Israel Navy Works with NATO in Major Exercise

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A huge earthquake hits northern Israel, killing thousands and knocking out infrastructure — this doomsday scenario was the premise for a multi-national naval drill this week.

Sailors from France, Greece and the United States arrived on their vessels and were joined by the Israelis off the Israeli port city of Haifa for the four-day exercise, called Mighty Waves.

They simulated extracting wounded civilians to sea for treatment, fishing people out of the water and transferring humanitarian aid, with representatives of seven other navies taking part as observers. . .

Israel is always looking to boost its profile among Western allies as well as reinforce its image as the Middle East’s most powerful military, and the drill was a chance to do that, said Eran Lerman, former deputy to Israel’s national security adviser.

“The very fact that Israel is perceived by key global players as a state that can and should be cooperated with militarily conveys a message of deterrence to potential enemies, while strengthening the increasing ties with like-minded Arab states,” said Lerman, now vice president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security. (Read more from “Israel Navy Works with NATO in Major Exercise” HERE)

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Hong Kong Police Used so Much Tear Gas Journalists Coughed Blood

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Researchers surveying the journalists covering the ongoing Hong Kong protest movement found that upwards of 90 percent of journalists covering the July 28 protest suffered health effects such as difficulty breathing and coughing blood when police fired liberal amounts of tear gas at the crowds, the Hong Kong Free Press (HKFP) reported Friday.

“The research figures show the widespread use of tear gas by police poses a real threat to public health,” Wong Cheuk-pang, one of the researchers who led the study into effects of police use of tear gas on journalists, said at a press conference Friday, according to the HKFP.

The researchers reportedly interviewed over 170 journalists covering the protests about their health experiences following their presence at events where police used tear gas. “After police used tear gas on July 28 in Sheung Wan, 96.2 percent of respondents said they had difficulty breathing, persistent coughing or coughed up blood,” the HKFP noted. A majority (72.6 percent) said they developed rashes and other skin issues following their presence there. Some said they experienced second-degree burns. At least one person developed pneumonia after being exposed to tear gas, the researchers said.

On the same day, in the suburbs of Yuen Long, police fired so much tear gas elderly residents of a nursing home, where someone had accidentally left a window open, filmed the tear gas entering the building and hurting the residents, sparking outrage online. No evidence has surfaced linking the affected in the nursing home to the protest movement.

Journalists documenting the protests – whose participants have been largely peaceful, while Hong Kong police have attacked with tear gas and pepper spray and masked mobs have beaten them with sticks – have endured significant assaults while present for the events. During the first pro-China mob attack, in Yuen Long in July, the South China Morning Post reported that at least four journalists received beatings for attempting to cover the assault. (Read more from “Hong Kong Police Used so Much Tear Gas Journalists Coughed Blood” HERE)

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Gulf Cartel Shoots at U.S. Border Patrol Agents

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Gulf Cartel gunmen fired what are believed to be AK-47s or similar weapons at U.S. Border Patrol agents on the Rio Grande. None were injured.

The shooting took place early Friday morning just south of Fronton, Texas. The agents were not struck by the gunfire, however, their boat was hit several times. The U.S. Border Patrol RGV Sector Office confirmed the incident to Breitbart Texas and advised it would issue additional information throughout the day.

Mexican authorities responded to the area after they received notification from the U.S. government about a shooting just west of Los Guerra, a Tamaulipas law enforcement source revealed to Breitbart Texas. Mexican authorities were not able to find any gunmen but did find “signs of activity.”

The area south of Fronton is a known smuggling corridor for the Gulf Cartel that is seeing an escalation of violence as rival factions continue to fight for turf. This week, rival convoys not far Camargo shot two innocent victims in a passenger bus. (Read more from “Gulf Cartel Shoots at U.S. Border Patrol Agents” HERE)

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Shroud of Turin Mystery Deepens as Medieval Dating Found to Be Fundamentally Flawed

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A new French-Italian study on the Shroud of Turin throws doubt on what many thought was the definitive dating of the cloth believed by millions to be the burial cloth of Jesus Christ. . .

In 1988 radiocarbon tests on the Shroud of Turin dated the cloth to between 1260 and 1390. The implication was clear: The shroud was a medieval forgery. After a 2017 Freedom of Information (FOI) request, a new team of researchers gained access to the original data used for the 1988 test. The findings of this new team are that the 1988 test results were unreliable. . .

Only then, after the British Museum acceded to the FOI — something it was legally obliged to do — did Casabianca and his teams gain access to hundreds of unpublished pages from the earlier study. The subsequent examination of the data by the Franco/Italian team found evidence, now published in Oxford University’s Archaeometry, which suggests that the methods employed by the 1988 scientists were flawed. . .

Casabianca’s team found that the 1988 carbon dating was unreliable, as only pieces from the edges of the cloth were radiocarbon tested. It has been long held by some scholars that those sample areas had been affected by exposure to fire in 1532 while the shroud was stored in the Sainte-Chapelle, in Chambéry, France.

“The tested samples are obviously heterogeneous from many different dates,” Casabianca, a convert to Catholicism, told the Register. “There is no guarantee that all these samples, taken from one end of the shroud, are representative of the whole fabric. It is, therefore, impossible to conclude that the Shroud of Turin dates from the Middle Ages.” (Read more from “Shroud of Turin Mystery Deepens as Medieval Dating Found to Be Fundamentally Flawed” HERE)

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President Trump Hits Venezuelan Dictator Maduro with Total Economic Embargo

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President Donald Trump announced an executive order to slap the government of Venezuela with brutal new sanctions that are reserved for only the worst regimes.

The order will freeze all assets of the socialist government in Venezuela and bars all transactions. . .

“I have determined that it is necessary to block the property of the Government of Venezuela in light of the continued usurpation of power by the illegitimate Nicolas Maduro regime,” [President Trump] said in the letter.

The letter listed the actions of the Venezuelan government that led to the sanctions, including, “the regime’s human rights abuses, arbitrary arrest and detention of Venezuelan citizens, curtailment of free press, and ongoing attempts to undermine Interim President Juan Guaido of Venezuela and the democratically-elected Venezuelan National Assembly.”

The U.S. and its allies hoped that Maduro would have stepped down after they threw their support behind Guaido, the opposition leader, but the dictator stubbornly held on to power with help from the Cuban government. (Read more from “President Trump Hits Venezuelan Dictator Maduro with Total Economic Embargo” HERE)

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Video: Car Rams Through Hong Kong Protesters

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A driver believed to be injured and refusing help from the crowd rammed through an improvised blockade in Yuen Long, Hong Kong, on Monday, hitting protesters standing on the other side.

The incident occurred during one of at least eight official protests organized against the Communist Party of China on Monday and a call for a general strike that left mass transit systems and the Hong Kong airport largely inoperable.

The protesters have presented a list of five demands to the Hong Kong government intended to safeguard the longstanding democratic tradition of the region, among them a call for universal suffrage. Currently, a direct vote only covers half the seats in the Legislative Council (LegCo), leaving the other half to regional special interests. . .

The Asian outlet Coconuts reported that the car in question, apparently a minivan model, boasted spray paint on its side reading “murderer” in Chinese. It is not clear at press time how the man’s car came to have that graffiti on it, though protesters on the scene indicated through Telegram that the man had an “altercation” with the protesters before driving into them. The nature of that alleged altercation also remains uncertain.

The Guardian reported that, according to individuals present, the driver was injured and refused help from the protesters, who offered to call medical services for him. Police confirmed only one person injured from the incident but did verify that video of the incident aligned with the reports they received. (Read more from “Video: Car Rams Through Hong Kong Protesters” HERE)

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Shooting at a Packed Nightclub in Canada, Where Gun Control Is Already Way Stricter Than the U.S.

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Shots rang out at a packed Toronto nightclub as an altercation involving a firearm sent five people to the hospital, one with life-threatening injuries, according to local police.

A Toronto police official told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation said that it was “fortunate there’s five victims only,” because “the club was completely full.”

The CBC reports that 3 victims from the early Monday morning shooting were found at the scene, while two fled and took themselves to the hospital.

“It’s very concerning,” the official added, “the club was packed with patrons.”

The story also notes two other shootings in Toronto over the weekend.

As I pointed out for a different story earlier this year (which was also about circumventing Canada’s firearm laws), Canada’s gun control situation looks much like what the gun control lobby says it wants right now, as opposed to the more draconian laws in most European countries, which look like what more extreme voices in the gun control movement actually want:

While most long guns are classified as “non-restricted” in Canada, most handguns are deemed “restricted” firearms (some are banned) and are under extensive regulation.

All gun owners have to be licensed, and there are extra licensure requirements for “restricted” firearms.

License applications require third-party references.

Concealed carry is virtually nonexistent unless you need to carry for work.

All “restricted” guns have to be registered with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

The government regulates private gun storage.

Last year, the country’s liberal government proposed expanding background checks to cover a person’s entire life history and requiring government authorization for the transportation of privately owned guns. Now, Canadian gun control advocates believe that a full handgun ban is “within our reach.”

U.S. politicians have responded to shootings in Ohio and Texas over the weekend by proposing different forms of reactionary gun control. President Trump gave an address from the White House in support of “red flag” gun confiscation laws, while House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., put out a joint statement calling for expanded background check legislation. (For more from the author of “Shooting at a Packed Nightclub in Canada, Where Gun Control Is Already Way Stricter Than the U.S.” please click HERE)

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Palestinian Rioters Raise Nazi Swastika Flag

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Palestinian rioters raised a Nazi swastika along with a Palestinian flag during the weekly Gaza border riots on Friday, where some 6,000 protesters gathered — many of whom threw rocks, firebombs and explosive devices at IDF forces.

On its Twitter page, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit posted a picture of the swastika underneath a Palestinian flag with a text written in poetry form chastising the move as “sheer hatred” and ending with a promise that Israeli troops would “defend Israel today and every single day.”

Fifty-one Palestinians were injured, 24 of them by IDF live fire, the Hamas-run Gaza health ministry reported.

The beginning of the year saw a dramatic spike in violence along the Gaza border with the so-called March of Return protests, with daily airborne incendiary devices being flown over the border, infiltrations and shootings. Hamas and other Gaza-based groups have also increasingly relied on drones and quadcopters to gather intelligence and track IDF movements. (Read more from “Palestinian Rioters Raise Nazi Swastika Flag” HERE)

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Scientists Are Making Human-Monkey Hybrids in China

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In a controversial first, a team of researchers have been creating embryos that are part human and part monkey, reports the Spanish daily El País.

Daring biologist: According to the newspaper, the Spanish-born biologist Juan Carlos Izpisúa Belmonte, who operates a lab at the Salk Institute in California, has been working working with monkey researchers in China to perform the disturbing research.

Making chimeras: The technique for making chimeras involves injecting human embryonic stem cells into a days-old embryo of another species. The hope is that the human cells will grow along with the embryo, adding to it. . .

Because monkeys are genetically closer to humans, it’s possible that such experiments could now succeed. To give the human cells a better chance of taking hold, scientists also use gene-editing technology to disable the formation of certain types of cells in the animal embryos. . .

So far, no part-human part-monkey has been born. Instead, the mixed embryos are only being allowed to develop for a week or two in the lab, at which time they can be studied. That is according to Estrella Núñez, a biologist and administrator at the Catholic University of Murcia, in Spain, who told El País her university is helping to fund the research. (Read more from “Scientists Are Making Human-Monkey Hybrids in China” HERE)

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Mysterious Radiation Cloud over Europe Traced to Secret Russian Nuclear Accident

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A vast cloud of nuclear radiation that spreadover continental Europe in 2017 has been traced to an unacknowledged nuclear accident in southern Russia, according to an international team of scientists.

The experts say the cloud of radiation detected over Europe in late September 2017 could only have been caused by a nuclear fuel-reprocessing accident at the Mayak Production Association, a nuclear facility in the Chelyabinsk region of the Ural Mountains in Russia, sometime between noon on Sept. 26 and noon on Sept. 27. . .

The lead author of the new research, nuclear chemist Georg Steinhauser of Leibniz University in Hanover, Germany, said that more than 1,300 atmospheric measurements from around the world showed that between 250 and 400 terabecquerels of radioactive ruthenium-106 had been released during that time.

Ruthenium-106 is a radioactive isotope of ruthenium, meaning that it has a different number of neutrons in its nucleus than the naturally occurring element has. The isotope can be produced as a byproduct during nuclear fission of uranium-235 atoms.

Although the resulting cloud of nuclear radiation was diluted enough that it caused no harm to people beneath it, the total radioactivity was between 30 and 100 times the level of radiation released after the Fukushima accident in Japan in 2011, Steinhauser told Live Science. (Read more from “Mysterious Radiation Cloud over Europe Traced to Secret Russian Nuclear Accident” HERE)

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