Netanyahu In UN Address Decries Iran’s Rouhani as ‘Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing’

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Photo Credit: Fox

Photo Credit: Fox

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appealed to the world community not to be fooled by the new Iranian president’s conciliatory words, using a U.N. address to decry him as a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

Netanyahu, speaking to the U.N. General Assembly session on Tuesday in New York, sought to counter the positive reviews Iranian President Hassan Rouhani got over his debut at the international gathering. As the U.S. reaches out anew to Iran under its new leadership, the Israeli prime minister suggested Hassan Rouhani is no better than his predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

“Rouhani didn’t sound like Ahmadinejad, but when it comes to Iran’s nuclear weapons program, the only difference between them is this: Ahmadinejad was the wolf in wolf’s clothing. Rouhani is a wolf in sheep’s clothing,” Netanyahu said. “A wolf who thinks he can pull the wool over the eyes of the international community.”

Netanyahu spoke after meeting in person with President Obama on Monday in Washington.

Netanyahu is wary amid efforts to re-launch diplomatic talks between the U.S. and Iran, and following a historic phone call on Friday between Obama and Rouhani. The Obama-Rouhani phone call was the first between an American and Iranian president since the Iranian revolution of 1979, which sent U.S.-Iranian relations into a deep freeze.

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Belgian Transsexual, 44, Elects to Die by Euthanasia after Botched Sex-Change Operation; 1 in 50 in Country Die from Doctor Assisted Suicide

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Photo Credit: Facebook

Photo Credit: Facebook

A Belgian transsexual has chosen to die by euthanasia after a botched sex change operation to complete his transformation into a man left him a ‘monster’.

Nathan Verhelst, 44, died yesterday afternoon after being allowed have his life ended on the grounds of ‘unbearable psychological suffering’.

It is understood to be the first time someone in Belgium has chosen euthanasia after a sex-change, and comes soon after it emerged that it is now the cause of nearly one in 50 deaths in the country.

Born a girl named Nancy, his transformation into a man began with hormone therapy in 2009, followed by a mastectomy and finally an operation to construct a penis last year.

But the procedures did not go according to plan.

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Critics Dispute Global Warming Assertions Made by IPCC

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

Critics of a new United Nations report on global warming say their skepticism is based on discrepancies between the UN’s climate models and actual, observable conditions.

The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will release its full report on Monday. It expresses 95% certainty that human activity is primarily responsibly for an observed rise in global temperatures over the past century. Environmentalists have said that even mild criticism of such reports on global warming as science “denial.”

Skeptics have already pointed to what they say are flaws in the report’s methodology and resulting problems with its findings.

Past discrepancies between the IPCC’s models and either subsequent environmental conditions or contradictory scientific work at the time demonstrate why those models should not be taken at face value, the critics say.

The IPCC predicted in 1995 that global sea levels would rise by up to 55 centimeters by 2100 “for the range of emissions scenarios.”

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U.S. to Teach Mexicans to Game American System

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Photo Credit: WND

Photo Credit: WND

It’s an expenditure of only $100,000 – mere pocket change in the vast labyrinth of federal spending – but the funds are for the creation of a manual to teach people how to get more money from the U.S. government.

And the recipients aren’t even citizens of the United States.

The U.S. Trade & Development Agency, an independent White House agency, is laying the foundation for the government of Mexico to infuse hundreds of billions of dollars into modernizing its roads, bridges and other critical infrastructure.

While it remains to be seen how much direct financial assistance the U.S. will provide, even the looming threat of a government shutdown has failed to curb President Obama’s plan to cut U.S. Treasury checks for the Mexican endeavor.

The industry-crafted report likewise will serve as a corporate-welfare roadmap for U.S. businesses seeking future contracts awarded under the massive project, according to a USTDA planning document that WND located via routine database research.

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Israel’s Netanyahu to Warn US, UN about Iran’s ‘Smiley Campaign’

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Photo Credit: Fox

Photo Credit: Fox

Just days after the first conversation between the leaders of the U.S. and Iran in 34 years was hailed as a “breakthrough” in relations between the two countries, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is taking an unpopular message to the White House and the United Nations: Don’t be fooled by Tehran’s “sweet talk.”

Netanyahu, who contends Iran is using conciliatory gestures as a smoke screen to conceal an unabated march toward a nuclear bomb, will meet with President Obama Monday to deliver strong words of caution to the U.S.

“I will tell the truth in the face of the sweet talk and the onslaught of smiles,” Netanyahu said before boarding his flight to the U.S. on Sunday. “Telling the truth today is vital for the security and peace of the world and, of course, it is vital for the security of the state of Israel.”

Netanyahu also plans to offer up fresh intelligence in his attempt to persuade the U.S. to maintain tough economic sanctions and not allow the Islamic republic to develop a bomb or even move closer to becoming a nuclear threshold state.

Israeli leaders watched with great dismay what they derisively call the “smiley campaign” by Iran’s new president, Hassan Rouhani, last week. Rouhani delivered a conciliatory speech at the United Nations in which he repeated Iran’s official position that it has no intention of building a nuclear weapon and declared his readiness for new negotiations with the West.

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UN Inspectors Prepare to Dismantle Syria’s Chemical Weapons Cache

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Photo Credit: Shaam News Network

Photo Credit: Shaam News Network

A 20-strong international team of engineers, chemists and paramedics leave the Netherlands for Syria on Monday to embark on the most hazardous mission in the history of disarmament: to dismantle one of the world’s biggest chemical weapons arsenals, during a civil war, under extreme deadline pressure.

In 35C heat inspectors from the international Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) will, at times, wear body armour and helmets over their chemical protection suits, sometimes carrying air tanks on their backs, in their efforts to abide by a UN security council resolution to destroy about 1,000 tonnes of nerve agents such as sarin and other poisonous gases such as sulphur mustard.

Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad vowed to co-operate with the mission in an interview with Italy’s RAI News 24 TV. “Of course we have to comply [with the UN resolution]. This is our history to comply with every treaty we sign,” he said.

The inspectors are due to arrive in Damascus on Tuesday. They will need to work quickly to meet the tight deadlines agreed by the security council on Friday.

In the first few days, a group of 20 inspectors drawn from about a dozen countries will have to fill the gaps in Syria’s initial disclosure of its inventory of poison gases, nerve agents, delivery systems and production sites and fine tune the logistics for visiting the declared sites.

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Christians in the Crosshairs

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Photo Credit: Washington Post

Photo Credit: Washington Post

Hiding the Christian name on his ID with his thumb, Joshua Hakim approached the gunmen and showed them the plastic card. “They told me to go. Then an Indian man came forward, and they said, ‘What is the name of Muhammad’s mother?’ When he couldn’t answer they just shot him.”

That’s the way it went inside the Westgate Premier Shopping Mall in Nairobi last Saturday. If you said when asked that you were Muslim, you were let go. If you answered no, you stayed. And maybe died.

More than 60 patrons in that upscale mall in Kenya’s capital breathed their last that day, shot dead by Islamist militants from Somalia who call themselves al-Shabab. The massacre was not al-Shabab’s first attack on non-Muslims.

But why should we know much about the killing of Christians when news of Washington’s political food fights, the looming federal shutdown and the National Zoo’s new panda cub keep getting in the way?

Since 1999, more than 14,000 Nigerians have been killed in sectarian violence between Muslims and Christians, reports the bipartisan U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. The militant group Boko Haram, which supports an extreme and violent interpretation of Islam, is behind most of the violence. It cites state and federal government action against Muslims, among other “reasons,” as justification for its strikes on churches.

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Iraq Says Iran’s Shift Toward West Is Serious

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Iran soldiersIraq’s foreign minister said Saturday that the new Iranian government led by President Hassan Rouhani offers “the best chance after 34 years of animosity” to improve relations with the United States and should be taken seriously.

Hoshyar Zebari also told The Associated Press in an interview that he is working behind the scenes to try to unite disparate Syrian opposition groups ahead of a November peace conference and to promote a thaw in Tehran’s relations with the United States.

Zebari said U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon asked Iraq at their meeting Saturday to press the opposition to come with one delegation and one position. The U.N. chief also told him he heard no opposition to Iran, an ally of Syrian President Bashar Assad, participating in the upcoming Geneva peace conference.

“Before he would hear outright rejection,” Zebari said. “This time, everybody was quiet. Nobody objected.”

Iraq is in a unique position in the Middle East. Its Shiite-dominated government has comfortable ties to Shiite Iran — an important ally of Bashar Assad’s Syrian regime. And according to Zebari, Iraq also has good relations with both sides in the Syrian conflict. It also has strong ties to Washington following the 10-year, American-led war that ousted dictator Saddam Hussein.

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Kenyan Authorities Had Been Warned About Threat to Buildings ‘Day Before Attacks’

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Photo Credit: Aijaz Rahi/AP

Photo Credit: Aijaz Rahi/AP

Kenyan authorities had intelligence pointing to an attack in Nairobi a day before the Westgate mall attack. According to counter-terrorism documents, the government and military were warned that al-Shabaab was planning an attack on the capital where it would storm a building and hold hostages.

There are also reports that Kenyan intelligence agents were at Westgate a few hours before the crowded shopping centre was struck by heavily armed terrorists last Saturday, in a four-day siege that left at least 67 people dead.

“We cannot say that this attack comes as a surprise,” said Farah Maalim, former deputy speaker of the Kenyan National Assembly. “The possibility of something like this happening, and of failures in the Kenyan intelligence community, has worried us for years.” Maalim added: “We have an intelligence service more worried about internal party politics than about threats to national security.”

It was announced yesterday that a sixth Briton has died following the siege. The Foreign Office has said it cannot rule out the possibility of further casualties.

Kenya refuses to comment on reports of warnings prior to the attack, but officials say they are still investigating the relationship between the attackers and al-Shabaab’s local offshoot, al-Hijra. In the past, Kenya’s large Somali-Kenyan population has borne the brunt of suspicion for involvement in terrorism, but sources say that the authorities are now focusing investigations on ethnic Kenyan converts to Islam for suspected links in the Westgate attack. One young convert was arrested and allegedly tortured last week, say human rights groups, for his suspected role in al-Hijra and Westgate. Allegations of human rights abuses and extrajudicial killings by the Kenyan authorities have gone hand in hand with their continuing investigations into al-Shabaab and al-Hijra networks in Kenya.

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Will Obama Fall for Iranian President’s Deception?

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Photo Credit: AP

Photo Credit: AP

He’s been portrayed by the mainstream media as the anti-Ahmadenijad—a pragmatic moderate who’s set to strike a grand bargain with the United States and save the world from a looming military showdown over Iran’s nuclear weapons program.

But as Iranian president Hassan Rowhani takes center stage at the U.N. General Assembly this week, full of reassuring smiles and promises of peace, the Obama administration would be wise to keep a peculiar-sounding Arabic word in mind.

That word is taqiyya (pronounced ta-kee-ah). Translated into English, it means “deception.”

Taqiyya has long been a favorite tactic utilized by radical Shia Islamists—like those that comprise the current Iranian regime—to confound their enemies and lull them into a false sense of security, even complacency.

If President Obama ends up meeting with Rowhani on Tuesday when both men speak before the General Assembly (an encounter White House officials have hinted may take place), expect nothing less than a full-on taqiyya-fest.

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