveling there. I can’t speak to that. What I can tell you is that we’ve been informed she was charged with violating a military zone.

“There is no such religion as Christianity … In reality, Jesus Christ was a Muslim coming from Jewish tradition … The name of the religion revealed to Christ was Islam …” — Abdurrahman Dilipak, columnist, Yeni Akit.

In Turkey, not even the smallest village of a few hundred inhabitants has a non-Muslim mayor.

Against this embarrassing background, Turkey is accusing Europe of being racist. That would be like North Korea accusing Europe of being a rogue state.

It’s not a bad joke; it’s a very bad joke. Turkey, where all variants of ethnic and religious xenophobia are a national pastime, is accusing the West of being racist.

Speaking after a spat with Austria and Sweden over news reports and tweets from those countries that accused Turkey of allowing sex with children under the age of 15, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu claimed that the behavior of European countries reflected the “racism, anti-Islamic and anti-Turkish (trend) in Europe.”

He is talking about the same Europe where the inhabitants of one of its biggest cities, London, recently elected a Muslim as its mayor. In Turkey, not even the smallest village of a few hundred inhabitants has a non-Muslim mayor.

CANBERRA, Australia—Australia will step up airstrikes against Islamic State, allowing its military for the first time to attack support facilities as well as militant fighters.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, in a major security speech to Parliament on Thursday, said the conservative government had agreed to new rules of engagement requested by the military, amending domestic laws that restricted strikes to only front-line Islamic State units.

“We must combat all of Daesh, including its financiers and propagandists,” Mr. Turnbull told lawmakers, using the government’s preferred term for Islamic State extremists. “It is why we must give our agencies the powers they need. To detect. To disrupt. To arrest. And to target,” he said.
Related

Australia Seeks Indefinite Detention of Some Terror Convicts (07.25.16)
Australia Takes Steps to Counter China’s Rising Military Power (02.24.16)

Australia, a close U.S. ally, has since 2014 committed combat aircraft and army special-forces advisers to the fight against Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, as well as refueling, early warning and control aircraft.

But U.S. warplanes have been attacking a wider range of ISIS targets because of restrictions in Australian domestic laws than created some ambiguity around who could be defined as a militant fighter. That meant airstrikes weren’t being carried out against so-called “Mad Max technicals”—armed sport-utility vehicles not clearly identified as belonging to militant groups—and supply dumps.

“The government has reviewed its policy on targeting enemy combatants,” Mr. Turnbull said. “This means ADF [Australian Defence Force] personnel will be supported by our domestic laws. They will be able to target Daesh at its core, joining with our coalition partners to target and kill a broader range of Daesh combatants.”

In April, U.S. commanders redrafted rules of engagement to allow airstrikes on ISIS even when there was some risk of civilian casualties, as coalition allies tried to capitalize on air and ground offensives that have seen Islamic State lose territory.

Mr. Turnbull said Islamic State and the inspiration it provided for homegrown terrorism was the greatest strategic threat faced by Australia, which has begun a A$200 billion modernization of its military to counter a buildup of weapons in Asia and increasing territorial assertion by China.

‘We must give our agencies the powers they need. To detect. To disrupt. To arrest. And to target.’
—Australia Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull

“We live in an uncertain and complex strategic environment, from territorial disputes in the South China Sea, to Middle East conflicts, tensions on the Korean Peninsula and instability in parts of Africa, broken borders in Europe,” he said.

But he said that Australia—one of the largest coalition military contributors—was confident the “tide had now turned” in the Middle East fight against Daesh after Iraq’s military defeated Islamic State in the key city of Fallujah, in the strategic Anbar province, on June 26. Coalition strategists, he said, believed Islamic State had lost close to half of the territory it once held in Iraq and about 20% of its territory in Syria, as well as losing around a third of its front-line fighters. CONTINUE AT SITE

How ridiculous… try some shock and awe therapy and closing the borders first….rsk
Therapy and Prevention: The Race to Stop Youth from Radicalizing Germany Tries New Strategies to Keep Men from Islamic State –
The recent spate of deadly attacks in Germany have highlighted the need to intervene with angry young men before they turn to extremism or violence. But the country has a lot of catching up to do — and the work can be controversial.

André Taubert used to feel pretty forsaken when he drove his old Mercedes through northern Germany every day.

He and one other colleague were the only ones dealing with Islamists in four German states: Bremen, Hamburg, Lower Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein. They were constantly getting phone calls from worried mothers, women whose sons or daughter were in the process of discovering jihadism. The women were desperate and concerned that they were losing touch with their own children, who suddenly seemed like strangers.

From 2012 to 2015, Taubert’s schedule often meant visiting as many as three different cities in a single day: Kiel in the morning, for example, Göttingen in the afternoon and Bremen in the evening. “We had to set priorities, make lists and think about where we could still have an impact,” he says. “They were kamikaze missions.”

Prevention was not an important topic at the time, at least not for lawmakers. There was only one counselling center for the family members of Islamists in all of northern Germany — with only one position paid for with public funds, which Taubert and his co-worker shared.

The working conditions have improved since then. In July 2015, 39-year-old Taubert became the head of Hamburg-based Legato, an “office for religiously motivated radicalization.” A team of nine employees now operates in Hamburg alone, where they have already handled 130 cases in only one year. None of these young people has traveled to Syria yet, says Taubert, and he is not aware of any of them having become terrorism suspects.

“I’m annoyed by statements that we can’t do anything about terrorist attacks, just because the security authorities don’t recognize everything. This is a disregard for the power of civil society.”

People like Taubert — social workers, therapists, psychiatrists and educators — are what Germany depends on now. They are expected to do what the police and intelligence services cannot achieve on their own: step in when parents run out of options, friends look the other way and neighbors fall silent.

In the bloody summer of 2016, this is perhaps the most important insight: A life without new attacks, and without fear of terror, can only exist if we begin to understand the rage of unstable young men — and find answers to it.

A Dire Need for Initiatives

There is a lot of catching up to do, as the findings of a SPIEGEL survey taken in all of Germany’s states demonstrate. The number of men prepared to use violence who are traveling to Syria and Iraq has risen over the years, but in Bavaria, for example, four relevant state ministries didn’t begin cooperating closely to foster a network against Salafism until 2015. An initiative in the neighboring state of Baden-Württemberg began operations shortly before Christmas. An office titled “Salafism in the Saarland” was opened in the southwestern state on January 1 of this year. There has been little funding for these efforts to date. The eastern state of Thuringia, for example, spent exactly €16,005.76 euros ($17,889.64) on Islamism prevention in 2015.

At a time when terrorism is becoming more and more of a threat, the government and German society have been oddly disinterested in helping at-risk youth or bringing young radicals back from the fringes of society. But appealing to their hearts and minds could be a successful strategy. The biographies — and possible pathologies — of perpetrators of violence are often similar in terms of their infractions, whether they are on the left, the right or extremists.

Last week Iranian naval vessels subjected U.S. warships to what U.S. officials called “harassing maneuvers risking dangerous escalation.”

In an incident last January, Iran illegally detained a group of U.S. sailors—using the fact that their boats had veered into Iranian waters as a supposed justification.

In last week’s incidents, Iran couldn’t even use that excuse since the American ships were in international waters.

First, on Tuesday, Iranian ships buzzed the USS Nitze, a destroyer, in the Strait of Hormuz. They “ignored repeated radio, whistle and flare warnings from the Nitze and slowed their approach only when they were within 300 yards of the U.S. ship.”

And in last Wednesday’s even more serious incidents, ships of the IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps) harassed two U.S. coastal patrol ships and a U.S. destroyer in the northern Persian Gulf.

Finally one of the coastal patrol ships, the Squall, had to fire three shots in the general direction of one of the IRGC ships to get it to stop chasing after the Stout, the destroyer.

As Stephen Bryen and Shoshana Bryen note, Iran is

[testing a] tactic called the “swarming boat” to destroy U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf.

The swarming boat attack is just what it sounds like: a number of fast boats equipped with missiles and torpedoes attack enemy ships from multiple angles to damage or destroy them as quickly as possible.

On Thursday the State Department hit back by calling the Iranian ships’ actions “unacceptable,” which should put fear in the hearts of the power-holders in Tehran.

And that was last week.

Further events this week might not have the drama of a precarious naval standoff, but are at least as significant.

On Monday it was reported, and visually recorded, that Iran had deployed its Russian-made S-300 missile-defense system at its Fordo uranium-enrichment site.

The S-300 is one of the world’s most advanced long-range missile-defense systems. Russia was initially supposed to supply it to Iran in 2010—but froze the deal when it came under U.S. and Israeli pressure to do so, citing UN sanctions on Iran as a pretext.

Nearly 3,500 Palestinians have been killed in Syria since 2011. But because these Palestinians were killed by Arabs, and not Israelis, this fact is not news in the mainstream media or of interest to “human rights” forums.

How many Western journalists have cared to inquire about the thirsty Palestinians of Yarmouk refugee camp in Syria? Does anyone know that this camp has been without water supply for more than 720 days, and without electricity for the past three years? In June 2002, 112,000 Palestinians lived in Yarmouk. By the end of 2014, the population was down to less than 20,000.

Nor is the alarm bell struck concerning the more than 12,000 Palestinians languishing in Syrian prisons, including 765 children and 543 women. According to Palestinian sources, some 503 Palestinian prisoners have died under torture in recent years, some female prisoners have been raped by interrogators and guards.

When Western journalists lavish time on Palestinians delayed at Israeli checkpoints and ignore bombs dropped by the Syrian army on residential areas in Syria, one might start to wonder they are really about.

It seems as though the international community has forgotten that Palestinians can be found far beyond the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. These “other” Palestinians live in Arab countries such as Syria, Jordan and Lebanon, and their many serious grievances are evidently of no interest to the international community. It is only Palestinians residing in the West Bank and Gaza Strip that garner international attention. Why? Because it is precisely these individuals that the international community wield as a weapon against Israel.

Nearly 3,500 Palestinians have been killed in Syria since the beginning of the civil war in 2011. But because these Palestinians were killed by Arabs, and not Israelis, this fact is not news in the mainstream media. This figure was revealed last week by the London-based Action Group For Palestinians of Syria (AGPS), founded in 2012 with the goal of documenting the suffering of the Palestinians in that country and preparing lists of victims, prisoners and missing people in order to submit them the database to human rights forums.

Wahhabi doctrines spread by Saudi-financed imams are redefining the way Islam is practiced in Malaysia. Politicians are now competing with each other to show off their Islamist credentials. These practices are eroding the tolerance for which the country was previously known.

Young Malaysians are being radicalized as a result of the Islamism and anti-Semitism that their leaders espouse. According to Malaysian police, there are at least 50,000 Islamic State sympathizers in the country.

Recently, an influential opposition party introduced a bill that would implement harsher hudud laws (brutal physical punishments for transgressions like adultery and theft) in the state of Kelantan.

Malaysia, a majority-Muslim country in Southeast Asia, is rapidly turning to Islamic fundamentalism through the state’s sharia-like legal system and the country’s growing number of Islamic militant sympathizers. Malaysia’s government is a federal parliamentary democracy under an elected constitutional monarchy. The country of more than 30 million people is made up of 13 states and three federal territories. It is a multi-ethnic country: Malay Sunni Muslims make up 50.1% of the population, Chinese people make up 23.6%, indigenous people 11.8% and Indians 6.7 %. However, the Malaysian Constitution declares Islam alone to be the official religion.

Malaysia is dominated by an iteration of Islamic culture that is highly influenced by the Saudi Arabian version of Islam. The use of political Islam has been a deliberate move by some Islamists in even the highest levels of Malaysian government to create a sharia-based nation. According to the Wall Street Journal, conservative Wahhabi doctrines spread by Saudi-financed imams are redefining the way Islam is practiced in Malaysia, and politicians are now competing with each other to show off their Islamist credentials. These practices are eroding the tolerance for which the country was previously known.