| McCain says he 'misspoke' in blaming Obama for attacks on Americans Posted: 16 Jun 2016 05:11 PM PDT By Susan Cornwell WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senator John McCain said on Thursday that President Barack Obama was "directly responsible" for attacks on Americans like the one in Florida because of policies that contributed to the rise of the Islamic State. McCain, who is in a tough re-election race, made the comments after reporters chased him down a marble stairway and into a hallway of the U.S. Capitol. "I'm hearing a lot from my constituents about what happened and of course I am making them realize that Barack Obama is directly responsible for it," McCain said. |
| Iowa Senator Wants to Make Sure the U.S. Military Runs on Meat Posted: 16 Jun 2016 04:47 PM PDT  One U.S. senator's crusade to block the military from signing on to Meatless Mondays appears to have hit the skids—for now. Iowa Republican Joni Ernst tried to tack a provision onto the Senate's military spending bill that would have required the armed forces to provide service members with enough meat to "meet or exceed the nutritional standards in the most recent Dietary Guidelines for Americans," The Des Moines Register reported on Monday. Ernst's measure would also have explicitly barred military facilities from adopting Meatless Mondays or any other program that would take meat off the table, even if it were for just one day a week.
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| US gun debate 'needs to change,' Obama says in Orlando Posted: 16 Jun 2016 03:44 PM PDT  President Barack Obama traveled to grief-stricken Orlando Thursday, meeting loved ones devastated by a shooting rampage and using his bully pulpit to demand that the Republican-controlled Congress pass gun control. Four days after the worst mass shooting in US history, Obama made a solemn pilgrimage to meet staff at the Pulse nightclub, emergency responders and some of the dozens of families shattered by gunman Omar Mateen. Forty-nine people were killed and 53 wounded when the 29-year-old Mateen -- a Muslim American of Afghan descent -- ran amok in a packed gay nightclub early Sunday, armed with a legally bought assault rifle.
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| Senate inches toward possible gun control action Posted: 16 Jun 2016 03:36 PM PDT  By Susan Cornwell and Richard Cowan WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A long-running battle over gun control in the United States reaches a critical stage next week in the U.S. Senate amid signs Americans are more willing to accept limited restrictions after the deadliest mass shooting in modern U.S. history. While it is far from likely new measures will pass, the Orlando, Florida, gay nightclub massacre of 49 people and a suggestion by Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump that something be done have fostered a different atmosphere. While President Barack Obama was in Orlando consoling the survivors of the rampage by a gunman who claimed allegiance to Islamic State militants, the U.S. Senate moved closer to votes on limited gun control measures.
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| McCain: Obama 'directly responsible' for Orlando shooting Posted: 16 Jun 2016 02:57 PM PDT  WASHINGTON (AP) — Republican Sen. John McCain said Thursday that President Barack Obama is "directly responsible" for the mass shooting in Orlando, Florida, because of the rise of the Islamic State group on the president's watch. But he later issued a statement saying that he "misspoke."
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| White House sees surge in Syrian refugee admissions this year Posted: 16 Jun 2016 02:41 PM PDT  By Patricia Zengerle WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration believes it will be able to process many more Syrian refugees in the last half of fiscal 2016 than in the first six months, allowing it to meet its goal of admitting at least 10,000 by Sept. 30. In a letter to Democratic Senator Richard Durbin seen by Reuters on Thursday, the White House said it has allocated additional staff and added more processing locations in the Middle East to expedite the screening process without compromising U.S. security. "Therefore, we expect to admit more Syrians in the third and fourth quarters of fiscal year 2016 than we did in the first and second quarters to meet our goal of admitting at least 10,000 Syrian refugees this fiscal year," the letter said.
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| McCain walks back claim Obama's to blame for Orlando shooting Posted: 16 Jun 2016 01:49 PM PDT  Barack Obama is "directly responsible" for the massacre at a Florida nightclub, US Senator John McCain said Thursday, a startling accusation that the Republican elder statesman quickly walked back. The condemnation by the straight-talking national security hawk McCain came with the US president in Orlando for a meeting with relatives of some of the 49 victims of Sunday's attack, the deadliest mass shooting in American history. McCain told reporters in a Senate hallway that Obama's failure to combat the rise of the Islamic State extremist group helped bring about the Florida violence.
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| MP shot dead, EU referendum campaigns suspended Posted: 16 Jun 2016 01:21 PM PDT  By Craig Brough BIRSTALL, England (Reuters) - A British member of parliament was shot dead in the street on Thursday, causing deep shock across Britain and the suspension of campaigning for next week's referendum on the country's EU membership. Jo Cox, 41, a lawmaker for the opposition Labour Party and a vocal advocate for Britain remaining in the European Union, was attacked while preparing to meet constituents in Birstall near Leeds in northern England. West Yorkshire regional police said a 52-year-old man was arrested by officers nearby and weapons including a firearm recovered.
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| Anti-IS airstrikes flown from Navy ships in 2 regions Posted: 16 Jun 2016 01:19 PM PDT WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. military says that for the first time in the nearly two-year-old air campaign against the Islamic State, strike aircraft flew counter-IS missions from Navy warships in two different regions — the Mediterranean Sea and the Persian Gulf. |
| Iraq forces push in Fallujah amid concern over civilians Posted: 16 Jun 2016 12:43 PM PDT  Iraqi elite forces battled Islamic State group jihadists Thursday in their bastion of Fallujah, where an aid group says nearly four weeks of fighting have ensnared civilians in a humanitarian disaster. "Our troops are operating in Nazzal, where just today we were able to destroy 15 car bombs driven by Daesh (IS) terrorists," Raed Shaker Jawdat, Iraq's federal police chief, told AFP. Iraqi forces launched an operation to retake Fallujah, which lies only 50 kilometres (30 miles) west of Baghdad, last month.
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| House nixes bid to bar illegal immigrants from military Posted: 16 Jun 2016 12:42 PM PDT  WASHINGTON (AP) — The Republican-led House on Thursday narrowly defeated an attempt to bar young immigrants living in the country illegally to enlist in the armed forces, as opponents tied the measure to Donald Trump's presidential campaign.
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| IS still has 'global reach,' CIA chief Brennan warns Posted: 16 Jun 2016 12:38 PM PDT  Despite suffering major losses in Iraq and Syria, the Islamic State group can still conduct and inspire attacks across the globe, America's spy chief warned senior lawmakers Thursday. John Brennan, the director of the CIA, testified before the US Senate Intelligence Committee amid renewed fears about IS and the threat of terror attacks, after a gunman slaughtered 49 people in a Florida gay nightclub. The IS group has lost much of the territory it once held across its so-called "caliphate" in northern Syria and Iraq, and has seen its ranks thinned by US-led air strikes and desertions.
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| British lawmaker shot dead, EU referendum campaigns suspended Posted: 16 Jun 2016 12:24 PM PDT  By Craig Brough BIRSTALL, England (Reuters) - A British member of parliament was shot dead in the street on Thursday, causing deep shock across Britain and the suspension of campaigning for next week's referendum on the country's EU membership. Jo Cox, 41, a lawmaker for the opposition Labour Party and a vocal advocate for Britain remaining in the European Union, was attacked while preparing to meet constituents in Birstall near Leeds in northern England. West Yorkshire regional police said a 52-year-old man was arrested by officers nearby and weapons including a firearm recovered.
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| Dr. Mike Evans: "Ideological warfare is ground zero in defeating ISIS. In order for ISIS to grow, it needs need a war with the 'Great Satan,' America and the 'Small Satan,' Israel. ISIS is not al Qaeda" Posted: 16 Jun 2016 12:10 PM PDT When the carnage ended, fifty-three had been wounded and fifty people lay dead, including the Islamic terrorist, Omar Mateen. Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump called for the resignation of President Barack Obama when he failed to use the words "radical Islam" to describe the horrific event. Trump tweeted: "Is President Obama going to finally mention the words radical Islamic terrorism? |
| The Syrians going for gold in Rio Olympics Posted: 16 Jun 2016 11:38 AM PDT  The front lines of Syria's civil war are just a few kilometres away, but at the Tishrin Stadium in Damascus, Majd Ghazal is training hard for August's Olympics in Brazil. "I'm going to do everything I can with my coach to achieve a strong performance, and I'm hoping to get up on the podium and make the Syrian people happy," Ghazal told AFP. Just six Syrians are guaranteed a place at the Games, which get under way in Rio on August 5 -- two athletes, two swimmers, a weightlifter and a table tennis player.
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| Obama in Orlando to console grieving families Posted: 16 Jun 2016 10:31 AM PDT  President Barack Obama arrived Thursday in Orlando, where he will console loved ones devastated by a shooting rampage that has fueled America's culture wars and a fresh push for gun controls. Air Force One touched down shortly before 1:00 pm (1700 GMT) in Florida, where Obama will call for national unity and meet families whose lives have been ripped apart by a tragedy of national proportions. "This will be, I think, an emotional trip," White House spokesman Josh Earnest said.
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| CIA director says Islamic State still serious threat Posted: 16 Jun 2016 10:25 AM PDT  By Patricia Zengerle and Jonathan Landay WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Islamic State's "terrorism capacity and global reach" have not been reduced, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency said on Thursday, adding that the group has tens of thousands of fighters around the world, far more than al Qaeda had at its height. John Brennan told U.S. lawmakers in a rare public hearing of the Senate Intelligence Committee that Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is in a stronger position than he was a year ago, bolstered by Russian air strikes against moderate opposition. "Despite all our progress against ISIL on the battlefield and in the financial realm, our efforts have not reduced the group's terrorism and global reach," Brennan testified, using an acronym for the Islamic State militant group, also known as ISIS.
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| How Can We Reduce the High Rate of Suicides Among Returning Veterans and Help the Survivors They Leave Behind? June 23 National Press Club Newsmaker Features Kim Ruocco of TAPS (Tragedy Assistance Program) Posted: 16 Jun 2016 10:05 AM PDT WASHINGTON, June 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Suicide in the United States has surged to its highest levels in 30 years, more lives have been lost to suicide in the past 15 years than the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan combined. Another staggering statistic, veterans are 12 times more likely to die by suicide than nonveterans. Even more surprising is the fact that female veterans are six times more likely to die by suicide than their civilian counterparts. Families affected by suicide also are at a higher risk of death by suicide. What can we do?On June 23, at 10 a.m. ... |
| What the UN’s genocide finding could mean for justice against ISIS Posted: 16 Jun 2016 09:37 AM PDT In the aftermath of 2014 IS attacks on the Sinjar region, home to the world's largest Yazidi communities, "no free Yazidis remained," the report summarizes. Yazidi men, meanwhile, are often given the choice of conversion or death. |
| DIVIDED AMERICA: Constructing our own intellectual ghettos Posted: 16 Jun 2016 09:31 AM PDT  Meet Peggy Albrecht and John Dearth. Albrecht is a free-lance writer and comedian from Los Angeles who loves Bernie Sanders. Dearth, a retiree from Carmel, Indiana, grew up a Democrat but flipped with ...
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| Christian militias fighting IS in Iraq hope for US support Posted: 16 Jun 2016 09:28 AM PDT  ALQOSH, Iraq (AP) — Clutching his rifle intently, the Iraqi recruit maneuvered between piles of bricks and cement obstacles. The sound of shooting pierced the air and he jumped behind a wall, lifted his rifle and imitated the staccato sound of gunfire.
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| UK law firm faces payout over missing Trafigura compensation Posted: 16 Jun 2016 09:21 AM PDT  Thousands of people due payouts over the dumping of toxic waste by oil-trading group Trafigura in Ivory Coast won their English High Court claim against their lawyers on Thursday, having never received their money. High Court judge Andrew Smith on Thursday ruled that London-based legal firm Leigh Day, who represented the claimants, had been negligent in using an Ivorian bank account to park the lump sum, leaving it open to embezzlement. "I am extremely pleased for our clients, who have been waiting for seven years to get their compensation," the claimants' lawyer Kalilou Fadiga, from legal firm Harding Mitchell, told AFP after Thursday's ruling.
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| 'I felt liberated' - life after Islamic State Posted: 16 Jun 2016 09:21 AM PDT  By Rodi Said AM ADASA, Syria (Reuters) - When U.S.-backed forces seized Souad Hamidi's village in northern Syria from Islamic State last week, the 19-year-old swiftly tore off the niqab she had been forced to wear since 2014 and smiled. "I felt liberated," Hamidi told Reuters after swapping her black face-covering veil for a red head scarf. "They made us wear it against our will so I removed it that way to spite them." For the last two weeks, the Syria Democratic Forces (SDF), supported by U.S.-led air strikes, have waged an offensive against the Islamic State-held city of Manbij, near the Syria-Turkey border.
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| UN Syria panel: IS committing genocide against Yazidis Posted: 16 Jun 2016 09:11 AM PDT GENEVA (AP) — The Islamic State group is committing genocide, crimes against humanity and other war crimes against the Yazidi community in Iraq and Syria, a U.N. panel said Thursday, calling on countries to do more to stop it and build a legal case on top of political condemnation from countries like the United States. |
| British MP critically ill after 'shooting' Posted: 16 Jun 2016 08:38 AM PDT  Jo Cox, 41, a mother-of-two who represents the opposition Labour party, was shot three times and also stabbed by a man in his 50s in the village of Birstall in Yorkshire, a witness told the BBC. Another witness, Hichem Ben Abdallah, told the Press Association she had been shot twice. Police confirmed that a woman in her 40s was in a "critical condition" but by convention did not name her.
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| Civilians stuck inside IS-held Falluja at risk of disease: WHO Posted: 16 Jun 2016 08:11 AM PDT  By Saif Hameed AMIRIYAT FALLUJA, Iraq (Reuters) - Tens of thousands of civilians stranded inside Islamic State-controlled Falluja are at risk of disease outbreaks as Iraqi government forces press their assault to retake the city, a World Health Organization (WHO) official said on Thursday. Islamic State has tightened control over civilian movement in central Falluja, where an estimated 40,000 people are stuck with little water or food, as commandos from an elite counter-terrorism force inch closer to the city's main government building more than three weeks after the offensive began. Falluja, an hour's drive west of Baghdad, is seen as a launchpad for Islamic State bombings in the capital, making the offensive a crucial part of the government's campaign to improve security, although U.S. allies would prefer to concentrate on IS-held Mosul, Iraq's second largest city in the far north.
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| Islamic State committing genocide against Yazidis: U.N. Posted: 16 Jun 2016 07:39 AM PDT  By Stephanie Nebehay GENEVA (Reuters) - Islamic State is committing genocide against the Yazidis in Syria and Iraq to destroy the religious community of 400,000 people through killings, sexual slavery and other crimes, United Nations investigators said on Thursday. The U.N. report, based on interviews with dozens of survivors, said the Islamist militants had been systematically rounding up Yazidis in Iraq and Syria since August 2014, seeking to "erase their identity" in a campaign that met the definition of the crime as defined under the 1948 Genocide Convention.
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| Hundreds in silent march for slain French police couple Posted: 16 Jun 2016 07:31 AM PDT  Mantes-la-Jolie (France) (AFP) - About 2,500 people marched in silence on Thursday in honour of a policeman and his partner who were knifed to death by an extremist pledging allegiance to the Islamic State group. Many in the crowd of police, gendarmes, firefighters and locals wept as they walked from the police station where the couple worked in the Paris suburb of Mantes-la-Jolie to their home in Magnanville where they were killed on Monday. The attack came in the midst of the Euro football championship -- already dogged by terror fears -- and is the first since Islamic State gunmen and suicide bombers struck Paris in November, killing 130.
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| Orlando gunman apparently searched Facebook during attack Posted: 16 Jun 2016 07:29 AM PDT  While his victims texted heartbreaking last words to loved ones from the blood-drenched bathrooms, Omar Mateen apparently went on Facebook to measure the shockwaves his attack on a gay nightclub was generating. The letter detailing Mateen's Facebook posts and searches in the final hours of his life came to light as grief-stricken Orlando prepared to bury the first of the 49 dead and awaited a visit Thursday from President Barack Obama, who planned to meet with victims' families and first responders and offer words of solace. "The real muslims will never accept the filthy ways of the west," Mateen, a 29-year-old American-born Muslim, wrote on one of at least five Facebook accounts believed to be associated with him, according to the letter from Republican Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee.
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| Post-Islamic State Iraq should be split in three: top Kurdish official Posted: 16 Jun 2016 07:06 AM PDT  By Maher Chmaytelli and Isabel Coles ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - Once Islamic State is defeated, Iraq should be divided into three separate entities to prevent further sectarian bloodshed, with a state each given to Shi'ite Muslims, Sunnis and Kurds, a top Kurdish official said on Thursday. Iraqi troops have expelled Islamic State from some cities the militants seized in 2014, and are advancing on Mosul, the largest city under IS control. Masrour Barzani, head of the Kurdistan Regional Government's (KRG) Security Council and son of KRG President Massoud Barzani, said the level of mistrust was such that they should not remain "under one roof".
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| The Attack on a British MP Posted: 16 Jun 2016 06:16 AM PDT Jo Cox, a member of Parliament from the Labour Party, has died of her injuries after she was shot and stabbed near the city of Leeds, according to news reports. |
| US commander in Afghanistan submits his 3-month take on war Posted: 16 Jun 2016 05:37 AM PDT  KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The new U.S. commander in Afghanistan has submitted his first three-month assessment of the situation in the war-torn country and what it's going to take to defeat the Taliban, a U.S. military official has told The Associated Press.
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| UANI Expands Global Reach, Deepens Defense and Foreign Policy Expertise with New Advisory Board Members Posted: 16 Jun 2016 05:30 AM PDT NEW YORK, June 16, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI), the nonpartisan, not-for-profit advocacy organization known for its efforts to heighten awareness of the danger the Iranian regime poses to the world, announced today that five renowned experts have joined its advisory board: former Mossad Director Tamir Pardo, British Lieutenant General Sir Graeme Lamb, former Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton, and U.S. Lieutenant General Michael D. Barbero. The addition of Pardo, Lamb, Sikorski, Bolton, and Barbero to the advisory board represents UANI's growing international voice, and enhances the group's defense and foreign policy credentials. |
| Federal plan for northern Syria advances with U.S.-backed forces Posted: 16 Jun 2016 05:05 AM PDT  By Tom Perry BEIRUT (Reuters) - As an alliance of U.S.-backed militias advance against Islamic State in northern Syria, their political allies are making progress of their own toward a new federal system of government which they hope will take root in newly captured areas. The autonomous federation being planned by Syrian Kurdish parties and their allies is taking shape fast: a constitution should be finalised in three months, and possibly sooner, to be followed quickly by elections, a Kurdish official said. While Kurdish groups insist this is no separatist bid, it is set to redraw the map as U.N. diplomacy fails to make any progress toward ending the war that has splintered Syria into a patchwork of separately-run areas.
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| Revolutionary Guard, Kurdish insurgents battle in Iran Posted: 16 Jun 2016 03:49 AM PDT BAGHDAD (AP) — Iran's Revolutionary Guard has battled armed members of an insurgent Kurdish group, leading to fatalities. |
| Iraq's Fallujah faces 'disaster', NGO warns Posted: 16 Jun 2016 02:49 AM PDT  Under fire and nearing starvation, thousands of Iraqi civilians trapped in the jihadist bastion of Fallujah face a "humanitarian disaster", a prominent Norwegian NGO said Thursday. Tens of thousands of others who have managed to flee the city as Iraqi forces press a bid to dislodge the Islamic State group also find little relief on their way out. "We have a humanitarian disaster inside Fallujah and another unfolding disaster in the camps," the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) said in a statement.
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| Aid group: 2-year-old boy killed as he fled Iraq's Fallujah Posted: 16 Jun 2016 02:12 AM PDT BAGHDAD (AP) — A two-year-old boy was killed by militants while fleeing Fallujah with his family amid a government offensive to retake the Iraqi city from the Islamic State group, an aid organization said on Thursday, highlighting the dangers faced by civilians trying to escape the nearly one-month military operation. |
| Trump's long, combative war with the press Posted: 15 Jun 2016 11:09 PM PDT  Donald Trump has had tense ties with reporters since launching his presidential campaign one year ago Thursday, but he took it a dramatic step further this week by banning The Washington Post from his events. At rallies during primary season, he lashed out at journalists as "dishonest" and "sleaze." Some were threatened by Trump supporters, others manhandled by security personnel or Trump staff. Trump's ban on the Post apparently stemmed from his disapproval of its story -- reported after the mass shooting in Orlando, Florida by a radicalized gunman -- stating that Trump seemed to suggest that President Barack Obama sympathized with terrorists.
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| President Bush: 'Being 92 doesn't hurt one bit' Posted: 15 Jun 2016 10:01 PM PDT  KENNEBUNKPORT, Maine (AP) — Fresh from his 92nd birthday, former President George H.W. Bush is enjoying himself in Maine after recovering from a fall at his home last summer.
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| Today in History Posted: 15 Jun 2016 09:01 PM PDT Today is Thursday, June 16, the 168th day of 2016. There are 198 days left in the year. |
