Tag: middle east

Omnibus Spending Bill: $410M for Border Security — in the Middle East

The $1.7 trillion year-end omnibus spending bill uses hundreds of millions of dollars of American taxpayer money to fund border security initiatives overseas as the United States, at its own border, is projected to set illegal immigration records next year.

The spending bill includes $410 million “for enhanced border security” in Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, and Oman. At least $150 million of the funding is to be used to help Jordan secure its borders.

The hundreds of millions of dollars for border security thousands of miles away from the U.S. comes after Republicans and Democrats negotiated a similar plan in March that saw about $370 million go to border security initiatives in the Middle East and North Africa.

In June of last year, Congress authorized nearly a billion dollars in border security initiatives for Middle Eastern and North African countries.

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Hypocrites! Disney adopts “don’t say gay” policy in order to appease Middle East censors

Disney, which famously went to battle with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis over that state’s Child Protection Act, hilariously named the “Don’t Say Gay” bill may have a little bit of explaining to do over its blatant virtue-signaling hypocrisy.

The decision to throw down with the radical alphabet mafia cost the entertainment titan a ton of money in canceled Disney+ subscriptions and canceled Disney World vacations by parents who think their children don’t need to be groomed by what used to be a wholesome entertainment company.

Now, they may have some ‘splainin’ to do with the alphabet community.

According to RedState, the House of Mouse has decided to remove all LGBTQXYZ content from Disney+, the company’s streaming service. Oh, not for the West but for Middle Eastern countries as a means to pacify censors there.

Bounding Into Comics writes that after several Disney films were banned in the Middle East for alphabet community-friendly content, such as Thor: Love and Thunder and The Eternals, Disney has caved to censors in Middle Eastern countries and will remove LGBTQ content from Disney+ there.

According to a release, a Disney spokesperson said:

“Content offerings differ across our many Disney+ markets, based upon a number of factors. Content available should align with local regulatory requirements,” while also stressing the platform has parental controls which allows parents to decide what their family members are able to view.

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Biden Falsely Claims US Troops Aren’t Engaged In Combat In The Middle East

President Biden penned an op-ed about his upcoming trip to the Middle East that was published in The Washington Post on Saturday, where he falsely claimed that US troops are not engaged in combat missions in the region.

The president wrote: “Next week, I will be the first president to visit the Middle East since 9/11 without US troops engaged in a combat mission there.” Biden’s claim came not long after he updated Congress on the deployment of US combat troops. In a letter to Congress dated June 8, the president said US troops were stationed in Iraq, Syria, and Yemen.

In Yemen, Biden said that a “small number of United States military personnel are deployed to Yemen to conduct operations against al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and ISIS.” He also mentioned that US forces were providing support to the Saudi-led coalition in a “non-combat role” by providing “military advice and limited information.”

In Iraq and Syria, Biden said US troops are “working by, with, and through local partners to conduct operations against” ISIS and al-Qaeda. At the end of 2021, the US formally ended its combat mission in Iraq, but all 2,500 troops that were stationed there stayed, and US operations on the ground didn’t really change.

In Syria, the US maintains an occupation force of about 1,000 troops and keeps a good portion of the eastern part of the country out of the hands of Damascus with the help of local Kurdish groups. While it’s easy to downplay the US role in Iraq, US troops in Syria are more often engaged in combat.

On June 16, US troops carried out a raid in northwestern Syria and captured a top ISIS leader, according to the US-led anti-ISIS coalition, known as Operation Inherent Resolve. US raids in northwest Syria are risky as they are far from US military bases in the eastern part of the country.

The US also continues to launch drone strikes in Syria against al-Qaeda affiliates in northwest Syria. According to US Central Command, a US drone strike killed a leader of al-Qaeda offshoot Hurras al-Din in Syria’s Idlib province.

Earlier in the year, the US was involved in a major ground battle between the Kurdish-led SDF and ISIS in northeastern Syria. Back in January, ISIS launched a major attack to gain control of a prison, and US ground troops helped Kurdish forces take it back.

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9,000-year-old ritual complex found in Jordan desert

Archaeologists deep in the Jordanian desert have discovered a 9,000-year-old ritualistic complex near what is thought to be the earliest known large human-built structure worldwide.

The Stone Age shrine site, excavated last year, was used by gazelle hunters and features carved stone figures, an altar and a miniature model of a large-scale hunting trap.

The giant game traps the model represents — so-called “desert kites” — were made of long walls that converge to corral running gazelles into enclosures or holes for slaughter.

Similar structures of two or more stone walls, some several kilometres (miles) long, have been found in deserts across Saudi Arabia, Syria, Turkey and Kazakhstan.

The Neolithic-era ritual site was discovered inside a larger campsite last October by a joint French-Jordanian team called the South Eastern Badia Archaeological Project.

The nearby desert kites in Jibal al-Khashabiyeh are “the earliest large-scale human built structures worldwide known to date,” said a statement by the SEBA Project.

It hailed the “spectacular and unprecedented discovery” of the ritualistic site, believed to date to about 7000 BC.

It featured two steles with anthropomorphic features, the taller one 1.12 metres high, other artefacts including animal figurines, flints, and some 150 arranged marine fossils.

The wider, decade-old research project aims to study “the first pastoral nomadic societies, as well as the evolution of specialised subsistence strategies”.

The desert kites suggest “extremely sophisticated mass hunting strategies, unexpected in such an early timeframe,” said the project’s statement.

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Israel Narrative Management Is Getting Incredibly Desperate And Brazen

The National Director Emeritus for the Anti-Defamation League has announced on Twitter that he is cancelling his subscription to The New York Times, claiming that a front-page story featuring the photos of children killed in Israel’s assault on Gaza this month constitutes “blood libel” against Jews.

“I am cancelling my subscription to NYTimes,” tweeted Abraham Foxman. “I grew up in America on the NYT- I delivered the NYT to my classmates- I learned civics- democracy and all the news ‘fit to print’ for 65 years but no more. Today’s blood libel of Israel and the Jewish people on the front page is enough.”

Foxman’s statement drew criticism from all corners, including from loyal establishment pundits like Jonathan Chait, for his ridiculous assertion that merely humanizing Palestinian children killed by Israel is the same as promoting the ancient antisemitic canard known as blood libel.

Supporters of Israeli apartheid and mass murder are losing control of the narrative, which has led to redoubled perception management efforts ranging from the cringey to the iron-fisted. In the former category we’re seeing them pen entire articles attacking Seth Rogen for tweeting a fart emoji at virulent Israel apologist Eve Barlow and claiming that putting “fart” in Barlow’s name is the same as a literal pogrom. In the latter category they’re blowing up entire press offices and arresting Palestinian journalists. This is narrative management at its least subtle.

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Why Are Israeli Defense Forces Soldiers Posting Thirst Traps on TikTok?

With her long, lush blond hair, almond-shaped blue eyes, and expertly manicured brows, influencer Natalia Fadeev bears a striking resemblance to model Gigi Hadid. On TikTok, where she’s racked up nearly a million followers, she’s mastered the art of the coquettish facial expression, balancing it with angles that show off her rear end. She’s cultivated a brand as an Airsoft shooting game enthusiast, maintaining a separate Instagram account under the handle @gunwaifu sponsored by a tactical gear store, and she regularly posts catgirl videos and kawaii (a Japanese-inspired cutesy aesthetic) cosplay on her TikTok page.

In addition to being well-versed in the art of monetizing her personal brand, Fadeev is a reservist in the Israel Defense Forces, and much of her page is devoted to pro-Israeli military content. Earlier this month, she posted a video of Israeli soldiers playing soccer with Palestinian children; in another, she dances and preens at the camera while the caption, “when they tried to destroy your nation but you ended up having one of the most powerful armies” flashes on-screen. In the context of the most recent turmoil in Gaza, which has left 13 Israelis and over 240 Palestinians dead, many criticized Fadeev’s content for making light of the Israeli military’s actions and attempting to put a sexy face on the conflict.

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