This is a pretty sobering statistic.   Last week in response to continued terrorist attacks in the Sinai region, Egypt began to widen the border between Gaza and Egypt.  A “buffer zone” is being built and homes on the border are being removed.  A “border wall” is currently being considered.
So far around 200 homes have been bulldozed or destroyed as Egypt’s President Abdul Fattah el-Sisi and his government begin the process.  Of the 200 homes removed, 78 have been found to house tunnels from Egypt into Gaza, that’s 39%.  These tunnels are used by Hamas to smuggle arms and rockets into the Gaza strip – the target of the rockets is Israel.

EGYPT – North Sinai Governor General Abdel-Fattah Harhour said owners of houses on the border line with the Gaza Strip will not receive any compensation for their demolished houses if smuggling tunnels were discovered inside their homes.
“The number of these homes whose owners will not receive compensation is 78, no compensation because these houses have smuggling tunnels,” he told local CBC television.
On Wednesday, the army began demolishing homes along the border line with the Gaza Strip to create a buffer zone which aims at preventing weapons smuggling. (more…)

For all intents and purposes Libya is the forgotten mess created by President Obama’s team and their insufferable incompetence.   Perhaps a time will surface when someone in the Western media will actually call Obama or Hillary Clinton to account for the mess they have created, but it doesn’t seem likely.

Imagine if Islamists were raging a power struggle throughout Canada while a Russian armed civil war was taking place in Mexico ~ imagine the position of our country in the face of such a problem.  That’s the analogy to a situation faced by Egypt as a consequence of our 2011 action, ISIS in Syria (with their eyes on Jordan), and neighboring Libya simultaneously in a civil war.
It’s easy to cast aspersions to the heavy-handed decision making of Fatah el-Sisi as he deals with the Sinai highway between Hamas (East) and the Muslim Brotherhood factions, which include ISIS, (West) along his borders with Gaza and Libya respectively.

President Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Susan Rice and Samantha Power deconstructed the governing authority of Libya under the auspices of a “Responsibility to Protect“.   All of those “good intentions” went to a land of perpetual FUBAR once Ambassador Chris Stevens was killed and it all, well, needed to be brushed under the proverbial rug. (more…)

Reuters […] Australia on Monday issued a blanket ban on visas from Ebola-affected countries in West Africa to prevent the disease reaching the country, becoming the first rich nation to shut its doors to the region.

Australia has not recorded a case of Ebola despite a number of scares, and conservative Prime Minister Tony Abbott has so far resisted repeated requests to send medical personnel to help battle the outbreak on the ground.
The decision to refuse entry for anyone from Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia, while touted by the government as a necessary safety precaution, was criticized by experts and advocates as politically motivated and shortsighted. (more…)

We were wondering why the White House put out last week’s meeting of the National Security Council so quickly – they never do that, ever.  Reading this lengthy Politico article the urgent optics now make sense…. there’s always a reason with this crew.

(Via Politico) When President Obama, after months of equivocation over how to respond to the takeover of parts of Iraq and Syria by radical militants, announced in September that the United States would “lead a broad coalition to roll back this terrorist threat,” the White House swung quickly into action, sending proposed legislation to train and equip Syrian rebels to Capitol Hill that same day.
Unfortunately, the White House failed to consult with the Pentagon—which would be doing most of the rolling back—on the timing or details of the announcement. (more…)

This is considered a staggering, albeit splendid, defeat considering Turkey was anticipated to be a shoo-in for a non-permanent U.N. Security Council seat.

Previously Turkey had claimed letters of support from 160 countries. However, the actual voting by secret ballot showed they only had 60 countries who supported their bid. The needed threshold is 128 supportive votes. Spain won the seat with 132 votes of support. New Zealand is the other contested victor who won in a previous ballot.
As Newsweek reported: “[Last] Wednesday night, Turkey’s foreign minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, hosted a posh party for diplomats at the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York, where many of the guests predicted an easy victory for Turkey“.
Apparently the ‘pinky swear’ diplomats partook of the ritzy digs; but when push came to shove they knew their ballots would be secret so they ditched the Turks who have become more and more unreliable as Sunni Islamist President Erdogan pushes Turkey further and further into radical Islam. (more…)

Reminder – healthcare workers in Liberia are now on strike.

Pres Obama signs Exec Order authorizing use of Reservists to assist in US Military mission building Ebola treatment centers in West Africa.

— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) October 16, 2014

(more…)

The Daily Beast has another good recap of a speech recently delivered by the evolving wannabe head of ISIS, Recep Erdogan.   Erdogan views himself as natural heir to the recreation of the Ottoman empire – ISIS is a means to accomplish that goal…. 
TURKEY – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan took on the iconic Lawrence of Arabia Monday in a furious anti-Western diatribe. The Turkish president compared the outside meddling in the region now to the role the renowned British army officer played during the Arab Revolt against the Ottomans during World War I. And Western diplomats here say the tirade bears a rather striking resemblance to some of the propaganda that has come out of the so-called Islamic State, widely known by the acronym ISIS or ISIL.

[…]  Erdoğan has been accused of at best turning a blind eye to the rise of ISIS and at worst actively encouraging it…

Last week, stung by Western criticism of Turkey’s conspicuous absence from the U.S.-led air combat against the terror organization, and the refusal of the Turkish government to rescue the besieged town of Kobani, just across the Syrian border, Erdoğan insisted he had no sympathy for the jihadists.
But on one very important point of history and geography it now appears there’s a serious convergence of views between ISIS and Erdoğan. In his speech Monday at a university in Istanbul, the Turkish president blasted the Sykes-Picot Agreement, a secret understanding (signed behind Lawrence’s back) that divided up the Middle East after World War I between British and French spheres of influence. (more…)

Charles Krauthammer pens analysis about the fraud that is Obama and Erdogan’s Sunni Syria / Iraq  strategy.   Both Islamic leaders willing to allow Sunni ISIS full control of Syria and Iraq in the grand hopes to resurrect the Ottoman empire with Erdogan at the head of the table…..   

(NRO) During the 1944 Warsaw uprising, Stalin ordered the advancing Red Army to stop at the outskirts of the city while the Nazis, for 63 days, annihilated the non-Communist Polish partisans. Only then did Stalin take Warsaw.

No one can match Stalin for merciless cynicism, but President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey is offering a determined echo by ordering Turkish tanks massed on the Syrian border, within sight of the besieged Syrian town of Kobani, to sit and do nothing.
For almost a month, Kobani Kurds have been trying to hold off Islamic State fighters. Outgunned, outmanned, and surrounded on three sides, the defending Kurds have begged Turkey to allow weapons and reinforcements through the border. Erdogan has refused even that, let alone intervening directly. Infuriated Kurds have launched demonstrations throughout Turkey protesting Erdogan’s deadly callousness. At least 21 demonstrators have been killed. (more…)

Last night former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta told Fox News’ Bill O’Reilly he believes President Obama totally understands the situation in Syria and Iraq and will make “the right decisions”. A few hours later CNN reports the following headline:

(CNN LINK)
Think about this from a few different perspectives.
First, what message does this approach send to our allies or, even more importantly, to ISIS?
(more…)

As expected the Syrian Kurdish controlled city of Kobane (Kobani) -located near the border with Turkey- is about to fall into the hands of Sunni ISIS extremists, and Recep Erdogan is doing everything he can to insure it happens.

[…]  Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the coalition air campaign launched last month would not be enough to halt the Islamic State advance and called for greater cooperation with the Syrian opposition, which is fighting both the Islamic State and forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad.

“Kobani is about to fall,” he told Syrian refugees in the Turkish town of Gaziantep, near the border.

“We asked for three things: one, for a no-fly zone to be created; two, for a secure zone parallel to the region to be declared; and for the moderate opposition in Syria and Iraq to be trained and equipped.”

Turkish tanks and other ground forces have been stationed along the border within a few hundred meters of the fighting in Kobani — also known as Ayn Arab — but have not intervened.  (link)

For two weeks we have watched Erdogan do everything he can to facilitate the falling of Kobane into the hands of his Sunni compatriots, ISIS.   Erdogan’s request for a “no-fly” zone insures that Kobane, once lost, will remain a safe haven for the ISIS extremists. (more…)