In one of it's most blatant attempts to inflict massive civilian casualties on Israel, Hamas sent a drone laden with explosive over a heavily populated neighborhood of the Israeli city of Ashdod. Fortunately, the Israelis were able to shoot it down:
An enemy Unmanned Aerial Vehicle (UAV), apparently laden with explosives, was shot down by the IDF near the port city of Ashdod Monday morning.
The interception caused a strong explosion to rock Ashdod and the air raid sirens went off, at around 6:30 a.m..
The Navy is reportedly looking for remains of the UAV.
The IDF Spokesman said that the UAV was shot down by a Patriot missile and that it fell in an open space along the Ashdod beach.
Mordechai Weisman, a resident of the Beit Shemesh area, told Arutz Sheva that the downing of the UAV "was accompanied by a very loud and long jet-like rumbling sound" that could be heard dozens of kilometers away.
“I just saw and heard massive column of smoke rising from Tel Aviv / coastal area,” he told Arutz Sheva's Tamar Yonah. “It sounded as loud as a large jet engine even from here near Beit Shemesh. Like nothing we've seen before. Looking at the photo, I would say it is coming from the Ashdod area. And just for the record, it was really scary watching and listening to that. The image does not at all do it justice...”
Here's a tweet from Avital Leibovich, a former IDF spokeswoman:
According to the Wall Street Journal, The U.S. has benn flying drones in small numbers over the areas of Iraq now occupied by ISIS. The drones are unarmed and for surveillance only..at least so far.
Someone described as a senior U.S. official was quoted as saying that the intelligence collected under the small program was shared with Iraqi forces, but added: "It's not like it did any good."
There's an understatement for you.
But with all that intelligence, the offensive by ISIS reportedly, 'caught the U.S. by surprise.'
Following the takeover of the two Iraqi cities, administration officials have asked the U.S. military and intelligence agencies to draw up options that include limited U.S. military action in Iraq, officials said.
One of the options being drawn up for the White House would expand the drone flights over Iraq, a step that could aid Iraqi forces or facilitate possible U.S. airstrikes.
"They're looking at everything and anything and have been told explicitly by the White House to think outside the box of what is possible," a senior U.S. official said.
In recent weeks, the U.S. has also stepped up planning for the possible evacuation of the American embassy in Baghdad, a U.S. official said. U.S. military officials say they don't believe an evacuation will be necessary and doubt Baghdad will fall to militant forces, but said expanded planning is prudent.
They were 'caught by surprise' by ISIS but now are saying Baghdad won't fall? Expanded planning is definitely prudent!
What will be interesting is the interaction between U.S. forces and the Iranians, whom already have units of Iran's Revolutionary Guard on the ground. And then there's the Iranian backed Shi'ite militias like Moqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi Army. The Iranians, as I mentioned before are not at all pleased at their Shi'ite colony changing management,
This seems more and more like deja vu, with American troops being caught in between two sides of a religious civil war.
Based on the 'rewards' we got from intervening last time, I think we might be better off staying out of it, to say the least. Let the two sides work it out. The only people I favor arming in Iraq are the Kurds..if they're willing to be our allies after the sordid betrayals of two consecutive American administrations.
Yes, this was definitely the beginning of something new. Rand Paul's 13 hour filibuster got the Obama Administration to commit to a 180 turn on their drone policy.
Pre-filibuster, Attorney General Eric Holder was playing coy and saying he thought President Obama probably did have legal authority to order a drone strike against an American citizen within our borders without due process. The next day, Holder and President Obama were forced to reverse themselves and issue a firm "no' on the matter.
The criticism of Senator Paul and those who helped him during the filibuster by the likes of GOP Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham isn't unexpected in the least. Among other things, they were probably angry because he took the spotlight off them.
Their dinner with President Obama, in a public restaurant with a twenty car motorcade and ample media attention was supposed to be a major photo-op and news story. Here were a bunch of Republicans eating with the president, getting things done, by gosh! All's well!
And then this freshman Senator from Kentucky had to embarrass them, play hero and capture the attention of America and the media. How dare he do that!
If I had planned to speak for 13 hours when I took the Senate floor Wednesday, I would’ve worn more comfortable shoes. I started my filibuster with the words, “I rise today to begin to filibuster John Brennan’s nomination for the CIA. I will speak until I can no longer speak” — and I meant it.
I wanted to sound an alarm bell from coast to coast. I wanted everybody to know that our Constitution is precious and that no American should be killed by a drone without first being charged with a crime. As Americans, we have fought long and hard for the Bill of Rights. The idea that no person shall be held without due process, and that no person shall be held for a capital offense without being indicted, is a founding American principle and a basic right.
My official starting time was 11:47 a.m. on Wednesday, March 6, 2013.
I had a large binder of materials to help me get through my points, but although I sometimes read an op-ed or prepared remarks in between my thoughts, most of my filibuster was off the top of my head and straight from my heart. From 1 to 2 p.m., I barely looked at my notes. I wanted to make sure that I touched every point and fully explained why I was demanding more information from the White House.
Just before 3 p.m., Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) came to the Senate floor to help out. Under Senate rules, I could not yield the floor or my filibuster would end, and Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) could have shut me down. The only way for me to continue and allow Sens. Lee and Cruz to speak was to yield the floor for questions.
Their presence gave me strength and inspiration. Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) also arrived to help. Sen. Ron Wyden (Ore.), the only Democrat who came to my defense, explained how we have worked together to demand more information from the White House about the rules for drone strikes. At about 4:30 p.m., Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) joined. I was flagging for a while, but these senators kept me going.
Sen. Reid came to the Senate floor to ask me when I would be done so he could schedule a vote. But I wasn’t ready to yield. I felt I had a lot more explaining to do.
At about 6:30 p.m., something extraordinary happened. Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), who has been recovering from a stroke, came to the floor to give me something. I was not allowed to drink anything but water or eat anything but the candy left in our Senate desks. But he brought me an apple and a thermos full of tea — the same sustenance Jimmy Stewart brought to the Senate floor in the movie “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” That was a moment I will never forget. [...]
On Thursday, the Senate confirmed John Brennanas director of the CIA. But this debate isn’t over.
The Senate has the power to restrain the executive branch — and my filibuster was the beginning of the fight to restore a healthy balance of powers. The president still needs to definitively say that the United States will not kill American noncombatants. The Constitution’s Fifth Amendment applies to all Americans; there are no exceptions.
The outpouring of support for my filibuster has been overwhelming and heartening. My office has fielded thousands of calls. Millions have followed this debate on TV, Twitter and Facebook. On Thursday, the White House produced another letter explaining its position on drone strikes. But the administration took too long, and parsed too many words and phrases, to instill confidence in its willingness or ability to protect our liberty.
I hope my efforts help spur a national debate about the limits of executive power and the scope of every American’s natural right to be free. “Due process” is not just a phrase that can be ignored at the whim of the president; it is a right that belongs to every citizen in this great nation.
I believe the support I received this past week shows that Americans are looking for someone to really stand up and fight for them. And I’m prepared to do just that.
As I said, this is the beginning of something new. And it will be interesting to see where that goes.
“I will speak until I can no longer speak,” Paul said. “I will speak as long as it takes, until the alarm is sounded from coast to coast that our Constitution is important, that your rights to trial by jury are precious, that no American should be killed by a drone on American soil without first being charged with a crime, without first being found to be guilty by a court.”
Paul called Holder’s refusal to rule out drone strikes within the United States “more than frightening.”
On Wednesday, Paul elaborated on his concerns: “When I asked the president, can you kill an American on American soil, it should have been an easy answer. It’s an easy question. It should have been a resounding an unequivocal, ‘No.’ The president’s response? He hasn’t killed anyone yet. We’re supposed to be comforted by that. The president says, ‘I haven’t killed anyone yet.’ He goes on to say, ‘And I have no intention of killing Americans. But I might.’ Is that enough? Are we satisfied by that?”
Paul said on the Senate floor, “No American should ever be killed in their house without warrant and some kind of aggressive behavior by them. To be bombed in your sleep? There’s nothing American about that . . . [Obama] says trust him because he hasn’t done it yet. He says he doesn’t intend to do so, but he might. Mr. President, that’s not good enough . . . so I’ve come here to speak for as long as I can to draw attention to something that I find to really be very disturbing.”
“I will not sit quietly and let him shred the Constitution,” Paul added.”No person will be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process,” he said, quoting the Fifth Amendment.
Full on old school filibusters are extremely rare in Washington, but legal. Any Senator can hold the floor for as long as he or she likes, according to the rules, but filibusters are usually done by legislative mechanisms rather than by physically holding the floor.
The record? The Palmetto State's own Strom Thurmond holds it, filibustering as a Dixiecrat for for 24 hours and 18 minutes against the Civil Rights Act of 1957, according to U.S. Senate records. Of course, he had help from his fellow Democrats, who managed to keep things going for 57 days, filibustering between March 26 and June 19, the day the Civil Rights Act of 1957 passed.
A close second place is held by one of my favorite Senators of all time, New York's Alfonse D'Amato. He spoke for 23 hours and 30 minutes to stall debate on an important military bill in 1986 that contained an amendment that would have cut off funding for a jet training plane built by a company headquartered in his home state.
The amendment was removed.
It will be interesting to see how Rand Paul does. If it were me, I'd be reading whole sections of William L.Shirer's "Rise and Fall of The Third Reich" aloud, particularly the parts of about hiow Hitler was democratically elected, and the parts about the 'emergency' of the Reichstag Fire that enabled him to shred the German Constitution and take full power.
You go, Senator. Let 'em have it. And let's see if any other Republicans have the gonads to help you out on this one.
Yesterday, I reported that Senator Rand Paul was holding up John Brennan's confirmation until he got an answer from the White House on whether drone strikes would ever be used within the United States, since U.S. laws restrict the use of our military within our borders.
“It is possible, I suppose, to imagine an extraordinary circumstance in which it would be necessary and appropriate under the Constitution and applicable laws of the United States for the President to authorize the military to use lethal force within the territory of the United States,” Holder replied in a letter yesterday to Paul’s question about whether Obama “has the power to authorize lethal force, such as a drone strike, against a U.S. citizen on U.S. soil, and without trial.”
Holder noted that Paul’s question was “entirely hypothetical [and] unlikely to occur,” but cited the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks as the type of incidents that might provoke such a response.
“Were such an emergency to arise, I would examine the particular facts and circumstances before advising the President on the scope of his authority,” he concluded.
Emphasis mine.
In other words, Holder and the president feel that in an 'emergency' or anything they determine as such, they're free to use drones, those spiffy new heavily armored APC's Homeland Security is stocking up on, any military force they want against our own citizens without due process.
I'm hardly surprised at this. Nor would I be surprised at a similar rationalization by the White House for using drones on 'domestic enemies' in the future.
That's the problem nowadays.When you speak, nothing goes away or is forgotten.
The man Barack Obama wants to head the CIA is an admitted Islamophile, as evidenced by a Feb. 13, 2010 address to a meeting at the Islamic Center at New York University, sponsored by the Muslim Brotherhood front the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA):
Travels around the world over more than three decades had taught him about “the goodness and beauty of Islam,” said Brennan, whose 25-year career at the CIA until 2005 included a stint as station chief in Riyadh. “Like the president during his childhood years in Jakarta, I came to see Islam not how it is often misrepresented, but for what it is – how it is practiced every day, by well over a billion Muslims worldwide, a faith of peace and tolerance and great diversity.”
In the speech, during which he drew applause after speaking in Arabic for more than a minute, Brennan used terms evidently designed to appeal to his audience, such as “Al-Quds” for Jerusalem, “Palestine” and “as the Qur’an reveals” – in keeping with the Muslim belief that the Qur’an was “revealed” directly by Allah to Mohammed through the angel Jibril (Gabriel).
He condemned what he said were negative stereotypes in the U.S. about Muslims and hostility towards Islam, adding that government actions and policies had contributed to the problem but saying this would change under Obama. “Ignorance is a threat to our national security, prejudice is a threat to our national security, discrimination is a threat to our national security. And those who purport to be religious are frequently the most egregious purveyors of ignorance, prejudice and discrimination – and it must stop,” he said.
“We must also acknowledge that over the years the actions of our own government have at times perpetuated those attitudes,” Brennan continued. “Violations of the Patriot Act; surveillance that has been excessive; policies perceived as profiling; over-inclusive no-fly lists subjecting law-abiding individuals to unnecessary searches and inconvenience; creating an unhealthy atmosphere around many Muslim charities that made Muslims hesitant to fulfill their sacred obligation of zakat [an Islamic tithe or tax] – these are challenges we face, we face together as Americans, and President Obama and his administration are pursuing a comprehensive approach to address them,” he said.
Let's put some additional context into these remarks. Mr. Brennan's speech took place in an Islamic center noted for its hardline wahabi views and jihadist literature, sponsored by a Muslim Brotherhood front group indicted in the Holy Land Foundation trial whose leaders only escaped prosecution because the Obama Justice Department filed Declination of Prosecution motions in what amounted to an open and shut case.
Brennan's tenure as CIA Head of Station in Riyadh during th eBush Administrastionwas also marked by a complete lack of pressure on the Saudis to investigate Saudi nationals known to be financing jihadi terrorism or to stop jihadis from transiting Saudi Arabia to fight in Iraq against our troops.
This is the man whom President Obama wants to head our CIA.As an additional benefit for this president's agenda, Brennan is 'Mr. Drone', on record as favoring the use of unmanned drones for domestic surveillance.
The Obama Administration has been marked by its empowerment and support of the Muslim Brotherhood overseas and here in America, and there are a number of people with this worldview as well as people with significant ties to the Brotherhood within the Administration.
The rot goes deep indeed, and it will cost us in the future.
The Israeli Air Force shot down a drone aircraft yesterday that penetrated deep into Israeli air space.
The drone originated in Lebanon, but flew over the Mediterranean and then backtracked to give the appearance it was coming via Gaza.
It then proceeded into Israeli air space over the IDF’s southern bases, the city of Beersheba and the IAF base at Nevatim before it was shot down over the Yatir forest south of Mt. Hebron.
Its mission was certainly to test Israel's response and may very well have been to record the electronic 'signatures' of Israel's air defense systems for its Dimona nuclear reactor and the American X-band radar station in the Negev. The drone unfortunately managed to sty airborne and transmitting for almost a half hour before IAF pilots scrambled and shot it down.
While the drone was spotted promptly, my sources tell me there was an unfortunate glitch between the drone being spotted and actual orders being given to take it out that allowed the drone to stay airborne far longer than it should have. From what I've managed to hear, a few reprimands went out and certain steps have been taken to prevent a recurrence. The drone could very well have been carrying explosives.
Contrary to what you see above, the drone didn't disintegrate into a fireball but yielded a number of fragments that were quite valuable in determining the drone's technology, navigation system and Iranian origin.
It was almost certainly launched by Hezbollah, probably with Iranian technicians handling the actual mechanics.
General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, a senior commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s ground forces said just a couple of weeks ago that Iran was preparing to carry out preemptive operations against the US and Israel.
While Iran may have trouble reverse engineering the drone itself, an Iranian company has profited by making miniature toy versions of the drone. The toys come on several colors, are made of Iranian plastic, and most of them have already been snapped up by Iranian government organizations.
A special model — a pink one — has been specially reserved for President Obama.
“He said he wanted it back, and we will send him one,” said Reza Kioumarsi, the head of cultural production at the Ayeh Art group.
I wonder if President Obama's going to keep it on his desk as a sign of 'engagement'?
The Ayeh Art Group normally makes things like t-shirts, posters, buttons and mugs but is now cranking out 2,000 of the toy drones a day.
“This is not made in China,” Kioumarsi stressed.
The toy drones also come with a special transparent plastic stand emblazoned with a quotation from Ayatollah Khomeini, the founder of the Islamic Republic: “We will put America under our feet.”
Nifty!
Who says there no laughter in Islam? Certainly they're finding President Obama pretty comical.
An event took place which is worth looking at in detail...just in case President Obama trots out the tall tale again that's he's not an appeaser and is decisive when it comes to foreign policy.
This latest episode started when a top secret American RQ-170 Sentinel drone went down over Iran a few days ago.
The Obama Administration's first impulse was to deny it...until the Iranians showed it on state television.
The RQ 170 is a fairly complex piece of gear, and stories differ as to what happened. The DoD says it malfunctioned. The Iranians say they used a top secret technique to bring the drone down electronically.
Such things happen, and knowing what I know about Iran's state of technology, my personal leaning is towards a malfunction.But the real malfunction apparently occurred afterwards, in the White House.
This is a perfect example of the 3 AM call scenario. For whatever reason, we had a top secret piece of equipment on the ground in the hands of our enemies. As ex-VP Dick Cheney relates below, President Obama was presented with 3 options to get the drone back in our hands including destroying it before the Iranians could plumb it's intelligence and the technology involved. His response? To do nothing, because he was afraid Iran might be mad at us...so he just asked for it back politely:
As if the Iranians were going to comply! The first part of their response was to openly mock the president and the US:
"The Americans have perhaps decided to give us this spy plane," Ahmadinejad said. "We now have control of this plane."
Speaking through an interpreter, Ahmadinejad said: "There are people here who have been able to control this spy plane, who can surely analyze this plane's system also. ... In any case, now we have this spy plane."
(ed. note..in Farsi, this could also have been translated as "This plane is now our property.")
He added, "Very soon, they're going to learn more about the abilities and possibilities of our country."
On Tuesday, a semi-official Iranian news agency said authorities have shrugged off the U.S. request. Defense Minister Gen. Ahmad Vahidi said the United States should apologize for invading Iranian air space instead of asking for the return of the unmanned aircraft.
Cheney of course asks the ultimate question..why not simply destroy the ground, ideally when there are a crowd of Iranian technicians poking around it? If our unmanned drones aren't engineered to explode when a certain radio signal or computer code is transmitted to them, a cruise missile would have done the job quite nicely. Instead, the president once again allowed a valuable piece of technology to fall into enemy hands because he was scared Iran,who has been in a state of war with us for thirty years and has been openly guilty of hostile action might take it the wrong way!
The Iranian energy minister told Al Jazeera television last month that Tehran was making plans to use oil as a political weapon if there were any future conflicts over its nuclear rogue program.
They have absolutely no reservations of provocative actions of this sort. You see, the Iranians know very well exactly what sort of man they're dealing with in President Obama.
One final word about the re-engineering, courtesy of Wired...it's unlikely the Iranians can pull it off:
“Someone will figure out the [materials'] composition,” the Boeing engineer explains, “but producing them is entirely a different matter.”
For the drone vivisectionists, it only gets worse. After examining the (alleged) RQ-170′s airframe, they will likely focus on its sensors. We don’t know for sure what devices the Sentinel carries, but it could include video cameras and a ground-mapping radar. The Darpa robot designer says the RQ-170′s radar — if it carries one — could share subsystems with the radars on the latest F-22 and F-35 stealth fighters, which might give U.S. adversaries some insight into how those planes operate, too.
But the designer isn’t too worried. “Even if [the radar] showed up completely intact, they may not know how to use it because they don’t know how to use the software.”
Moreover, the software includes classified anti-tamper measures. At least, it’s supposed to, according to the Boeing engineer. “Dumbest thing in the world if it didn’t.”
So maybe we got lucky. Or maybe we didn't. Blowing up the drone certainly would have made sure, and denied the Mullahs a propaganda coup.
Avital Leibovich ✔
@AvitalLeibovich
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