Typhoon Haiyan: 600,000 Believed Homeless; Desperate Survivors Wait in the Open for Aid as Rains Return

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Photo Credit: EPA/FRANCIS R. MALASIGHundreds of thousands of people were spending their fifth night sleeping in the open in the Philippines last night as soldiers and aid workers struggled to deliver help to the victims of Typhoon Haiyan.

Almost half of the estimated 660,000 people left homeless by its devastating wind and waves were still without shelter as tropical weather brought more heavy and forecasters warned of the risk of a second typhoon later this week.

Anger across the Philippines was continuing to rise at what seemed to be the slow response to the crisis, with many areas yet to receive aid on the scale needed.

The number killed remains unclear, with the United Nations estimating at least 10,000.

Benigno Aquino, the Philippines’ president, said yesterday that he believed that the true figure was lower – saying only between 2,000 and 2,500 had perished – but many of the worst-affected towns and islands have yet to provide reliable death tolls.

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North Korea Publicly Executes 80, Some for Watching South Korean Videos or Owning Bibles

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Photo Credit: APAs many as 80 people were publicly executed in North Korea earlier this month, some for offenses as minor as watching South Korean movies or possessing a Bible.

South Korean newspaper JoongAng Ilbo reported that the so-called criminals were put to death in seven cities across North Korea on Nov. 3, in the first known large-scale public executions by the Kim Jong-un regime.

A source, who is familiar with internal affairs in the North and who recently visited the country, told the paper that about 10 people were killed in each city.

Eight people — their heads covered with white bags — were tied to stakes at a local stadium in the city of Wonsan, before authorities shot them with a machine gun, according to the source.

Wonsan authorities gathered a crowd of 10,000 people, including children, at Shinpoong Stadium and forced them to watch the killings.

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Soldiers Killed by Terrorists Backed by US Cash

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Photo Credit: Jonathan Saruk/Getty ImagesThe United States has paid more than $150 million to companies in Afghanistan that are accused of helping to finance terrorist attacks on American soldiers and facilities, according to the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.

“It’s like the United States government subsidizing the Taliban, al Qaeda, the Haqqani network, those groups that are trying to shoot and kill our soldiers,” said Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., a member of the Senate’s Armed Services and Foreign Relations committees, in an interview to be broadcast tonight on ABC News’ “World News with Diane Sawyer”.

A list of 43 companies in Afghanistan was compiled by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) using data from both classified Pentagon investigative reports and Commerce Department lists of terror-connected companies.

Among them is a road construction company the U.S. says is partly owned by a leader of the brutal Haqqani network, which was blamed for an attack on the U.S. Embassy in Kabul that claimed 16 lives in 2011.

The cover letter of a classified investigation by the U.S. Army said there was evidence of a direct role of both the company and its owners “in the facilitation and operation of the Haqqani Network” and that “approximately $1-2 million per month flow[s] to Haqqani Network to finance its activities.”

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Hagel Sends US Troops Into Philippines to Help with Post-Typhoon Humanitarian Efforts

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Photo Credit: REUTERSSecretary of Defense Chuck Hagel on Sunday directed the U.S. Pacific Command to support American humanitarian relief efforts in the Philippines in the wake of Typhoon Haiyan.

Col. Brad Bartelt, a Marine Corps spokesman, said the U.S. military was called in at the request of the Philippines government.

Haiyan struck the island nation Friday, impacted more than 4.2 million people across 36 provinces in the Philippines, according to the Philippine government’s National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council.

The death toll has reached 1,000 but the number is projected to climb to 10,000.

Philippine officials say they will have a better idea about fatalities and damage in the coming days as transportation and communications systems are repaired.

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French MP: If Sanctions on Iran are Loosened, Israel Will Attack (+video)

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Photo Credit: Marc Israel Sellem/Pool/Flash90By Times of Israel Staff.

A French member of parliament telephoned French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius in Geneva at the weekend to warn him that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would attack Iran’s nuclear facilities if the P5+1 nations did not stiffen their terms on a deal with Iran, Israel’s Channel 2 News reported Sunday.

“I know [Netanyahu],” the French MP, Meyer Habib, reportedly told Fabius, and predicted that the Israeli prime minister would resort to the use of force if the deal was approved in its form at the time. “If you don’t toughen your positions, Netanyahu will attack Iran,” the report quoted Habib as saying. “I know this. I know him. You have to toughen your positions in order to prevent war.”

France’s Fabius is widely reported to have scuppered the finalizing of the emerging deal late Saturday, leading to the halting of the negotiations with Iran, and an agreement to reconvene on November 20.

Explaining his concerns to reporters in Geneva, Fabius said Tehran was resisting demands that it suspend work on its plutonium-producing reactor at Arak and downgrade its stockpile of higher-enriched uranium.

Habib, the deputy president of the Jewish umbrella organization in France, was elected to the National Assembly in Paris in June, to represent the district of southern Europe, which includes French nationals residing in Israel.

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Photo Credit: Daily Caller Iran general: No doubt Israel and America will be attacked

By Reza Kahlili.

Even before the nuclear negotiations between Iran and the 5+1 world powers ended in Geneva early Sunday with no deal, an Iranian general lashed out at America Saturday and warned both the U.S. and Israel that they will be attacked.

According to Fars News Agency, the regime’s outlet run by the Revolutionary Guards, Gen. Massoud Jazayeri, deputy chief of staff of Iran’s armed forces, said “America’s interests and all of Israel are within the range of the Islamic Republic and there is not the slightest doubt among Iran’s armed forces to confront the American government and the Zionists (Israel).”

Jazayeri said Israel is pulling the strings of Washington and “the American government is one of the most hated and evil governments in the world.”

The general mocked President Obama’s position that the military option remains on the table over Iran’s nuclear development. “If America had the ability and the will for war, it would allow no doubt in attacking Syria. America will soon find out that Iran’s power cannot be ignored.”

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Thousands Feared Dead in Philippines Typhoon

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Authorities expect a “very high number of fatalities” after one of the strongest typhoons on record devastated the central Philippines, cutting communications and severely damaging an airport in one of the hardest-hit regions.

A senior regional police official and a city administrator in the typhoon-ravaged city of Tacloban in the central Philippines said early Sunday that the death toll there could reach 10,000 people, according to the Associated Press.

Regional police chief Elmer Soria said he was briefed by Leyte provincial Gov. Dominic Petilla on Saturday and told there were about 10,000 deaths on the island, mostly by drowning and from collapsed buildings.

Tacloban city administrator Tecson Lim said that the death toll in the city alone “could go up to 10,000.”

On Samar Island, which is facing Tacloban, Leo Dacaynos of the provincial disaster office said Sunday that 300 people were confirmed dead in Basey town and another 2,000 are missing.

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Right Wing’s Surge in Europe Has the Establishment Rattled

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Photo Credit: Laerke Posselt for NYTAs right-wing populists surge across Europe, rattling established political parties with their hostility toward immigration, austerity and the European Union, Mikkel Dencker of the Danish People’s Party has found yet another cause to stir public anger: pork meatballs missing from kindergartens.

A member of Denmark’s Parliament and, he hopes, mayor of this commuter-belt town west of Copenhagen, Mr. Dencker is furious that some day care centers have removed meatballs, a staple of traditional Danish cuisine, from their cafeterias in deference to Islamic dietary rules. No matter that only a handful of kindergartens have actually done so. The missing meatballs, he said, are an example of how “Denmark is losing its identity” under pressure from outsiders.

The issue has become a headache for Mayor Helle Adelborg, whose center-left Social Democratic Party has controlled the town council since the 1920s but now faces an uphill struggle before municipal elections on Nov. 19. “It is very easy to exploit such themes to get votes,” she said. “They take a lot of votes from my party. It is unfair.”

It is also Europe’s new reality. All over, established political forces are losing ground to politicians whom they scorn as fear-mongering populists. In France, according to a recent opinion poll, the far-right National Front has become the country’s most popular party. In other countries — Austria, Britain, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Finland and the Netherlands — disruptive upstart groups are on a roll.

This phenomenon alarms not just national leaders but also officials in Brussels who fear that European Parliament elections next May could substantially tip the balance of power toward nationalists and forces intent on halting or reversing integration within the European Union.

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Iran Nuclear Talks End with No Agreement after France Balks at Deal

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Photo Credit: Fox News Negotiations among world powers to temporarily curb Iran’s nuclear program ended with no deal Saturday after France objected that proposals did not go far enough.

French foreign minister Laurent Fabius said that the talks, which ended early Sunday, managed to narrow differences without eliminating them, saying there are “still questions to be dealt with” in future rounds. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said “significant progress” had been made on the differences that remain.

A Western diplomat said a new round would be needed to agree on all points of a temporary deal that would to lead to a comprehensive agreement ensuring that Tehran’s nuclear work remains peaceful.

European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who coordinated the talks, said Iran and the five permanent U.N. Security Council members plus Germany would meet again on Nov. 20.

Fabius said there were “several points” in the initial deal with which his country is not satisfied and told France-Inter Radio France does not want to be part of a “con game.”

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Obama’s Secret Iran Détente

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Photo Credit: APThe Obama administration began softening sanctions on Iran after the election of Iran’s new president in June, months before the current round of nuclear talks in Geneva or the historic phone call between the two leaders in September.

While those negotiations now appear on the verge of a breakthrough the key condition for Iran—relief from crippling sanctions—began quietly and modestly five months ago.

A review of Treasury Department notices reveals that the U.S. government has all but stopped the financial blacklisting of entities and people that help Iran evade international sanctions since the election of its president, Hassan Rouhani, in June.

On Wednesday Obama said in an interview with NBC News the negotiations in Geneva “are not about easing sanctions.” “The negotiations taking place are about how Iran begins to meet its international obligations and provide assurances not just to us but to the entire world,” the president said.

But it has also long been Obama’s strategy to squeeze Iran’s economy until Iran would be willing to trade relief from sanctions for abandoning key elements of its nuclear program.

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Anti-Semitism is on the Rise, Finds Survey of European Jewish People

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Photo Credit: REUTERS/Vincent KesslerThe survey of 5,847 Jewish people from the eight European countries where 90 per cent of Europe’s Jews live found that more than three-quarters believe anti-Semitism is on the rise.

The European Jewish Congress has condemned the findings, timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of the Kristallnacht pogroms in Nazi Germany, as “a watershed moment for the continent of Europe”.

“The Jewish reality in Europe is of great concern and the authorities need to deal with incidents of hate and intolerance in a holistic manner to really combat these manifestations before it is too late,” said Dr Moshe Kantor, the congress’s president.

According to the survey, conducted by the European Union’s Agency for Fundamental Rights, almost one-third of Jewish people have considered emigrating because they do not feel safe. In Hungary, France and Belgium between 40 to and 48 per cent said they had thought about fleeing.

Thirty eight per cent of the Jewish polled people in Sweden, France, Belgium, Britain, Germany, Italy, Hungary and Latvia said they always or frequently avoided wearing a skullcap, Star of David or anything else that could signal their religion.

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