Center of Soviet Aspirations - Fortune Magazine Editors

By 

Fortune Editors

August 1, 1951

 From the August 1951 issue of Fortune magazine.Harrison/Fortune/Time Inc.

Among the secret documents captured in the archives of the German Foreign Office was a report from the German Ambassador to Moscow (Schulenburg), dated November 26, 1940, in the period of the Nazi-Soviet pact. The German Ambassador said that Molotov was prepared to accept the draft of a proposed four-power pact between Germany, Italy, Japan, and the Soviet Union, subject to certain conditions. One of these conditions was simply stated: “Provided that the area south of Batum and Baku in the general direction of the Persian Gulf is recognized as the center of the aspirations of the Soviet Union.”

This is one of the most candid declarations of Soviet Russia’s intentions ever made public. The document in which it appears was published by the U.S. State Department in 1948. There is every indication today that this area remains a center of tremendous Russian expansionist pressure.

Cutting through eastern Turkey and Iraq, and western Iran, this triangle is the heart of the Middle East. It effectively divides the globe, East and West. Thus the aspirations of Soviet Russia in this area are not limited to a bit of territory but fit accurately into its broader aspirations of world conquest. This triangle, coveted by czarist and bolshevist Russia alike, is also the weakest salient in Russia’s historic defense-in-depth strategy. It lies at her back door, only a few hundred miles by air from most of Russian oil and much of its industry. On the other hand it is open to reasonably easy conquest by Russian land armies, U.S. airpower notwithstanding. Perhaps sometime the Red Army will come through the passes of the Caucasus and the Elburz Mountains, and take it. But this no doubt would be generally regarded as the formal opening of World War III, and from Korea and other evidences, it seems probable that Soviet Russia would like to get it cheaper, that is, by subversion, civil war, and conversion to a satellite, and thus continue to throw sand in the eyes of the non-Communist world.

Read more:

Bible Prophecy is Happening Now! (2019)

It’s official, America is in BIG trouble

Reblogged from servehiminthewaiting.com

By STLloyd March 31, 2015

 

Folks, at this point in time, the question of God’s plans for America, how it will all end, and whether we have “more time” is answered, because Scripture has already told us that those who curse Israel will themselves be cursed.  Can God be swayed?  Of course He hears the effectual fervent prayers of righteous men and women.  But on the question of the treatment of Israel, the verdict has already been announced, and is non-negotiable.  Chastisement is coming.  The only room for variableness, may lie in degree of severity, which is all the more reason to put on the armor, and fast and pray like never before.
Here is Jan Markell’s commentary on this:

Revenge, Abandonment, Betrayal

By Jan Markell

March 30, 2015

www.olivetreeviews.org

Did you ever expect to see those three words linked to the U.S.-Israel relationship? Have we fallen down a hole and we now are in an “Alice-in-Wonderland” world? America embraces her enemies and lifts sanctions on Iran. She will likely place sanctions on Israel. It is an upside down world. Is the Mad Hatter in charge?

Things aren’t falling apart–they’re falling in place.

The entire world is in the process of abandoning Israel which the Bible foretells in Zechariah 12:3. It is ultimately fulfilled in the Tribulation but the process begins much sooner.

Here’s what some are saying.

Pamela Geller, President of the American Freedom Defense Initiative  and Stop Islamization of America says, “The White House actions against Israel and Prime Minister Netanyahu are a ‘jihad against the Jews.'”

She refers to the story broken by Israel National News that the Obama administration declassified a Department of Defense top-secret document with details of Israel’s nuclear assets, a highly covert topic that Israel has never formally announced to avoid a regional nuclear arms race.

Geller states that Israel has shared its nuclear secrets with America for decades. They just never imagined someone in the White House would stoop so low as to reveal them to the world.

Joel Rosenberg says, “There is mounting evidence that Obama is preparing to ‘divorce Israel.’ Once it would have been preposterous even to ask such a question. Today, it feels like it’s a matter of ‘when’, not ‘if’ Mr. Obama will formally abandon American support for the Jewish State. And the situation is rapidly going from bad to worse.”

Rosenberg cites some headlines:

• U.S. Could Abandon Israel at the U.N. (CNN)
• Washington Threatens to Abandon Israel at the U.N. (Times of London)
• The U.S.-Israel Relationship is at “The Lowest Point in the Alliance That Diplomatic Sages Can Recall (New York Times)
• Israel-White House Relations at All-Time Low (Breaking Israel News)
• Iran Deal Worse Than Israel Feared (Times of Israel)

Rosenberg states,”For an American President, or Congress, or the American people, to turn against Israel and the Jewish people would be more than bad policy or unfortunate politics. According to Bible prophecy, such moves would pose an existential threat to the future of the United States.” 

Israeli commentator Caroline Glick writes, “the administration’s animosity toward Israel is a function of Obama’s twin strategic aims, both evident since he entered office: realigning U.S. policy in the Middle East toward Iran and away from its traditional allies Israel and the Sunni Arab states, and ending the US’s strategic alliance with Israel.
“Over the past six years, we have seen how Obama has consistently, but gradually, taken steps to advance these two goals. Toward Iran, he has demonstrated an unflappable determination to accommodate the terrorism supporting, nuclear proliferating, human rights repressing and empire building mullahs.”

Find Jan’s newest DVD on which U.S. Presidents have blessed or cursed Israel here. What are the consequences of cursing? How has our current President contributed to this? The DVD is just $15 and runs almost 60 minutes..

White House correspondent Bill Koenig, my frequent conference and radio guest writes in his e-newsletter, Koenig’s Eye-View from the White House:“The more President Obama’s actions affect or jeopardize Israel’s security, the stronger the response will be from the God of Israel as evidenced in Scripture. This will have enormous implications for the United States.” 
Koenig writes, “The Obama administration keeps speaking about its unprecedented security cooperation with Israel, but what good is that if Iran gets nuclear weapons? What good is it if Iran deploys missiles in Syria and Lebanon, or Hamas takes over the Palestinian Authority, entrenches itself in the mountains of Judea and Samaria and brings in arms from Iran and Turkey? What good is it if Iran takes control of Yemen and the Red Sea?”

(Find info on subscribing to Koenig’s e-newsletter here. It’s well worth the nominal cost.)

Journalist Bill Wilson writes, “The U.S. government is trying to literally ‘cut’ Israel in half with its proposal of a Palestinian state. All that burden themselves with this issue may find themselves ‘cut into pieces.'”

The White House has also suggested Israel shrink her borders to PRE-1967 borders. Call them suicide borders. They are not defensible.

Bill Koenig states, “This is the White House that continues to leak information that puts Israel’s security at risk, while speaking of its close co-operation with Israel. This is the White House that pressured the Pentagon to leak potential Israeli military actions against Iran to the press in 2012, 2013, and 2014. This is the White House that leaks news about Israeli air strikes inside Syria.”

Koenig provides a complete timeline of Obama’s anti-Israel hatred in his newsletter. He quotes Breitbart News suggesting President Obama finally called Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to congratulate him on his re-election — but the “congratulations” was actually a lecture directed at forcing Netanyahu to surrender to the terrorist Palestinian regime.

Joel Rosenberg summarizes that we are watching Barack Obama:

• Negotiate an incredibly dangerous nuclear deal with Iran.
• Refuse to share the precise details of this deal with Israel, America’s most faithful and trusted ally in the region.
• Treat the Israeli Prime Minister nearly as persona non grata.
• Send his political strategists and operatives to defeat the Prime Minister and his party in Israel’s recent elections.
• Threaten revenge because Netanyahu won re-election.
• Threaten to abandon Israel at the U.N. and allow anti-Israel resolutions to pass without an American veto.
• And now declassifies details of Israel’s top secret nuclear program in what is being described as an unprecedented move.

Rosenberg concludes, “This is the most dangerous moment in the 67-year history of the U.S.-Israel relationship. What do the next two years hold? I cannot say for sure. I’m praying for the President and his top advisers to back off, turn from this dangerous path, and find common ground with Israel, despite policy and personality differences.”

Iran is about to become a nuclear power player with the blessing of America and a few other blind-as-bats nations. That means many nations in the region will  have to pursue this goal as well. If you ever wondered what end-time references to fire, vapors of smoke, and the resulting strange signs in the heavens mean, I think it is obvious. At the time of the very end, nuclear war will be raging — for sure in the Mideast. Maybe it will happen before the Rapture. The timing of all such events is uncertain. The Bible references appear to be Tribulation-based.

Things are coming together. They are falling in place. Even if it seems they are falling apart, they really are not. Nations must have “distress with perplexity.” (Luke 21:25.)  Can you think of a single nation that is not plagued with some kind of perplexity or plague? A dilemma for which the leaders have no solutions.

Neither kings, generals, mullahs, ayatollahs, presidents, Fuhrers, or pharaohs can obliterate Israel. But the evil they perpetrate on God’s covenant land can boomerang back on them and their empires.

We have been warned. Scripture is clear. Mess with Israel and there are consequences.

“And I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” (Genesis 12:3)

  

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Saudi Arabia, Iran and the Houtis - Avi Lipkin Part II

Saudi Arabia, Iran and the Houtis - Avi Lipkin Part I

Satan´s Temper Tandrum

Satan’s Temper Tantrum

By Donna Wasson

Reblogged from  raptureready.com

---

I’m overwhelmed these days. I feel as if I’m standing in the middle of a field without a weapon, while continuously being fired upon by enemies I can’t see. I know the general direction of their hiding places and I know they mean to do me great harm, but there’s nowhere to run or hide. I’m exposed and vulnerable, and that makes me very, very angry!

So, who’s the enemy and what are they shooting? Ephesians 6:12 pretty much says it all. “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” That’s who we’re battling, but I’d still like to slap the ever-living snot out of the human beings they currently employ.

I’ve never been a big fan of temper tantrums. When I see anyone, whether adult or child, giving in to their base, immature nature and spilling the toxic sewage of their rage on the rest of us, I have an overwhelming urge to blister their fanny. And, right now, satan is throwing one hellacious temper tantrum that’s getting louder and more violent and obnoxious by the day.

He’s had approximately 6000 years or so since the fall of Adam and Eve, to rule this earth and his time is quickly running out; after all, he’s read the Bible too. He’s well aware that his playdate is about to end with a long sojourn in the Bottomless Pit and, because he’s a spoiled brat with a massive entitlement chip on his shoulder, he’s going to go out with a bang, wreaking all the havoc possible and taking as many human beings down to the pit with him.

At the moment, he’s pitching a royal fit on the floor of the cosmic grocery store, kicking and screaming, because he can’t ascend to the heights of heaven and be like the Most High. Poor baby. Quite frankly, he’s so out of control at this point that his machinations have progressed past causing alarm and terror in my heart, to inspiring a yawning boredom and disdain. If I hear about one more beheading, I’m tempted to buy a ticket to Syria, find one of those filthy camel urine drinkers (No, I’m not kidding) and stick a pencil in them!

You do realize that ISIS was created by our government, don’t you? Just like the CIA created, trained and equipped Al Qaida in the 1980’s to battle the Soviets in Afghanistan during the cold war, we have a new, improved version, courtesy of our twisted, wicked, Globalist serving government.

Remember back in 2013 when Bashar al-Assad supposedly used chemical weapons against his own people? The Occupant went into convulsions of humanitarian sympathy, announced that the United States needed to invade Syria to depose Assad as the United Nations inspectors were called in to investigate.

While this inspection was occurring, the Occupant was doing his dead-level best to persuade the American people that we needed to start yet another war against a Middle Eastern nation that posed no direct threat to us, and he didn’t need the permission of Congress to proceed either. The American people put their collective foot down with a resounding “NO!” No more of our blood and treasure would be wasted.

Besides, Russia and China had wagged their fingers in the Occupant’s face and dared him to step one toe into Syrian territory. They threatened ‘If you do, America might just go boom!’

Suddenly, the Occupant decided he might need to check in with Congress after all, knowing they wouldn’t back him, and he’d be able to back out of his pitch for war and save face at the same time. It would be all Congress’ fault for not giving him permission. That is, until the United Nations inspectors report showed it was the rebels who used the chemical weapons—not Assad. Whoops! Our bad!

The Globalist’s directive that the Occupant continue the ‘Arab Spring’ regime change in Syria would have to wait for another opportunity, so it was put on the back burner. Hmmm. What could they come up with as a reasonable excuse to bomb the patooty out of Syria and get rid of Assad? Oooo, ooooh, I got it! Let’s create a new boogeyman; one SO big and bad and scary that the American people would freak out and demand action be taken to stop it.

Introducing: ISIS.

It’s pretty much common knowledge that Ambassador Stevens was a CIA operative in Benghazi, whose mission it was to procure weapons for the Syrian ‘rebels.’ Those rebels were members of Al Qaida, who were secretly trained by the U.S. in Jordan, and supplied with weapons so they could pose as ‘freedom fighters’ in Syria in their quest to overthrow the ‘oppressive Assad regime.’

They were more than happy to learn the best of America’s combat secrets, as well as receive billions of our tax dollars in backing and weaponry. Heck yeah, they’d take it! They’re not stupid—they just seem to avoid bathing.

Some of the ‘freedom fighters’ apparently got tired of fighting Assad’s forces, set up shop inside Syria where they knew Russia and China would have their back and under the leadership of the ever charming Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, decided to take it upon themselves to establish a Middle Eastern caliphate. In other words, the Frankenstein-monster freedom fighters the U.S. government created are now out of control, and cutting a bloody swath across Iraq and Syria.

So, only one year after the Occupant pulled all troops out of Iraq, against the advice of his military advisors, ISIS has conquered almost every major city our nation fought to free from Saddam Hussein. America spent 10 years in Iraq. We lost 4,500 precious men and women, had 32,000 wounded, some severely, and spent 3 trillion dollars of our treasure. Great. Isn’t that special.

When ISIS reared its ugly head in Iraq, the Iraqi army we spent the last several years arming and training to take over the security of their own country, screamed like little French girls, threw down the weapons, tanks, personnel carriers, etc., we left behind for their use, and ran for the hills, giving ISIS state-of-the-art American equipment to use against anyone who looks at them funny

Again, the ISIS monster is not minding its creator. They have their own agenda which must be stopped, and soon! Russia and China are still wagging their finger, warning the U.S. against invading or even bombing inside Syria for any reason. So…what’s the plan, Mr. Occupant? What’s that? We’re going to conduct airstrikes inside Syria anyway?

Airstrikes which ISIS can scatter and hide from? Airstrikes which are all but useless according to our military leaders? Airstrikes which might just hack off Russia and China enough to lob a few nukes our way? Our current and retired military leaders are all over the talking head shows, pointing out the obvious: ISIS cannot be stopped by airstrikes alone. Oh, but the Occupant has promised that America will NOT have boots on the ground in the fight against these horrible people.

And if we like our doctor, we can keep our doctor.

Now, Congress has just approved giving $500 million MORE of our tax dollars to train and equip “moderate Syrian rebels” to fight ISIS on the ground. OK, so let me get this straight. We’re gonna give more money, training and weapons to Syrian rebels so they can fight former Syrian rebels? The same “moderate Syrian rebels” who just signed a non-aggression pact with ISIS? The “moderate Syrian rebels” who will most likely join the very ISIS that we’re trusting them to fight?

Am I missing something? Who’s the President of the United States? Forrest Gump? After all, “Stupid is as stupid does.”

I think it’s time I change the Occupant’s name to “Obomb-ya,” because he apparently thinks that’s the answer to everything. Hey, we have to use those drones for something! And, don’t forget he boasted that he’s very good at killing people. Unless, of course, he’s on the golf course. I’m so proud to be an American. Aren’t you?

I’ll address the nightmare that is ISIS in part 2 of Satan’s Temper Tantrum. By the way, are you saved? I highly advise you get right with the Lord because the U.S. government created Frankenstein plans to come to America. God promises tomorrow to no man. Think about it.   

author: bensmomi99@gmail.com  

Hamas rebuffs Israeli offer to extend humanitarian window | The Times of Israel

Hamas rebuffs Israeli offer to extend humanitarian window | The Times of Israel

As Israel strikes back, fake Gaza images dominate social media

A BBC report has found that many of the photographs used to illustrate the situation in Gaza are from years ago, and even from the conflicts in Iraq and Syria.

Aryeh Savir, Tazpit News Agency

Latest Update:  07.08.14, 21:10 / Israel News

Reposted via http://servehiminthewaiting.com/

A significant part of any battle nowadays is waged in the media, as each sides tries to garner public support through the exploit of images and footage used to influence popular opinion.

• Follow Ynetnews on Facebook and Twitter

A report by the BBC shows that Palestinian supporters are using fake images to illustrate the suffering in Gaza.

"Graphic images are being shared on social media to show how people have been affected by the renewed tensions between Israel and the Palestinians," the BBC reported.

"Over the past week the hashtag #GazaUnderAttack has been used hundreds of thousands of times, often to distribute pictures claiming to show the effects of Israeli airstrikes on Gaza."

The hashtag has received 375,000 retweets in eight days.

The network found that several graphic photos, that spread through social media proporting to show killed Gazans and destruction caused by IAF strikes in recent days, were actually photos taken several years ago, some of which in other war areas like Syria and Iraq.

"BBC Trending," a show that examines trends in social media, checked the veracity of widely spread photos on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram with the hashtag #GazaUnderAttack.


Over 300,000 posts were made under that hashtag. In one case, a picture of a neighborhood being bombarded was posted with the caption "This happened today in gaza while ramadhan.Our prayers always be w you. Israel is the real terrorist! (sic)"

But a BBC investigation found that the photo was taken during an IAF strike in 2009 in Beit Lahia during Operation Cast Lead.

In another instance, a photo of blooding children was posted with the caption "This is not a matter of religion. This is a matter of humanity."

According to the BBC, the photo was taken in Aleppo in Syria and not in Gaza. Another photo in the same post was taken in Iraq in 2007.

The British broadcaster also spoke to one of the posters who shared a photo under the #GazaUnderAttack, even though the photo was taken in Syria. "I deleted one of my posts that has the image in there," she said. "It's disappointing that images get shared quite quickly. I guess that's the different between the internet and credible newspaper publisher where pictures are from a source."

A Ynet examination found that photos that are not from the IDF's current Gaza operation are still being shared on Twitter.

A search of the hashtag found a photo of two men rescuring a boy severely wounded in IAF bombings with the caption "The world is silent as Israel wipes out Gaza with airstrikes. Another kid, one of many, says goodbye." with the #GazaUnderAttack hashtag.

But a search of Google Images found the photo was taken in 2012 during Operation Pillar of Defense. The boy in the photo was killed along with his family in an Air Force attack.

Hamas has used this tactic in the past too. Tazpit's Anav Silverman reported in 2012 that during Operation Pillar of Defense, the militant organization used fake images of Gaza with false headlines, inciting a flurry of comments on Facebook against Israel.

The photos were of massacres that occurred in Syria the previous month, but were depicted as massacres of Gazan families by the IDF. Other such incidents reoccur persistently.

Ynet contributed to this report.

With prophetic implications, the Kurds, known as the Medes in the Bible, seize oil-rich region of Iraq. What does it mean?

Reblogged from:Joel C. Rosenberg's Blog

In Uncategorized on June 17, 2014 at 12:39 pm
 
(Washington, D.C.) — Could recent developments in Iraq have prophetic implications? Actually, the answer may be yes — especially with regards to the Kurdish people who live in northern Iraq. Let me explain.

As we’ve been seeing in recent weeks, the Radical jihadist forces of the “Islamic State of Iraq & al-Sham” (ISIS) are on the move towards Baghdad. They are leaving a trail of bloodshed and carnage in their wake.
The objective of the ISIS leaders is to topple the Iraqi government, seize control of all of Iraq, establish a jihadist state under Sharia law, and use Iraq to begin a regional — and eventually global — Islamic caliphate, or kingdom.

Now, the Kurdish leaders have taken advantage of the chaos of this moment to seize control of the oil-rich region of Kirkuk for themselves. (see AP story below)
The oil fields of Kirkuk have been a long-standing issue of controversy in Iraq, especially since the liberation of the country in 2003. Whoever controls those fields would control enormous wealth as the oil there is more fully developed and shipped to markets around the globe.

The Kurds, generally, are Sunni Muslims, but they are not ethnically Arabs. Indeed, many Kurds have a deep hatred for the Arabs. Several decades ago, the world create a special, protected, autonomous region for the Kurds in the north region of Iraq, after Saddam Hussein repeated attacked and tried to destroy the Kurds, including with the use of chemical weapons.

Ultimately, many Kurds want to create an independent country of their own, uniting Kurds living in Iraq, Iran, Syria and Turkey. Yet each of those national governments strongly oppose the creation of an independent Kurdistan.
What’s fascinating is that the modern Kurdish people were known in ancient, Biblical times as the Medes. Here is where things get interesting.

Bible prophecy indicates that in the End Times, as we get closer to the Second Coming of Jesus Christ, God will allow the Medes to gain power, even as the Lord allows the Arabs to gain power and rebuild the kingdom of Babylon in the heart of Iraq.
The Book of Revelation, for example, tells us that Babylon will be the epicenter of evil in the last days of history, and will eventually face the judgment of God. The Hebrew prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah and Daniel tell us this, as well, indicating Babylon will be completely destroyed and when the judgment is complete, Babylon will be completely uninhabitable. Indeed, Isaiah 13:20 says of Babylon, “It will never be inhabited or lived in from generation to generation; nor will the Arab pitch his tent there, nor will shepherds make their flocks lie down there.”

What’s more, Bible prophecy indicates that God will raise up the Medes — that is, the Kurdish people — to be an instrument of judgment against Babylon.

• Isaiah 13:17 — “Behold, I am going to stir up the Medes against them [the Babylonians]….”
• Jeremiah 51:11 — “The Lord has aroused the spirit of the kings of the Medes, because His purpose is against Babylon to destroy it; for it is the vengeance of the Lord….”
• Jeremiah 51:28-29 — “Consecrate the nations against her, the kings of the Medes, their governors and all their prefects, and every land of their dominion. So the land quakes and writhes, for the purposes of the Lord against Babylon stand, to make the land of Babylon a desolation without inhabitants….”

 How exactly will these eschatological prophecies come to pass? It’s too early to say for certain.
But after studying these prophecies, traveling four times to the Iraqi Kurdistan region, meeting with senior Kurdish leaders — including Kurdish Prime Minister Nechirvan Barzani — and tracking developments there over the past decade or so, I think it is fair to say we may be seeing some of the prophetic battle lines developing:

• The hatred of the Kurds/Medes against the Arabs, and vice versa, is steadily growing.
• The Kurds/Medes and the Arabs are in a continued struggle to control the oil resources that will make either or both of them enormously wealthy and powerful in the End Times.
• The Kurds/Medes are, step by step, forming into their nation, and possibly their own country.
• The Kurds/Medes are developing an increasingly effective military force that is able to overpower the Iraqi Arabs at times. 

Please keep the Kurdish people in your prayers. There are a growing number of truly born again Christians living in Kurdistan, including many MBBs, Muslim Background Believers. Please pray that they would boldly preach the Gospel, and be able to make many disciples, and help the believers that grow deep in their faith in Christ, especially amidst all the chaos and carnage. 
For more on the latest geopolitical developments, here are excerpts from a recent article from the Associated Press, “HOW THE KURDS SEIZED KIRKUK.”

• “After a decades-long dispute between Arabs and Kurds over the oil-rich northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, it took just an hour and a half for its fate to be decided,” the Associated Press reports. “As al-Qaida-inspired militants advanced across northern Iraq and security forces melted away, Kurdish fighters who have long dominated Kirkuk ordered Iraqi troops out and seized full control of the regional oil hub and surrounding areas, according to a mid-ranking Army officer. He said he was told to surrender his weapons and leave his base.
• His account was corroborated by an Arab tribal sheik and a photographer who witnessed the looting of army bases after troops left and who related similar accounts of the takeover from relatives in the army. All three spoke to The Associated Press Friday on condition of anonymity because they feared retribution from Kurdish forces.
• “They said they would defend Kirkuk from the Islamic State,” said the Arab officer, who oversaw a warehouse in the city’s central military base. He asked that his rank not be made public.
• He insisted the Iraqi troops had not planned to retreat before the Islamic state. “We were ready to battle to death. We were completely ready,” he said at a roadside rest house just inside the semi-autonomous Kurdish region.
• The Kurdish takeover of the long-disputed city came days after the extremist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant and other Sunni militants seized much of the country’s second largest city of Mosul and Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit before driving south toward Baghdad. Their lightning advance has plunged the country into its worst crisis since the 2011 withdrawal of U.S. troops.
• A spokesman for Kurdish forces, known as the peshmerga, said they had only moved in after Iraqi troops retreated, assuming control of the “majority of the Kurdistan region” outside the semi-autonomous Kurdish Regional Government.
• “Peshmerga forces have helped Iraqi soldiers and military leaders when they abandoned their positions,” including by helping three generals to fly back to Baghdad from the Kurdish regional capital Erbil, Lieutenant General Jabbar Yawar said in a statement on the regional government’s website….
• Kirkuk, 180 miles (290 kilometers) north of Baghdad, is home to Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen, who all have competing claims to the oil-rich area. Kurds have long wanted to incorporate it into their self-ruled region, but Arabs and Turkmen are opposed.
• In the 1970s and 1980s the Arab-dominated government in Baghdad drove hundreds of thousands of Kurds out of Kirkuk and surrounding regions, settling Arabs from the south in their place in an attempt to pacify a region that had seen repeated revolts.
• During the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 the highly disciplined peshmerga swept down from the semi-autonomous Kurdish region and established a strong presence in a belt of largely Kurdish towns and villages stretching south toward Baghdad.
• But the disintegration of Iraqi forces this week seems to have led the peshmerga to assume full control in areas they have long coveted, further enhancing their autonomy from Baghdad and undermining hard-fought U.S. efforts to bring about a stable, multiethnic Iraq.
• “To a great extent Kurdish forces had been de facto in control of Kirkuk for some time, but now they’re completely in control,” said F. Gregory Gause, III, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Doha Center.
• He said it was unlikely the Kurds would seek formal independence from Iraq, however, because such a move would be strongly opposed by neighboring Turkey and Iran — both of which have sizable Kurdish minorities — as well as Washington.

Israel´s Ambassador Ettinger on Iran´s Intentions

Iranian Intentions: 04/10/14 from Gary Stearman on Vimeo.